46' Sailing Cat, Panama - Costa Rica (130)

Last month, we had just completed a Panama Canal transit, from el Carib to the Pacific, aboard a new 46' Leopard sailing cat. We took a mooring in front of the Balboa Yacht Club. First thing the next morning I said goodbye to the owner and his friends. They were a hilarious group.

The hard part of the delivery was over. Boats, weather, the sea, all make sense to me. Humans? Not so much. I went back to the boat and to clean in advance of my own crew's arrival. I switched off and isolated the stuff we wouldn't need: aircon, generator, freezer, icemaker (that's a tough one). If it's not on, it can't break. The boat was ready for our cruise north to Mexico! ;)

On easy (downwind) deliveries, I'll usually take one crewmember with me. Someone I know or have sailed with. He/she usually gets paid. Upwind, or for more challenging trips, we take a third whose only job is to ease the watch schedule. The third is often someone I don't know, from people who have contacted me or from Hank's crew list - Sailopo.com. The third crew doesn't get paid and flies themselves in. What's in it for them? Some offshore miles and a steep learning curve .

What makes good crew? I would sum it up by saying that the crew's job is to make the skipper's job easier. Sounds selfish, but when the skipper is left to focus on weather, routes, trim, fuel consumption and range, maintenance, anchorages and marinas, owner communications, officials and documents, transportation, money, etc.; things go smoother for everyone.

I got lucky on this trip. I invited a friend from the docks back home and our third was an older CG licensed commodore of a sailing club. As the skipper of power boats all his life, the commodore had to adapt to our sailing and motorsailing operations.

The crew bar was set to a new high by my friend Octavio. I had to do a lot of explaining to owner and insurance company about Oc's lack of offshore experience. I don't consider that a factor in my choice of crew. What Oc does have is adventure experience and a calmness, which is invaluable at sea.

I rounded up the boys and we got their gear stowed. We had lunch at the club. I speak enough Spanish to make these trips easier but Oc is fluent. We negotiated an hourly rate for the cab. We scoured Panama City for parts and did the big food provisioning. Our agent, Tina McBride, would have our departure paperwork in the morning. Back at the boat we secured everything for an upwind sea, got cleaned up and got to bunk late.

And finally … we were at sea! And zooming downwind in the big beautiful new cat. Did I mention I had the entire starboard ama to myself? Picture this: a king size bunk aft (pillow-top view of the helm through the hatch). Moving forward, rows of drawers, hanging lockers and a desk. A big head with stand up shower forward. Large viewing ports all along the hull.

We rounded the bottom of the Golfo de Panama and started making our first northing. Oc made beans and rice. Ya, he cooks too. During provisioning, he bought cheap, good for you, food-of-the-earth stuff. He made a big hot meal every day, so us non-chef types wouldn't have to eat out of the can. Off to starboard, lush green hills drifted by while brilliant sunsets kept us entertained to port. Sunny, warm, some clouds; nice cruising.

And we had some bumpy times, as expected. The afternoon breeze would kick up that perfect short swell that brings out the jerky motion and loud banging that cats have made famous. Though these cats have dual motors I only run them both when parking. The second motor only gets you about one knot more. Skippers with power boat backgrounds tend to want to power into swells, both motors a-chuggin'. That's a lot of extra engine hours and juice wasted. Not on my watch.

When heading to weather, I still use the one motor and deploy a tight sail and crack off the wind and swell. My VMG goes up. With less wear and tear on boat and crew, I'll beat the smokers everytime. And when there's usable wind, we sail, and this boat hummed. We all burn fuel in our day to day. It's how our infrastructure is currently set up. But there are ways to decrease the burn rate while increasing our quality of life.

And then it was time to sail. Log entry: “1828: motor off and screaming 8kts in 14t. Quiet, flat, cat conditions. M1 H0” That's 8kts boat speed in 14kts true wind. My Low Key won't do that. And that was with a reef in the main and full headsail. Oc spent his off watches that day cooking … a turkey. Back at the Mega 99, I had sent the commodore for frozen chickens, they help the fridge chill (and they taste good). He came back with a turkey. It came out perfect. The crew, and the fish that could keep up, ate like kings for next few days.

We cruised into Marina Papagayo in northern Costa Rica at 0400, intending to catch some Zzz's at the fuel dock. I figured they'd wake us up at o'tooearly and we'd fuel. But security was on us with flashlights and walkies, they didn't want us to tie up. Tied up, Oc did the negotiations. They figured out we weren't going to leave and offered us a slip. I guess we'd fuel on the way out.

The slip was only $104 but it was $350 for the check in, check out of CR. That price had gone up. It's a good scam. You used to be able to do the whole process right in the town of beautiful Playas del Coco. No longer, you now have to do the trek into Liberia (where Capt. Bitchin spent time in prison on our Lost Soul cruise) to get the paperwork done. But difficult checkins are what happens when the agent cuts the port captain in for a piece of the greenback pie. So I won't be back.

This being my last visit … I figured we should live it up. The marina is spectacular. It's surrounded by steep green hills. The bright buildings, lusty cantina and immaculate docks, crown a beautiful swimming pool area. There's a shop, nice showers, laundry, a computer room and even a TV viewing room complete with a dozen loungers. The commodore was in heaven as he was a big football fan and it was Saturday. Our paperwork got started and wouldn't be done until Monday. On the brightside, the agent's assistant, who tended to us, was supermodel quality. At least our top dollar was getting us something.

After a quick interior wipe down I sent the boys off to play. Oc is an ocean swimmer so he jumped in and headed out across the bay. He ran into a sea snake which made sense when he learned the bay was called Bahia de Culebra. I washed the boat and checked motor fluids etc.. I shot off some emails to the owner, the next skipper, the blog and my better half. And I checked weather. I'm still using passageweather.com, awesome, when ashore.

The crew and I had a great dinner in the cantina (Dorado salad's worth a go). Afterward, we took turns getting beat by the locals at table shuffleboard. Good guys, good times. More next month …
Quality, Balance and a Clean Wake

Leaving Gulf of Panama - Woody Tracker

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Depart Panama?

Owner's are gone, boat's cleaned up and provisioned.  Just stretching out in the owner's cabin, which takes up the whole starboard ama. 

We have a broken Harken batten part ... but we're in Panama.  The boat has an experimental square top mainsail.  I guess it's back to the drawing board.  We'll try moving a lower car up.  

The BYC has served us well as usual.   Wx looks good.  If all goes well, you won't hear from us for a while.  Planning on fueling in beautiful Costa Rica.  


Hasta luego

Balboa Panama, 46' Sailing Cat

Hola,
I am moving a new Leopard 46 from Panama to Mex.  We have just transited the canal and are headed north soon.  The owner and his friends were hilarious.  I've got my crew, Octavio and Eric, coming in in an hour or two.  We'll provision and head out by Wednesday.

46' Sailing Cat through the Canal (129)

They're always saying you have to pay your dues. To move up in my 'industry' you might have to crew for room and board for 13 months under a pirate named Bitchin and his lovely cohort Jody. Then you could move up to a low paying position doing watches on the Raja Muda's circumnavigation. You might then qualify for your Coast Guard license and start skippering mid 80' private yachts for a Roll's Royce supplier or Bruce Springsteen's music producer. If you're lucky you'll have scraped together enough dough, and found a worthy enough companion, to help you sail your own coastal boat around the world. If you survive all that you could find yourself of some value delivering boats, moving up from previously sunk boats being delivered upwind across el Carib in hurricane season to a nice new 46' luxury sailing cat over nearly flat water … 'cause you've paid your dues.

From the air you get a good look at the grossly green and flooded landscape that feeds the needs of the world's greatest lock-through canal. I landed at the airport, breezed through migracion and customs with just a carry on, got a cheap sim card for the quad band phone from the beautiful Movil girls, negotiated $20 off my cross country fare and was chillin' in the back of the cab in less than an hour.

On the Carib (north) side of the Panama Canal there is now only one place to slip your boat. To get out to Marina Shelter Bay you have to cross the canal and take a trip through the jungle. But it leaves you in a safe spot, away from the high crime of Colon.

The guys were on the boat when I got there. Rick owned the boat and had hired me to move her through the canal and up to Mex. He was a good guy. He had two friends with him who had helped him sail the boat down from FL. One of them was a sweatshop mogul and the other was their rum drinkin', cigar smokin' pastor. Those two snuck off to drink at the club while Rick went over the boat with me. I tend to come across as young and I'd imagine it's hard to hand over your half million dollar yacht to a 'kid'. Rick was good about it.

The owner and friends were just doing the canal part and then heading home, switching out with my crew on the other side. It was raining on transit day. I don't mind the rain when it's 80 degrees. I put on my foulies and went out and set up lines and fenders. Lines for the canal are 120' each and fenders are a bunch of tires tied to the side, all rented from our agent.

The owner had hired agent Tina McBride. She was our agent on the first boat I ever transited on. Both times, now and then, things went smoothly. We also got two locals from her to help with lines, old Rudy and young Juan. I hopped up into the flybridge and took the new cat out to the Flats. Though the Panama Canal Yacht Club is just a memory, low end cruising boats who can't afford Shelter are still welcome to anchor in the flats though getting to shore is more of an adventure now.

A heavy steel pilot boat carefully dropped off our canal advisor Francisco. He was a young tall fit black dude, calm and cool. This was his side job but he knew a lot about the canal. We slipped in behind a large ship as the sun set over the upper locks. The ancient monster-holding doors, silently swung shut behind us, no escape. There were no other small yachts in with us. We were center tie. I had briefed the guys on what to expect and how to make our adventure less eventful. They all followed directions except the mogul, he owned a Hylas so he was beyond instruction. I compensated for his mistakes with the helm.

Going up, when the lock is flooding and the fresh and salt waters are aggressively mixing, it is the roughest. Don't think you can control the boat with the throttle and helm. You are at the mercy of your line handlers. Basically, they need to remember to never try to take in slack when there is, or is about to be, tension on the line. And never take all the wraps off the cleat. The rest is easy.

We made it out the top, 70' up, and motored full into the blackness of lake Gatun. We soon rolled up on the big red, yacht mooring buoys. Local Rudy had us tied up the right way quickly. I recalled the many times had I toasted lock survival with various excited crews while tied to these buoys.

Below the pastor was cutting up chicken for dinner. The ceramic blade slipped and made a nice deep cut in his ankle. They handed me the med kit. I don't mind doing it, it just seems strange that people always assume I know how to patch people up. On the bright side, I am a fast learner.

The locals and I slept in the saloon, shivering in the cold and listening to the grind of the generator and the ever cycling air conditioners. There are humans among us that have devolved to the extent of requiring excessive climate control. I refer to them as Morlocks (H.G. Wells) as they will inevitably breed ever more dependent, weaker humans, forgoing moral constraints. We hammer the sea (acidification), the global climate and the next generation, with every twist of the thermostat. I found myself envying the simpler boats on the lake that were enjoying the comforting warmth of the high jungle air and the sound of frolicking monkeys as they lived in synch with their environment. Fortunately, those privileges are allowed to even the purest cruiser, especially so.

I got up early to do a re-patch of the pastor's blood soaked foot. Getting the tention right is important. Wrap too tightly and the appendage turns blue, wrap too loosely and the wound will bleed. I think we got it right the second time. Breakfast? Mogul-made freeze-dried scrambled eggs. A good hot morning meal is always appreciated.

It was a first for me but the advisor was almost three hours late. We got underway. Jose was a cool cat. The short cut was closed but he did let us do some sailing. Sailing was cut short when I discovered that you can't actually see where you're going, through the sail, from up on the flybridge. Panamanians love talking global issues. Our economic situation had not affected Panama's unique industry but they were glad for the stimulus that prevented global collapse.

It was a beautiful day to enjoy the canal. After raining hard all week, this day turned out sunny and nice. The boat was running perfect of course – Yanmars. I reminded the gentlemen that the canal had a webcam at pancanal.com. Phones were deployed, loved ones were notified and waving commenced. We locked down, left Jose with his transport and dropped our wounded at the dock in Balboa. Rick and I took fuel and secured the big cat to her mooring.

After a clean up, we headed to shore and caught a cab out to the chandlery for some parts. The store owners drove us back to the club! There are nice people everywhere. After a long day of 'work', it was time to chill. Rick and I pulled up barstools and coldies, overlooking the boat, at the Balboa Yacht Club. It's a perk of the job, hanging out with interesting people. We had an amazing conversation. For his work, he invested money … at a high level. I enjoyed his purely financial breakdown of economics generally as well as our current situation, leading and lagging indicators and what to expect moving forward. He discounted the gloom and doom reporting we're seeing that I think is done for political benefit. End report: things are getting better, a slow recovery is a good recovery, I'm holding on to my speck of a stock portfolio. Our cruise north, next month.

Mid Panama Canal - Woody Tracker

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Lake Gatun Tie-up Diagram for Cruisers

Lake Gatun - Woody Tracker

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Shelter Bay Colon - Woody Tracker

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Two Harbors Catalina - Woody Tracker

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Stuart Island, WA - Woody Tracker

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Lopez Island, WA - Woody Tracker

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BJ's at Whidby Isl, WA - Woody Tracker

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Straights of Juan de Fuca - Woody Tracker

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Just heading into the Straights of Juan de Fuca

Safe and sound, 'round the corner, Neah Bay

Port Orford - Woody Tracker

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Port Orford, OR

Port Orford, knarly rocky high fueling.

Off Humbolt - Woody Tracker

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Off Humbolt, sailing up the coast.

Bodega, CA - Woody Tracker

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Bodega, CA

Arriving at Bodega.  First stop fuel dock.

Cool local fishing boats.  

Rates, FYI.

Hiked to the beach.  Bunch of driftwood shacks. 

Reeds and waves.

 Driftwood comes in all sizes.

Gotta pay attention to markers and tides.

South Bay, SF - Woody Tracker

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South Bay San Francisco

Paul

Sailing out the bay.

40' Sailing Cat - San Diego to Sequim, WA (128)

And it was back to San Diego to finish moving our friends 40' Leopard cat up to Washington. We had a long leisurely trip up from the Panama canal. During the beautiful cruise north, I had done a respectable amount of maintenance on the diesels and Saildrives. Four years of brutal charter company servicing had taken their toll on the new boats underachiever drivetrain. It was time for some much needed professional servicing.

We were in the right place, if you can break it on the water, San Diego has a place you can get it fixed, if not cheaply. We finally found an authorized Volvo mechanic. These guys must have all the work they can handle. After tens of thousands of dollars and four weeks of servicing including new fuel pumps, rebuilding alternator mounts, replacing a cracked case (manufacturing defect) and even a haul out to fix a small leak in the starboard Saildrive, we were back at sea.

I've said it before, 'Buy a fixer and you may end up doubling your investment'. One thing that worked great was the solar panels. We never plugged in and even in the yard, the boat maintained it's own batteries and systems stayed online, unattended. Credit to the panels and the Blue Sky controller.

Paul took us out of San Diego bay while Sheila and I enjoyed the parade of boats traversing the waterway. Just out of the harbor we had problems with the cooling water. I wasn't going back. We drifted for a bit while I coaxed water through the system. Was it sucking air? Time would tell. It was a quick beat to Catalina. I wanted to show the kids where the locals went for our sailing getaways.

We rolled into beautiful Two Harbors and took a mooring. I gave the kids the lowdown on what to do and, “Don't forget the Buffalo Milks”. I dropped them ashore and went back to wrench … just for old time sake. That night, cleaned up, we had a grand dinner at the little Harbor Reef restaurant.

Bright and early we motored off and up through the Channel Islands, dolphins aplaying at the bow, whales lingering off to port. Off Santa Barbara we cruised through the oil slick I always find trailing off the rigs. We took a slip in Santa Barbara, nice people, cute town. Paul and I worked on some close quarters boat maneuvering.

But it was time for the big Oakland Boatshow, excuse me, the Pacific Boatshow, ya that sounds better. Which means I got to ride the train. Amtrak goes from downtown Santa Barbara straight to the boatshow in Oakland … perfect. I grabbed some snax and reading material and was All Aboard in no time – front-facing ocean-side of course. The kids didn't need me for the short SB-SF leg. They made it up to the bay and to the show before it closed on Sunday.

I met the boat at the new West Point marina in SF's south bay. They've done a nice job there. We had a big ribs dinner with the kids and their son Paul, our SF mechanic Lloyd and his beautiful wife. The next morning, Lloyd joined us for the short run up the bay to fuel at Coyote Point marina, nice spot.

We sailed out with the tide, the city on our portside lit up with the orange glow of the setting sun. That's a beautiful town. The head wind and short chop kicked up to make us work for the bridge. We cracked open some headsail and shot off across the bay and into the lee of Sausalito. Tacked again and cruised out under the north end of the Golden Gate. Another epic scene.

We arrived at the entrance to Bodega Bay before sunup and in the thickest fog I could remember. I was alone on watch. I had been in the bay before. Using the radar as my eyes I eased up between the breakwalls at half a knot. The one on starboard was too low to show so I had to guess where it was. Once further inside, visibility opened up to a good 50 yards. That was enough to lay eyes on the marker posts.

We ended up at the end of B dock, for transients, where we chilled for a few days. It's only $30 a night there plus a deposit for the bathroom with the solar-heated firehose-pressure shower. We had an out of season system pounding the coast just to the north, so we were not in a hurry to get right back out. We spent some time honing our close quarter maneuvering skills and even did the walk around the bay to the little town where The Birds was filmed. We ate dinner at the new version of the diner and then watched the movie back at the boat … and then slept fitfully.

We finally got back out to sea, into the big swell aftermath of the storm. We had a lucky couple of days before the normal 20kts on the nose kicked back up. We pulled behind the wall at Port Orford. I know, I've never heard of it either. It's basically a 20' sea wall with local small fish boats sitting on it. They lower the boats with cranes to go fishing - cool. I finally raised the locals on the radio and they said we could take fuel. We tried parking sideways but it didn't seem safe. We went out a bit, dropped the hook and backed in. I got a line around a pylon and with the boat in forward to keep us off the wall, I called up for the fuel hose. The guy didn't like my set up but agreed to fuel. We paid in a coffee can on a string, Turtle Bay style. It all worked out.

Back at sea it was rough going around the point. Alone on watch with the boat launching off waves and landing in holes, spray shooting aft with the strong breeze and Nickelback blaring on the mp3 player. The big roach main driving us ever forward as we headed for the last and most treacherous cape on our 4,000nm voyage to weather, Cape Flattery. I felt alive.

On that last ocean leg we saw ships, whales and found out that wooden fishing boats didn't always show up on radar. We put the great Pacific behind us as we rounded the pinnacle, Cape Flattery and eased gently into the Straight of Juan de Fuca. A satisfying sense of achievement warmed me.

And what was that odd sensation? I almost forgot what tail winds felt like. But there they were, easing us gently to our destination. All the way up from San Francisco we had bitter cold and grey conditions and now, a quarter mile inland, it was warm and sunny.

We enjoyed some nice downwind running to Sequim Bay where the kids had a house over the water and the boat had its own home, a permanent slip. As we entered the marina triumphant, we enjoyed some odd stares from the locals who hadn't seen a lot of adult catamarans in these parts. And there's a reason for that.

As I type this I am sitting at the wide nav station of a big new Leopard 46 cat, watching the calm sea in front of Nicaragua slip by the rail. I just brought her through the Panama canal and will be relocating this work of art to Mexico. Two beautifully running Yanmars aft and a full length stateroom to myself in the starboard hull. I've earned this. Unless something more exciting comes up, I'll be filling you in on the details next month.

40' Sailing Cat - Turtle Bay to San Diego (127)

Our adventure on the Leopard 40 catamaran continues. After attending a beautiful ceremony to celebrate Turtle Bay's 60^th anniversary, we headed back out to sea. Turtle Bay is a protected anchorage and fuel stop – thank you Anabell's – about halfway up Baja CA. The afternoon breeze had just started to lay down. There were whales everywhere. We cruised up inside the island of Cedros and popped out the top ... to smooth water. I had never seen it smooth there. I celebrated quietly inside myself, careful to not let the sea know that something was amiss.

But the wind did come on that next day and blew hard. I saw a chance to get a break from the mean chop by shooting up inside the Sacramento reef - sinker of ships and cruising boats alike. But we ran into one of the shortcomings of cats. They won't go into the big wind/bad chop combo, no matter what you do. I used to stay out and bang it out all night, getting nowhere, but thankfully, I've outgrown that. I turned tail and we ran 12 miles back to San Carlos. An hour and a half later we were anchor down in a beautiful, calm spot.

We were very close to the states now and the urge to jump back into the fray was strong. But the weather turned worse and sanity kept us in port. We spent the next day gleefully parked in flat water as 30kt gusts whistled through the rig. To kill time I pulled apart the starboard heat exchanger and found a couple impellor pieces clogging key channels. Yep, if you are missing an impellor fin, make sure you find it. For fun, Sheila made brownies and we enjoyed movies and coldies all afternoon.

That night I walked out onto the bow. There was a tiny fishing village ashore. The pueblo generator had shut down and all the fishing shacks were dark. I looked back over my shoulder to see our array of cabin lights and big screen TV aglow. I remembered back to my trip up this coast on my little Low Key. If it were back then, I'd be sitting under the warm glow of my oil lamp, reading some adventure book. Was one experience better than the other? Maybe.

Our weather reports indicated that the weather was going to break soon. We picked a time that would put us at the reefs with some light. At 0400 we tried to leave. The bow roller on these cats is not on the bow, it's back toward the middle of the boat. To ease tention on the chain you have to motor into strong wind. Not being lead from the front, the boat tended to pivot allowing the chain to come up and grind on the hulls. It was not a clever design. It took us about an hour but Paul and I got the chain up, and with the morning land breeze, we sailed out. The breeze whisked us quickly up through the reef. It was eirie sailing with land to starboard and breaking waves to port.

And I spent more time in the engine rooms, nursing the motors so they would survive 'til San Diego. About mid day we started to smell rotten eggs. It didn't make sense, Sheila kept the boat immaculate. I've had that smell on boats when I haven't pumped the head in a long time (the life in the seawater dies eventually).

That day I learned another very important event that makes that smell. One of our big house batteries was failing and heating up. The worst thing you can have on a fiberglass boat is a fire. They say that if you don't get a fiberglass boat fire put out early you won't be able to, it burns too hot. I re-wired the batteries taking the offending one out of the loop.

We cruised into Ensenada putting the worst of the Baja behind us. We fueled up and took a slip at my favorite marina, just north of town, the Coral (say: corral). It felt good to have made it so far on less than perfect motors. We headed right up to the salon to get our showers and then cabbed into town. Unusual for Mexico, you can do a whole check out in one building! Then it was lunch and a coldy at my favorite roasted chicken place where a never ending train of mariachi groups played and plyed for our business.

After walking out of the 22^nd chandlery of the trip that didn't have the impellers we needed, we headed back to the boat. We relaxed for a couple of hours, savoring our last evening in Mexico. At 2200 we got underway so as to have a morning arrival in San Diego.

The sea was smooth for our cruise across the border. Morning brought us to the mouth of San Diego Bay with its sail, power and submarine traffic. Our tired cat plowed in, pushing steam out both sides. After two months of Latin American adventuring, we drifted up and secured to the first US Customs dock since Florida.

Once we were inspected and checked in, we moved over to the public dock. They gave us a spot on the inside next to a small sloop that looked familiar. It was a tight squeeze but I'd had a couple months of practice parking with motors and gear boxes that were not always reliable. Once on the dock I recognized the boat next to us. It was the wreck I had brought down months before, the one we had to sail and finally row up to the dock. I wrote about it. It looked pretty good. It must have just rained.

There was a different kind of cruising crowd at the dock than I'm used to seeing. I suspect it is something we are going to see more of. There were a bunch of young people, 20's and 30's, with classic plastic rigs, prepped and ready to head south to begin there own unforgetable cruising adventures. It was good to see and it brought back the feeling of cruising my own boat, just a few years ago. I hear there's a book on the subject.

But I was home … or pretty damn close. I was ready to take a little vacation from my vacation. I was going home for two weeks. But first there were some details to be worked out, mechanics to be called and a haul out to be arranged. When my part was done I called for my ride. Dena made good time coming down from our South Bay, a couple hours away. Though she had visited the boat often in the two months, I think she still missed me.

Fond farewells were doled out. I chucked my bags in the back of her truck and she whisked me off to blissfull post delivery leisure. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my deliveries. But it's about striking a balance. If done right, I accept the number of deliveries that keeps me on the continuous happy-go-round of being excited planning the next trip, excited being out on the cruise, and then being excited to be home. And start again.

Land life is renewed for me when I spend a chunk of time on the water. We stopped off in tiny Encinitas and pulled up a coldy at a little Mexican food place (I know, I didn’t care what I was having). No concern about getting back quickly or maintenance that needs to be done or plans to make for the next day. No where to be. Just us, catching up.