Salardup, San Blas

So we were doing some brisk sailing around San Blas, zipping between islands so quickly that it often left us wanting to do a bit more sailing.  But we had a trip to Locombia (Colombia, but I’m sure you got that) in which we’d have plenty of sailing.  Against the wind, waves, and current. So  these short, fast hops were fine with me.

We overtook a larger monohull, which is always fun.  It may sound petty, but when you’re sailing – it’s a bummer to have another boat blow by you.  So it’s good that doesn’t happen often.

Salardup

We pulled into Salardup in front of a monohull that left about an hour ahead of us.  It was a little tricky as said monohull took a weird angle, and I didn’t realize it until we’d already taken the inside track – but we kind of cut her off.  It wasn’t intentional.

She pulled in right behind us, but as we were first, we had a chance at some prime real-estate.  I nosed NOMAD up to a little sand spit in about 10 feet of water.  No boats in front of us, which meant our view from the boat would be an unobstructed view of a beautiful Caribbean beach, with water a thousand different shades of blue.  We watched the anchor drop, it hung and we got straight to the anchor beer and setting up our tent-shade-thing.

We recognized more than a couple of the boats in the anchorage, but nobody that we’d consider friends.  A quick run by the charter boats in the area and we figured out who we knew and who we didn’t.  In short:  we didn’t know any of the younger crowd.

Luke packed our beach-invasion bag, which consists of enough alcohol to cover a small country, a few hammocks, music playing devices, fresh ceviche, some playing cards, a book or two, etc.  And then we invaded the beach.  It wasn’t quite as epic as Normandy, but we made a good show of it.

As soon as I went to the local Kuna -in-charge, he told me his outboard was broken.  I’m not quite an outboard mechanic, but I’ve learned what can keep an outboard from running.  And I can tell if something doesn’t look right.  So Luke and Amanda began setting up our little beach party spot – and I began troubleshooting our Kuna host’s outboard.

Outboard troubleshooting

During this our friend in the monohull, whom we thrashed on the way here, came over to lend a hand with his tools.  I was happy to have the help.  As soon as I took a look into the outboard I knew this wasn’t going to be an easy fix.  We check all the usual – cleaned the carb, checked the plugs, etc.  Of course, almost everything we looked into had some problem with it, including a missing bolt – which holds the carb onto the head.  A fairly large deal.  And it wasn’t pushing water through the engine.  And it was leaking gasoline like a sieve. Well…

We tried for more than an hour and the only thing I managed to do was find a myriad of problems, get a few sea-urchin spines stuck in my foot, and lose my sunglasses in the water.

Volleyball

Eventually I gave up on the outboard, and so did the Kuna.  They decided to put up their sails, and forego the troublesome outboard; I prefer this method too – mechanical stuff fails quite often in this environment.

Sailing > Motoring

I was starving and wanted a drink.  I dove straight into the ceviche, then made a drink, then took a quick survey of the island.  We weren’t alone, and there was a volleyball net.  Luke got a volleyball and then the real fun started.  First up was a German and American girl.  Luke paired up with the German, I got the American.  They had to leave before our game was over.  Then we were alone on the island again.  About the time I started to think we should head back to the boat, a dinghy full of drunken Englishmen and Englishwomen came ashore.

Ceviche!

Quick introductions were followed by a game of rum volleyball. Which is volleyball, with lots of rum.  Compared to our English friends, we all seemed very sober.  The cycle started with a few volleys, followed by a drink-break.  Then we’d cool off, and wash off in the crystal-clear water.  Then we’d go play another game of volleyball.  A fun afternoon, for sure.

Volleyball

Back onboard we heard the Englishfolk partying late into the night, but Luke was out almost immediately on the trampolines.  Amanda and I cooked.  Then we ate, watched a movie, and went to sleep.

Naturally, the wind picked up overnight, turning our tent-shade-thing into a loudly flapping tent-sail-thing.  I finally convinced myself to get out of bed and take it down.  With the Englishfolk passed out, and our tent-shade-thing silenced – it was finally peaceful enough to sleep.

Salardup, San Blas

San Blas Sailing

Good news ‘round these parts:  my fixes have held up.  We’re mobile, and its likely (nothing’s for sure in a marine environment) that S/V NOMAD is actually in better shape than she’s ever been.  Aside from things that need to be done via a haul-out.

Leaving Porvenir

There were a few worrying things over the last couple of days – the most notable being an exhaust leak.  With that fixed, and new, unobstructed exhaust elbows installed – the engines are performing as well as can be expected.  We’ll really try them out on the way to Locombia, but right now we have wind – and I’ve missed sailing so much, that’s all I want to do.

We were stuck in Porvenir waiting on some epoxy to dry.  But with that dry, I was able to install the exhaust silencer, clamp everything together, and try it all out.  It worked.  We did a last trip into “town” to pick up some fruit and another bottle of rum.  With that sorted, we picked up anchor, raised sails – and did some pretty epic sailing.

We plowed though a bit of rough stuff crossing the channels.  After we were through that though – we were flying.  I managed to grab a screenshot of us at 8.1 knots, with a dirty bottom.  I love sailing like that.  The only downside is that when you’re sailing that fast – the “day trips” between islands become much shorter.  Which can leave you wanting to keep sailing.

Kuanidup

Either way, we enjoyed the sail out of Porvenir.  We sailed to a fun little spot that our buddy Andy showed us – Kuanidup.  There’s an island there that is usually uninhabited, and next door there’s a bar with (wait for it….…)  A POOL TABLE.  I wouldn’t nominate it as a spot for a billiards tournament – but any kind of pool table in San Blas is welcome.  Playing pool against a backdrop of bright blue ocean water, listening to the waves crash on white sand beaches is something worth mentioning.

Check out the pool cues:

San Blas Billards

There were three games played.  The captain took home two wins. Then we found the hammocks.  Then Luke found a swing.

Hammocks

More hammocks

Swinging in the Carib

Then we went back to the mothership, cooked, watched a movie and slept.  The cooking is worth a mention.  We made hamburgers, Luke made hamburger buns.  We ate like Kings (and a Queen).

Diving Kuanidup

That night we got a bit of a beam swell, and it made our anchorage a bit uncomfortable so nobody slept particularly well.  I heard Amanda up early so I stumbled out of bed around 7AM.  We had coffee and breakfast, hoping Luke would wake up so we could go dive.  Despite a knock on his door, he was completely out.  So Amanda and I went diving.

There are two spots worth diving in this area – one that’s about 60-70 feet, with mediocre vis.  There’s a hole there that holds nice Dog Snapper and a few 6 pound lobsters.  But it’s hard to locate, deep, etc.  Amanda was with me – so this trip was about ceviche and sightseeing.  So we choose Option 2 – a shallow water dive with really beautiful coral formations.  I’d pulled a decent Dog Snapper out of there last go-round and knew where the majority of the snapper lived.

We kicked against current, located the snapper house – and I started diving.  They’d clearly been hunted.  They knew what speargun range was.  The big ones kept their distance, the small ones were curious.  After a half hour, mostly spent on the bottom of the ocean – I opened up and started pulling the trigger.  I shot one, missed one, shot another, lost him, and then shot another small snapper.  One Dog Snapper and one Schoolmaster came back for ceviche.

Amanda wanted to learn how to clean fish – which is a skill I’m happy to teach (and a chore I’m happy to offload), so we had a quick lesson.  Finger’s crossed that she’ll clean more fish as we get them.

Dinner

More dinner

Leaving Kuanidup

At this point we were over Kuanidup and anxious to set sail.  We had sunshine, wind, and relatively calm seas – perfect sailing weather.  So I did a couple quick fixes in the engine rooms and then we pulled our anchor up and sailed out.  Again, we had the wind with us and only a moderate swell – so we were cooking.  Not quite 8 knots, but we made it up to 7.9 before losing wind behind the islands.  Zipping around San Blas like this is a bunch of fun.

At this point we didn’t really know where we were going – just a general direction.  We’d missed the Panama Connection Net thus far – so we had no idea where our friends were.  We headed East.  We started to pass Salardup, but decided to pull in for a night.

I’m glad we did, this would turn out to be one of our favorite stops.

San Blas Sailing

We were underway.  Motoring out of Puerto Lindo into a 15 knot headwind, 10 foot seas, and a current.  It wasn’t going to be easy sailing – but I’ve done more with less.  Things were going almost going according to plan, which is remarkable in itself.

Wind and Waves

I was starting to gain some confidence in my engines.  Then Amanda noticed some black smoke coming from the portside engine – incomplete combustion – potential causes being:  something around the prop, clogged exhaust elbow, clogged air filter, etc.  Luke went in to check the props, nothing found.  I found the problem shortly thereafter – definitely a clogged air filter.  That problem solved, I was breathing easier – we were going to need the engines today.  No more shenanigans.

Coming out of the channel into the craziness that was the Carribean between Puerto Lindo and San Blas, wasn’t fun.  I was under full power, directly into a 15 knot headwind.  The waves were breaking all around us.  Not small ones.  If I were a religious man, I would have said a small prayer – if the outside as bad as the inside, this was going to be a long, green day.

Once outside, things were slightly less tumultuous.  The waves weren’t topping off, they were longer, with longer periods between them.  And once outside, I could turn and use some of that wind.  We raised the main, put out the genoa – and we actually were making a couple knots.  This was very close to the wind, with waves and current against us – so I was happy to see we were making any forward progress, sans engines.

The next problem was one from the night before.  I’d left it unresolved because it hadn’t appeared to be a show-stopper.  But as we sailed, the problem got worse – what had started as something occasionally making my radio quit was now shorting out my house and navigation systems. This meant no autopilot, no depth readings, etc.  That is an issue.

So I put Luke in the captain’s chair and he navigated using the compass.  I went below and began playing with connections – looking for heat or anything amiss.  When I went to flip the house-power switch, I felt some heat there.  I played with it for a bit and decided to switch switches, hoping it was just a bad switch/breaker.  After a bit of delicate electrical work, in 10 foot seas, I got everything hooked up (without getting electrocuted) and it was working again. Second problem solved.

Mechanical Paranoia

Running engines while battling against currents, winds, and seas makes me paranoid. Every little sound, every little variation of RPM, every little thing makes me very nervous.  The crew was all knocked out, the captain made sea-sickness pills mandatory for this little adventure.

On the way we caught a nice Spanish Mackerel.  Luke began cleaning it, then got seasick, then threw-up.  He managed to not throw up on the decks, or the fish – which is all that was important.  Then I took over cleaning the fish.  Shortly thereafter, I saw S/V REACH pop up on my AIS, going the opposite way. They definitely were going the “right” way, we definitely weren’t.  I hailed them, and we had a quick conversation.  He reiterated what I already knew:  we must have been in a hurry to take on wind, current, and seas.  I admitted that I was tired of Puerto Lindo, and had some crew onboard that had some schedule pressure. Surprising enough – we were doing a little over 6 knots with only one engine.  S/V REACH was doing roughly the same speed, so we weren’t really that bad off.  The difference: we were doing a fair amount of up and down, while moving forward at 6 knots.

By 2PM we’d made it to Punta San Blas, where we make the turn into either Chichime, Yansaladup, or Porvenir.  I needed to get a visa issue sorted, so we went into Porvenir.  When I was making the turn upwind we noticed some black smoke coming from the starboard side engine.  I figured it was the same problem – clogged air filter.  I was correct, but when I popped the starboard side engine hatch, I was accosted by a plume of black exhaust smoke.

That means that I had an exhaust leak.  Which means my entire engine compartment and my bilges were flooded with black, oily carbon-water.  Nothing made it as high as the engines or floorboards inside, thankfully.  But, rather than a relaxing evening with drinks and dinner – I was stuck back inside engine rooms – scrubbing exhaust residue and soaking up blackwater.

As to what actually happened – I’m hoping it was one of two relatively simple fixes:  a) a leak in the exhaust hose or b) a crack in the exhaust silencer.  After cleaning the engine room for a couple hours – I’d managed to transfer most of the black sooty mess onto myself and out of the engine room.  Then I pulled out my spare exhaust hose, measured and cut appropriately.  Then I cleaned and pulled out the exhaust silencer, where I did find a small crack.  I’m hoping the combination of reinforcing the exhaust silencer (epoxy and glass mat) and replacing the exhaust hose will fix this issue.

I could only do so much before it was time for dinner.  Then I was exhausted, so I called it a night about a third of the way into Office Space.  When you’re really tired, even classics can’t keep you awake.

Visas and Exits

The next morning I finally got to play Dumb Gringo in Porvenir at the immigration office – hoping the most I face is a stiff fine for my non-observance of certain visa guidelines.  In fact, it wasn’t entirely my fault – but I was nervous.  No reason though – I made it in and out under an hour and the only fine I paid was $50.  I can handle that.  There were a couple moments of “oh-shit” when the guys running things became very serious – but I think it’s their job to overplay that so they get a little more money out of you.

While I was dealing with immigration and the port authority, Luke epoxied our exhaust silencer.  Then we all went into “town” to provision.  We got distracted exploring and forgot eggs. But we remembered Coca Cola, rum, and beer.  Then we came back, and practiced various dives off the boat.  The rest of the day was spent between getting covered in oil/soot and attempting to clean off said oil/soot from my body.  In a failed attempt to clean my hands/fingernails I resorted to steel wool.  I only succeeded in shredding our steel wool.  I gave up.  Luke went surfing, we cooked dinner and drank a couple of drinks.  Sometimes the best thing you can do is remove yourself from a project and enjoy a drink.  Then I picked Luke up from his surf break.

 

Surf Pickup

Goodbye Porvenir

I was a little anxious to see if the epoxy job would hold on our exhaust silencer and get the exhaust system back together.  I desperately wanted to vacate this anchorage in Porvenir.  There were a couple of tweaks that I needed to do, but it appeared that the exhaust fixes held and we were back in business.

We remedied our partial shopping failure on land, then briskly motored out of Porvenir.  There were a few options:  Chichime, Kuanidup, Yansaldup, etc.  We chose Kuanidup.  There we could anchor in relative peace, have an island to ourselves, and do some pretty decent diving.

8.1 knots

So we raised sails and soon enough we were doing a bit over 8 knots.  Which is a fun sailing pace, for sure.  Anything over 7 makes me feel good, anything under 5 makes motor-sailing tempting.  Anything under 3 knots makes me wonder what the Hell I’m doing wrong.  We didn’t have to worry what we were doing wrong.

Wind and Waves

Luke and I were both back onboard.  We had most of the boat parts we needed.  The boat was cleaner than I’d left it.  Luke hadn’t starved to death.  The monkeys remembered me.  So, things were looking up.

Getting Out

After putting the groceries and boat parts away, I needed to chill out.  And after a couple days in Panama City the boat seems remarkably tranquil.  It’s exactly what one needs.  Like therapy.  We retired early that night.

I woke up early. Very early.  For the next few days it was all-day-boatwork-marathons.  We were trying to catch a very minor break in the crazy weather – so we could get to San Blas to wait on an even less likely break to jump to Cartagena.  The first weather window was coming up very quickly and I needed to do a TON of work.  Everything that I’d taken apart – injectors, alternators, exhaust systems, sailtracks, etc – needed to be put back together in working order.  As always, when you put something back together, it often doesn’t go back together quite as easily as it comes apart.

Include some trash burning, some oil disposal, more cleaning, and a bit of frustration.  Well, that was our boatwork marathon/sprint.  We did take time to have a beer every once in a while, and we did usually cut out around 5PM – leaving us enough time to cook, clean, and be human.  This is us drinking beer, while burning trash.  I’m covered in engine oil, literally covered – which is why that shirt appears to fade from blue to black.  Luke is remarkably clean, I don’t remember why.

Burning trash…

I spend quite a bit of time in the engine rooms.  But, as long as I have food and water and someone to hand me a tool occasionally – I don’t mind it as much as I used to. The one pet-peeve of mine is that the engine rooms are dirty right now.  I hate having dirty engine rooms.  It leads to a dirty Nate.  Which leads to a dirty boat. Other than that – I was as happy as a guy working on a boat, on a schedule, can be.

Luke started getting our other cabin in order.  We had a new crew member coming:  Amanda.  Another blonde-haired Australian traveler.  She’d reached out, seemed very keen, and had immediate availability with a relatively open-ended schedule.  That’s the kind of thing that I can work with.  So we agreed, I sent her “directions” and right about the time I got the boatwork complete – she arrived.  I picked her up covered in soot and engine oil – but that’s probably a realistic first impression.  We had a beer, she ate, I took her back to the boat.

That night Rob was interested in meeting our new Aussie crewmember.  He had already buzzed by the boat and made very clear hand-gestures (hours earlier) indicating that we should make haste to come and have a drink onboard Southern Comfort.  We did so after a little visit to see the monkeys.  After a couple of months of absence – the monkeys and I are still on good terms.

Monkey business

Amanda con monos

When we arrived Rob had other Aussie friends onboard and a Swiss guy who’d bought a boat and contractually received something like 700 bottles of various liquors and wines with the boat (in his keel/bilge).  The bottles were being carried in the bilge of the boat he purchased, and the rumor is they were worth nearly as much as the asking price of the boat.  Some very old wines were in there.  He provided the alcohol that night, and we all had to do the smell/taste tests to figure out what was what – as many of the labels had begun peeling off.  We came back, I cooked, we went to sleep.

The next day Amanda and Luke scrubbed decks while I finished some work on the engines.  Then we went to lunch at PanamaMarina – where the Frenchies cook some great food.  We had a couple of drinks with lunch, then came back and started arranging for our departure the following day.  I checked weather and we had a small window – though we’d be beating against 10 foot seas, 15 knots of wind, and likely a current.  That was the best weather we were going to get, though, at least for a week or so.  As a buddy said, “Oh well, sometimes you just get plastered.”  It’s true.  Perfect weather is often a luxury.

Luke was very ready to go.  Amanda wasn’t worried.  I’d been through worse.  I made the call – we were leaving tomorrow.  So we tightened everything down.  Then I made arrangements to have my car and mooring sold while I was gone.  Then I said my goodbyes.

When I got back to the boat I noticed a troubling problem with the electrical system – it was shorting out, sometimes knocking out power to my entire house-system (fridge, radio, lights, water-pumps).  The problem was intermittent, the worst kind.  So I started trying to isolate the problem – starting with the things that I’d changed over the past few days.  After two hours of work, I’d been sure I fixed it twice – only to have it re-appear.  It was late, I was hungry, and I needed to be 100% the next day – so I gave up.  We cooked a larger-than-average dinner, so we’d have leftovers for lunch the following day.  The seas were large enough that cooking was going to be a challenge underway.  I went to sleep around 10PM, and woke up around 5:30AM.

I started coffee, started prepping the boat, and grabbed a bite to eat.  Then the crew was up and we were getting ready for takeoff.  We managed most things without issue.  Then we were motoring out of the anchorage.

I’m hoping this goodbye was my final one in Puerto Lindo, but you never know.  Either way, it felt damn good getting out.

Getting Out

Challenges in Civilization

No dice on the Pacific Puddle Jump Party.  Luke is running out of cash and I need to fix too much stuff on the boat.  So we worked on the boat, mostly. Or worked on getting parts for the boat.  I even climbed the mast, which for a guy who is moderately afraid of heights – isn’t my favorite task.  Below is what Luke spent a couple hours looking up at.  Poor guy.

Mast Climbing

Exhaust Elbows

I finally got ahold of the guy fabricating my exhaust elbows (Ali, Eric Bauhaus’ father).  He said he was busy so they’d be late, and he raised the price.  No problem though; he’s well known for his skill fabricating, the parts from Volvo were even more expensive, and I’m going to end up with a better product this way (stainless rather than cast-iron).  So when they were done, I left Luke on the boat and headed back to Panama City with another long list of boat parts, the primary ones being the exhaust elbows.

I spent the first day in Panama City looking for a diesel compression tester.  I visited every halfway decent auto-parts store in the city – a couple had basic kits, but none had the correct adapters.  Not great news.  Next up were a couple more (32’ long) Teleflex cables – I wanted all new cables and a spare (one less thing to worry about).  Naturally I could only find 34’ and 36’ cables, and they were dramatically more expensive than I’d expected – so I passed, hoping to find the right size/price cables elsewhere.

Then I needed fuel line, blower tubing, electric fuel pumps, chemicals to convert rust, etc.  Two more stops and I had  about 1/3 of what I needed.  Then everything was closed and I was starving.  I went to the Surf Hostel.  I took a room, changed into board shorts and soaked in the pool.  Then I grabbed a cheap sandwich.  I was planning a quiet night writing, reading, or doing some research.  But that wasn’t in the cards.

Another Night Out

On the way back from Subway a few girls yelled at me to come and have a drink with them.  There was a moment of internal struggle:  quiet night in, or drink with the group of girls.  I chose what was behind Door Number Two.

We talked, they asked 20 questions, I answered, we drank.  I went back to my room and changed, where I bumped into the owner of the hostel.  We were friends, I asked him to come, he said he was planning on it.  Soon enough we were in a bar, with decent music.  Then more girls came, then some guys, then some other friends of mine from another time in Panama City randomly showed up. Then we started moving around.  A purse was stolen.  Most folks went home.  Four of us went to Casco Viejo, where another purse was stolen and recovered.  Then back to the hostel, where we decided to visit the pool – and I dove in with my phone in my pocket.  Genius.

I woke up feeling meh, with a soaking wet phone and no way to get ahold of Ali, the guy fabricating my exhaust elbows.  Immediately I took the phone to a repair store, where they told me it was worthless (I hated that phone, so I agreed).  I bought a new phone, installed my SIM card and… No numbers.  Or, let me correct that – some numbers.  So I signed into my Google account hoping for the rest of my contacts – no dice.  I was stuck with very, very old contacts;  none of which did me any good in Panama City.  So I started problem solving, and while I was tracking down my fabricator’s phone number, Ali called me.

We met at the mall.  I was late due to traffic and a taxi driver with an IQ in the mid teens.  Ali looks like some cross between a sailor, a mechanic, and the last living Grateful Dead fan.  He’s drinking coffee, I’m starving – but since I am late there’s no time for food.  He starts fidgeting, and I realize that pink backpack he has on his lap actually has a puppy in it.  So I speed up the conversation.  Then his daughter bumps into us.  More conversation, I’m ready to start back to Puerto Lindo.  Then it turns out he forgot the gasket material I needed for these parts in his car.  I follow him to his car, carrying the pink backpack with the puppy in it.  It was a sight worth seeing.

The gaskets aren’t in Ali’s car – must be in his dinghy on the other side of Panama City.  No problem, let’s go.  We go, we talk while waiting in traffic, we agree on a surprising number of moderately deep issues.  But now it’s getting late and I still need those longer Teleflex cables.  So on the way we drop by a marine store. They’re closing, I plead – so they let me in.  I ask for the cables, they bring out cables that are 20’.  I need 32’.  They say they don’t have them.  Then someone appears with two 34’ cables.  I sigh in relief and ask how much.  They tell me over $150/cable.  I rescind my sigh of relief.  They agree to a discount, I pay, they dawdle, I eventually leave.

Finally we make it to the dinghy.  Find the gaskets.  Now I need to get back across Panama City to my car, so I can shop and then drive back across Panama to Puerto Lindo.  Made it back, jumped in the car, and I was finally off.

I left Panama City with no pictures, some of the boat-parts, and only a portion of my dignity.

Heading Back Home

Of course, the adventure wasn’t over.  On the way back I was pulled over by the police.  This isn’t good.  Especially considering I was alone, having a minor issue with my visa, and in a car that had more faults than working lights.  I pulled over, and immediately started sending Luke a Facebook message letting him know that if he didn’t hear back from me soon – to start calling police stations.  You know, just in case.

The cop walked back, asked for my license.  I provided it.  He then asked for my passport, which I made a show of not being able to find.  I was, afterall, in a car that was completely full of boat-parts – so it was believable.  So he walked back and started writing on his pad.  I put my passport somewhere out of sight. The Dumb Gringo is often the best weapon in times like these.  So I played it to the max.  He came back, asked a couple of questions.  I smiled and answered in intentionally broken Spanish.  He handed me a piece of paper, signaled to slow down, and said “that’s all.”  Off the hook.

Then I did the last bit of real shopping before the trip.  The biggest concern was cheese.  I got that, and some other less necessary items like ground beef.  Then the car was full.  Really, really full.

I arrived back in Puerto Lindo with too much stuff in my heap-of-rust car.  Luke was drinking at Hans’ restaurant with The Russian.  Originally we met The Russian in San Blas.  The Russian is younger than us and has a little, simple, 30 foot monohull.  He spends much less time working on his boat, and can speak fluent English, Spanish, and Russian.  He’s also brutally straight-forward and you can quite easily tell when he’s over a given subject or conversation.  I haven’t met enough Russians to know if this is a country-wide trait (that’s a damn big country, too).

The Russian was in the middle of a story about his trip to Colon.  Colon is a nearby city we visit from time to time. Not a fun place, actually more like a war-zone than a city.  Poverty, crime, and not much to redeem it.  Well, in Colon they’d tried to mug The Russian.  But he’d had his boat-papers and his passport with him – and they didn’t have a knife or a gun out.  So they tussled a little and The Russian ended up flat on his back in an alley, but luckily he was wearing a backpack with his important stuff.  And when you’re flat on your back, a backpack is relatively difficult to steal.  The attackers gave up after everyone started screaming, The Russian only suffered a broken computer.  He got lucky.  There are more than a couple of people that have been poked by rather large knives in Colon, in similar scenarios.

I drank a beer, and mentally prepared to load everything in the car into the dinghy and head across 3 foot seas, in the dark.  It was going to be a wet, slow, ride to the mothership.  From there – we begin boat work in earnest.  Including days in the engine room and hours 60 feet in the air.

Challenges in Civilization

So we left Panama City.  On the way back we needed to provision, and deal with the madness associated with driving in Panama City.  We managed to do it all without issue.  The stop at PriceSmart (like a Costco) wasn’t cheap, but we were trying to get everything we needed onboard for a month or so.  The trips themselves to Panama City aren’t easy, fast, or cheap – so I prefer to maximize them.

Shopping

The thing that we got the most excited about in PriceSmart was parmesan cheese.  We could finally eat pasta without feeling like something was missing.  As a general rule, we just needed the stuff that was a) dramatically more expensive elsewhere and b) hard to find elsewhere.  So we got that stuff, but it quickly added up.

Luke in control of the provisions

Then it was time for the drive back to Puerto Lindo.  We managed it without incident, and for the first time – loaded the stuff into the dinghy and then the mothership during daylight.  So much nicer with light.  Every one of these little adventures to the city is followed by a huge relief to be back on the boat.  So we chilled, had a drink or two – and put stuff away.  The next day we started boatwork, and that’s what the next few days were:  boatwork.

Boatwork

Included in this boatwork was (for each engine) an engine oil change, a fuel filter change, a change in alternator belts, and changing impellers.  The impellers weren’t in great shape, despite having changed them less than 100 hours ago. The port side wasn’t too bad, but  when I pulled the hoses off the heat exchanger, pieces (evidently from the previous impeller) fell all over the engine room.  Starboard side only had a two blades left – check it out.

 

Not a pretty impeller…

None of this work is difficult work, but really messy, dirty work that isn’t particularly enjoyable. I really hate oil changes in the boat – everything gets nasty.  And, per usual, I found some issues that needed remedying as I worked through the basic maintenance.  I needed a couple new bolts for my alternator, I needed to rewire some things, remedy some corrosion, and Luke did some general cleaning of the engine rooms.  Here’s Luke getting really dirty.

Luke getting dirty

We were making progress – but it couldn’t be called fun.  We found a couple of things on the mast that needed remedying.  We reran a couple of the sail lines.  We epoxied some stuff.  A couple more 12V plugs were added.  Nothing too notable.

The wind picked up noticeably, and it has begun raining (just a tiny bit) daily.  That brings back some memories of the rainy season here – I hope it’s just a fluke.  It’s a little early for the rain-every-day part of the year.  We still need to climb the mast, finish some epoxy work, get the engine elbows back on, figure out the oil leak in my starboard engine, and do a host of smaller projects.  During the next trip to Panama City, I’m hoping to pick up a compression tester – I really want to know how well these engines are working.  Hopefully, though, when we get the exhaust elbows back we’ll have the “must do before Cartagena” problems solved.  A year into this, and I’ll be something close to a mechanic.  Maybe not a pro, but I’ve been charged money (and had money stolen) by people that do far worse work.

There have been several changes in schedule and plan, but we’re hoping to be out of here early next week. Mid part of next week would be fine too.  From here to San Blas, where we’ll try to stock up on fish and wait for a weather window to head to Cartagena.  In Cartagena I need to do some fairly major boat work.  Then put the boat up for a couple weeks.  Then a trip to Costa Rica for a wedding, and from there – well, who knows?

Very likely we’ll have an additional crew member for this little adventure.  It would be nice to split up watches and general onboard duties.  We’ll see. There’s also the Pacific Puddle Jumper Party at Shelter Bay Marina on Saturday.  That’s something worth visiting for a variety of reasons, but if we go – it’ll set us back a couple of days.  Having a schedule is such a bummer.  Rob and Laurie are going, so it’s even more tempting to visit said party.  After all, this will be a group of people who I’ll probably run into somewhere in the South Pacific, Australia, or Asia over the next couple years.

And I’ve heard my buddy, Ron Abuelo will be around that party.  So there’s that.

Boatwork...

So Luke and I were terrorizing Panama City.  With only the occasional night out in the city, it’s easy to get carried away.  Drinks, food, people, horns, trash, sewage, and everything that comes with visiting a big city.  It’s kind of a culture shock, but I’ve spent enough time in Panama City that it feels familiar.

Panama City

First stop the other night was a bar with, you guessed it, pizza. And beer, of course.  Stop number two was a rooftop bar.  Honestly it reminded me of being in Austin at a couple of our favorite hangouts.  Nice place, expensive though.  The gringos here stick out like sore thumbs, us included.  The good news is that we were able to pick out the Canadian girls without trying too hard.

A crappy picture of a bar in Panama City

The Canadians agreed that we should leave the rooftop bar.  I closed the tab, we went back to the pizza joint where Luke and I started.  They were having a special on beer in a bucket – so we did that.  We really liked the beer buckets and being a few drinks into the night, decided the beer buckets would look especially nice on S/V NOMAD.  I took a trip to the head, and when I’d returned the Canadian girls had stashed the beer bucket for safe-keeping.  Over the rest of the night, we took a couple of cabs, shut down a swimming pool, and eventually woke up in our beds with thinner wallets.  One report has us back about 4AM, another after 5:30AM.  The good news is that we did manage to keep that beer bucket.  And it does look really nice on S/V NOMAD.  That was a damn expensive beer bucket though.

When Luke finally started stirring around it was about 11AM, I’d been awake for a couple hours but was having trouble moving.  In theory, we were leaving the city that day – heading back to NOMAD and doing some shopping along the way.  Of course, when you start your day with a headache at 11AM, it’s unlikely that you’re going to do hours of reprovisioning, boat shopping, and then drive across a country to load up a dinghy to move all of said supplies to your sailing house.  Spoiler alert:  we didn’t go back that day.

Beers Poolside in Panama City

Instead we spent the day drinking beer at the pool.  I resolved to rest and not stress my eye – which was feeling better, but certainly wasn’t healed.  That night we ordered pizza (seeing a pattern here?), played cards, and just hung out.  I was planning an early bedtime, but I met an interesting French chap and we began discussing the differences in the French and US militaries (both of us having served our respective countries), which led us to a discussion about hour the way our language is constructed determines so much about our culture.  I’d explain, but it’s late-night beer-drinking discussion.  So I retired late.

Luke was stoked about seeing a sunrise from a hill overlooking the city.  He tried to convince me to wake up at 5AM with him and go hiking, but that sounded remarkably like those physical training sessions in the military that we did while hungover, with no sleep.  I don’t remember those fondly, so I passed – plus somebody had to have their shit together tomorrow for the shopping marathon and the driving chaos.

Luke’s alarm (my phone) woke me up.  It sucked, I tried to go back to sleep, no dice.  Then an hour or so later Luke showed up.  He wanted to talk, I wanted to rest.  I gave up and got up.  A quick breakfast, a cup of coffee with some (now) friends at the hostel – and we said our goodbyes.  Next up – shopping, driving across a country, and getting back to boat-world (and boat work).

Panama City

Puerto Lindo to Panama City

So we’re back in a place I’d prefer to not be in.  But this is hopefully my last stop here – just need to sell a couple of things, get some parts, do some boat work, and then we’re out.  For good, I hope.

Puerto Lindo

The first thing to do was to work on the engines.  I needed to do a fair amount of work on them.  Starting with locating the oil leak and checking my exhaust elbows (black smoke means incomplete combustion – a likely cause is a blocked exhaust).  I took apart the exhaust, and couldn’t find a blockage in the area that I could get to, without taking the exhaust elbow off of the manifold.  So I decided to take the exhaust elbow off.  Which entailed removing a couple of hoses and some very, very corroded nuts.  I tried every trick in the book to get them off without rounding them off, to no avail.  I rounded a couple of them off.

The next challenge was getting these rounded-off nuts off of the bolts without damaging the bolts themselves.  I tried vise-grips, smaller spanners, different spanners, different sockets, everything…  Eventually I managed to get a smaller sized socket on the rounded-off nuts, and then with the help of some oil – remove the nuts.  When I finally got the elbow off, I was bummed by what I saw – it was badly corroded, falling apart, and almost completely blocked.  As I was scraping away the carbon buildup around the inside of the exhaust elbow, pieces of the elbow itself were falling off.  In an effort to loosen some of the carbon buildup without further damaging the elbow – I began gently tapping on the outside of the elbow with a hammer.  In the picture below, the black buildup should not be there – it should be clear all the way through.

Rotten Exhaust Elbow

Tapping with the hammer made the exhaust elbow almost completely disintegrate in my hands.  Clearly it was time to replace the exhaust elbows.  So, in a state of near-panic I sent an email to figure out what it would cost to get replacements shipped from the states, and how long it would take.  Of course, being a Volvo Penta part – it was priced as if it was cast from gold.  And it would cost almost as much to ship it down here if I wanted it within three weeks.  Totally bummed.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that I know a couple people who know a couple people.  After a quick chat with Alex, I had a chat with a local fabricator.  He told me he could make the parts out of stainless (better than cast-iron).  Now the rush was to get the other elbow off – better to replace them both, while I’m at it.

Taking the other elbow off was even tougher.  Another full day blown fighting corroded nuts.  On this one I actually had to take out the Dremel and cut the nuts off the bolts.  This wasn’t easy.  To further complicate things, I needed to be sure to not damage the threads on the bolts – as I had no idea how to replace these very specific (very rare) bolts.  And without those bolts, I couldn’t reconnect the exhaust elbows, which means I couldn’t run my engines.  The joys of boat maintenance/repair.

Here I made a pretty dumb mistake.  I was in a hurry to get the remaining exhaust elbow off, so I could head to Panama City and drop them with the fabricator (Eric Bauhaus’ father) and couldn’t find my safety glasses.  It was getting dark, so sunglasses weren’t an option.  So I just positioned myself where the Dremel wouldn’t throw metal towards me, and I began cutting the corroded nuts from the corroded bolts on the exhaust elbow.

Good news:  I managed to get the nuts off the bolts without completely screwing up the threads on the bolts.  Bad news:  during said Dremel-surgery I managed to get some rusty pieces of metal in my eye.  Not cool.  Totally preventable.  Dumb.

That night was pretty painful, but we were headed to Panama City the following day where I could get it checked out by a hospital if need-be.

Naturally, my car wouldn’t start.  Dead battery. So we brought one from the boat and got it cranked up.  After a warm-up I felt alright about the prospects of getting to Panama City in the pile of rusted metal I call a car.

Panama City

We made it to the city in the early afternoon, headed to the mall for a Carl’s Jr burger – and then dropped off the exhaust elbows to what would appear to be a Grateful Dead fan (in front of Hooters).  It’s crazy how one can move from third-world to first-world in a couple of hours in Panama.  Eric’s Dad (the fabricator who looked like a Grateful Dead fan) is as interesting of a guy as Eric is, and it was a pleasure meeting him.  I was even more stoked about his price and turn-around time on the exhaust elbows.

After dropping those off I found out that the friend I was planning on staying with in Panama City had company – meaning that Luke couldn’t stay, even if I could.  Which meant we needed a hotel/hostel.  I did some more boat-shopping while Luke tried to find a hostel.  We ended up staying at a surf-hostel – with cold $1 beer and a swimming pool.  Could be worse.

At this point I was having a ton of trouble with my eye and decided to visit the hospital the following day.  The eye was getting worse, and neither I nor anybody else could locate whatever was in it.  I pinged a couple of friends, did some research online, and struck out for a private hospital, looking for a reputable eye-doctor.  I found the right place after a bit, but the doctor wasn’t in until 4:30PM that afternoon.  So there were a few more hours of pain involved.

Eventually I made it back to the doctor, who eventually pulled three pieces of metal out of my eye, cleaned it, and scribbled a prescription on a notepad for a couple of types of eye-drops.  He then put some kind of ointment on my eye and put a ridiculous bandage over it, telling me to leave it on until I went to sleep.

The Eye Patch

There was no chance of me leaving that on all night.  I removed it on the ride home.

When I got back to the hostel Luke was bored, but I was in pain and sleepy.  Eventually I caved and decided to go eat out with Luke. Luke wanted steak, we went to a steakhouse.  I told him it would be pricey – we found out it was pricier than I expected.  So we left the steakhouse.

I wanted Lebanese or Chinese or Indian.  Anything that I can’t get “out there.” Luke seems to think more along the lines of pizza, hamburgers, or steak.  At this point, I figured “to hell with it” – let’s make a night out of it.  So we took a taxi to the Old City in Panama City.  Where one beer turned into three or four…

Puerto Lindo to Panama City

We’re moving around again.  It’s starting to look like we’ll be leaving San Blas behind relatively soon.  I really will miss it – but I’m feeling the need to start moving again.  There’s a lot of the Caribbean to explore, and to be honest the spearfishing here isn’t quite what it could be.  Colombia is calling.  And I haven’t forgotten about Providencia, San Andres, or Bocas Del Torro.  Just as exciting is diving on the Pacific side of Panama – where the big tuna play.  On the flip side, San Blas is easy sailing, it’s beautiful, and Panama City is relatively close by.

Moving Around

We reprovisioned in Porvenir, which means cookies, beer, rum, and pasta.  Then Luke baked, I cooked, and we slept early and soundly.

The next morning we woke up pretty early.  I immediately started on the ever-increasing boat-project-list.  My shower drain pump isn’t working.  And there’s a troubling amount of water in my starboard bilge.  And my starboard engine is acting up again.  And there’s some oil in the bottom of my starboard engine compartment.  And I needed to change the oil in my starboard saildrive (I hate saildrives).  And there’s some air getting into my fuel lines in my port side engine.  Same story, different day:  boat maintenance.

We spent a couple of weeks not doing boat projects – besides the obvious checking of fluids and belts.  Clearly that caught up with me.  So, after a couple of weeks of relaxation and fun – I have some serious work to do.  Hopefully nothing that will keep me too busy for too long.

I replaced the shower drain pump a while ago, and it was working.  But after I checked the pre-pump filter, it lost it’s prime and I couldn’t get the damn thing working.  I chopped up my hands pretty badly on the hose clamps, which didn’t help.  After lunch I gave up on that and started on the more pressing tasks involving bilge pumps, saildrives and engines.

Long story short, I managed to pump the old saildrive oil out and replace it without incident. But it took awhile.  And I found a couple more issues.  At that point I made a decision – I needed to do a big re-provisioning, some real boat work, and wrap up some stuff in Puerto Lindo (like sell a car and a mooring).

After finishing some of the work in the engine room, we motored from Porvenir back to Chichime to stage for a sail to Puerto Lindo the following morning.  It was fairly uneventful, other than noticing a lack of power in my starboard engine.  Black smoke, meaning incomplete combustion, when in gear.  White smoke, meaning water vapor or oil burning, when throttled up in neutral.  Something else to figure out in Puerto Lindo.  But first I wanted to get a “real” shower in Chichime.

We arrived in Chichime, I was covered in oil and bleeding from a million small cuts on my paws.  I wanted a shower onshore, typically offered for $1.  A bargain.  We anchored, I went ashore and tried to get a shower.  They insisted I pay before my shower, then they couldn’t get the generator working.  I got my money back, went back to the mothership and settled for a breakfast-for-dinner meal and a good night’s rest.

Heading Back To Puerto Lindo

The next morning we motored out of Chichime, raised the main, and sailed back to Puerto Lindo.  It was a damn good sail.  We were sailing through 6 footers, but had enough wind that I never even considered using the engines.  In fact we averaged something like 5.5 knots the entire 45 miles, including actually sailing into Puerto Lindo.  We weren’t breaking any speed records – but it was a really pleasant day.  It helped that we had a few strikes on the rods and that Luke pulled in a tasty Blacken Tuna on the way.  The motors were on for about 15 minutes the entire day – which is really nice.  And even with a fridge, AIS, the autopilot, etc – we arrived with the batteries 100% charged.  So glad I put those new solar panels and batteries in.  If only I could convince my other systems to be so reliable.

Back in Puerto Lindo, I found Alex, Alex’s Dad, and Carla back in Puerto Lindo.  Alex was trying to recuperate after a few long months working on their other boat in New York.  A quick conversation with him helped remind me that I don’t want to sail in the cold.  Sounds miserable.  And the poor guy has to head back North shortly to finish some really hard boat work.

Then Luke and I took a tour of Puerto Lindo.  Luke asked what was onshore – I explained:  mangy dogs, trash-lined beaches, and mostly unfriendly people.  I’ll admit that wasn’t the best way to sell Puerto Lindo – but I’d been in Puerto Lindo too long already.  That said, I saw a few friends and it was good seeing them.

Since I’ve been absent, Guido – the local mechanic had a really bad motorcycle accident in which he severed his foot. They think they’re going to be able to re-attach it, but I wouldn’t put money on him in the 100M sprints.  He was in pretty bad shape for a couple of days, and I can’t imagine the stress on his family.

In other related Panama-moto-accident-news:  the guy managing the construction of the new Puerto Lindo Marina had a really bad vehicular accident too.  He was in a coma last time we heard, but the word is that he’s awake and making progress – though partially paralyzed.  This is a dangerous place to be in a vehicle, me thinks – I’ll be happy to get rid of mine.  The latest car accident has definitely set back the marina construction.

And now start the boat projects.  I’m genuinely hoping to be done with the major stuff in two or three weeks.  Of course, this depends on what I break while trying to fix stuff, what parts I need and can find, and how long it takes to get said parts.  I do believe I’m getting a pretty decent education in marine diesel mechanics.

The goal is to have S/V NOMAD ready for a trip to Colombia.  In Cartagena I can do more work, with greater ease – as the city is a boat-city and it’s right there.  Whereas in Puerto Lindo, it’s an ordeal to get to Panama City and find parts.  And based on a limited data-set, it just seems like the Colombian people are a more friendly, more helpful, and more professional type.  I hope this holds true.

The real challenge is that I need to be sure I have all the parts I need before I leave Panama.  Importing parts here is much easier than Colombia (though much harder than other parts of the world).  The thing that Colombia has going for it is relatively skilled marine labor, for relatively little money.  The thing that it does not have going for it is the ability to easily and cheaply import parts.  So in an ideal world, one would have all the parts necessary when heading to Colombia and then use said cheap/skilled labor to install/replace those parts.

It’s also looking like there is a haul-out in my immediate future.  I need to replace some sail drive seals, re-seal the escape hatches, etc.  Might as well replace any bad seacocks and through-hulls.  And if the boat is hauled, I may as well do a fresh coat of bottom-paint.  There’s a few days of engine work I suspect as well.  It’ll be tough to squeeze all this into what promises to be a few fun nights in Cartagena, me thinks.  Then in April I’m headed to a wedding, and likely another one in July.  Busy times.

So here starts a couple of weeks of breaking stuff whilst trying to fix it, selling stuff, and generally getting ready for another little sailing adventure. NOMAD in Colombia ought to be something worth reading.

Moving Around