The Long Wait

Currents, Motor Sailing, Wildfires, Traffic Jams and Boat Life Problems:

Panama, Panama echos in my head. Van Halen somehow seemed to find the perfect time to blast through the speaker as we dread yet another day in Panama. We are beginning to feel a bit stuck. Things may be different if the sailing was actually good with clear waters and fun anchorages. Don’t get me wrong, Panama does have something to offer. Islas Las Perlas are certainly good, not great, but pretty good. The western portion around Punta Mala is beautiful and if you had the money to spend, I’m sure Coiba would have been nice. The sea life has been great, especially since you don’t seem to have to get in the water to see it. All that said, inconsistent winds and strong currents have made our time here mostly about motor sailing. A true sailor hates the endless drone of the motor. It’s just nowhere near as pleasant as hearing the swish of the water and the wind as it propels you forward. It has become the long wait…

We wanted to check out the western Pacific coast, so we decided even though the current that runs between 2-4 knots around Punta Mala would be a major challenge on the way back, we would suck it up and go somewhere different. Tony’s Mom was to visit in 10 days so we had a little time. The sail routing / weather modeling on PredictWind struggled to calculate the return trip, and even struggled a little on the initial route.

The way around was glorious until the wind died all together. We had a downwind breeze and the current was pushing us along fast. We rounded the point and then it became dead calm. For the remaining 12 hrs or so we motored. It was sometime around my early morning shift when I was checking details of our destination for navigation that I learned Coiba National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site, would cost us A LOT more than we were willing to pay. It was a one time park entry fee of $20 per person, but then they tacked on an anchoring fee per night which was dictated by the size of your boat. For us that would be $60 / night. No thanks… Off to Bahia Honda instead.

Our final stop before the 1.5 – 2 day sail to Buenaventura was a picturesque bay. We had decided to leave earlier than originally intended because we were concerned about the current and wind conditions. We motored out mid-afternoon and as we were making our way to open water, I noticed the bilge pump going off a lot and lots of water being pushed out. I poked my head into the cockpit lazarette, peered down toward the main bilge and was shocked to see water spraying from our driveshaft, lots of it. We dropped the throttle to idle and it stopped but had a slow drip. As we were trying to figure out how, why and what was happening, devil rays leaped out of the water and did flips right next to the boat. I screamed and startled Tony… It wasn’t a great time. to be screaming. We decided to turn back to the anchorage. If we had wind, no currents and could have sailed, this would not have been a problem.

We learned something new about the boat that day. Our driveshaft has a PSS dripless seal. This seal has an accordion like bellows that allows water to cool the shaft as it spins. A plate is pressed up against this creating a seal so water doesn’t enter the boat. It seemed the bellows in our seal needed to be compressed further to stop the spray. This requires loosening some set screws and pushing the plate toward the stern to compress the bellows. While we managed to fix the issue the next morning, we learned we should be replacing the set screws any time you do this and that other components should be replaced every 6 years. We have no idea how old the seal is. So now we would have to order parts… At least our repair location wasn’t half bad.

Once that fire was put out, we were on our way again. The passage around Punta Mala was just annoying. It started with no wind, so more motoring, but we managed to motor sail since we were mostly headed up wind or on a beam reach. Randomly the wind would change direction for a few hours and come from behind us, causing the sails to flap. I knew at some point the wind would start coming out of the north and we would head directly into it, as well as into the current.

We caught a fish just as it was getting dark which caused Tony to lose his nap prior to his shift. At one point we got some wind and we tried to sail. It worked for a short time before the current became so strong that it started pushing us backwards. I awoke during Tony’s shift when after once again trying to sail, he had shut off the engine. It had become extremely quiet and I had a bad feeling. I went into the cockpit and he had fallen asleep. The wind had died again. We were dangerously close to rocks awash a few miles from shore and the boat had turned directly towards shore. He had also forgotten to remove the pin for Patience’s wind vane which steers us. Time for Tony to go to bed. That was a close call. If we had been way offshore, a little nap wouldn’t have been an issue since there’s nothing to hit… In hind sight, our shift schedule should have been shorter for the coastal sailing to avoid this.

Just as dusk came the wind picked up to 20 knots on our nose. Of course this coincided with Tony making dinner. I noticed the bilge pump getting stuck on again. This happens to us often and we have to shut it off and set a timer to check it every hour, as it’s not actually drawing any water out. I neglected to set the timer. We continued bashing and when I went down at 9pm, the bilge pump had been off for at least 3 hours. Nobody noticed. A few hours later the winds continued and Tony had trouble tacking. I got up to help. Just as I was going back down I remembered.

When I turned it on, it immediately started pumping water out. I checked the bilge area where the diesel tank is and it had 12″ of water in it, nothing I’ve ever seen before. I could have sunk the boat. Holly shit! I was so angry at myself. How could I have been so stupid. We needed to improve our shift checks… Crisis averted after a lot of pumping including some manual pump action and we continued on. Eventually the wind died again and the motor would come back on. We arrived at Isla Farralon, outside of Buenaventura Marina the following morning. We would wait one night for the following mid-morning high tide to enter the marina.

Buenaventura Marina is in a gated community that resenbles something straight out of Florida. There’s condos, apartments, restaurants, hotels, golf, and a few fancy small grocery stores. For how fancy it is, it was the cheapest marina so far at 55 cents / ft. This is all because of the access in through the river. Anyone with draft has to consider the tides, bad weather pushes sand up into the inlet, and what we would learn later is that large southerly swells cause breakers. Getting in wasn’t bad. We would rent a car and go to an Airbnb in San Carlos for Tony’s mom’s visit.

The Airbnb was no typical place. It was a beautiuful property with chickens, ducks, peacocks, guinehens, and other birds. There were gardens and fruit trees. The cabin was very chic farmhouse, high end decorated. It seemed like someone from the city owned the property and had caretakers and a property manager. We were unsure, but there was definitely money going into it and caretakers there daily. We were enjoying a bit of land lubbing.

We decided to go to Panama city for the day. We had some errands and walked around the old town. Then we made a huge mistake and left at rush hour. We all experienced the worst traffic jam any of us had ever been in. After 1.5 hrs to move less than 100ft, and a total of a 3.5 hr drive back, we were exhausted when we got back. I awoke that night to a loud crackling sound. I sat up in bet only to immedately see flames right out the window! I screemed to Tony, fire, wildfire! It appeared to be just on the other side of the fence at the neighboring property. I immediately started packing the car. It was 3am. We had no idea how to alert anyone, let alone explain the address to anyone in spanish. We woke Lynda and watched. It was smokey and flaring and dying on and off. It continued to stay on the other side of the fence.

We watched someone drive by, stop, look and keep driving. We watched the neighbor across the street turn their lights on. Another car drove by, and again, just kept going. At 5:30 am it flared up again. It’s windy here, so this was a concern. Embers were falling into the yard. I messaged the property management on Airbnb. I knew it was too early. I tried to call 311 (fire hotline) only to be hung up on when I couldn’t communicate the address.

We watched and waitied. At 7:30am I received a message on airbnb saying they were sorry we had to experience this and that they were told it was under control and no longer a threat. Nothing had changed. It was still smoking and burning, but not as extreme. We saw the caretakers out watching it. At some point a fire truck came by and just watched, but it was left to smolder. The next night it flared up again. We were beginning to just accept it as the normal reality.

We had been awaiting a shipment with our shaft seal parts to arrive at the Mail Boxes Etc. in Rio Haut, but it hadn’t arrived yet. We couldn’t suffer another day in the marina so we would go out to Isla Farallon, anchor and wait it out. Here we would finally test the watermaker. Lynda had come to Panama with numerous plumbing parts and other items that I had pre-ordeed to her house. We finally had what we needed to finalize the system, or so we thought..

We filled our diesel tanks and extra jerry cans, filled our water tanks to the brim, did bucket laundry and prepared for our departure. At around 4:30, the tide seemed high enough so we decided to leave. I knew there was a larger swell due to the weather forecast. What we didn’t know was that waves break at the inlet entrance / exit from the marina. We wouldn’t find out until we started to round the corner and I saw them. Too late, we weren’t turning around. I screamed out to Tony, “breaking waves!” I increased the RPM and hoped everything would be ok. It seemed we had just seen the end of a set and the waves subsided. There were a few peaks at the tail end of the exit, and just as we left it appeared another set may be coming in. Phew…

I knew the wind would eventually shift north, likely right at dusk near Punta Chame. That it did and we began our night sail. We were making a bit better ground than I thought we would and it was looking like we would arrive in the dark of the early morning hours. At around 3:00am when Tony woke, we took the sails down and motored the remaining channel to ensure we avoided the rocks. We were headed to an anchorage that has been used to film the show Survivor, Isla Chapera & Isla Mogo Mogo.

At some point I heard a noise and it seemed like the water pump was running. I opened the lazarrete and heard it hissing and it wouldn’t shut off. I shut it off manually and checked the main tank. It was completely dry! 65 gallons of water just gone! Tony mentioned hearing the bilge pump go off on his shift but didn’t think too much of it. I assumed it must be a plumbing fitting right at the tank so I switched to our 20 gallon bladder tank. I didn’t turn the water pressure off immediatelky, but I did at some point a few minutes later after washing my hands. At least we had the water maker!

On we went and as we approached the anchorage there were some strange red blinking lights in the water along the beach. It was dark and tough to make out what was going on. Another sailboat was in the anchorage. We dropped the hook and I continued to be baffled about the water. Then I tried to use the water to brush my teeth and it started spitting a lot. This is when we learned the 20 gallon bladder had also drained! I found the issue immediately. It was a “T” fitting. One of the hose clamps broke off and the hose had popped off the T. It was draining into the bilge in a narrow gap near the hot water heater and the cabin wall bulk head. The only remaining water we had left was about 4 gallons of filtered drinking water. Time for bed.

I awoke at 7:30am, 3 hours later and the sun was hitting the boat hard. I jumped up to put the shades up only to look out and see the beach filled with people and boats. More boats were coming. Just as I finished shading our hatches and portlights, a boat approached. They told me we had to leave. They were filming today and we were in the shot. The other boat + one further away were also told to leave. We were pissed. Not only were we exhausted, but we had just started making water and the clarity here was good. It looked like a great anchorage, one of the better ones we’ve seen. We lingered and waiting to see if the other boats left until both us and the boat behind us started getting heckled by a guy on a jet ski. We had no choice.

We had started making water before leaving that anchorage. It would take 60 hours of constant water making to get back what was lost. We likely would not run it consistently, so we were looking at 5-6 days of making water during the daylight hours. We moved into an anchorage that seemed like it may be nice as it was supposed to be protected and have some potential “snorkeling.” Immediately the water quality was not looking great. There were turd like things floating in the water as we went deeper into the bay. We turned around and anchored out near the mouth. It was calm. We continued making water and it seemed to have no problems when we motored over to this anchorage.

Las Perlas is known for area of shallow rocks. In general, I have found everything to be well charted. I have also used google earth to see where the deepest channels are. We navigated with our old track out of our current anchorage and then around through a somewhat large gap. I let Tony take the helm. I went to the bow to keep an eye out. There were exposed rocks, but the chart had also shown an area of submerged rocks on the opposite side of the channel. He assured me he had it under control. At one point I pointed for him to give the exposed rocks a wider berth. This was apparently taken as me directing him to go the other way around the submerged rocks on the opposite side of the channel. We motored along and I noticed we were getting closer to the port side shoreline. All the sudden I could see the shallow rocks in the water. ROCKS! ROCKS! I yelled. I thought for sure we would hit them. I pointed to the only direction I thought I couldn’t see any and as we turned I saw a huge boulder on the port side. We narrowly missed them. Phew…

I took over the helm again as we were going to round a corner into a much narrower channel that had rocks on both sides. Right as we enter this channel I see two boats (Pangas). Both with huge umbrellas inside them. One of them heads towards me and I think, no, not now, this is bad timing. I’m in this narrow channel and this Panga is pulling up along side me. I’m stressed. He starts speaking to me in Spanish and pointing. At one point I can tell he says something about photography and then makes a frame with his hands. They are filming here too! I don’t care. I say, “No hablo espanol,” and keep going. He leaves, we continue on and multiple small boats pass us that seem to be full of people. We anchor and I can see there are two women in bikinis on the beach on an uninhabited island with no boats nearby. I get out the binoculars and there’s an obvious structure with clothes hanging, the kind you would only see in Survivor. Nobody bothers us, we try making water again and settle in. A local looking guy is picked up at the beach by a boat. The Survivors start a fire.

We continued trying to make water and continued to have it quit outputting fresh water. It was becoming more frequent and this location seemed to change nothing. After dinner, I was starting to become fed up. I stopped the water maker and asked Tony to dump the measly 2 gallons we had made in 4-5 hours into our main tank. I was pissed, feeling like everything was against us. We couldn’t win. When he didn’t immediately budge, I nagged him to put it in the tank or I would do it myself. He got up annoyed with me and went to dump the water. The next thing I heard was “Oh No, oh no!” “What Happened?,” I asked. He had just dumped the two gallons of water in our main diesel tank. The deck plates are right next to each other. I was devastated before, but now I was having a temper tantrum. A few moments later, I took a deep breath and said, we are going to Panama City in the morning. Too many issues are piling up and we have no containers to try and pump the water out of the tank. Luckily we have another diesel tank, luckily diesel wasn’t emptied into our water tank. It will be ok.

We departed at 5am in the dark. My old track from where I had entered this bay some weeks back was not showing on the chart plotter anymore, but it was still a safer route than the one we took in yesterday, so in the dark we motored out. The wind and sea state was calm, and yes we had to motor sail not long after we got sails up. Big surprise. Tony did some troubleshooting the entire sail back with the water maker. I was beginning to give up on it. We were on a starboard tack and healing toward port while he was troubleshooting. Our thru hull is on the starboard side. I wondered if it was coming out of the water. I pulled out the GoPro and videoed it. Sure enough it was popping out of the water. Katadyn states that you should use a thru hull on the deepest portion of your hull for this reason. We had thought that this old thru hull that was used for the marine head was deep enough, but it seems it wasn’t. It’s likely even at anchor if the boat hit waves or bounced at all it would cause the issue we were running into now.

They say that the only people who can make it living on a boat, cruising full time, crossing oceans and large bodies of water are those who have perseverance. You cannot give up. Every punch needs to be seen as the next challenge to be solved. This is simply the way it goes, not just for us, but for everyone. Even people with brand new boats go through the same challenges we are going through. We will re-plumb the water maker to use the same thru hull as our refrigeration system. We will extract the water out of our diesel tank and polish the remaining fuel with a system we had already started building (for the prospect of getting bad fuel in our travels). We will suffer the huge boat wakes creating rolly conditions in the La Playita anchorage to replace our water stores and dump contaminated diesel into a proper oil well. We will wait in Panama for our sails and other parts to arrive. Panama, Panama, Panama…