Boat Plans Australia | Panama City to David

Boat Plans Australia

Its been an interesting three days trying to get to remote Bocas del Toro. Flight delays, missed connections, holiday travelers, etc. have conspired to keep us from reaching our destination, but we are pretty sure that with a little ingenuity well finally reach Almirante tomorrow, where we can catch a water taxi to Bocas Town. From there its a short ride in a panga to Bastimento Island, where the Red Frog Marina is located. We left Puerto Vallarta on the 28th and I expect to arrive at the Red Frog a few minutes before the new years eve festivities begin.

Right now were in the city of David (pronounced daveeed). The ride, around 350 kilometers in a taxi, took us through the heavily industrial parts of Panama city, through rough looking suburbs, and then through wildly beautiful tropical countryside. Looking out the windows of the truck that served as our taxi, we saw people living in squalid tin-roofed shacks, caballeros astride beautiful horses tending their herds of brahma cattle, poor people trudging along the road carrying all manner of things, including chickens in cages, sides of beef, and other small caged animals. At one point we passed an overturned tractor trailer that had split open and kids were taking cases of soda that had burst from its seams. At another point, we passed a scene where the police had captured, handcuffed and roughed up two men alongside the road. Life in Panama is a long way from how we live in Orange County.

I just finished reading David McCulloughs fascinating book, "Path Between the Seas". Its an account of how the Panama Canal was built and the forces, political, economic and military that were brought to bear to accomplish that stupendous feat. Just as important to humanity was the discovery and implementation of effective means of controlling and eradicating yellow fever and malaria in ths region. The USA played a key role in the founding of the Republic of Panama and has been involved in many of this countrys most important historical milestones, from Teddy Roosevelts support for its secession from its mother country of Colombia in 1903 to George 41s decision to invade the country and capture Manual Noriega, Panamas president, in 1989. That particular adventure was called Operation Just Cause.  I suppose it should be no surprise that the local people of this country have shown us little of the buoyant friendliness that we have constantly experienced in Mexico, but I should also say that in spite of the delays and frustrations of our travels, weve been enjoying our time here. Delays are part of travel everywhere in the world at this time of year, and were very glad that its not snowing and freezing here. Wherever you are, have a rockin good time ringing in the new year!

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Dinghy Boat Plans | Ixtapa

Dinghy Boat Plans

Zihuatanejo

The days flew past while we were in Ixtapa. We had not planned to go there but Im really glad we did. While there we toured both Ixtapa and Zihuatanejo, visited Isla Grande, Playa Linda and the Cocodrilario, and perhaps most fun of all, celebrated our friend, Judys 50th birthday. We stayed at the Marina Ixtapa Nautica, a fairly luxurious marina in Ixtapa. We had been at anchor in more remote places for three weeks prior, so it was nice to get into a marina where we could give the Honcho a good freshwater scrub, sleep all night without an anchor watch, and take easy advantage of the great restaurants and stores nearby. I also wanted to get the hull bottom scrubbed, but laughed when I was told that no one is allowed to swim or perform underwater services in the marina because of the crocodile threat. We kept a sharp lookout but saw no crocs.

Hobie Cat

Judys birthday was much more than a simple party, it was an Event, with guests flying in from various points in the States, and as far away as Denmark for five days of festivities. We arrived on Feb. 12th and participated in a day long outing to Isla Grande, then a day of Hobie Cat racing and the grand finale party on the 15th. We met a lot of great people and had a wonderful time at the party, the highlight of which was Torben, Judys husband, shedding his conservative Danish demeanor to grab the mike and belt out an excellent rendition of Blue Suede Shoes. He truly rocked the place. After three days of partying, we spent the next day taking care of boat chores and relaxing. The following day we took some friends out to Isla Grande where we swam and relaxed and I had an opportunity to scrub the bottom of the boat myself. Im glad to report that it was surprisingly clean, with only some serious growth on the speed and depth sensor thru-hulls. I checked the rudder, prop shaft, strut and prop as well as the zincs, all in good shape.

Pina Colada Isla Grande Style

On our last day in Ixtapa we decided to visit the Cocodrilario (Crocodile preserve) in Playa Linda, since we had yet to see any crocs in the wild, except for one poor little duffer in a flood control canal in Puerto Vallarta. Taking the bus, which is our usual mode of land transportation in Mexico, is always interesting. Local  buses charge between 5 and 12 Pesos and if they dont have a music system, a local musician often climbs aboard and serenades the riders with a guitar and song. The cocodrilario is located at the bus stop in Playa Linda so we got to see the crocs, iguanas, turtles and other wildlife up close. I like that theres nothing but a chain link fence between the spectators and the animals, you can get within a few feet of them, so we got lots of up close and personal photos. Playa Linda is a beautiful beach with dozens of vendor stalls selling everything from toy crocs to clothing, along with delicious food and Mexican beer. Isla Grande lies less than a mile off the coast and tourists arrive by the busload to take pangas out to the island for a day of snorkeling, sipping and sun. We wandered around the place for a while, but quickly tired of the tourist crowds and grabbed a bus back to the marina, where we began preparations to leave Ixtapa. Lisa went up to the office to check us out while I loaded the boat with diesel...a few minutes later she came running back, telling me that finally there was a crocodile swimming through the marina, which she got photos of. Frankly, Im a bit crocd out and didnt need to see it myself.

Croc

We cleared the breakwater around 1630, and set a course that would take us out around Punta Ixtapa and northwest, back toward Manzanillo.  I must say I felt a twinge of regret as we rounded the point. Ixtapa marks the furthest south we will go on this voyage, and every mile we travel from now on will be homeward bound. Id rather be headed for the other horizon.

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Boat Plans For A Chesapeake Deadrise | Panama Retrospective

Boat Plans For A Chesapeake Deadrise

Caught a flight out of Bocas Town to Panama City on Monday. Went to the Miraflores locks where there is an excellent museum with exhibits showing the struggle to build the canal, how it works, its impact on Panama and global commerce along with plans for the canal expansion project. The canal runs in a roughly north-south direction. The Atlantic terminus at Colon is actually to the northwest of the Pacific terminus at Panama City. The canal is approximately 88 kilometers from end to end and it takes about 8 hours for a ship make that passage. The Panama Canal was officially opened on August 15th, 1914. Ownership of the canal was transferred from the United States to the Republic of Panama on December 31, 1999.

 In the Honchos home port of Long Beach we are accustomed to seeing very large container ships in the harbor. Those ships are too large to transit the canal, and the trend is toward more of these larger vessels. The Panama Canal Authority recognized the need to expand the canals capacity to accommodate these ships, thus the new enlarged locks, which I believe are scheduled to be opened in 2014.

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Northbound ship moving out of the lower locks at Miraflores

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Here are some interesting stats:
Containers are essentially tractor trailer bodies. They come in a variety of sizes, but are measured in "twenty foot equivalents" (TEU).
The largest container ships currently in service can carry more than 15,000 TEU.
The current locks can handle ships of up to 5,000 TEU capacity (965 feet long, 106 feet wide).
The new canal locks will handle ships of up to 12,000 TEU capacity (1,200 feet long, 160 feet wide).
The busiest container port in the world is Singapore.
Seven of the top ten busiest container ports in the world are located in China.
Los Angeles and Long Beach are ranked 16th and 18th respectively.
The top three US ports (L.A., Long Beach, New York) combined handled approximately 16,500,000 TEU in 2009. Shanghai alone handled 25,000,000 TEU in the same period.
Surprised? I was too.

45 foot cruising catamaran transiting the lower locks at Miraflores

We arrived back in La Cruz to find all well with the Honcho. Over the next few days well reprovision, refuel and prepare for sailing again, then head out around Cabo Corrientes, the southern boundary of Banderas Bay and on to points south.

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Boat Plans And Patterns | Tenacatita

Boat Plans And Patterns

Tenacatita Sunset

Bahia Tenacatita is the most beautiful place the Honcho has visited so far on this voyage. After we arrived here we just sat in the cockpit and enjoyed the magnificent views of the golden sand beaches to our north and east, the craggy rocks to our west and southwest, and the pretty little town of La Manzanilla across the bay to our south, then were treated to a beautiful sunset. Weve been here three days, doing very little except enjoying the scenery and visiting with friends. Wednesday we took the dinghy up the small estuary where there are supposed to be crocodiles but we didnt see any. That was fine by me, as we did see lots of other wildlfe as we motored slowly through the mangroves. In spite of the beauty of the place, there has been trouble here recently. A developer showed up a few months ago with armed guards and bulldozers and chased everyone off the beach in one part of the bay where there had been some palapa restaurants that locals and yatistas liked to hang out, claiming that he owned the land that others thought they owned. Apparently the developer won this argument because we were met with some of the guards a mile or so up the estuary, and thats as far as we got to go.

We were also visited by the Mexican Navy here. Early on the first morning we were anchored in the bay, a boatload of sailors, all armed with automatic weapons approached and boarded the Honcho. They asked for our papers, took pictures of our communications gear and filled out some forms before bidding us a good day. They were friendly and didnt intentionally point their guns at us, but with five of them crowded into the cockpit, it was impossible not to find myself looking down the barrel of one or the other now and then.

Another Approach to Cruising
Weve seen this Nordhavn 63 in various places along the Mexican coast.

The day before we left Tenacatita we took the dinghy across the bay to La Manzanilla, a quaint fishing and tourist village, where we stocked up on fresh vegetables. Located on the southeast side of the bay, it is exposed to the open ocean so going ashore means landing the dinghy through the surf. We stayed dry going in but got a bit damp going out, as the wind and waves had built during the afternoon. If youre looking for a quiet seaside vacation, far from the crowds, but still with a little spice, you might like La Manzanilla. To me, it appears to be Mexican with a Mediterranean twist.

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