Greetings,
We just got back yesterday from a lovely weekend in the Perlas, with Sharon.
Last week Johne went back over to Colon to work a bit more on Kokomo Kat. There were some project he’d meant to get done for Sharon, but ran out of time before the transit. And a few more projects that she’d had come up later. So Johne drove over and spent Monday-Thursday working. While he was gone, I held down the fort on Second Star and got some procrastinated projects knocked out. Sharon and Johne came back over here for a long weekend with me.
We headed out on Friday afternoon after running a few errands (dropping off the part that needed bolts drilled out at the machine shop and picking up some awesome, fresh produce at the huge produce market) Friday morning. On the way out we saw a turtle, dolphin and more whales. This time I got to see one breach. Awesome!
We got to Isla Mogo Mogo late in the afternoon. The visibility wasn’t great for anchoring and our first choice of places had a rocky bottom (not good holding) and a swell coming in from the South West, so we went around to the other side and anchored by Isla Chapera just to the North. We seemed to get a good bite with the anchor and settled in for a nice dinner. We slept well that night and got up the next day ready for projects. Johne had brought some parts from Kokomo Kat that need welding so, while he worked on that, Sharon and I got in the nice, fresh water and gave Hook a long-over-do bottom scrubbing.
After lunch, we all jumped in Hook and ran across to Mogo Mogo for a snorkel. It was very different for what I’m use to. With the large tidal variation and the rock (as opposed to sand or coral) bottom. Some of the fish I knew, some were new to me. The rocks were beautiful with lots of colors and interesting textures. It was fun to just relax and drift back and forth with the surge. When I did that, instead of swimming, the fish ignored me and didn’t swim away.
That night a storm came through with lots of very close lightning and a good sized swell that was hitting us on the beam for quiet a while. None of us slept well, between the uncomfortable roll and frequent checks to make sure we weren’t dragging. When the storm passed we got a bit of sleep but, in the morning, we found we had swung around and drug a bit, and we were closer to the beach than was comfortable. We wanted to see some of the other islands anyway, so we pulled up the anchor and headed south to Isla Casaya. We again had a couple of spots we were thinking about anchoring. When we came around where we could see the first place, the two sport fishing boats with the bunch-of-kids and two jet skis that had been anchored by us the previous day, were anchor there so we went to the other spot which turned out great. We were in the channel between Casaya and Gibraleon. No one else was around (yea! No people) There was a good current but not much wind and we were pretty confident in the anchor holding.
Johne took Hook out to do some fishing and came back, just when I’d finished getting lunch ready, with some nice snapper and grouper. There was enough for dinner that night and lunch the next day. Johne and Sharon decided they’d go out again in the morning before we headed back to town and get some more to bring back.
After lunch Sharon and I put on scuba gear and went down to scrub the running gear (props, shafts and struts). We had intended to do it while the tide was slack but, after lunch and clean up and getting the gear ready to go the current had started to pick up again. When we first went in it wasn’t to bad but it kept increasing and, but the time we got done I felt like one of those cartoons of someone trying to hang on to a light post in a strong wind. It was a new experience for me and a heck of a work out.
Monday, after morning fishing and lunch, we headed back to town. As we left we saw a mama and baby whale right by the island. We got into the anchorage late, made a quick dinner and crashed.
This morning I took Johne and Sharon into the dock to go pick up the parts and head back to Colon to finish up the work on Kokomo Kat. So for the rest of the week I’m batching it again. When Johne gets back we’ll be installing the new inverters and getting ready to move on…
No comments:
Post a Comment