Isla Canas, Las Perlas

Around the world with the Aqualunies
Jonathan & Gabrielle Lyne
Sat 27 Feb 2010 12:19
27th February, 2010
 
We are now anchored off the south side of Isla Canas.  We were originally on the north side tucked into a very sheltered 'lagoon' with a narrow entrance.  In the book it is described as having clear, turquoise waters.  Well the water is still green and full of leaves and general debris.  We are only 20 miles off the mainland of Panama and there is  a very large river estuary which enters there so it could be from that.  Jonathan and Allan went ashore to the village to see if they could buy any langoustine from the fishermen who had just arrived back but no luck, only small reef fish.  The little shop there which is supposed to have some vegetables had nothing either.  We decided to motor around to the south side of the island which is described as having a lovely beach.  It is beautiful in it's own way, with dark sand, some of it black volcanic, and jungle coming down to the shoreline.  The sea is much clearer but still full of jellybugs which sting like mad when swimming (although Jonathan seems to be immune  to them and they don't sting him).  Went for a walk on the beach, J, unsuccessfully, tried to get some coconuts off a tree.
 On our way here we came across a huge amount of pelicans (a posse of pelicans?) in a very tight group in the sea and some were diving.  We decided to take the yacht through the centre of them with a line out and managed to catch a very nice 16lb jack.  This I marinated in lime juice in large chunks and then dipped in cornflour and stirfried with ginger, garlic, chillie, spring-onion, nampla and an unripe mango and served alongside stirfried pak-choi; it was good.  All had rather too much wine, some fell asleep in the cockpit; it was a beautiful night with a near full moon up, no wind and the sound of the sea lapping on the beach.
After making some more water with our desalinater we plan to go to Rio Cacique where there is a river which we hope to take the dinghy up it to see the wildlife.