VISTA MAR MARINA AND LAS PERLAS ISLANDS

  

After 7 years in Panama we have mixed feelings for the Caribbean side, meaning Portobelo to San Blas. The mixed feeling is the constant humidity and lots of rain. Rainy season starts anywhere from March on, more dominant from July on and worst September to November. December can still be rainy and sometimes you get the rain into January, which leaves about 3 months for dry season. now being in Vista Marina, near San Carlos on the south side of Panama, the weather is a different ball game. The humidity and rain are far less, never less we get wicked thunderstorms with lots of wind. This season 3 boats were hit by lightning in the marina, never found out if individually or side strike.

The marina amazes me and I told the office to add a section to their website how the marina was built, how long it took and how much rocks they brought in etc. What amazes me is they built a great big breakwater in the ocean, we are a good ¾ mile from the beach. I did find out though that one of the several marina owners owns a mountain and the breakwater rocks are from there. I think Maria said too that he ran out of mountain LOL. 

 

The marina employees are amazing, hard workers and super friendly and go out of their way to help us or try anything to make things better for us, to the contrary of for instant Shelter Bay Marina and the Linton Bay Marina where their wallet comes first and who cares about the customers anyway. Well the Vista Mar Marina does they put the customer first, a real nice change and feeling. They are trying to expand the marina to add a haulout area which should be ready January 2019, the travel lift I was told, will arrive before Christmas 2018, the jack stands had arrived already. Haulout will be for repairs and long term storage. They also already have mechanics and maintenance people hired. 

The marina is well built and is the only affordable marina on this side of Panama. The only 1 negative thing I can find is unfortunately not the best thing. Being on the open ocean, there is a surge running through the marina, and the swells also refracting from the rocks and hitting the marina in a different angle than the swell already do. Depending on the direction of wind waves also affecting the marina it can get downright uncomfortable.  The Linton Bay Marina can have big swells but they hit the boats on the bow so it’s an up and down. Still lots of stress on the dock lines. The boats at Vista Mar jerk back and forth, so bad bumpers explode, dock lines chafe and cleats take a beating. We lost 1 cleat while our neighbor had 2 ripped out in same night. We figure the money we saved in this marina is spent on new dock lines and bumpers plus wear and tear on boat and crew. 

It’s a great Marina for short term and for owners to be onboard. Long term get good bumpers, lots of extra line and dock line snubbers. Don’t tie the lines too tight to the dock, leave the boat some room to move freely and you will save some dock lines, maybe. 4 out of our 6 are damaged. Catamarans have it a bit easier as they can tie up in the middle of the slip and are tide to both sides.

The marina is in a big golfing community and to get to the main road to catch a bus you would have to walk 25 minutes in the heat of the day. The marina office is so kind to drive us to Coronado every day at 11 and coming home you are on your own. Taxis are trying to hit you up for 8 bucks a ride back. I met a nice cabby Prospero, he told me don’t pay more than 5 dollars, should be 3. So I hired him every time I need a taxi and gave him his well-deserved 5$. (Prospero 6469 4964 very nice gentleman with always clean cab, he drives slow and safe not like the rest of the cabs they are always in a hurry and no he is old school he uses a regular no data phone, so no whatsapp).

The Club House of this development has a beautiful big infinity pool we cruiser get to enjoy as well and the wonderful restaurant offers a Monday night special by French chef Patrick, choice of each salad or appetizer, 2 dinner special, 2 desserts, coffee or tea and dinner comes with a glass of red or white wine at $ 22 per person. By far one of the best restaurant meals we have had in Panama. On the menu you will find Ossobucco, Rabbit, Lamb, Steaks etc. Very impressive. I lucked out Sid does not drink wine so I got his second glass.

On the breakwater is the Boga Bar with OK food and Karaoke, yes Karaoke. But only every second Saturday and we had to share it with the locals. Since it was so popular if we got to sing max 1 to 2 songs each you were lucky, it was too long of a wait for a song to sing. So I talked to the manager and did organize Thursday night karaoke for just the cruisers. It was a hit but after second time the cruiser’s lost the interest and I was singing by myself, oh well, at least I got to sing LOL. The restaurant manager and guests loved the entertainment and I was rewarded with a complimentary cocktail.

There used to be a Mini Mart and a Chandlery next door to the Marina Office but they have long closed. The Marina is opening a Breakfast and lunch bar that will serve Hot Dogs, Hamburgers, breakfast during the day. Was told it will open soon. We know how soon “soon” can be in Panama LOL.

Every second Saturday is the local fresh veggie market in San Carlos and the cruisers are organizing a walk with up to 20 people at a time. We leave at 9 am and the walk takes you down the breakwater across a little creak that runs down the beach into the ocean, constantly changing the beach, along the beach to a dirt road that leads by the local fishermen and eventually into town. It’s a pretty walk that takes about 30 minutes and takes you by simple but colorful homes. San Carlos is a charming and clean town with many simple stores and also I think the town with the most barber show, in a just 200 feet on the main road are 7 barber shops. The guys must use fertilizer to wash their hair, that they have such a demand on barber shops.

The first time I went there was only 4 of us. I wasn’t too impressed with the open market, there were only 6 farmers selling their produce, which mainly was chayote, onions, pineapple, papaya, tomato and some lettuce. But the daily produce market had quite a bit of other ordinary veggies. Nothing fancy.

Too funny though in the grocery store Barry (met him in Shelter Bay Marina he was one of the guitarists that play at open mike, he is incredible), so he walked up to me at the register and held a bag with what looked like a mixture of ground corn, rice and other wheat kernels and said: “This looks delicious what is it?” I had a feeling what it was but definitely was not going for the delicious. As we were at the register I asked the owner who was the cashier and told her in Spanish: “this guy said this looks delicious and wants to know what it is.” Her and her employee stopped what they were doing and broke into laugher and she snorted “chicken feed”! OMG LOL!!! We all had a good laugh.

 Then Tara piled her stuff on the counter and I noticed a bag with huge corn kernels, knowing already what it is, I asked her what she was gonna do with that. She said: “popcorn”. Now I broke out into laughter, store owner and employee looking at me with a questioning look. I said “Popcorn!” Owner almost fell off the chair, yep it was more chicken feed. The employee, he brought his laughter under control disappeared into the isles and return with the real popcorn for Tara. Back at the boat I gave my neighbor Cristo a mango I had bought at the market. 5 minutes later he knocked on the boat and gave me a taste of the juicy mango asking me what it tastes like. Popped it in my mouth and the scent of orange hit my nose before the flavor of orange burst in my mouth. Wow orange flavored mangoes (my friend Melania planted a seed and she will see mangoes in about 6 years). What a fun morning this was.

As I mentioned the rainy season here is much mellower than on the Caribbean side so whenever it didn’t rain around 4 pm. Some of the ladies in the marina joined me at the pool for noodeling aerobics.

We still had a storage shed in Shelter Bay Marina which we needed to empty. Should have rented a bigger car to fit everything in. All fit but it was a tight fit. Had lunch with Carol and Greg at the restaurant and stopped at Ida’s for the night. Jim and Melania were already there so we had a last get together at Ida’s home. Manuel surprised us and up too. It’s so nice to know we have family here in Panama.

It was Regi's BD that day so we celebrated it for him without him LOL

 

Jim the Rock Star

Full car

Plan was the following morning to head to Ida’s office as we both had a dental appointment with her. Nelly her assistant called at 8 telling Ida all the streets were flooded in Colon and 4 Alto, the Aeronaval closed all the roads. So instead of getting dental work done we enjoyed a wonderful breakfast with our dentist before we headed on our almost 4 hour trip back to San Carlos. 

Actually we lucked out on that deal because originally we would have departed for Shelter Bay on Thursday but found out Marina Manager was there on Wednesday and as they still owed us money since last May, we decided to surprise him on Wednesday. Had we gone on Thursday we would have been cut off from the rain. BTW we finally settle for the money but of course did not get all they really owed us, amazing shshhhh.

Thanksgiving came up and two kid’s boats decided we needed to have Turkey cooked Hawaiian style on the beach. We were at first a bit worried about the high tide here for them to find a spot where the water would not seep into the fire pit.

We all had a fun beach day and sat around the 4ft deep pit where 3 turkeys were banana leaf wrapped, cooking away. I had to get back to boat at 2 to cook my vegetables and noticed the black cloud approaching. It was a dark, dark cloud. It looked ominous enough, I prepped the boat for a heavy blow and sure enough right around 3 we got hit with 35 knots of wind and the pelting rain was deafening. Poor beach people including Sid got pelted with wind and rain but they did manage to get the tent over the turkey. Wind and rain did not stop so we decided to move all to the cruiser lounge. It was a huge effort from everybody including all the marina staff that were invited. OMG the banana wrapped turkeys were amazing and so tender and juice. The food was a huge smorgasbord and including the 2 oven cooked turkeys there was no turkey left over. 5 turkey for 40 people. It was a great party.

Diane Seagrass, we had met while at Binnie’s has a condo in Gorgona which is 20 minutes by car from our marina. She was finally back from the States and invited us to spend a night at her place. What an incredible view from her 11^th floor, long white sandy beaches as long as the eye carries, lush hills and mountains, just breathtaking. We had a great time. I insisted on cooking dinner and had all ready, Artichoke Ravioli with a yummy saffron cream sauce……. Only problem was the bag with all the seasonings and stuff was left behind in the cockpit. Never less I managed to whip up a delicious dinner. On the beach in front of her condo is the Tikki Bar run by one of her neighbors, but only on weekends where a local gringo band plays. I had a feeling Scott a harmonica player that lives in the Vista Mar golfing community would be in the band and sure enough he was. Great band by the way.

Fabulous view from her kitchen, I'd be cooking all day long

The following Wednesday we invited Diane, a boater herself, to our weekly potluck. I think she enjoyed it and we hope she will join them in the future even with us not being there. On Saturday we had her over for dinner on Paradise. That day we had a pretty good wind storm come in and blew the Aeronaval into the marina and they were forced to spend the night here. It was funny as we were sitting in cockpit having appetizers one of them came over and in good English he apologized for bothering us and asked if he could borrow my frying pan. Told him sure I will bring it over as soon as I am done cooking. So 20 minutes later I brought the pan over to their boat and found out, my stove came with borrowing the pan. They had no way of cooking on the boat, had a stove at one time but the Captain decided they don’t need that luxury. Their food that is provided by the Station is a bag of horrible looking sausages wrapped in a plastic skin, breakfast cereal and Baby Ruth. So I took the sausages from him and cooked them up. Knowing they had nothing else I made them a big pot of rice and returned their dinner with some mustard and hot sauce. They were so happy they gave us each a Baby Ruth.

On one of my shopping trips in Coronado I found some Swiss Fondue, bought some fresh, crispy French bread to enjoy for dinner. Well the marina was so jerky, it would have never worked in the boat, so Sid got us a table from the lounge and we set up outside and enjoyed a wonderful sunset fondue on the dock.

Neighbors were asking us what we are celebrating: “Happiness” was our response.

Our Swedish neighbors on Walkabout had a rental car and invited us to tag along to see El Valle. Comes out it was his BD. We thoroughly enjoyed the butterfly farm. Must have spent 2 hours in there taking nothing but photos. 
 

Glass Wing Butterfly amazing little thing

Making babies

Morpho colors on top

Morpho's bottom side. Look very closely

To keep predators away this looks like an eye of an owl

And this like the head of a snake. Pretty smart!

On the way to find a restaurant, Sid got a haircut at a Barber Shop. All the boys in there took a photo of the blond gringo getting a haircut, it was fun and only 4 bucks. 

 We bought lunch for the BD boy and from there we ventured off to drive over the mountain to Altos de Maria. Wow never seen steep roads like this not even in the Swiss Alps. We finally made it to the top to find the gate was locked for visitors, only residents were allowed to pass. So we returned.

 

Very steep fields

  

Steep roads

The following day Sid and I had some computer stuff to do and went to the cruiser lounge for wifi, when Sid noticed a tornado passing by. Wow it kept going and going. Quite impressive even as small as it was.

We didn’t just have fun, most days were spend with hard work. I had several sewing projects which took up 10 solid days and lots of sweat and on occasions I had to leave the boat as I was getting seasick from the jerking around.

new lee cloth

Rain inclosure

extension to sun/rain shade so we don't have to close the dodger window

Windows are missing

my atelier

great view from floor

 

a well deserved ice cold beer

adding snaps

finished product

I would say out of 7 days you get 3 nights of sleep the rest you stay awake getting jerked around. A real shame as this is such a nice marina.

After all sewing and boat project were done we splurged and rented an SUV for our provisioning (should have done that to retrieve our stuff from Shelter Bay).

Panama City is hurting for tourism so all the hotels are at a low cost, I found a great deal at the Plaza Patilla Hotel. I think we had the best room in the house on the 18^th floor overlooking the beautiful skyline along Balboa Avenue. The best room  we have ever had in Panama City and we had nice rooms. The window was huge and rounded. At night I sat on the floor with my nose almost to the window just awing over the city lights and rolling by traffic.

spectacular view from the 18th floor

breakfast in room

We visited Ida’s office as she works in Panama City on Wednesday then later on we all met at Palabar for dinner. Coincidentally Carol and Greg were in town and joined us. We had the shortest distance to travel but unfortunately the 3 min drive turned into a horrible gridlock and we arrived an hour late. But what made that horrible traffic jam worth it. A car tried to pass everybody on the right which was the drive way to the parking lot. If it wasn’t for drivers like him traffic would not get jammed, so I managed to block him. He honked, told him no way. When traffic started inching again, I let a car that came out of the parking lot in, then another and another, the fourth let me in and then they would not give way again. 30 minutes/10 car lengths later we arrived at the traffic light but the guy was still stuck where I had blocked him. That made my night.

Everybody was there 1 hour before us, dinner was great and fun was had by everyone and it turned into the long evening.

The following morning Adrienne called to say she was on her way to PC, her flight will be there around 10. Our room deal was so great she asked if we would get another night and she would stay. So we did that. We met her did some shopping with her as she had lots of wine and stuff to buy we offered to take on the boat to Contadora as the plane charges an arm and a leg.

We did not have much to shop today but we had a wonderful lunch waiting for us. Louray (Pizzas) from Bonaire was on her way back from visiting friends in Boquette to Cartagena for a BD party and had a night lay over in Panama City. We met her at her hotel near the airport and spent a wonderful couple of hours for lunch. It was great to see her even just for a short time.

We made it out of town before the crazy Friday night traffic started. We had one more day of shopping to do and figured we do it in Chorrera. Decided to hit the mall first but found out they don’t open till 11, whaaaa??!!!! A mall opening at 11 on a Saturday, opens at 11 every day. So we did the Price Smart and Riba Smith shopping before that. The stores were a mad house when we realized oops it’s mother’s day the following day. Yes Panamanian celebrate Mother’s Day on the 8^th of December. The mall was packed, we gave up soon and headed back to the marina. Just after Capira we keep passing this restaurant that has a pig roast glass pit, not this time, this time we pulled in and OMG wonderful pig roast, we feasted but paid the following day (it was tasty but everything we ate was rather salty so our Blood Pressure was through the roof the next day). From here we did a detour to Punta Chame. Which is a famous surfer spot, the winds always blows and the surf is always high. Not to mention the beautiful miles and miles long beach that passes Dianes’s beach. It was a long drive out there but worth it even only for 5 minutes being there. 

The Xmas winds have already started and are funneling down the mountains. We found an OK window on the 10^th of December. By watching the weather but also checking the weather in Pedasi and Panama City on Wind Guru, I realized that it blows the most here but the further East you go the better it gets. True enough we had up to 35 knots of wind gusting over us but in the lee of the land the water stayed flat and we had a wonderful motor sail. Wind angle prevented us from just sailing. 

We anchored in Isla Bona, when I realized we had anchored there on 26^th of November 2000 already, wow. The aeronaval was anchored and we wondered already if it was the boys from the marina I cooked rice for. I was just done enjoying my Passionfruit Mojito and headed to the galley to cook dinner when they pulled anchor and headed over to us and rafted with us. They asked if we had our boat papers, told them yes and if they wanted to see them. He said no, we are just here we want to find out about your life style. He had a lot of good questions and each he translated to his 4 comrades in Spanish. In the meantime the swells coming in got bigger and bigger to the point it was not good anymore to have them next to us. But that didn’t faze them. Our savior was a phone radio call for an emergency call. So they asked if we had coffee for them. Boiled some water and used instant coffee, they were happy and offered us Baby Ruth, I laughed and told them the story of the other boat. They laughed and were very apologetic as the bag of Baby Ruth they had only contained 1 which they gave us. He said that’s all they eat and they hate them. Off they took and we finally had our dinner at 9pm.

It was a pretty lumpy night and the wind was howling. Even as lumpy as it was it was a great lump compared to the jerk in the torture chamber called Vista Mar Marina LOL. It was definitely blowing too hard to leave for Contadora but that was in the weather prediction so instead we moved to Isla Otoque which is less than a mile next to Bona. Soto at the Marina had suggested to go there as it is much better protected. Sure enough we enjoyed a calm day there and what a beautiful place with a gorgeous beach. Towards the evening we heard many shots fired and a dog bark, guess the few locals on this island are hunting.

Wind was still blowing and we were debating whether to leave or not, but remembering how the wind lightens up towards East, looking at Wind Guru over the last months, we left. It was lumpy bumpy for the first hour but then it got less and less and we had a beautiful sail with the current with us all the way to Contadora. It was a great day and felt good to be out and about again.

This time of the year with the North winds blowing we anchor on the south shore and were the only sail boat here. We pulled our Xmas light up the mast and made sure we anchored where Ginny and Werner could enjoy our lights from their house.

It was a happy reunion and seems like we spent most days at their house.

Before we had left Terry and Ilene had 3 snorkeling tour deals with a cruise ship and asked us to be snorkel guides, paid $100 bucks per day. Sid wasn’t needed anymore but I was able to go. Interesting the tour agency from Panama City who organized this has obviously no boating experience nor cruise ship experience, nor wind and wave and location of beach experience. I had to meet T and I on the beach at 7 am. We were there but our panga wasn’t that had to take us over to Saboga islands and to the beach the cruise ship people were going to enjoy a sunny day. Ilene flagged down a panga driver that wasn’t too happy to take us to Saboga as he had his own deal on Contadora and dropped us off on the dock in Saboga. Ilene and Teri were none stop on the phone to the other 10 panga drivers as none were in sight. Comes out you don’t hire pangas here on a Monday they all party on Sunday and get drunk and wake up with hangovers and definitely will not be ready for you. Good we still had some time to drum everybody up. 4 pangas were for snorkeling, 4 for fishing and 2 to transport people back and forth from cruise ship. At 8 all finally were at the beach and the fishing and snorkel pangas headed out to the cruise ship to pick up the guests. My tour was not till 10 so I waited on the beach. The wind was at 20 to 25 knots and the waves pounding onto the beach, me wondering how the heck are they getting these people ashore, not just that onto the boats from the cruise ship which was anchored 1 ½ miles north of the island in heavy northerly weather. About 20 minutes later all the pangas returned, the captain canceled the trip as it was too rough to get his passengers onto the pangas. He said he will wait till 10 and make a decision. So we all waited around. In the mean time I had a little chat with Michelle the Travel agent organizer, she was upset that the ship could not change location and anchor behind the island or park the boat sideways so people can get off. Don’t think she understood the positioning of a boat into the wind and rules where cruise ships can anchor plus the beach she chose is too rough as most cruise ship passengers are elderly people and this is too dangerous for them to get on and off in high surf. The captain pulled anchor and headed to the next destination. Same exact thing happened with the tour on the following day except the pangas all showed up not hungover. This time all the pangas went out to the cruise ship, different company, but the Michelle approached the gang on the windy said of the cruise ship and they bounced around like mad. It was definitely too rough and the captain decided to made a decision at 10. We all went back and Michele was complaining again how stubborn this captain is and not parking the boat sideways, I just laughed. At 11 she went back to the boat to discuss the situation, came back and said the captain canceled as his passengers were 75 years of age and could not climb into the low pangas plus get off on a beach with surf. She kind a glanced at me when she told us that, I guess it sunk in, finally. The cruise ship for the 30^th of December was canceled in advance.

Tara and mike showed up around the 20^th, they were glad to be out of the Vista Mar Torture Chamber and vowed never to go back. It’s really a shame, such a good marina in a good location but such a jerk and roll.

Spaetzle, Rhubarb Chicken and Tara's wonderful cauliflower

A while back I made a group chat with all the island girls and asked them if they were interested in getting together for a fun day to make Swiss Christmas cookies. They all loved the idea so told them I need a volunteer for the kitchen.

I had bought all the ingredients plus extra cookie cutters and so we met at Adriana’s spacious super kitchen and started baking. It was a lot of work but also lots of fun. And everybody enjoyed the cookies.

Same day with the money I made for the no snorkeling I sent Sid and Werner on a fishing tour, my Xmas present for both of them. They had fun and had a few LDRs and none for freezer.

Christmas was wonderful. In Latin countries and in Europe we celebrate it on Christmas Eve. Adriana a Colombiana invited us over for a Xmas Celebration. The only difference between here and in Switzerland, we start at 5 or 6 and here they start at 7:30 with dinner around 9 pm. We had a wonderful time and the turkey was yummy. Jerry made the gravy and I watched him adding milk to the gravy, wow it was delish. Adriana’s daughter and son in law are both opera singer so they sang two songs. After they sang Besa me mucho I told Adriana I wished they would also sing Historia de un Amor, which is written by a Panamenian guy, when his brother lost his wife. My favorite song and first song I learned on my guitar in Portobelo. Rui said the author’s son lives there. After I told her she smiled at me and pointed at Mariella and said: “Her dad wrote that song.” Wow, instant goosebumps, what are the chances wow. So a bit later on Mariella and I sang the song together and it is her sister Sandra that lives in Portobelo and I had met her as well.

It was a late night when we returned to our dinghy and the tide now was very low, it was a long way to get the dink back in the water.

Adriana and Jerry

More Xmas cookies, the one we did not make Cinnamon Stars

Mariella

On the 25^th we were all at Ginny and Werner’s. 16 people, including Tara and Mike on Xenia. Food was amazing too and all had fun. But as usual some of the guests do an “eat and run” and Adriana caught on to that and insisted I should play Christmas songs on the guitar (which I still had at the house). Only knowing 1 song I played that then clinkered around some others. Everybody that was going to leave stayed and we all had a great time. It was a fun evening everybody started singing and everybody left late. When we left we noticed at least 9 empty bottles of wine, some rum and a tequila bottle, yep we had fun. Werner announced that this was the best Xmas he has ever had at the house. Funny thing in 1998 we did a Christmas party in Mazatlan and he said something then, what a life.

making Cinnamon Stars

After all the partying we took a day of rest and on the 27^th we had Ginny, Werner and Adrienne over for rabbit stew, that we had planned to do a loooooong time ago. It was delish and it was a beautiful evening.

Weather has been wonderful and in the meantime all the Panamanian boats have arrived. We were told that it is going to be a madhouse and you don’t want to be here. So far so good, we enjoyed watching all the boats. Except for one 34 foot power boat anchored next to us less than a boat length, I asked him if he was planning to spend the night there, he said no, ok great. But while I was talking to him 3 idiot boats, well dinghies for the big mega yachts, the size of our boat and bigger, rafted right in front of us over our anchor not even a boat length in front of our bow. We could have spit into their cockpit. I asked them if they were going to stay the night and it was a confirmed yes. Nope not gonna happen so I asked if they could move as they are over our anchor and dangerously close should we get heavy winds, which were predicted or a wind change. “Tranquillo, tranquillo”, they shouted and were not gonna move. One guy screamed over “Hola Manuela”, great they know me too. Anyway I hopped into the dink and headed over there to explain why they had to move. They did’t give a damn that our boat moves differently than theirs and that we will hit in the current changes. Tranquillo, tranquillo we are accustomed to this, no worries we sleep on the boat nothing will happen, they tried to convince me. Yeah right, drinking till drunk then sleep. Told them they had two options either move or we move which means they have to move as they were over our anchor. Well we ended up moving as they motored their boat raft forward. We re-anchored quite a bit away from them and further out from the island and were barely hooked when a big wake from a power boat hit. You should have seen the 3 rafted boats, the dudes big eyed trying to hang on for dear life and trying to keep the boats from hitting each other. We just laughed. Oh yeah a 4^th boat rafted with them and all were noisier than heck. The second evening they all rafted up again and guess what, at least not in front of us but next to us,  they ended up dragging and not toward us but out sea. Ah karma!!!!!

About 8 pm Sid happened to see something floating next to our boat. It was as nice AB dinghy with console worth about 10 grand. It had broken loose on one of the mega yachts. I kept a flashlight on it and Sid hopped into the dinghy and rescued the breakaway. About 5 minutes later and another of same type dinghy with flashlight approached, I asked them if that was their dinghy. Sure enough, they thanked us to no end then headed back to their yacht.

The following morning a guy in the same dinghy approached Paradise. It was the owner and he looked awfully familiar, but couldn’t quite place him until he said: is your dinghy an AB? I responded: yes and you sold it to us! It was Alberto the owner of Centro Marino. Didn’t recognize him with a baseball cap on. It was too funny. Anyway we chat a little and he handed me a very nice bottle of red wine as a thank you for having rescued his dinghy.

On the 29^th I prepped a whole bunch of goodies for all our island friends to come out on the boat for Happy Hour. Unfortunately not 1 made it, oh well, Sid and I enjoyed a yummy Sushi.

Poor Adrienne had her hands full and at one point called me and told me that the airport guy was frantic as a plane is coming in in 10 minutes and this huge catamaran with a tall mast anchored right in front of the airstrip if we could rush over there and tell him he needs to move ASAP. So we officially turned into the Contadora Harbor Patrol LOL. The guy OKd right away to move but you know how long that takes bringing up anchor. The plane arrived before they could move and OMG the plane was lower than the mast when it passed them. Poor airport guy almost had a heart attack.

After a rough day Adrienne called us and ashed if she could come out, so Sid picked her up and we spoiled her with sushi and all the goodies I had prepped. I had made a wonderful Mojito with fresh Watermelon juice and Coconut Rum, yum, you need to try this. We ended up killing a bottle of bubbly and a second one in the dink doing a harbor cruise. Adrienne knows a lot of boats so we visited them all including Albert’s. It was huge fun. For the second night we had a fireworks show, can’t wait for the 31^st.

The anchorage didn’t get as bad as we were told but there were 72 boats in there all mega yachts with their dinghies bigger than our boats. We had fireworks all night long but it was really spectacular at midnight. It was pretty cold as well so Sid and I toasted the New Year in with a hot Dr. Pepper and we saved the bubbly for the following day.

Ginny was dying to prepare a Danish Smorgasbord for a while so it was a great occasion to do it on the 1^st. of January. I had no idea what to expect but OMG all light and delicious food and according to Werner everything had its place to be eaten and it’s way to be prepared, first we ate his home made pumpernickel bread and other breads he made. The smorgasbord was with smoked baby clams, hard boiled eggs, onion slices, lox, capers, pickled red cabbage, tomatoes, cheeses tradition a beer and Aquavit.

I forgot to mention we were the only boat in the anchorage with Xmas lights up The evening Adrienne came out she told me she just met some tourists on the beach playing guitar so she told them, pointing at our boat, that I was playing guitar as well, they responded: oh the Xmas Tree People, but last night they turned it off after only ½ hour. LOL. So that night we had the lights on for 3 hours.

Becky and Jason friend of Adrienne we had met at her BD party left for the holidays and Adrienne was house sitting. We spent a couple sunsets up there. What an incredible house.

One morning we saw rays jumping like popcorn all over the place behind out boat and towards shore. We thought they were spotted eagle rays until the next morning when we got into the dinghy to see them up close, we realize they were baby mantas about 16 to 18 inches across, which as an adult they are 30 some feet. Amazing critter.         

Susan we also had met at Adrienne’s BD arrived again. We were going to have her over for dinner when Ginny texted that Terry just told her it was Ilene’s BD so we changed plans and all met and Ginny for a surprise party for her.  Susanne and Adrienne came over the following day and it was huge fun.

The following day Susan went fishing and invited us all to dinner. Look at the fish (plural)  she caught:

Celebrating Ileen's BD

Terry and Ileen

Our time got shorter and shorter for our departure to Mexico, on the … sailed to Chapira and spend 3 beautiful days there. The beaches are incredible. The one across is littered with pink and orange scallop shells, I have never seen so many shells in one spot. We found a little path that took us to the West side of the island where an even prettier beach presented itself. This would be a wonderful anchorage were the water deep enough, not even catamaran can anchor in here. The beach is untouched and walking on it you sink into the soft sand to your ankles. No shells on this beach though. Later on that day we also went to the East side of Chapira island to the beach that is visible from Contadora. Wow, just as beautiful if not more. The tides here are amazing, at low tide you have these big beaches to walk on, at high tide depending on the moon cycle the beaches can totally disappear. We enjoyed a few relaxing days here then returned to Contadora. I needed to buy the flight from here to Panama City for my provisioning trip. Rumors has it that Air Perlas was sold and the flight are unpredictable so instead of leaving on Tuesday I decided to leave already on Monday as lots of visitors leave on Monday to go back to work.

Definitely suffering with food out there

Agape sailing into the sunset

I also needed Internet to organize our European Vacation. My niece Tyffany is getting married on June 27 in Switzerland and nephew Michele on August 4 in southern Italy, so we thought to check out reposition cruises. Every April to June the cruise ship leave the Caribbean for the approaching hurricane season to the Mediterranean. They give up to 50% discount for these trips. We found a cruise leaving May 3^rd from Fort Lauderdale to Barcelona, via Azores, Madeira, both in Portugal, Casablanca in Morocco, Cadiz, Malaga and Barcelona in Spain. We arrive on May 18 and will spend my BD in Barcelona. On the 20 we will fly to Malaga to visit my bestie Rita and spend a week with her and family. It will be fun to show Sid Rita’s Spanish school and see all her neighbor and friends again. I was checking flights from Malaga to Zurich out and found 2 options: For $88 via Lisabon or $66 via Oslo? Go figure Zurich is between Malaga and Oslo, but hey, my cousin Gaby lives in Holmestrand 1 ½ hours out of Oslo, so I emailed her and so we are flying to Oslo and spend a week with here in Norway, how kewl is that. June 4 we fly to Zurich. The flights are amazingly cheap, for under $ 600 for both these 3 flights.

As Michele’s wedding is in southern Italy what better way to leave 2 weeks ahead of time and travel through Italy.

You probably wonder where will Paradise be, well, it’s going to be a fast trip north to Mexico, not much dillydallying around and depending on weather when we get their we have 3 options, Chiapas, Barra de Navidad or Puerto Vallarta. Which one we will know when we get there.

We are organized through Zurich so we pulled anchor to explore the rest of the Perlas.

Ginny told us how wonderful (T)Ampon is (I added the T to remember the name LOL). Indeed it was a very calm anchorage or it looked that way but at night we did get a wrap around the island swell and the wind was howling. This is a good anchorage to do boat projects, even going up the mast, but there is not much there, no beaches, not our cup of tea. We did take the dinghy for a spin around the neighborhood and found behind Ampon Islands on Isla Casaya the cutest village called Casaya. 

 

Sid stayed in the dinghy while I wandered around. Everything looked clean but there was no soul on the one paved path in. Except the lady that owns the only convenient store. The island is about 15 houses long and has a temple at the end. I checked the store if they had butter, yes the worst thing to run out butter happened, almost out of garlic now that will be a huge disaster. Most Latin convenient store just sell Margarine, no thanks, olive oil will do, got plenty of that. Pretty island with incredible view over other islands, the beach with white sand and turquoise water. 

We left further south the following morning, wind was still howling but going with it was no problem. Our destination was Espiritu Santo by the biggest Perlas Island El Rey, also highly recommended by Ginny. Heading into the anchorage area about ½ mile north of Espiritu Santo is a bite that is pretty well protected and OMG the view, it was so beautiful we decided to anchor there. It reminded us of photos we have seen of beaches in Thailand. Since this is a nameless anchorage we named it Playa Thailandia. I have never seen a jungle this dense as this one, rugged and steep and all the rocks blended in as they were covered in moss, beautiful. The parrots were screeching their story of the day and early morning the chit chatter continued. It was pure Paradise, well the howler monkeys were missing. 

We ventured out dinghy through the Espiritu Santo anchorage and headed into a shallow bay where fish were jumping everywhere. On our sail here we did land a nice Bonita with white meat, so we landed another one but later cleaning it found out this one was the dark meat one, so rather on the fishy side. 
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On our way back the only other boat in the south anchorage waved to us so we went over and said hi. The captain was German, crew was from US, France and Sweden. The French guy and US gal had a lot of questions and when they found out we have been cruising for 22 years and living onboard for 32 and 42 they jumped on it. Both are independent writers and wanted are conducting interview with cruisers they meet, so they could not wait to do so. Later on at 5 they came over and the cameras and tape recorders were running and the stories were flying. It was fun, but not enough time so we postponed the interview for the next day on the beach, but the Captain had other plans and they headed on, bummer, it was fun, but they have more than enough to write a story. 

They were looking to go to Esmeralda a small village on the south side of El Rey, in the hopes to find some Veggies. I cautioned them to lock everything down as it is unpredictable. A few days later we heard a boat was burglarized, I hope it is not them because all their cameras, computer etc. are gone.

While at that subject, Portobelo is getting a bad rap, a boat was boarded by 7 thugs with guns, screamed cocaine, cocaine and pistol whipped the crew, made them lay on the floor while they rand sacked the entire boat. The Captain and 3 more crew were ashore and came back to the guys still onboard, but they decided to leave. But headed to the next boat, luckily this guy had a big dog, Latinos don’t like dogs so they left. They did shine the light on another boat before this one screaming boarding the boat, but left the dog boat instead.

Puerto Lindo they had multiple robberies including in the marina, so that side is not all too safe anymore. So either avoid those two places or be very careful.

 Back to the fish we caught, I have been dying to make fish jerky, last batch I made was 21 years ago in the Sea of Cortez. I marinated the thing sliced meat in smoky flavored soy sauce with garlic, herbs and other seasonings. Sid apologized that he had no 100 lb fishing line to hang it up. To his amazement I brought my little jar out with 3 100 test lines I had kept since the Sea of Cortez, the Jerky Factory was open. 

Sid made plans to circumnavigate the whole island which would have been about 60 miles. Well we liked it so much on day 2 he said: would you mind if we just stay here it’s so beautiful? It had crossed my mind as well, so we stayed. The beach was amazing, we walked it the first day and found the path that goes across to the East Beach. It was low tide and wow the water was so far out, the beach is ¼ mile deep. Our side is more steep to and at super high tide, which by the way we got, during that the bottom kissed Paradises butt, the beach totally disappears. 

 

Second day we went to explore the rocks on the East side of the anchorage, there was a natural bridge carved into the rock. Pretty rugged. On our walk slipped with one foot but was OK, Sid followed and he slipped at same place and fell hard on his back, got his kidney punched pretty good. Never had a bruise but was out for 3 days.

One early morning this 3 man fishing boat came in. I was just cooking breakfast. The 3 guys looked like they could use a good cup of coffee, so I made them some and threw a few extra eggs in the omelet and delivered it to them. They were so happy and couldn’t get over it. We left with a nice, nice Mahi Mahi. They are fishermen from Panama City that come out it 8 to 10 days fishing before returning. Hard job. (I made some more jerky as there was a lot of fish, much better than the bonita).

From them we learned there is a little stream next to the beach where they bath and also get their drinking water. Later on that day we had a refreshing bucket bath and enjoyed the scenery.

As soon as Sid was able to move around again, not necessarily felt better, we headed back to Chapira for 1 day and night then returned to Contadora as I had some more flights for Europe to organize.

Did I luck out purchasing the flight upfront! Ginny decided to go to PC as well but the flight was fully booked. So she will take the afternoon ferry.

The flight was very calm and I only had to wait a few minutes for Debi and Roger to arrive. It was sooooo good to see Debi but my heart it sinking lower and lower, knowing soon it’s going to be a big see you later and who knows when we will see all our friends here again. 

It was like good old times or like it was just yesterday going shopping with Debi and Roger. Debi bought a new dinghy which was too funny when they had to wrap it with seran wrap as the store did not have a box for it and she had to transport it on a truck to the San Blas then from there on a panga out to her boat.

We covered a lot of ground and arrived at out hotel TRYP Windham just a little past 4pm. Melania was already waiting in the lobby. We relaxed first sipping on a bottle of bubbly before we headed for dinner. Second day in town, Debi did her own shopping, while Melania came with me. I took her to her favorite stored and a few she hasn’t been to yet, then for lunch out to the causeway for some Calamari and Clams. At 6 we met the rest of the PTY Chicas, yes we have a chat now LOL, for Mojitos then a wonderful dinner at Sen the Vietnamese restaurant right across from Siete Mares. Food is just amazing and we right after we were done eating a big explosion rocked the air. I saw lots of spark from the transformer across the street that just blew up. Darkness overcame most of the city. Funny thing was when we got to our hotel which is at least 1 mile away, we heard generators everywhere but our hotel seemed to be fine.

We finished the evening with a white Russian at 7 Mares.

Dinner at Rincon Suisso

Amazing wine celar

Third day Debi took off with Roger to pick up her new SSB radio in Colon and Roger was going to check us out. This is the very upsetting part. As he checked us out all the paperwork was ok we just needed the stamp in the passport when the immigration guy decided he needed to see us both together. Well, I was in the hotel as Roger is our agent and we don’t need to be with him and Sid was in Contadora. Well long story short my shopping was done, as it didn’t make sense buying veggies and having to sail back to PC. Sid was pretty upset as well. It’s almost 40 miles to sail into the weather and current to get to Panama City. We are short on time already so that adds another 2 lost days plus 80 extra miles to our itinerary. How does my song go: Don’t worry Shit happens.

I returned to Contadora, at least we had the dry goods. We are just waiting up Super Bowl, which is today. We are having a fun party and Ginny and Werner’s. Tomorrow early it’s going to be saying see you later again to some wonderful friends. That’s the part I hate on cruising.

We are heading back to Mexico and up the Sea of Cortez, and hope to make it to at least Puerto Vallarta by begin of April.

There probably will no postings on the trip up due to lack of Internet. But I will update you as soon as we get there.

Hugs and kisses

Yes the nights are cold in Panama

Here are a few photos of our good friends Carmelita and Roberto that used to live in Cartagena and Cholon, now in Florida. After 20 years they finally tied the knot on November 17.