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Delivering the sun.

Sailing to Puerto Velero on the way to San Blas Islands

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There are many ways to sail to the San Blas Islands and many places to clear into Panama. Some people clear in at Puerto Lindo or El Provenir while others sneak into the San Blas islands and clear in further up the island chain. The problem with clearing in at Puerto Lindo and El Provenir is that you have to pass by most of the San Blas islands.  So, where does Puerto Velero come in?

Since we didn’t want to take the risk of sneaking into the country and we didn’t want to circle back, we had to find another choice.  Our best option was to clear in at Puerto Obaldia which is a small village and a fairly unique entry point. It’s located on the border of Colombia and Panama and is not a popular clearance location. The guide book and noonsite have confusing language about who is and isn’t allowed to clear in at this port. Most people just avoid it due to the uncertainty and poor anchorage.

The sail to Puerto Obaldia is roughly 260 nautical miles. We could either sail 3 days/2 nights directly from Santa Marta, Colombia to Puerto Obaldia, Panama or we could sail to Puerto Velero one day and sail the remaining 200 miles in 2 days/1 night. Puerto Velero seemed like the best choice.

After leaving the comforts of Marina Santa Marta at 630am we noticed immediately that there was something wrong with our props. Matt was at the helm and was not getting much forward propulsion even though we had prop wash. We decided to forge ahead and carefully navigated our way out of the bay. We raised our sails with two reefs in and headed south without the engines. The winds were gusting over the forecast to 35 knots and predicted 1-meter waves were over 3-meters. We settled in for a fun sail down to the Magadelana river in Barranquilla.

As we approached the Barranquilla river we watched the beautiful blue water turn greenish brown. The water became more polluted with tree branches, logs, and trash. We even saw a man’s shoe. Which is scary as the rumor is the cartel dumps bodies into the river to be carried out to sea. We started to cross at about 6 miles offshore, into the light brown water, then into the dark milkshake waters. The depth gauge started reading 3 meters when it should be hundreds, so an immediate about face back to the 3-color water highway.

Mucky waters.

Mucky waters.

Thank goodness, we had strong winds and a broad reach / run which enabled us to sail fairly quickly without the engines. However, we had to use our engines as we entered the Puerto Velero bay which was painful at 2 knots with both engines pushing 1800 rpm (normally that would give us 6 knots). Once we arrived into Puerto Velero, we dropped anchor and Matt hopped in the water with the hooka to clean the props. We had offers to clean the bottom of the boat but we did not think it needed it since the water line was pretty clean. Big mistake! Matt spent an hour cleaning off 1” of hard and soft growth from the props. No wonder they could not give us forward propulsion – poor things. Matt prepared a really nice pulled pork dinner in the pressure cooker which turned out amazing!

Day 1
• Total Daily Miles: 68
• Max Speed: 15.2
• Avg Speed: 7.2
• Hours Moving: 9
• Wind Avg: 25–30 knots
• Wing Angle: Broad Reach to Run
• Wave Height Avg: 3-4 meters

Up next, the completion of this voyage and arrival into Panama…

Matt took this photo in Santa Marta and it missed a post…

This is how the sun is delivered in Columbia. This is how the sun is delivered in Columbia.

Sunset Marina Santa Mart

Comedy of Errors and Total Disaster

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Comedy of Errors.  Even the best made plans can turn into a comedy of errors. Our good friend, Wayne was coming to visit us (he is not the error). So we scheduled an English-speaking taxi driver to pick him up (with a sign and everything). He flew on American Airlines from Dallas to Bogota and then Avianca Airlines from Bogota to Santa Marta.

After Wayne landed in Bogota he alerted us that his next flight would be late (10p vs 830p). When we notified the taxi driver she offered to pick us up and bring us to the airport at no extra charge – a great surprise! We loaded a small cooler with beer and met the taxi driver at 915p giving us plenty of time to get to the airport.

We arrived early, confirmed at the counter that his flight had left, and went upstairs to the café to watch the screens for his flight’s arrival. The eateries closed, another flight arrived, but it wasn’t Wayne’s flight. It’s getting later and later. We decided to head to the arrival area, despite the fact that the screen still showed his plane in route. We asked the airport personnel and they said his flight had come in before the flight unloading now. Yikes we missed him! Our error as we should have just waited at arrivals outside.  We rushed back to the marina. Luckily, Wayne was able to get another English-speaking driver to take him to the marina and accepted U.S. dollars (both unusually rare). He had been waiting about 5-10 minutes by the time we arrived with beer in hand. Welcome to Colombia!

The next day, Matt got up early to get a much-needed haircut and swung by the bakery for morning treat.

We decided to show Wayne around town while finishing up last minute provisioning. First stop was the Mercado Publico to show off the fresh fish, meat, veggie, and fruit markets.

We picked up lots of fresh fruits and veggies, then stopped by the gas station to pick up two-stroke for the dinghy. Next, we picked up rolls at the bakery on the way to Exito, the large supermarket. We each had several bags full of items with no receipts (considering we bought them from street vendors).

DISASTER

As you enter Exito, the security guard searches your bags and tries to staple them closed, which works on plastic bags but not our cloth bags. So, I had this brilliant idea, to use Google Translate on my phone to look up “can we leave our bags at the security desk?” I asked, he said “no” so the boys jockeyed through the crowd to find an empty place out of the way. I set my bags, phone, and wallet down with the boys to go get a cart. Somewhere, somehow, my wallet and phone walked off – gone! Poof! Disaster!

The boys went searching, back tracking our steps, checking garbage cans looking everywhere while I sobbed and tried to explain, in Spanish what happened. We checked the security cameras, nothing. I was a mess, heartbroken, and so disappointed. My wallet had my driver’s license, $300, my atm card, credit card, and photo copies of all 3 of our passports. Matt and Wayne took me begrudgingly back to the boat where we cancelled the two cards and filed for a new driver’s license. We could not use “find my phone” as the phone was in airplane mode. I can only hope that it was a petty thief who saw an opportunity to give their family a better Christmas. Using the money, selling the phone (which was locked) and not stealing my digital footprint or identity. One can pray.

I was in a funk despite the boys’ effort to cheer me up. We went to happy hour where I sulked and then went to El Bistro one of our favorite places to eat. Matt even bought me a new wallet and two cute bracelets’ (all of $8) and my head still hung low.

We did manage to dig up an old iPhone5 which we tried to replicate as much as possible. The problem being we were leaving a wifi zone for a non wifi zone and anything I needed to update had to happen that night – we did our best.

Time heals all wounds and this one particularly stung!

Sunset Marina Santa Mart

Sunset Marina Santa Marta

Sweetie All Dressed Up

Our Dinghy, Sweetie, Gets a Face Lift

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As a cruiser, you rely heavily on your dinghy as it is your “water car”.  The only time you don’t need your dinghy is when you are in a marina.

Our dinghy, “Sweet N Low” or “Sweetie” as she is now referred to, has been in dire need of some lovin.  We have needed to work on her for a while, but didn’t have several days in a row where she wasn’t in use.

List of ailments:

  • Rub rail was coming off
  • Velcro holding chaps was peeling off
  • Chaps needed mending (several tears, velcro, patches, and seams)
  • Slow leak, somewhere

Dinghy tubes are typically made from two types of materials: PVC or hypalon.  We have a hypalon dinghy which requires a specific type glue.  Matt found a glue used for escalators, Cement SC 2000 which is a two-step gluing agent that requires several days to cure.

Several chemicals can be used to remove this type of glue.  MEK, acetone, and mineral spirits.  They are wicked on your skin and have a pungent odor.  Several videos show you how to remove the glue as well, but they require tools that we don’t have on the boat. We had a few ounces of MEK to test in small areas.  We had less than a liter of acetone and about 3.5 liters of mineral spirits.  All three seemed to do the same thing, none better than the other.  Since we had more mineral spirits than the other two that became the solvent of choice.

My first thought was to find out where we could get more MEK or acetone so I went to Facebook.  I know, you are thinking she’s lost her marbles.  Maybe–probably,  There is a really good Facebook page for Columbia cruisers and I thought I’d ask them where to get our supplies.  I explained our project and what I was looking for and within an hour I had a reply.  Just not the reply I expected.  I was told to “never, ever ask a local Colombian for acetone as it is a key ingredient used to make cocaine.  And if I were to ask around, they would think I was part of the Pablo Escobar family.”  What the HELL!  Yikes!  Won’t go down that road.  So, we will make due with what we have on board.

Typically, we would avoid showing pornographic images on our blog, but for the sake of education, we will show you Sweetie without her chaps on.  She looks so very sad.

Note the velcro coming off both inside and outside the dinghy, the rub rail (gray & white below the velcro) is coming off and she is all around a mess.

Dinghy in repair

Sweetie’s bow with velcro coming off & rub rail on

Matt removed the rub rail with little effort and looked mournfully at the mound of glue that had to be removed from the entire circumference of the of the dinghy and the rub rail.  All that brownish yellow stuff is old glue.

Dinghy in repair

Sweetie with rub rail off and side velcro in pieces.

The port side of the dinghy had been repaired in the past using Matt’s escalator glue (it dries black) so it was a bigger mess.  Matt tackled the dinghy first while I worked on the rub rail.   We both started with the worst part of the project-the port side.

The troughs had a combination of glue, dirt, sand, and muck.  They didn’t need to be totally glue free, but the chunks had to be removed.  The two gray outer rails and the white center had to be 100% cleaned with no sticky residue as that is where the new glue would be applied.

Dinghy in repair

Rub rail being cleaned. Top cleaned, guck in crevices and bottom full of glue.

It was frustrating because it took a lot of work that garnered very little progress.  It takes a lot of patience and elbow grease.  You can see that what was once yellow is now almost white again.

Dinghy in repair

Matt finishing up removing large pieces of glue by hand.

After removing the large chunks of balls of glue, Matt used a flap wheel.  This removed the last residue of stickiness.

Dinghy repair.

Matt removing last sticky residue with flapper.

The process for the rub rail was a little different  I used a small brush and mineral spirits in a circular motion to loosen up the glue and remove the large chunks.  Then I used the scraper to remove the chunks in the troughs on either side.   Then I used a bristle pad to get the rest of the glue off.

Dinghy repair.

Cleaning the rub rail. Top cleaned, bottom not.

After the chunks were gone, I used the flap wheel to remove the last of the residue.

Dinghy repair.

Rub rail before sanding begins.

It is amazing how nice it looks once all of the old glue is off.  The flapper wheel really cleaned it up and removed the last bits of stickiness.

Matt and I talked through the gluing process several times before he mixed the compound.  We had a lot of area to cover and a limited amount of time to do it in.  First, you mix the two elements together, then you spread a light coat over the dinghy and the rub rail, and then wait an hour.  It took us 50 minutes to cover all areas with the first coat.  So we had 10 minutes to get a drink, rest, and pat ourselves on the back while the compound sat in a bowl of ice water to prevent it from curing.

The second step required us to reapply another light coat over a 3′ section (both the dinghy and rub rail or both the dinghy and velcro), wait 15 minutes until it’s tacky and then stick the pieces together.

Remember how nice it looked all clean and white – now it is all black and gooey.

We were both working with 1/2 kg can that had to cover the exterior rub rail, exterior velcro and interior velcro.  And it had to be applied to all pieces.  Did I mention that the temperature speeds up the process and hardens or cures the compound?  And did I tell you it is HOT!?

Somehow we managed to squeak every drop out of the can to cover everything we needed.  We destroyed several brushes, but it was done.

The only unfortunate thing is that we came up short on one side.  We should have started in the middle and worked our way down each side.  Either the dinghy was super inflated due to the heat or we were supposed to stretch the rub rail more to make it fit.  Too late now, we cannot start over–it is stuck on good!

3" section that came up short.

3″ section that came up short.

We let her dry overnight which gave it strength of 32 lbs per square inch.  Pretty darn strong.