Roatan to Bocas del Toro, Panama

We Made It!
Braving a non functioning auto helm, vicious headwinds, the electrical navigation system dying, and awe inducing lightning storms Heidi, Jim, and I sailed safely from Roatan, Honduras to Bocas del Toro, Panama. We stopped for two nights at the offshore Columbian island getaway San Andres to rest up and take a look at the auto helm and chart plotter. We left on Tuesday May18th, and arrived at the jungle clad islands of Bocas del Toro this morning, Monday May 24th.
To understand our mindset as we left Roatan you need some background. First, Heidi already has a plane ticket out of Bocas del Toro on the 26th so we have a time table. Also we tried unsuccessfully to leave twice already, being beaten back to the island both times with engine failures. (really a gremlin in the fuel lines). We checked the weather, and the idea of beating into the wind for half the trip wasn’t inviting, but we had to get moving.
The third time is a charm. Hearing the engines purr contently for more than an hour was wonderful. And we all had smiles even if waves were washing over the deck and up into some windows that were not very well sealed. Then after 5 hours the auto helm suddenly shoots off a warning beep, reads failure on the screen, and then shortly turns off altogether, not to come back on again. Heidi and I were used to this from our adventure on the Odyssey, and we knew that it meant long hours hand steering at the helm. We all got very talented steering with our feet. I took this all in stride but the next failure was even tougher.
An hour after the auto helm died both of our electronic chart plotters and radar malfunctioned and went dead. We use these instruments to tell us our gps location imposed on a chart of the area, water depth (reefs, rocks, etc), speed, direction to destinations, radar, etc… You may be asking yourself, ‘well how did sailors do all of that before electronic navigation and radar?’, and luckily for Heidi, and I our time working on tall ships came in very useful since we still practice a lot of the old, less technical techniques for finding out these things.
Even luckier was the fact that I had a small handheld gps that ran off batteries. So, finding speed and position was easier. I just plotted that position onto one of our charts and had a good idea where we were going. We steered by compass which can be pretty difficult heading into big wind and waves at night. This was getting pretty tiring by 3 and 4 in the morning but then our luck began to change. For some reason one of the chart plotters popped back to life and wallah, we were back in business.
After rounding the horn where Honduras meets Nicaragua we squeezed out thru a passage in the offshore reefs called the Edinburgh Passage. We had received some local knowledge and waypoints to help guide us thru the treacherous Nicaragua Banks. Once we turned south to head towards the Columbian owned island of San Andres the ride became much smoother. We couldn’t sail on sail power alone but putting the mainsail up really dampened the rolling effect of the waves.

Checking in and getting cleared in San Andres was a breeze. We had to sail past miles of fringing reefs which are cluttered with wrecks. Some old, some new. There was a huge 200ft freighter up on the reefs that hit only 8 months ago. The island reminded me of Honolulu with big hotels and lots of shopping just behind a nice beach with beautiful water.
We stayed at NeNe’s marina where we could fuel up which was a good thing because we ran out of fuel! We were pushing pretty hard against the wind but were under the impression that the fuel consumption was 1.3gallons per hour. It turns out that at our rpm’s it was closer to 3gallons per hour! Luckily we had 30 extra gallons in jugs on deck. We glided into the marina with a healthy 5 gallons left over.
Heidi and I immediately jumped into the water to cool off as Jim got the paper work going. Then we shared a cold beer. Aguila is the local favorite. Nothing like a cold drink when you safely reach harbor. We spent that afternoon and the entire next day snorkeling, checking out the beaches, and trying some Columbian cuisine.

It was a nice break but we were up and ready to go at 4am on Monday the 23rd. We quietly shoved off from the dock and motored out of the lagoon on our way to Panama. We had a couple of guest on our way out. First we heard the local policia chattering away in Spanish on the radio. I soon realized that not only were they talking to us, but they were in high speed pursuit on a motorboat behind us! They thought we were making a pre-dawn getaway but in fact we had all our papers in order, having checked out the night before. So we soon left them in our wake, only to find our other surprise guest, bow riding dolphins! That is always a good omen. Not to mention the auto helm was back up and running.
And what a good omen it was. The wind was light but enough to keep the sails full. We were speeding along right on course with intermittent squalls. The winds headed us a bit during the night but we kept speed up until Heidi noticed some powerful looking lightning storms ahead. Imagine how susceptible a golfer is standing on a golf course, then think about a sailboat on a flat sea with a huge metal mast. Now not to worry, they are built to withstand a direct hit, but it is almost a certainty that while you will remain safe your electronics will not. So we throttled back to let the storms run by in front of us heading west towards land.
This lasted until I took over watch around 1am. A huge lightning storm was building off of our port bow. It looked like we would get swamped by it if we stayed or if we ran ahead. So I powered us up and tried to outrun it. 2 o clock it was still there, hauntingly close. 3 o clock a little bit closer, a little bit bigger. 4 o clock it was all around us. I had all the electronics turned off except our running lights so other boats could see us. Then, inexplicably it was past. I guess it just got tired of bullying us and dissipated.
After that we cruised thru another sunrise, had a wonderful breakfast burrito, and pulled into Bocas del Toro Yatch Club around 2pm. The jungle covered islands and palm fringed beaches of this archipelago are very picturesque. I cant wait to explore them and find some good surf spots. We havnt been able to clear in yet, which means we havnt been allowed to leave the boat but we did have 3 congratulatory beers delivered too us. A solid end to a great trip. I have such a sense of accomplishment after completing an adventure like this. I wonder what will be next…

Comments

  1. I appreciate you shared your escapade. It really seems to me that even with all the misfortunes that you’ve suffered, you still have a great time sailing. And I guess the old ways of sailing still really works especially during desperate times.
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