The Colon Yacht Club to Balboa Yacht Club -- Transiting the Panama Canal

3/24 SITTING IN THE QUARTERBERTH ON MISTY (Just forward of the afterberth)

The arrival at Panama went smoothly. My biggest fear was that the baggage wouldn't arrive--or at least wouldn't arrive on that flight. I was tired from the long night of standing in lines but the actual flight was painless. I was able to sleep for an hour or so and that made the time go very quickly. There were no screaming babies which was also a nice bonus.

As I left the plane I didn't expect to see Bill Austin, whom I'd been told to expect. Since no un-ticketed passengers were allowed in the debarkation lounge, I was surprised when an obvious yachtie with tousled hair and a brightly sunburned face looked at me as I passed the waiting area and called my name. Turns out this was Fritz, another of the crew from Miami, and he was catching the same flight leaving. Didn't have time to talk much with him but he seemed an amiable guy and I think he would have been a good shipmate.

Bill Austen was exactly as advertised. There were several people holding signs waiting for debarking passengers. Bill stood out of the crowd with his unruly mop of white hair, his spare build, blue eyes and, yes, sunburned face. He had brought a taxi to pick me up and we had about an hour and a half ride to the Colón Yacht Club to get acquainted. He's a very personable man, retired now but with interests in commercial rentals. His background is sign painting and Phil tells me he is still a helluva sign painter. Unfortunately, he has to return in two days and, although he says he wants to return to Misty later, I doubt if he'll make it back at least for two or three weeks.

Colón is also as advertised--named accurately as Cólon (as in slightly north of cloaca) instead of Colón. That's a joke Tony will enjoy. What a skuzzy town. To call it run down would be to grossly overinflate its charms and to call it a dump would fall abysmally short of an accurate assessment of its squalor. There is a good grocery store there, however, and one of the things I'll do is stock some produce and other products that don't live in cans.

I've a lot to say on that subject, but want to get back to sleep, now and will write more later.

LATER

I expected to have trouble sleeping with the humidity, especially in the quarterberth that is located under the cockpit on the starboard site. However I slept really well. I got up about 2AM and Phil was up so I got a good chance to find out what was going on. In a lot of ways we've done similar things. Phil has a self storage business. He found that when he figured out how much money he was supposed to bring in and how much actually came in he could never get it to jibe. He got a copy of DBase 2 and wrote himself a program to keep track of his business. He kept working on it and finally it got to the point that he decided to sell licenses for the program to other self storage companies and had a lot of success eventually selling out to his partner.

I've known Phil for 30 years although we haven't been in touch very much during those years. We were classmates in training for UDT (now called "SEALS) and over the weeks we shared that masochistic pleasure got to know one another pretty well. Phil is strongly goal oriented, very intelligent, and a problem solver par excellence. He will always honor any commitment he makes including those he makes to himself. Understanding that will explain why we found ourselves following a demanding schedule of progress even though the fates seemed to conspire against us with many equipment and system failures>

I learned a little more about the passage from Miami. The 16 foot waves were actually about six feet. The steering problem was about as described.

We started the day by first attacking the bilge pump problem. After doing some testing we found the bilge pump worked just fine. We decided to change the float switch that is responsible for turning on the bilge pump when the water exceeds a certain level. That appeared to work, too, although later we found that it would not turn off without lots of jiggling. The steaming light which is clearly broken will be a project for tomorrow. Phil had to go in today to pay the fees for the transit about $1500

I went back to sleep and slept in until about 7 local time (3 hours difference with PST).

The three of us had a breakfast of instant oatmeal, "orange juice" (sweet orange flavored water) and coffee. The coffee wasn't bad.

INTERLUDE OF THINKING

I truly envy the few people I know or have heard of who simply make their life one of continuing challenge, both physical and mental. The engineer who becomes a mountain guide, the young man or woman who chooses to be a combat pilot or spend a life at sea. I'm grateful that I have had interludes in my life that have allowed me to live that life for at least part of the time.

Perhaps the most ubiquitous challenge that any person must face is their own mortality. Most people ignore it or deny it even exists. They are like the person who puts to sea without a raft, or a plan for emergencies. They must deal with the often sudden appearance of death stripped of protection and then make do as best they can. Others, possibly through fear seem to over-prepare. They feel that death is the ultimate loss and that they must fight it "to the death" so to speak. Metaphorically they're sinking their boat with a plethora of lifeboats and defensive gear.

I don't really know how many people really prepare their soul for their death. How many look on it as a transition? How many feel it is simply an end? I don't know, I really don't because it isn't something that most people want to discuss on a gut level. At least I don't think so...maybe it's just my perception.

I don't really think it makes a difference if I have an unshakeable belief that death is transitory or not. It is a fact of life. It is certainly a monumental challenge and worthy of a lot of thought and preparation.

A strong element of the adventure inherent in any challenging event is the unknown. Death is not really an unknown, but how you yourself will handle it is. No matter how well you think you understand your own mind or how well you think you will face eternity, you don't really know. That is the adventure, that is the challenge.

I've said before that when people face life threatening happenings they come out of it feeling more alive than ever. That is our reward for being required to die. Without that ultimate adventure life would be insipid although prolonged and we would probably tire of it and work very hard to invent death.

END OF THINKING

MARCH 15, FRIDAY EARLY AM

GOOD FRIDAY

Just dropped off a load of groceries on Misty. It's the siesta hour and so as soon as the packages are dropped off Phil, hits the cushions. I have never seen anyone who can fall asleep so quickly. Before I am able to change out of my cocktail shorts into my scraggs the boat's saloon is filled with Zs in the humid midday heat. I grab the typewriter and flee to the "Yacht Club" which is closed down for Easter but has an open patio with tables and chairs overlooking the small marina. There are perhaps two dozen yachts of various sizes and persuasions across the walkway from where I sit. Almost all are waiting for their scheduled transit of the Panama Canal.

We are scheduled for Monday, 8 days after I arrived. We have spent the last few days preparing for the transit and repairing items that failed during the boat's passage from Miami here to Colón. We've installed a new steaming light that lives half way up the mast. The repair required two trips up the mast and we took turns being the ascensor and the ascensee. The acensor has the job of winching the other's fat ass up about 30 feet. The ascensee sits in a bosun's chair and trustingly awaits the other to raise him to working level and not to absentmindedly forget what he's doing and let go of the rope. Well, we did that, we repaired the bilge pump, cleaned out numerous yucky filters, sent the Iridium satellite phone back to the manufacturer for repairs, sent back the single sideband radio which never did work, and sent back the main satellite navigation system that works beautifully when in port and let's you know to within 30 feet where the yacht club's head is located. (It will not however perform any geopositioning tricks when underway.) It prefers to pout, hiccup, blink and play coy little games like telling you that you are in southern Yemen rather than Panama.

We have also fastened ten old auto tires along side Misty with the intent of protecting her from the expected impacts with the sides of the locks and whatever other big things might want to crunch us on the transit. We went shopping at the supermarket for food to feed the line handlers that will be with us on the transit. I hope they like peanut butter & jelly, potato chips, crumbled cookies and something green that we're not sure what it is but it did come from the food locker.

I marvel at the miracle of modern science in action. Due to the miracle of telephone and email we are able to complain to the customer support departments of almost all of our electronic systems to tell them that their pinche equipment doesn't work worth shit. Before such modern communication miracles were invented we would have had to wait months to be told "tough shit" by the tech support departments whereas now we get their reaction almost instantaneously.

Still, although the phones have not been working and the onboard satellite phone and email program have not been working, I was able to cadge some time on a computer and check my email. Jana, bless her heart sent me an email to warm my heart. It was poetic in its simplicity. It consisted of three expressive words: "HELP!!! CALL ME"

Some of you may think that was too abbreviated a message to really convey much but you don't understand the incredible rapport that Jana and I have developed over the years. The message was very clear. It meant simply:

Either the phone bill is overdue, I totaled the car, the IRS has me in jail, the cat has ringworm or I need $.50 to buy a Pepsi.

The joke is sure on me when after several hours of begging the local phone company to let me have a connection for only $20 per minute I do manage to get through to a cell phone that has a dead battery and find out that the trouble is not serious and I needn't have called after all.

That being said it is terrific to find out that there is no serious problem at a measly cost of $64.

EASTER FEAST

We've decided to have a typical cruising Easter feast of Beef Bourgignon with Yucca a l'eau-that is if we can find some red wine to put in the canned beef stew... Well, it doesn't matter since we dined at noon at McDonalds (Ok, give me a break! It's Good Friday and everything else is closed)

Next morning... had eggs, bacon and leftover yucca home fries (not "yuckie", "yucca", a root vegetable).

SATURDAY

Phil decides to buy a Colón Yacht Club tee shirt. I'm with him when this conversation takes place.

Phil: "I want to buy a large size tee shirt"

Lady behind counter obviously a fugitive from Kmart: "A Tee shirt?"

Phil: "Yes, a large tee shirt"

FFKM: "What size?"

Phil: "A large size tee shirt"

FFKM: "How many?"

Phil: "One. I want one large size tee shirt."

FFKM: "Here is one. It's a large. Is that OK?"

So, anyway Phil gets a tee shirt that says "Colón Yacht Club."

We then decide it's time to have a beer and while downing a couple we find that another package that we've been looking to be delivered by FedEx arrived two days ago and is safely stored in the bar's broom closet. Well, it's great to find it since it has Garmin, our primary navigation device, in it. It's discovery occasions another couple of celebratory beers that make us realize that with stores closed Easter Sunday we'd better go to the super market and get some necessities.

We get a couple bottles of killer Merlot at $4.70 a bottle and a great liter of Carta Vieja Reserva Especial rum (the best in the house) for $6.50 and then a bunch of pineapple juice so the rum won't be lonely in a glass and a few limes to make the rum and pineapple smile. We look around for a spear gun but settle for twin fly-swatters which seem more likely to be useful as we really don't want to spear anything and we do want to wreak terror on a herd of flies that has decided to join us on board. A couple of steaks were $2.50. And we pick up a prize three pound yucca root for 38 cents so we'll have some nice healthy roughage and we're outta here.

Get back to the boat and Phil asks me if I want to check out the rum and pineapple but I tell him no I would rather wait until later and so he declares that it is later and it's really a great drink.

Now I'm sampling the pineapple and Carta Vieja. sabrosíta (Spanish for "Yum"). The sun is disappearing and I toast it and all you poor people out there who are not living in this pit of luxury.

Easter Sunday. They don't celebrate Easter here. Good Friday is the big day. That's good since we can get things done today. Don't know what that would be, but if there should be something to do, by God, we can do it!

Phil is off to town to find a water jug and I sit here with the newly reinstalled GPS navigator doohickey. It still is crushingly accurate with regards to the head. It tells me that by setting course of 010 degrees and sailing .02 nautical miles I can take a crap providing I remember to take the key and my own TP. I've been trying to establish some sort of rapport with the beast so that if at some later date I should ask it to let me know where Costa Rica is it will not panic, but will try to help.

The idea seems to be to put in some "waypoints" by entering longitude and latitude. After you enter a lot of waypoints then you get to your destination much like completing a "connect the dots" kids game. That seems pretty cool to me and so I put in some waypoints that, if connected, will outline a teenager's fantasy of Brittany Spears. As much fun as it would be to connect the dots I'm afraid all my work will be for naught since a lot of the course we'd have to follow is further inland than is really practical to sail in a 33 foot sailboat. Oh, well...

Tomorrow we'll have 6 people aboard this little boat. 4 line handlers, a helmsman, and a pilot. Since we'll most likely be tied alongside a tug boat most of this gaggle of marineros will have little to do but eat ham sandwiches and swill ginger ale. If we could talk them into swatting flies the whole operation would be worth it.

Anyway, for better or worse we'll be on the Pacific side by tomorrow evening. We have a few chores to accomplish there and we will be ready to go. Mark is arriving on Wednesday evening and we'll probably be getting underway for Costa Rica early on Thursday. Phil is debating whether to tell Mark, his son about our early departure or not. He thinks it would be a fine bonding experience to have Mark's first glimpse of Panama be on the horizon dead astern.

Well, back to trying to learn how to program the "Garmin" GPS. I'm trying to teach it to play "Pong", but it's way too stupid. Besides Phil also brought back another quart of pineapple juice to replace the one that disappeared last evening and that has to be stowed properly.

Checking all of the old weather maps for this time of year and in this area all indications are that we'll have fair winds most of the way to Costa Rica. Frankly, this worries the shit out of me. This could just be a little joke the Creator set up to rap my knuckles for not even making the minimum effort to attend church services today...hmmm, maybe it's not too late.

It looks like about 2.5 days to Costa Rica after we get underway from Balboa, Panama. That means we should be there on Sunday more or less, well I'd actually prefer all together to more or to less. Anyway we plan to spend about a week in Costa Rica doing a little exploration, diving and rum depletion exercises before going on northwest toward Mexico. The general plan is to not spend a lot of time in the intervening countries as they are not really properly respectful of tourism. We'll play it by ear, however.

Phil just got back from his trip to town. He didn't find another water jug but his secondary mission was to take back a hand operated egg beater that was not working properly. The good news is that he was able to get an operating one and didn't even have to send the original back to the factory by FedEx.

Just heard that we'll be transiting the canal alone. That should be a lot more fun than tied alongside another boat. Just us in the middle of the locks with 125 foot lines from the four corners of the boat controlling it as the locks fill or drain. I've heard that there is terrific turbulence as the locks fill. There are a series of 4 foot openings in the bottom of the locks that admit the water. The trick is to stay away from the sides of the lock and to avoid any other boats that may be sharing the lock for that move. Guess the line handlers won't have too much time to swat flies. We have to get underway at 4 AM to make the schedule and starting that early pretty much assures us of completing the transit in the one day. It would be a bummer to have to wait an extra day half way through. So it's all going to be up to the little three cylinder Westerbeke to keep us moving at about 6 knots to keep up.

Next to us is a 50' motor yacht. The owner doesn't seem to be on board and the whole time we've been here there is only the caretaker and his cronies. They've set up lawn chairs under a big tree in front of the boat's slip along the mole and so we are entertained all day with their conversation that sometimes becomes very loud and very strident. Raúl is the Alpha retiree of the group and it is through him that we get our clothes washed and that we located line handlers, etc. Raúl was here during the American period and so seems to know most of what's happening. You never know for sure when you're likely to be taken advantage of, but all seems pretty mellow here at the Yacht Club.

Our neighbor on the other side is a 45 foot catamaran. It's a really beautiful boat and looks like it would be a lot of fun to travel on--just about ideal I would say. The owner doesn't show himself much but the boat is very clean and ship shape. We had the first inkling of how he spends his spare time yesterday when a young lady walked out to his slip and called out a name. Couldn't make out what it was but she was persistent and we assumed the skipper was her friend and she was trying to awaken him or catch his attention. She was remarkably persistent and kept calling over a period of about 20 minutes. Finally another young lady emerged from the companionway looking a little disheveled and bounced down the gangway to join her friend on the dock and the two of them sauntered off. The owner of the boat (or perhaps its caretaker) appeared briefly on deck, lit a cigarette look around desultorily managing to convey during his brief appearance an air of satisfaction, and then he disappeared back down the companionway - I guess for a well-deserved siesta.

Further down the mole there is a new arrival. Looks like about a 60 foot steel ketch. Went down to say hello. The skipper "Skip" and his crew "Jim" were the only ones on board. We spoke for a while and found that he's from Australia and is on the last half of a leisurely circumnavigation heading back home. As several others we've met the next stop is the Galapagos and then the Marquesas, Tuamotus, Tahiti, the Cooks, Tonga and Australia. Sighhhh....

Just had a nostalgic last meal here in Colón. Phil wanted to go to McDonalds but I resisted and we ended up with a pitcher and a hamburger right in the Yacht Club. It was pretty good, too.

Well, we certainly made ourselves useful during the afternoon. A couple of boats arrived after transiting from the Pacific and we were able to sell them our shower key for $5 so we would not lose out by not being able to turn it in tomorrow. We also contracted to have our laundry done and I'm sure it was done very well, but since it hasn't come back to us yet I'm not so sure that that matters. Some would rather have it dirty than not have it at all. Well, I still have my cocktail shorts.

During the afternoon it did seem that both Phil and I were in danger of coming down with malaria. We did see a mosquito. Anyway we felt the best bet would be to take preventative action by downing some quinine water which as you know tastes wretched without a dollop of gin. Double medication is a good idea as you know so we applied ourselves to self medication throughout the afternoon.

Tomorrow morning at 4:00 AM we leave the dock hopefully with our line handlers and our laundry to meet the pilot who will guide us through the canal. Since we are going alone, that is not tied to anyone else, it should be a wonderful adventure. Kind of like the ant that wanted to plant a rubbertree plant on the elephant that thought he could or something like that.

Here we are in Miraflores lake which is located between the descending locks of the canal. We have a two hour wait until the Cruise ship we are going to accompany catches up with us.

The day started at 4:00 AM when our hired line handlers arrived and we cast off from the yacht club. Enroute to the first lock a pilot boat met us and we took on two advisors. With a total crew of 7 Misty is pretty well completely full up. One of the advisors immediately went below and stretched out on the cushion in the dining area. He remained there for most of the transit talking to his girl friend on his cell phone. It took about an hour to reach our assigned spot and to wait for the huge ship we were to go through with to get placed in the first chamber. The chamber is about 100 feet wide and this big mamu was about 98 feet wide a really tight squeeze.

After the ship was secure in the chamber we tied up alongside the tug immediately behind it that was accompanying it. It was truly awesome to see this chamber that was 1000 feet long and 100 feet wide rise 27 feet in about 10 minutes. There are vents in the bottom of the chamber 4 feet wide that admit the water, 26 million gallons. We did three locks like that raising us 85 feet above sea level. We then crossed about 20 miles of Gatún Lake. We had a fair wind and so were able to raise the jib and add a knot or two to our speed. At the next lock we were rafted up with two other sailboats and we had to maneuver all tied together. It was something like a three legged race but done by centipedes. We did manage to maneuver into the lock and get the three boats centered away from the snaggly sides of the lock. One of our line handlers either has never been on a boat before or his mother was frightened by the macramé slasher, because he didn't seem to get along with ropes in general and the one he was assigned specifically. He had his rope so tangled that we were fortunate not to be left dangling from the side of the lock with the other two boats trailing below. I was just about ready to attack the rope with my trusty boxcutter knife when the tangle gave and we were reprieved.

When we exited the lock we were told by our advisor, who had been jabbering colloquial Martian into his walkie talkie, that we would transit the next two locks alone and not cozied up to the other two frog-crewed boats. Our lock companions then cast off our lines and went on happily conjoined as we sheared off in shame and scurried over to our assigned bouy to wait.

Our advisor assured us the change in our status was not the result of our participation in the cluster f..k but was rather due to some other reasoning.

Almost everyone is sleeping, now. Snores and wheezing abound throughout the boat. One of the pilots has been sleeping since he joined us at 5AM so I suppose he's actually dead and we're not as crowded with live bodies as I thought.

Phil, who took a trip to the pacific side the other day and learned that there was a TGIFriday's there just shuffles around the boat swatting flies and muttering TGIF, TGIF. I really admire people with clear goals in life.

Our second advisor has a pronounced Brooklyn accent and he came by it honestly while living in Brooklyn. I wish I could transcribe the effect of his Spanish mixed with Brooklynese but can't quite manage that.

BALBOA YACHT CLUB, PACIFIC SIDE

It's 5 AM at the Balboa Yacht club. We're on a mooring. The bridge of the Americas is a scant quarter mile to the north, soaring over the ship channel at least 300 feet high. It's still night and there's a gentle northerly breeze flowing over the anchorage and on to the Pacific Ocean where we'll be headed in a couple of days.

We completed the passage through the Miraflores locks which from the Pacific side are the entrance to the canal. We took these locks solo with our only companion a huge cruise ship. Our position was at the front of the lock and the cruise ship snugged up behind us about 50 yards. We got to see a view of a ship that you normally never want to see from a small boat.

Fortunately for the many observers on the ship we were ahead of the overhang of the bow and so if they had good vision or binoculars they could observe us at their leisure and marvel at our prowess in handling Misty as we negotiated the locks. We also passed the main control tower of the Transit Authority that controls the canal. They have a visitor area that also allowed a peanut gallery of admirers for us to play to. Even more was the Internet camera located there that allowed anyone in the Internet world to gaze upon and marvel at our antics. (We felt sure you had been hanging on this all day in order to catch a glimpse of us). I probably shouldn't have mooned the entire world but with such an audience how could I resist. (Just kidding, honest) Well, I did think about it.

We have a few chores to accomplish. Securing the boat for sea. Making a few last minute repairs. Picking up some items at Costco. Picking up Mark on Wednesday evening and, of course, getting the Iridium phone installed again.

It's cool this morning on deck and it is really a great feeling to be slightly chilled. I'm looking forward to being someplace where it's comfortable to just dive into the water anytime the mood strikes.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 3

God I'm tired of Panama. We've now got charts of the area north, We've got plenty of coffee, four apples 18 potatoes 50 packets of potato chips and corn chips. A bunch of pasta and envelopes of stuff to put on the pasta if it ever gets cooked. We still have half a big jar of peanut butter and some grape jelly in a jar that is big enough to bathe in, and we still have that 4 pound yucca root. We've got other stuff too but I don't know where it is so I'm not sure it counts.

I spent the afternoon putting together fishing rigs so that when we get up toward Costa Rica we can catch a big Dorado or Tuna. Of course I'm not too sure what we'll do if we do catch one since the cockpit is hardly big enough for four human beings to all put their feet on the deck let alone a big bloody flapping fish jumping around. Well with a little preparation... I'll have a big club to bash them into submission and to fight off my shipmates until I can whip out my trusty tube of wasabi and can get a mouth full of sashimi.

Mark arrives tonight so maybe he will add something unique to our eclectic mix of nutritionally challenged meals.

I think it would be hard to beat my dinner this evening, however because it was that all American favorite, peanut butter and no jelly without milk. It's lucky I can type this as it may be several days before my overworked tongue will be able to remove enough chunky style from my palate to render me vocal again.

I've been studying how to use the GPS navigator and after a thorough reading of the manual it's clear that I haven't been getting enough sleep. The instrument will d o some amazing things for those who know how to make it do them. I have a start, however, I do know that we're here on this mooring and it does have a location. If I could find a pizza delivery company that understood latitude and longitude it would be no problem to get a pizza delivered. I guess I could even order it by satellite phone. Now that would be very cool.

We haven't left Panama yet but I think I'm going native. I've virtually lost my skill with the remote. Well, not really because it's like riding a bike and you never forget how to hit the power with your thumb (or is it the index finger?)

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