Isla Linton 09.36.8N79.35.4W
Salsa af Stavsnas
Ellinor Ristoff Staffan Ehde
Thu 28 Mar 2013 23:47
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5477Nautical Miles from home, if we fly the shortes
way. 9 degrees above the equator, wich means that nine times 60minutes
equals 540nM.
Leaving Panama going to the Galapagos we will
actually go down to 0 degrees wich a less fun experience.
The area around the equator is known for little
wind and thunderstorms.
But let's talk about today. We left Kuna Yala and
headed out to sea. We had to tack eastward first to clear a lot of coral
reefs, and as we approached the Caribean sea with all the swell the waves grew
intensely. We actually had to wear life harness, as the waves crashed on the
boat.
But once we headed out at sea and got more water
under the keel the waves got a little bit nicer, but still big.
As the wind was brisk we actually had an average
speed of 6,8 knots including leaving harbour and working our way in to Isla
Linton.
As we rounded Punta Manzanillo we worked our way
into a channel between Isla Linton and mainland of Panama.
Getting here is adviced to be done in daylight and
that was more than important. Big lines floating from everywhere and some
fishfarms made the entry very tricky and even with a person by the bow the lines
appeared just before us.
Now we are anchored and we can see Panama Mainland
for the first time. Here it is some rainforest all the way into the water and we
can hear screaming birds or monkeys. We cannot tell the difference. Isla Linton
would have been nice to visit but our pilot says that only monkeys live
here.
And as they will approach visitors for food they
get very agressive when you are about to leave or have no more
food.
Our plan tomorrow is to go to Colon, we will see
how that goes. The wetaher is very unstable, you can tell from the forecast, our
program Meteocom was the one that gave the best prediction for today. The other
sources where either to much or to little wind (Chris Parker on Shortwave
radio is very good but today he was not really right), but that is more to worry
than to complain, because that means it can turn out either way.
You might be curious how the children cope with a
day like this. It is actually a hard day for them, mostly because everybody has
been spoiled for 17 days sailing behind the reefs in Kuna Yala. It is like being
in the Stockholm archipellago and suddenly be thrown out in the
ocean.
Andreas gets seasick for a while, then he goes
down, plays with something and comes up again and has to check the horizon. But
he does not throw up. Erika had a little sense of seasickness today but she can
do very well most of the time.
The adults? Well Ellinor has her seasickness
medicine that she takes as a plaster behind the ear. And that helps, but she
cannot go down and do anything. So if we are sailing a day or two I have to do
all the ground service from the galley. I have no problem below, but I was
really tired today, had a hard time to sleep last night since I knew we had to
have a good tactic to cross the waves that come ashore from the entire stretch
of the Caribean sea. You might think it looks small, but the fetch is 1000nM
from the Lesser Antilles. With the stady strong tradewinds the wavetrains have
developed quite big by Panama shores.
We will all sleep well tonight...
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