BOAT DELIVERY FROM PANAMA TO FORT LAUDERDALE

The Diva Party at Ida’s was a hoot. There was 12 of us and we all came from as far as Chiriqui which is in the mountain area next to the Costa Rican border and I traveled from San Blas. If it was up to Ida she wanted me there a week before party, so I decided to get there 3 days before to help her set up. Good planning on my part as the day I arrived Ida was bombarded with all kinds of unforeseen problems. First problem was, Ida had lent her car to her daughter, she was moving to her own apartment. Deal was to return Ida’s car at 15:00 so she could meet me in town. I had left my bags earlier that morning in her office and she was going to bring them. No Adriana showed up and by 17:00 Ida and I were waiting on the bench in front of her apartment complex for her daughter to arrive with car and keys to apartment. She hadn’t even left her apartment yet and now was rush hour. There was no way Ida and I could have returned to her office, which closes at 18:00 (she has no key), on time and collected my cloths and her medical instrument she needed the following day in her Colon office. So I decided to take a taxi to get our stuff while Ida waited for her daughter. She tried to call me a cab but none of them, being rush hour, was interested until I told her to offer $10 round trip, that did the trick, we could almost hear the squealing of breaks to do a U turn to pick me up. Here I sat in the taxi at 17:35 on my way to Ida’s office and half way there the already grumpy guy said: “oh by the way you are not going to make it period as the whole area of Via España is blocked due to a bomb scare at the Federal Building.” Really and you are telling me this now. It took me a few seconds to swallow his arrogant demeanor and told him to keep going we will make it. He kept fussing, hey you want the dough you work for it, don’t scam me out of money to return to apartment because you knew. I actually told him to follow my instruction how to get there and he did. The problem now was there was a lot of traffic but knowing the city I told him at a certain area to let me out, ordered him to make a U turn at next intersection and I would meet him in front of office. From where I left  the taxi I had an easy 2 minute walk to the office and got there 5 minutes before closing. Taxi driver was not so dumb after all and did the U turn but observing the heavy traffic he pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant and did the foot part to get me. I was more than happy to pay the parking lot fee. We were back at Ida’s apartment in no time with our stuff. She was still waiting for Adriana but 5 minutes later we were on the way to her house. 

The other problem Ida had a new tenant to move in the following day which was postponed to the following day but she had to get her workers from Colon to the Apartment by 7 in the morning to finish work. She also had to pick up flowers the following day for the party plus work in her office. Solution was I dropped her off at her office at 5 am (I think she slept in the dental chair until first customer arrived at 8), drove her workers to the apartment, did some boat part shopping in-between bringing parts to the apartment as needed, picked up the flowers and drove the boys back to Colon, picked up Ida and the day ended perfectly. I got my, what I call “Sid Provisioning done” and Ida had an easy day at work.

I remember the first day in Colon I got two mosquito bites and hoped for no dengue or zika. The day of the party I woke up to a sore throat, could not swallow it hurt so bad. Pat, the chef for the party and also a nurse doctored me up with tons of vitamin C and I was OK for the party. Didn’t eat much of her wonderful stuffed squid and had about 5 sips of wine as my throat was on fire. But that didn’t stop me from dancing.

A few of the Divas arrived the afternoon before party to help with food preparation and other things that needed help but mainly just to have fun.

Chef Pat and Su-Chef Jill 

Filled up the refrigerator

Deb, Anita and Anita the helpers

Everybody else arrived mid morning and a light salad lunch was served and lots of pampering stuff was ready for the girls:

Stuff to make barefoot jewelry

While in the San Blas I had made some presents for the girls and not knowing they were making barefoot jewelry I made matching ones for Debi, Ida and my outfits:

Deb's black dress

My dress

Ida's

Our bathing suites. I am telling you we went all out for this party

I was in charge of the table including hand sewing the pieces together. Luckily nobody looked at the stitches

Ida had her worker and made dressed up as server, they were wonderful

Cocktail hour was elaborate:

Deb, Anita and Sara

Melania and Sandy

 The party was wonderful. You should have seen all of us, we were dressed up to the hilt. Pat outdid herself, the dinner was high class gourmet. 

wonderful ceviche, lox, caviar appetizer

Squid stuffed with shrimp

Or Steak with Porcchini Mushroom Sauce

We celebrated all the January to March Birthdays and each one got presents. 

The Birthday Girls, Debi, Anita Jil, Ida and Renee

Big group hug Ida, Melania and Deb

After that Ida and I had a little surprise for the girls. Ida had certificates for them so I told her you can’t just give certificates out like that, we need to have fun with it. So I came up with the idea to have a Diva Academy Award. I think Ida and I had the most fun creating it. Just before we started Ida brought a (not plugged in) microphone in turned some spot lights on and welcomed the Divas to the first “Diva Academy Award” and welcomed and introduced an honored guest. Ida’s employees then brought a life size card board Richard Gere statue out with a beautiful dressed partner with face cut out. Every diva of course got an award and was able to take a photo with Richard with her face placed into the cut out part. It was hilarious all the girls loved it, I have never seen them laugh so hard. 

The award ceremony was followed by dancing then while most went to bed some of us went skinny dipping in the pool at midnight howling at the moon. Actually there was 5 of us in pool and we did just that, poor Ida got on her balcony and yelled at her dogs LOL.

Next day pool and game day I missed most of it as I stayed in bed with a fever. It was a successful party and so much fun the girls decided once a year is not enough so the next party is begin of June and Ida is talking already another one in October, theme is "Denim and Diamonds".

Deb, Ida and I had some fun showing off our bathing suites

Monday Deb, Anita, Melania and I went into town. They wanted to spend time with me before I headed back to the San Blas. A girl’s night out at the Veneto Casino and Hotel. Ida joined us after work. Had a wonderful dinner at the Wine Bar an Italian Restaurant, but after that I excused myself as I just was not feeling well, still had a fever and I notice I had somewhat of a rash. The girls went gambling. Everybody went home the next day except Debi and I. 

I was still not feeling well and got worse as the day went on, fever, rash and more and more joint pains, I was a mess and walked around like an old lady. Debi had hired Rogelio Taxi as Reg had a doctor appointment late that day so we went shopping then eventually met Reg later. The day did not go well for me. My debit card kept declining so had to put everything on the credit card. After we met Reg they dropped me off at Cruiser’s Casa which is run by an ex Cruiser Deb on Sweet Dreams. I am glad that Reg insisted to help me get my stuff up to the Penthouse, as we walked in a short and unfriendly woman ran out of the room towards us saying: What do you want? Move in for the night as arranged?! No you don’t and she kicked us out of the place. Turns out it was the owners wife and owner who just returned. Owner was in business with Deb but that day when they arrived at the Penthouse he handed her a notice of eviction. I had no place to stay and I was miserable. While back in the car I remember that the El Parador in El Cangrejo had a roof pool so I called them (comes out they have a nice pool but ladder in was so far off the ground with my achy joints I would have never been able to climb back out, bummer). I was dropped off at the hotel and I had just enough time to leave all my stuff in the room then head to Dr. Judith. 

I was feeling so bad I made an appointment with her. She thought I had either Dengue or Zika so sent me to the lab. Dengue test took 3 hours but Zika is tested by the government and has to be sent to them by courier and it takes two weeks for the result. Back to the hotel I was in such bad shape I called Sid to let him know that I would stay an extra day in town. Also when I returned to my room after Doctor visit I realized that $160.00 of my Price Smart groceries were missing. I questioned everybody from Deb to Rogelio to the poor bell boy at hotel where they saw it last. The last day in town I had Rogelio take me shopping and after I had bought all $160.00 items again I saw him waiting at the customer service desk. Imagine when we left last time he forgot to put my box in the car and it was left behind in the parking lot. An employee brought it back and they listed it in the “left in parking lot” book. It completely matched my receipt and they refunded me the money, I love happy endings. When it rains it pours, not just credit card problems and being sick and the missing grocery, our health insurance neglected to contact us for the renewal so I had to run around for that. Got it done but man that was painful.

I finally arrived back on Paradise, no fever but still joint pains and just tired. I was whipped out for 6 weeks before I finally felt better but then fever came back with joint aches. Still now after more than 8 weeks I have flare ups. This chikungunya virus is viscous. Sid was even concerned but good thing was I did not have to do dishes for a while LOL. I don’t wish this on anybody.

While I was gone Sid did a lot of work. He cleaned the rigging, hull, bottom and repaired odds and ends. It was soooo nice to be back in and on Paradise in the San Blas. After I felt better we visited a few new islands and also went back to Nargana to do some laundry up the river as we’ve done before. But this time just as we got to the shallow part where we usually hop out of the dingy to wade through the water and get dingy ashore I saw a big lizard swim under the dinghy. Lizard?!!! That’s not  a lizard IT’S a CROCODILE, yikes, within feet where we wash laundry and bath. I told the Kunas already there but they looked at me like I was crazy. We had Truday May with us and I don't think they liked the crocodile idea either.

Kuna on his way to get water up the river

Following day we received an email from Sid’s ex-brother in law that the delivery for Sandial was on in the near future. We had to come up with a date as we had gusts arriving end of April and John had an offer to deliver a boat in the Med .The departure date was set which gave Sid a room of 5 days to play in Florida. I was going to stay in the East Lemons and was so excited to be for a couple of weeks by myself in the San Blas.   

I had the taxi already arranged for Sid to get to Panama City and the day before his departure Sid decided to work on the solenoid as it was sticking when starting the engine. Well there was a little booboo where a nut fell into the bilge Sid got it back but did not realize the connection from battery to alternator came off and screwed nut back on. Ran engine all good. A bit later we decided to make some water and turned the engine on. I was in the galley and all of a sudden I smelled this weird odor of something burning. Alerted Sid but he could not smell it but did removed the engine cover off, the smell intensified. Turned the motor off immediately and then that’s when Sid realized the booboo which now had burned up the Alternator. We had no choice but sail Paradise back to Linton Marina to be on electrical power, I was bummed. Yes they do have power now but still NO water.

SANDIAL DELIVERY:

April 6^th Sid left following morning for Shelter Bay where John and his son Matt had arrived the night before. At 14:00 I received a WhatsApp from owner’s wife Pam with a photo of Sandial departing for Fort Lauderdale. Hot damn they barely arrive and bolted out of the marina. On the 7^th at 08:30 I tried to reach Sid on SSB as we had arranged but I could not get out, neither did Debi, oh well there will be tomorrow. About 10 minutes later I received a call from Wally that we had a problem the US Coast Guard had called him at 8:15 that the EPIRB (emergency location device) of Sandial is sending a distress signal 79 miles off shore Panama. Wow, not good but then I was not surprised as last June they tried to leave, the fuel tank had holes and leaked diesel into the bilge. Also the Electrical wires were all shot, this boat hadn’t left the marina in a while. He said the US Coasties are getting in touch with the Panamanian Coast Guard and he would keep me posted. ½ hour later Pam calls me tells she can’t understand the Panamanian Coast Guard, he spoke to fast, and if I could call him. I did and the day turned into hell. This guy had no knowledge of the distress call and when I gave him all the info plus that they were headed to the Cayman Islands to re-fuel he asked “Cayman Islands where is that?” Whaaaaaat?!!!!! If I understood right he said that they can’t do anything without the US Coast Guard consent. I told him that I was told they did. He then said that there is nothing they can to. He did speak fast so just to make sure I did understand him right I told him I would call right back with a fluent Spanish speaking person. I ran up the Marina Office and explained to Adam what was going on and I needed a confirmation what the guy on the phone said. He called him and the same guy asked for all the info again then he asked Adam also where the Cayman Islands were, Adam about  had a cow and jump down his throat asking if he was serious with this question, he should not work  as  a coastguard if he does not know what our neighbor islands were. But he confirmed to Adam as well that there was nothing they can do. Adam told me he would call someone else a Lieutenant he knew. I went back to the boat and retrieved the US Coast Guard number Reg on Runner had given me earlier. Wouldn’t you know this number goes through the US Embassy and the friendly Operator connects you with their office. Answer machine comes on to leave a message after the beep, then …beeeep… you start talking and get interrupted with a voice telling you that the recipient was no allowance for receiving messages….?????...Isn’t that great.  I tried at least 5 other times that morning to call them. In the meantime the Panamanian Coasty called with some nonsense. The more he called the more frustrated and desperate I got. Pam called me as well telling me they got the same position report hasn’t changed at all. The third time she said they are just stuck in one spot. Something’s not right they should be moving with the current (comes out later her husband never communicated to her the position had changed, it was all so frustrating).

In the meantime Debi came over to keep me company which was hugely appreciated as I had another bad situation Mas Mobil my phone server went out, no tone, no signal no calls and no data. Luckily I also have a Digicel chip but only had a $15.00 card left so could not afford to add data. That’s when Deb came in she used her phone for emails and my phone was used for calls only. And believe me the money runs down fast. Poor Deb had to go through the whole frustration with me. Thanks Debi I owe you big time.

By 11 I could still not get through to the Coast Guards and the operator by now recognized my voice and would automatically connect me. Not this time before she rattled of her greeting I jumped in: “Do NOT connect me but listen to me”. Told her the 3 men on board could be in a life-threatening situation and that the Panamanian Coasties are not doing anything. She then connected me with Citizen Services. Friendly Cindy answered the phone and asked me after hearing my story if my husband was an American Citizen. YES, and a VETERAN was my answer, then she wanted to know if the other two fellers were US citizens. Really?! At that point I wanted to ask her that if they were not are you just going to pick my hubby up and leave them behind?!!! I told her yes instead. She then wanted everybody’s passport number and date of birth. Told her that they can check passports later after they rescue them I did not have that info but gave her Sid’s Birthdate info. Then she said she would get in touch with the Lieutenant and call me back. I can’t call him without going through a third person? She called me back and said that the US Coast Guard has no jurisdiction in Panama and their hands are tied. So I told her to tell him to untie his hands and make a phone call to the Panamanian Coast Guard who were not notified by the US Coasties as we were told. She called me back later that they are working on it. At 15:00 and we still had no confirmation that something was being done. Wally was not talking to me if he was in contact with US Coast Guards or anything but wanted to know how it was going here and he had the nerve to tell me to I should relax and not even be involved in this. Really, as I recall they called me to call the Panamanian CG. This may not be my boat which is replaceable I got a hubby and some friends on the boat which are NOT replaceable. He sure pissed me off. I started getting desperate so I contacted Ida whose brother is one of the two Port Captains here in Colon. Pretty high up from what I understand they don’t have a boss but report to the President. I told her my dilemma and that I needed to talk to her brother. A while later she said call him now he is waiting for your call. Now’s 16:00 he asked me to send him a text with the position that he had a guy that will work on it. At five he called me and wanted additional info and told me right of the bat: “you know where you are, in Panama, the Coast Guard have no boats to go offshore!” Whaaaaat?!!! But he said not to worry that he has a guy working on it and his hands are not tied. That was great news.  At 16:30 Adam storms down the dock telling me that he just found out that the US Coast Guard had a C130 ready to deploy at ANY time at Tocumen airport. Wow that now got me really going, by now I had the direct line to Cindy I called her up and told her to report to the Lieutenant that I know that they have a C130 ready. Called Port Captain as well. My next step was to contact Glen who runs the Cruiser’s Net online. Wally beat me to it at 17:00 Deb received an email from the Cruiser’s Net with urgent message that all cruiser’s in the Carriben were asked to be on lookout for missing Sandial plus all the info he had about their possible whereabouts. So now the entire Caribbean including all the Coast Guard Stations around the Caribbean knew of missing Sandial. Then I get an email from our dear friend Nell stating: “you have no idea what I just did after I red Glen’s report”. She called the Miami and New Orleans Coast Guard Stations to let them know what a competent sailor Sid was. She also managed to get the Lieutenant Menendez in charge here in Panama and gave him hell for not going out there. She gave me his number but he beat me to the call finally something seemed to be rolling. He was very professional on the phone and said that they are corresponding with the US Coast Guards in Miami. At same time the Sandial mechanic’s wife texted Deb saying that her hubby had overheard John having a personal EPIRB. Hmmm??? I tried to put two and two together, if they were in trouble why is John’s not going off, Sandial’s MUST have fallen overboard. Immediately I called Pam and asked her where theirs was mounted and if there was a possibility to fall overboard. She said no way it’s up on the upper deck nailed to the wall can’t come off. Upper deck was another key word, nope I told her it fell overboard I am pretty sure about it.

Earlier that day I decided not to contact John’s wife Marsha yet as both her hubby and son were on the boat until I knew for sure we had a problem. Didn’t want to worry her over nothing yet. Little did I know at that time what’s in store for me. It got so busy that time escaped but I finally called her with an apology for not having called sooner and filled her in. She said: “nah that can’t be, John has sent me spot check GPS points and at this point they are passed San Andreas.” But she added that she was surprised that he sent that many. That explains it. So I notified the US Coasties, Glen, Lieutenant Menendez and the Port Captain that the EPIRB fell overboard. By now it was 18:00. 19:00 Menendez called and said a Miami aircraft just flew over the site didn’t find the boat, contacted the closest boat to investigate and they found the EPIRP lonely bobbing in the water, took some photos and left it there. I was relieved already just hearing from Marsha that she had position reports of them. Lack of communication, would have been nice if we all had been informed about the spot check and I am sure John will in future deliveries inform the owners that they can track the boat. As for Sid who likes deliveries I have no problem for him going in the contrary but there is a deal: has to have the spot check GPS with text and it can NOT be a power boat J.

This was truly a day from hell I never want to go through ever again. Just thinking back on that day gets my adrenalin rising.

Sid and I had agreed to meet on SSB at 08:30 every day to see their progress. My radio did not boom out neither did Deb’s. So after a failed first day then knowing the problem I informed Michael on Panda located at the time in Portobelo and Allan on Honallee in the San Blas if they would be my backups should I not be able to transmit or hear Sid. We never were able neither was Glen who has a strong rig and booms out, so we knew that the SSB was not working. In deed Sid said it didn’t even though Wally had assured them it was working. While in Cayman’s when Wally talked to John he blamed it on Sid. Last June while going through the boat with Wally, he showed Sid the SSB and Sid commented that the Icom 700 is a good radio, guess Wally heard it works good not it is good, even though Sid had never touched it. Also Wally seemed to think that the boys were on their way to Isla Mujeres so I contacted Glen and told him they are planning to re-fuel in Cayman Islands.

Sid said that they could hear on the radio but not transmit and when listening to Chris’s Weather on the radio  the first morning  out they heard a phone ringing in background then Chris saying “sorry folks have to take that call” a few minutes later he came back saying there was a lookout for Motor Vessel Sandial. Sid’s eyes must have almost popped out, told John to check if EPIRB still was there and see if it was turned no, he  came back shook his head and no but it was gone. Yep, that’s how they found out they were missing.

With no communication we followed their progress and at some point they must have had a current of 2+ knots as they were traveling at 10 knots. The last day they seemed to slow down and I hoped they would make it to Cayman’s before a cold front hit them with strong winds. They arrived just about that time. Sid was the first to contact me, but again my phone server let me down, no signal not until I was at lunch in Portobelo did I get a missed call. As I was in Portobelo I finally received his voice message from 5:30 that morning. His message said they had the trip from hell and starter broken and glad to be there. Then one text from him and when I texted back I realized when my text did not go through that he was out of money. Wow roaming is huge 59 bucks gone on his voice message and one short text. Luckily I am able to put more money on his phone via mine, so every time he texted I added an extra 5 bucks to his phone. In the meantime Wally tried to contact the boys but could not get in touch with them so he wanted Sid’s phone number which he already had and I told him that right now Sid is loading the battery and that he was roaming but he called him anyway. Sid could just say hi and the money was sucked out of the phone again. I was furious and finally told Wally to get in touch with John via WhatsApp. Long story short John had tried to contact Wally numerous time on WhatsApp but Wally never ok’d him, I think Wally was new at this What’sApp thing. At last they got in contact.

4 days later they made it safely to Fort Lauderdale. Wally contacted me wanting to know when Sid wanted to fly back, so texted him Thursday April 21^st out of Miami as he has rental car out of there.  Throughout the whole ordeal I found Wally very uncooperative and it hurt my feeling after he found a ticket for $53 via Venezuela with a 6 hour layover and he was not going to pay for an $85 taxi home. Even hung up on me. Wally asked Sid a while back if we knew a delivery captain and as a friend Sid offered to get him a delivery crew himself and his ex- brother in law and we helped getting the boat ready and provisioned last time around. It’s just money we lost, but part that hurts is to see that friendships are not always mutual. He did find a better flight for Sid from Fort Lauderdale via Atlanta. Thanks Jerry for driving him to drop off car and getting him to the other airport.

Every story has two side so here is the other:

Sandial Delivery 2016

4/5/16-Tues.  The early morning trip to the airport went easy enough.  It wasn't until we tried the check-in computer kiosk that things started to go sideways.  The computer kept saying to ask for assistance.  When assistance came she couldn't get us checked in either.  We were directed to the counter.  At the counter we were introduced to the problem that was to cause us to miss our flight and almost the next flight that could still have us make our connecting flight to Panama.  It seems that if you have a one way ticket to Panama you have to have proof that you have, in our case, a defined way to leave.  Our word that we were leaving by private yacht wasn't good enough.  We were directed to the “Main Cabin” desk where we were  told we couldn't get on the flight because we couldn't prove we were leaving the country of Panama. 

We moved up the food chain to the supervisor who stated we needed proof of departure from Panama and it had to be in writing.  We missed our first flight by this time.  The supervisor wouldn't take emails or a phone call or anything but a fax stating the info he wanted to see.  I called Manuela in Panama to call Wally, Sandial's owner, to have him fax a letter with boat numbers and departure dates.  Wally didn't have a fax.  The clock was ticking.  The supervisor couldn't seem to understand that we weren't getting on a cruise ship, no matter how many times we explained it to him.  Things weren't going well for us to make our last hope flight.  Then Matt had his idea.  He figured he could download an app to send a text document from his phone to the fax machine right next to us to give to the supervisor, who wasn't budging and seem to enjoy what he was doing to us.  I dictated a letter complete with made up documentation numbers and Matt worked his magic to get it to the Fax machine.  It worked except it cut off right when the boat number was going to print.  For the supervisor that wasn't good enough.  It did it twice and the supervisor wasn't having a letter with no number.  The clock was down to about 15 minutes to go before we out of time to check in.  Matt downloaded another app, under pressure, that did indeed get the fax to print out the whole letter.  The supervisor was placated and we checked in with 3 minutes to spare.  We made our flight.

We made our connecting flight ( another story) and arrived at the boat in Shelter Bay Marina at about 2300 hrs.

4/6-Wed.  The next day Matt and I waited through the morning for Wally and Pam and Sid to arrive.  Sid Is my ex brother in law and is the common thread between Wally and Pam and myself.   About the time Matt and I ordered breakfast at the restaurant at the marina, around 1100, everybody started showing up.  Breakfast was dispatched in a hurry and we repaired to the boat to go over systems and operating quirks.  This was necessarily done in a hurry as we had a weather window to make to get to the Cayman Islands without getting hammered by bad weather.  I tried to soak up as much info as I could and wished we had more time.  I remember looking around the cabin at lamps and miscellaneous items not secured and asking if maybe they should be secured.  The answer was that in 21 years of cruising there's never been a problem.  We cast off from Shelter Bay around 1340 Wednesday the 6^th of April.  Inside the breakwater off Colon everything is great, we engage the stabilizers and engine synchronizer at idle and get ready to go to sea.

As the boat cleared the shelter of the breakwater and into the Caribbean Sea things changed rather abruptly.  It was rougher than a cob with short close period seas and 15 kts of wind.  No big deal. We settled in under autopilot and stabilizers and the contents of the boat were finding there lowest spot to settle in at with these conditions.  We were off to the Caymans, our fueling stop about 650 miles away.

The watch was set to start at 1800 and Sid started the rotation.  Dinner was skipped, it was too rough to cook and nobody was really hungry.  I came up a little before 2000 for my watch and Sid said the low oil light for the stabilizers was flicking on and off.  We had been warned the light would come on for a while then go off and everything would be fine.  About then the light came on solidly and the stabilizers packed it in and quit.  Sandial really came alive now.  We were bucking and rolling and really moving stuff around.  Chairs, fire extinguishers, lamps, food, even the pots and pans in a cabinet broke out and spread themselves about the boat.  On the upper steering deck the motion was worse.  Things were sliding back and forth, it was really dangerous to move about.  One had to plan for the next handhold, which were few and far between, then crouch down and lunge when the timing was right.  We all crashed and fell more than once.  We slowed the boat to 5-6 kts.  There was no moon so it was pitch black.  I remember being braced in the helm seat hearing stuff slide around behind me.  It turns out one of the things sliding was an ice chest sitting on a drain pad made of hard plastic that really slid well.  Well enough that the ice chest after siding across the deck on a starboard roll came siding back on the port roll, hit the EPIRB that was mounted at ice chest level, sheared off the mounting screws, bracket and EPIRB and launched the whole shebang over the side.  We didn't know this happened, or when.  The EPIRB functioned flawlessly and started to broadcast its message that we were in an emergency and needed  immediate assistance.  The other thing that aided this happening was that the boat was taking on a decidedly heavy list to port.  The wind and seas were coming from the starboard side so when we rolled to port we went pretty darn far to port, helping the ice chest to gain speed in that direction and to continue on over the edge after taking out the EPIRB and land on the deck below.  The ice chest was full of rope.  This port list was very concerning and I went down below to see what was causing this.  Below decks in the engine room I noticed there was a full tank of fuel (about 475 ga, 3400 lbs.) on the port side and much less fuel to starboard.  I studied the fuel distribution manifold diagram and saw the valves were set to come out of the port tank, not the starboard tank.  But the port tank was full and the starboard tank was going down.  How could this be.  The more we listed to port the more fuel went to port making us list to port, etc.  We were really going over on the port roll.  There was some discussion of turning back.  We decided we were not in any immediate danger if the conditions didn't get any worse.

I nosed around in the engine room and found 2 fuel tank outlets, a small one and a larger one.  Presumably the small one was a crossover line between tanks, I closed the starboard crossover valve and hoped we would soon be drawing the port tank down.  That didn't happen.  I shut down the port side return line at the manifold and left the starboard line open, didn't make any difference.

4/7-Thurs.  All day Thursday was rough as was Wednesday night, but not deteriorating. The upper autopilot control developed a trick of shutting down and sounding an alarm if you tried to correct your course with any of the buttons on it.  The first time this happened I was alone on watch at night and thought I lost the pilot completely.  I changed the throttle settings and stomped the deck to get someone's attention,  Sid came up and we shutdown the pilot to reset it and it seemed to work after that, for awhile.  Still couldn't figure out the tank distribution problem.  Now the inverter started to trip itself off with a low voltage reading.  The meters on the panel read about 12.8 volts, which is normal for a fully charged battery maintaining off the alternators.  The inverter read 10.8 volts.  The refers were defrosting and the one in the galley started to leak water over the floor.  I fired the gen set and put on the battery charger.  It started to charge whatever battery the inverter was using as the voltage readout went to 13.5 volts and the it stopped tripping off.  Late Thursday the weather started to get better.  We were listing worse than ever.  Back in the engine room to ponder the what the hell was going on with this fuel system.  While down there I noticed the vacuum gauge on the fuel filter was approaching the red.  All this rolling was stirring up everything in the tanks.  It turns out all the fuel that feeds the motors goes to one fuel filter so you have to shut everything down and roll in the trough while you change filters.  We discovered we only had two spare filters and were now down to one.  While shut down I checked the oil levels and added ½ ga of oil to the port main.  While starting the motors back up the port starter just clicked and wouldn't turn the motor over.  We tried jumping the starter at the solenoid, no luck.  Click, click.  Then with one last try after 20 minutes of trying it caught and started the motor.  Yeah.  Off we went.

I decided to look in the file cabinet to see if there were any notes or diagrams of the fuel system.  In the filter file I found a diagram of the two tanks with a crossover line between the two tanks.  It also stated that all fuel has to flow from the port tank to feed the motors.  So why was there a second large feed line on the starboard tank and a manifold that looked like it controlled the flow of fuel.  Still the voo doo that is this system didn't act right.  There was something I didn't understand.

I forgot to mention that on Thursday morning while listening to SSB for weather we discovered we had deployed our EPIRB and a search was underway to find and help us.  The SSB radio wouldn't broadcast so we couldn't communicate that we were OK.  The freighters that passed us by within a couple miles wouldn't respond to requests to help us.  This happened 4 times with the freighters.  Then we remembered the SPOT locator and started sending our position every hour to show that we underway way making way.  This is what finally convinced everyone that we OK.  It must have been pretty nerve racking for everyone until they became convinced we were OK.  Marsha actually got a call from the Coast Guard that they had a visual on the EPIRB, but no boat and a fly over revealed no infrared heat signatures so the bodies went down with the boat.  Thanks, Marsha, for setting everyone straight.

4/8-Fri.  Friday morning was much better, weatherwise.  We were listing worse than ever.  The wind pushes us over causing us to list which puts more fuel to port, etc.  1700 Friday weather getting better.  The autopilot can't be touched to adjust course without shutting down.  We can adjust it downstairs, though.  We started to put the boat back in order, both big fans broken, dolphin lamp shade broken, cracked aft shower pan with wooden grate which was too wide for shower,etc..  The boat is running good.

4/9-Sat  Last night was good, calm and boat speed 8+ knots.  Must be a favorable current.  The wind started up around 0800 and the weather report is for 25-30 kts of wind later tonight.  We're 100 miles from the Caymans at 1100.  I checked the filters and the vacuum was up again.  We were coming out of the port tank on the manifold.  I decided to open all the valves and did so, the vacuum reading fell to “0”.  WTF!!  This magic fuel system keeps up with new tricks.  I hope it doesn't die when we need it.  At 1030 the seas were building and the wind is 15+ kts.  Still doing almost 8 kts boat speed over the ground.  Both battery banks showing 12.8 v but the inverter is down to 110.9 v.  Started gen set to charge mystery battery bank.

4/10-Sun.  Boy, did yesterday go down hill in a hurry.  The filter vacuum came back up and the motors started to “hunt”, varying RPM for no apparent reason.  The vacuum wasn't quite in the red.  Back to the engine sauna room to discover a nut holding the throttle linkage on the starboard engine has come off.  I decided to shut down the engine to work on it.  As we were throttling down the strbrd engine, it died, not good.  The other one was keeping us on course.  The engine with the questionable starter.  I really didn't want to shut it down.  I found the nut down in a hole atop the engine.  I could see it but couldn't get at it.  We had no spares and a set of tools that could be had at any garage sale for $3.  A pair of pliers, 3 screwdrivers, vice grips and a set of end wrenches. I cut a stay wire from an umbrella I found on board and bent the end to form a hook and hooked the nut.  With the throttle linkage back together it was time to start the motor.  The engine wouldn't start.  The port engine and gen set were still going. The engine died from lack of fuel. We decided the next filter in line ( a smaller Racor) or the filter at the motor must be clogged.  We found replacement filters for both of these.  We didn't want to shut down our remaining motors because the one may not start and the other would keep up power to the boat.  Sid traced out the line to the motor after the second Racor filter and decided it was ok to change that filter out without shutting anything else down.  There's no valve to isolate the filter so we clamped the inlet fuel down with a pair of vice grips.  Took off the top of the filter and started to change the cartridge.  About this time the port motor slowed down and died, crap.  Then the gen set slowed down and died, double crap.  I guess all the fuel goes through that filter also.  Completed changing the filters and proceeded to try to start them up.  With no charging taking place I decided to start the gen set first.  It wouldn't start.  The little pump on the engine to prime the injector pump didn't seem to work.  Segwayed to the strbrd motor which had a manual pump that seemed to build up pressure.  After hand pumping and cracking an injector and hand pumping again, about 8 times, the motor came to life.  The port engine starter just clicked.  No joy.  We took off with one motor for the Caymans with 60 miles to go.  We made 5 kts and were hoping to be in the lee of the island when the winds started.  With no generator we shut down both refers and everything else on 120 v to save electricity.  While running with one motor the idle motor's prop shaft has to be stopped so as not to damage the running gear.  We were given a 12” pipe wrench for this task.  A 12” pipe wrench is woefully inadequate for this purpose.  Its just not big enough.  The shaft would just overpower it.  We had to stop the boat and reposition the wrench each time we tried to see if would hold. Time consuming and frustrating when you're trying to get somewhere.  After decideing the little wrenc wasn't going to do the job, Sid came up with a plan to tie the shaft with webbing to stop it from turning.  After many more stops and starts, this worked and we were off. The ocean got very lumpy but the wind stayed at 15-20 kts and we got to Georgetown, Cayman at 0230 Sunday 4/10.  I contacted Cayman Port Security and was told to pick up a mooring and check in in the morning.  Not so easy, picking up a mooring.  We finally found one but had no boat hook.  We did, however, have a rusty gaff.  The first float we got up parted its line to the mooring eye right off.  Bear in mind this is all with one engine, on a dark night, with 15 kts of wind in a somewhat crowded anchorage.  We went off in search of another mooring site.  We found another one and I got the gaff in the mooring line eye but couldn't get it high enough to tie our dock line on it before the boat drifted past and started to pull the gaff out of my hands.  I couldn't get the gaff out of eye and eventually couldn't hold the gaff against the pull of the boat and had to let go.  Now we were trying to lasso the mooring ball with a dock line to pull it up to get a hold of it.  This almost worked a couple of times, but not quite.  What did happen eventually was that the boat drifted over the mooring line and tangled the stabilizer and rudder in it.  The boat stopped drifting.  We got the mooring eye by standing on the swim step and pulling it closer and tying on our dock line.  It didn't do a lot of good as we were still tangled up.  I didn't want to have the boat tangled that way when the wind really blew so I jumped in and got the stabilizer untangled pretty easily, its on the side of the boat near the surface.  The rudder is under the boat, in the dark.  The boat is moving up and down and back and forth.  Matt held a flashlight over the swim step so I could see better and on the 4^th try I got the line off the rudder.  The boat swung around to the bow line and we were secure.  It felt good after a really long day to have a rum and coke and lie down to sleep at 0430 Sunday morning.

At 0700 we started to trouble shoot the gen set.  To get fuel to it we rigged the fuel polisher pump to pump fuel into the feed line to the gen set.  This involved tie wraps, hose clamps and a pen body tube but it worked.  We got fuel all the way thru the fuel pump on the gen set.  Then while tightening one of the brass hose barb fittings at the gen set the fitting broke off.  Shit.  We found a fitting on the 5kw gen set that had the correct pipe thread size but a too small barb size.  Took the fitting and wrapped electrical tape around it to bring it up to size the fuel hose would seal on.  Then took the broken fitting and filled it with epoxy and put it in the hole on the 5 kw to seal it up so it wouldn't leak fuel. Everything is ready, we cracked an injector and cranked the starter.  A couple of tries and varoom, it ran.  Only the fan belt was screaming and the raw water pump was not turning.  Shit.  Off comes the raw water pump (thanks, Sid) and upon dis assembly we find all the impeller blades are turned the wrong way and the belt isn't strong enough to turn them to the right direction.  My theory is that when the generator ran out of fuel and died it kick back in the opposite direction in its dying quivers.  We put the pump back together correctly aligning the impeller and Sid put it back on.  Fired that puppy up and we have power out on the mooring.

During all that I had to go with the Harbor Patrol, which was nice enough to give us a ride, to check in.  Everybody was very helpful and nice and enjoyed my story of boating nightmares.  The Harbor Patrol guy made a bunch of calls to find a mechanic to fix the starter but everybody was busy.  So we have one motor and a gen set running.  We're out of filters and have a bad starter.  The wind is howling and we're just happy to be here.  Had a late lunch of steak (thanks Pam) at 1400.  We worked from 0700 to 1400 on the boat to get to this point.  Think I'll go for a swim.

4/11 Mon.  We got a ride in to town with the harbor patrol guys.  No luck finding a mechanic.  I decided to do the job myself once I found out we had a spare starter on the boat.  We went to an internet cafe and called Wally, Marsha, Manuela, Anoush, etc.  I needed to find a phone to call the Coast Guard to tell them we were OK and they could close the file on Sandial's EPIRB.  I found a phone at the phone store and bought some minutes and got a hold of the C.G. But got cut off when we were half way thru the conversation.  Went to the store for food and by the Port Authority to ask about fuel and checking out.  We found out that if we fuel after we check out we save all the taxes and duty on the fuel.  That was about $.72/ga..We would have 24 hours to leave once we checked out.  We had to get back to the boat by 1200 because the Harbor Patrol would be busy all afternoon and unable to give us a ride out to the boat.  The Harbor Patrolman mention that we might be able to come in the South Terminal and tie up.  Not many cruise ships till Wednesday.  I call Port Security and they gave us permission to come in and use the wharf.  We dropped the mooring and came in on one engine, in the wind.  Got her tied up without too much fuss and were happy to be able to come and go without a ride to shore.  The first order of business was to get filters.  We drove around to a couple of places and found a great chandlery that had the correct  filter but not the 30 micron ones I wanted.  I figured we'd go through a lot of the 10 micron ones they had so I bought a bunch.  We stopped and bought street food at “Mr. Don's” on recommendation of our cab driver.  It was ok but the ox tail plate was mostly bones.  I think the cabby ripped us off with the fare being $62.  We spent the rest of the afternoon getting ready to change out the starter then took chairs down to our own private beach and had beers and watched the sun set.  The evening was spent watching the 2^nd half of the new star wars movey that we passed out watching the night before.

4/12 -Tues.  Looks like we're racing another weather window and have to get out of here asap.  Started working at 0600 on the starter.  Miraculously our $3 garage sale set of tools got the old starter out.  The new starter had the mounting plate in the wrong position so we had to go into town to get a set of allen wrenches to change the position. Walked into town and stopped at the internet cafe and got some coms done then off to the market and hardware store for food and allen wrenches.  We walked back to the boat and got back on the starter.  Got the screws out of the base with our new 5mm allen wrench and with the help of our 12” pipe wrench hammer we got everything correct and installed the new starter onto the motor.  After the usual pumping and grinding we got the port motor to fire.  Yippee, everything's running at the same time.  I decided to shut down and make sure our new filters were correct as they were a different color than the old filters and I didn't want any surprises at sea.  The new filter fit and I put the old 30 micron one back in as it still had some life left in it.  Buttoned everything up and fired the Gen set.  It ran for awhile then quit, apparently the victim of an air bubble in the fuel line.  While getting fuel to the gen set I noticed the tape I put on the fuel fitting was looking pretty shaky.  We saw some fittings on our travels yesterday so Sid went after a more correct fitting and I went to the phone stare to call the Coast Guard again.  I got through and had a nice conversation with the Ensign handling the Sandial case.  He had much praise for Marsha and the Spot device.  I got back to the boat to find Sid was successful and we installed the more correct fitting, put everything back together, bled the system and got the gen set running.  Turned everything off and on a couple of times to make sure they'll start and went to check out and schedule a fuel truck.  After a little running around we get checked out and a 1630 appointment for fuel and water.  We moved over to the commercial dock at 1630 and took on 265 ga water and 707 ga of fuel.  We got permission to return to the South Terminal and moved there to get ready to leave, sit at our private beach for sun down and go into town for a final dinner.  We found a nice Italian place with nice Italian waiters right there in Georgetown, Cayman Island.  Thanks, Wally. The restaurant had WiFi and we called everyone to say we were leaving.  At this time I got the message to call Wally before we leave, so I did.  Wally wanted me to pin the stabilizers before departure.  Back to the boat and back into the sauna room.  The strbrd stabilizer was only a small hassle but the port one was impossible with what tools we had and the time limit we had.  The gen set is located right up against the side of the boat blocking any access to the stabilizer except over the top.  To go over the top you would have to disassemble the sound box and lay over the red hot generator motor and stand on your head to try and locate the pin holes to line up and stick the pin in.  Wasn't gonna happen.  I decided to let it pivot.  I had watched the over one while we were underway before and it really didn't move much in the water flow.  We left the dock at 2140 and headed for the west end of Cuba some 250 miles away.

The conditions were good and we were making good speed.  Only the synchronizer wouldn't come on.   No big deal I could sync them by ear.  Which is the only way to do it on Sandial because all 4 tach.s read a different RPM.  By 100's of RPM's.  Some time during the night Sid traced down the wires to power the sychronizer and discovered power was coming from the horn circuit which was switched off.  I was probably told of this back in Panama but didn't remember, what with all the rush.

4/13 Wed.  All is well with following seas and a favorable current.  I seemed to have fixed the upper autopilot control.  It completely quit and we only had the lower unit to steer with.  That's a little inconvenient but when you couple that with the constant alarm sounding,  its really annoying.  In desperation a got behind the panel and started unplugging connectors to try a shut it up.  The connector from the upper unit to the lower unit shut it up and when I re-plugged it in it stared to work normally and worked well the rest of the trip.  Also I finally worked up the nerve to completely shut down both fuel feeds from the strbrd tank to right the boat.  When we left Cayman the boat was fairly well in trim but as we went fuel transferred to the port side and we started listing again.  That finally worked.  The boat is slowly righting itself.  All we have to do is turn on the feeds from the starbrd tank once in a while to keep trim.  Apparently both feeds on the strbrd tank feed the port side.  Interesting.

4/14 Thurs.  We rounded the west end of Cuba, Cabo de San Antonio, at 0900.  I decided to skirt Cuba until we could lay a rumbline course to Key West.  The weather report was good weather until Sat morning when a cold front was coming in with strong winds.  At noon we had 200 miles to Key West.  At 7 kts we should get there Friday night.  Then if we got weathered out we could find a place to hide.  Once we got on our course of 054 degrees and we left Cuba we picked up the gulf stream and took off.

4/15 Fri.  0100 the seas are building but we're making 8+ kts, everything pretty good.  Just before sun up the seas were building and the wind was into the current making some steep, close period waves.  We're doing 9.5-10+ kts for hrs but its really rolly, worse than Panama. .   Shut down each engine and added ½ ga oil to each.  They both started up again.  Just before the sun came up we were picking up more wind and the seas were getting rough.  Still OK. The boat is doing 9.9-10 kts for hours and its getting more and more rolly. We rolled far enough over to tip the upstairs freezer on its side.  Never saw that coming.   We tied it down after that.  Everything in the salon a shambles again.  We picked up two Coast guard cutters that followed us for awhile.  I was afraid they were going to try to board us.  That would surely result in damage in these seas.  They watched but let us be.  Around 1100 the wind started to let up.  We passed Key West around noon, the wind kept going down and we sailed out of the gulf stream.  The boat is still doing 8+ kts and the conditions are fine.  Chili dogs for lunch and the weather looks good to continue on to Ft Lauderdale.  We were finally picking up weather reports on the VHF, ah its good to be home.  All day was nice.  The weather forecast says light winds, 30% chance of rain showers and isolated thunder storms.  Winds to pick up Sat night, its all good.  In the late afternoon we started to see clouds building over the land to the left and as it got dark lightening was putting on a great display.  Lighting the clouds and hitting the ground underneath the clouds once in a while.  Good its 60 miles away.  I came up for my watch at 2200, the lightning show was still on, except now there was some up ahead and infrequently off to right.  It was also very dark up ahead.  Not good.  I approached the dark band of clouds and about 2330 I went under them.  The air temp dropped 15 degrees.  I knew what this meant.  I went around and zipped up all the windows and closed everything up.  The wind picked up, a lot.

4/16 Sat.  Just after 2400 all hell broke loose.  The wind went to 30+ kts, the seas went crazy and it started to pour rain.  The guys came up as it was impossible to stay below.  This was the worse motion we had yet.  Things that never moved much, moved.  The heavy divers hardhat lamp jumped up a went down into the v berth.  My computer did the same dance of death.  Broken light bulb everywhere.  The VHF started to broadcast emergency weather warnings.  This cell caught everybody by surprise, luckily it only lasted 1 ½  hrs, then it started to taper off.  That was our final slap from mother nature, but not from the boat.  The filter clogged and we lost both engines.  There we are in the trough again with me trying to get fuel to the engines.  By this time I'm getting better at it.  Fast, but not fast enough to avoid totally drenching myself with sweat.  The rest of the morning wasn't bad and we got to Frt Lauderdale around 1200.  All we had left was to navigate the New River up to the marina where the boat was to stay.  That's a story for another time.  We tied up around 1400.

J

Sid had 3 days to run around in Miami area to get new alternator, membrane for water maker and other parts. I was stressing that he would not make it on time for Felicia’s vacation, bad enough we were not able to pick her up directly from San Blas. Gently I tried to explain the situation to her that boat was not fixed yet and we were in Puerto Lindo. She wrote back how excited she was that she will be in Puerto Lindo first, she was hoping that as she would love to show her boyfriend where she was on vacation 3 years ago. That was a BIG boulder that fell off my shoulder and I know Sid was relieved as well. Sid arrived 20 minutes after Felicia had arrived perfect timing and another Happy Ending. Gosh I love those. It was a late night drive home but everybody was anticipating a fun adventurous vacation for Felicia and her boyfriend Joel.

About my Zika:                                                     
                               

8 weeks later as I went back to the doctor for check up and more bloodwork I still did not have the results but found out that although it’s a free test from the government the labs have to send it via special courier that costs an arm and a leg. There is such an epidemic the labs and hospitals are losing money so they don’t even send it in anymore. I wished they would have told me I would have paid for the courier. Blood work revealed that I was still fighting a virus, Doctor said the Zika virus. Last time I saw Katrin she wanted to know what symptoms I had and her responds was: “you did not have Zika you had Chikungunya, you had the same symptoms as mine”. She also said that it stays with you up to 8 weeks or longer and keeps flaring up which it did.

Linton Bay Marina Gossip: 

We have been in the Marina from April 5^th and I didn’t see water on the dock until April 19^th. There is water up by the office which everybody uses to fill their tanks. I don’t trust it from last time when they told us it was city water while it was creek water that ran along a farm with pigs. So I filled up some buckets with water, I was washing the boat (did about 10 buckets of laundry) and noticed a familiar blue truck pull into the parking lot and fill up the water tanks then the ones for the pressure washer. I KNOW THIS TRUCK!!!! While living at Binnie’s I had to pass it alongside a creek during the dry season. They pump river water in their tank. I always thought that must be for their farm. No they sell it as a matter a hotel in La Guyra and Isla Grande use it for shower and toilettes only. I couldn’t believe it they are selling this river water that runs through a cow pasture for drinking water. Well some at marina were told it was river water, others including people in the anchorage were told its Spring Water and was sold to them. I hit the roof. Same time another cruiser who has lived here forever came charging at me, telling me he recognized the truck. So there were 3 of us jumping down Mauricio’s throat who claims everybody was warned about the water. I called Adam and asked him on the phone. He wanted to know where the river was. The Government provides people with water they have trucks that bring good water to houses and villages that have no water, why does this marina have to bring dirty water. Ah let me guess? To save money. This marina so far has showed us that we don’t care about you just give us your money. There is still no shower or bathroom facilities except a porta potty and two porta showers but in order to take a shower you have to schlepp a hose there and get the hose through the vent hole and shower out of the hose. Ridiculous. Yeah there are two shower stalls but only one hose, even more ridiculous. I don’t think we’ll come back to this marina until they have competent employees and facilities. I could go on and on. I truly think this marina is going to be a success someday, but what it is right now is far from it.

Next Blog will be more fun to read I promise, it will be the adventure of Felicia and Joel.