Our first anchorage in Panama is Linton, a small island with a very protected bay behind it. It is supposedly very safe from the weather and from crime. We had heard that it was connected to Colon and it was possible to hire cars here so we wanted to check it out as a possible base for a week from now when the kids arrive.
Closing in on Panama the country looked different to the landfalls we have made before. More mountainous, more rugged and more lush. Again we get this sense of adventure, of being somewhere completely new.
I’d actually had a bad night. I’d been running a slight fever and not slept well. On arrival we first secured the boat, tidied the lines and communicated our position. The we fired up the washing machine and, as the generator was running to do this, we ran the A/C in our cabin to feel cool for a bit. I’m not sure if I slept at all but the hour of coolness really picked me up. During this time, using my US SIM, I made a call to an agent in Colon to discuss terms for his organising our way through the canal. Ordinarily we would do this ourselves but we don’t want any slip ups that would cost us time. We don’t mind the delays ourselves but with the family aboard their time is limited and we want to minimise the risk of being stuck somewhere due to an omission or mistake somewhere.
I then made a general call to the nearby boats to see if anyone had any good experience of the local area that they could share. Louis, an Ozzie, from Sympatica responded and gave us lots of useful info before having to stop for brunch. We had brunch then too and afterward Louis came over to see the boat and talk further about the local area and our ideas. He and his wife Julie are another couple on their second circumnavigation and they’ve been in the Panama area a lot. We gave Louis some of our mahi mahi in thanks for all his help.
I was keen on getting a SIM card for my phone so that we could have a local number to communicate with our agent for the canal. Helen and I dinghied 2 miles over to La Guarya where they had a single shop that seemed to sell everything. And everything did include SIM cards and we soon had a Panama number. I wasn’t that long ago when you had to wait months for a land line to be installed. Now you can buy a number in a one horse village in the middle of nowhere and be going instantly. Amazing.
On the way back we stopped by Sympatica as Louis had invited us back. We met his wife, July, and their passenger Heather. They had a shore-side party to go to so we didn’t stay more than an hour but had a good time chatting. I was able to help him out with a setting on his charger as they had been spending too many hours charging each day. The place they were going ashore to had four orphan sloths they were looking after. Louis said he would see if he could arrange a visit for us this morning.
Back on Dignity we relaxed for a while before having curry for dinner. We watched a few shows to stay awake before hitting the bunk and crashing out for a well needed nights sleep. It’s a lovely feeling going to sleep knowing you won’t be woken in less than three hours.
Today we’re going to close the 30nm distance between here and Colon. We’ll go and see the sloths if we can and then move on. Plan A is to go to Portobello and check that out and do the final 20nm early Monday morning. Plan B is to go all the way to Colon and anchor out on the Flats before going into the marina early Monday. We haven’t yet made up our minds up which to do.