Blogs from Panama, Central America Caribbean - page 143

Well, the last days are here...we are busy arranging travel back to Seattle and on to LaConner...and seeing the sights in Panama City... The Canal was amazing....! We arrived around noon as a tanker was heading northwest (or to the Atlantic...directions are confusing here since Panama mostly runs east-west and the canal north-south) through the locks. Two small sailboats then came through in to opposite direction. And then they announced there would be no more boats til 3:30 pm! We visited the exhibits (two days of Canal info is a lot!), ate lunch overlooking the locks and then got to see four really big cargo ships come through. We found out that the biggest ships can only transit during daylight, and that boats from the Pacific cross in the am. Thus sometimes there is time with ... read more

During our last days in Miami we made the mistake of reading the foreign office's website and its country-related advice to help us get an idea of what we could expect to find in Central America. We say “mistake” because it put us right off. Each country we looked up sounded worse than the previous one. Of course we're talking about violence and robberies against tourists, including tourist buses hijacks and so on. So when we landed in Panama City we were feeling rather apprehensive. We found a hostel in the bank and commercial district, which is where all the activity is (the old centre is now just a touristic area), and we felt quite safe there. People seemed quite friendly and the restaurants were cheap again. They gave us water with every meal too, so ... read more

We took these pix for Walter and Cindy, of their beautiful property in the Darklands near here...... read more

Once we had done the clear up at fieldbase and offloaded the venturers on the 14th May all staff headed for the beers and then the two day party in Cahuita on the Caribbean coast. Suffice to say it involved a luxury hotel (compared to pallets on the floor anything is luxury!), lovely food, games of pool, and copious amounts of alcohol - rum and coke at 3am in the swimming pool having gone for a midnight swim on the beach and finished mad cap dancing at one of the local bars. We also undertook a gorgeous walk through the Cahuita national park headland along sandy beaches to the park ranger station where Rich and Katy had done a phase helping build trails for the park rangers to patrol the turtle nests with quad bikes. It ... read more

The Lake Between Seas (Gatun Lake & The Panama Canal) quickly became the torment of the Panama Canal Authority on Sailboat owners. Actually, it is perfect...I did NOT actually end up paying the $800 penalty charge for having my motor stall for ten minutes and delaying other boaters, and I did not actually cause any other expensive sailing yachts tied to my side to spin in a 360 out of control accident into the channel walls in Lock #1 because of massive prop wash and heavy currents. I am actually a professional captain, and of course, it went very smooth. I was able to smile in the face of anxiety, and even did not feel captive by the mandatory pilot who is supposedly in charge of the entire affair. Of course, the main ubsurdity is that ... read more