Blogs from Colón, Panama, Central America Caribbean - page 4

My last entry only talked about the adventure of getting from Vancouver to camp so I really feel like I need to write about the jungle. I've been working everyday in the jungle for the last three weeks so its hard for me to recall my first impressions and first trepidations but I'll do the best that I can. I came to Panama to do a seismic survey with explosives but there was a delay in delivering the explosives and so I worked my first day in the jungle with the resistivity crew. I didn't pick up much of the field methods of resistivity but I wasn't really interested in learning something that I could possibly confuse with my own array and hinder me. I basically stuck to carrying a car battery all day through the ... read more

My first Blog! We are cruising on a Royal Caribbean Enchantment of the Seas repositioning cruise leaving from Colon, Panama and arriving back in Ft. Lauderdale. Looking forward to visiting new ports - Cartagena, and Santa Maria, Columbia and Oranjestad, Aruba. Will also dock in Limon, Costa Rica. Have been on the ship before and we're traveling with good friends, so it's bound to be a good time. Looking forward to taking some great photos.... read more

We are now Panama bound! Luckily we have Karin "the meatball" Dahl and Blair "the Kiwi" Neal joining us on our first leg directly from Florida to Panama. Ok... It would of been direct if Cuba wasn't in the way. For those of you with the geography background we had... you may want to review the map on this site... but yes, Cuba tends to be in the way of a big downwind sail. Though we would of particularly enjoyed stopping in for a mojito and a cigar, but alas... they want us keeping at LEAST 12 miles off their shore. Fair enough. We thought keeping 13.1 miles away on Sorcerer was cutting it close, but nah.... that was nuthin. After sailing successfully through what we would describe as square waves in a washing machine as ... read more

This transition was pretty much like the previous one - except, of course, in reverse. We arrived at the eastern end of the canal at Port of Colón (Crisóbal). We waited to join our convoy of other vessels preparing to transit the canal. The general direction of the canal passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific is from northwest to southeast, because of the shape of the isthmus at the point the canal occupies. The Puente de las Américas (Bridge of the Americas) at the Pacific side is about a third of a degree east of the Colón end on the Atlantic side. Still, in formal nautical communications, the simplified directions "southbound" and "northbound" are used. So we were travelling southbound. From the formal marking line of the Atlantic Entrance, one enters Limón Bay (Bahía Limón), ... read more

We are still hanging out in Santa Fe. We took a short trip to Santa Catalina to visit the beach and take a vacation from our vacation. We stayed at a great little hostal called the Blue Zone. It had hammocks overlooking the Pacific Ocean. There is a huge hype right now about this little town, but we just couldn´t see it. It has a very small beach. It is suppose to be excellent for surfers so maybe that is why we didn´t quite get into it. We did have some great food at a little restaurant called Donde Vianca. Not only did she have great food, she was about the only restaurant open for lunch. We are not quite sure where the tourists are suppose to eat there (although there aren´t many tourists there). Not ... read more