We anchored at 10 am in Porvenir, San Blas which is our port of entry into Panama.

Now we are safely here I can tell you about the worst sailing we have ever encountered! It has taken us 4 days to sail here from Bonaire and on the second day, Thursday, we encountered strong winds and square waves - which are flat faced waves like a wall of water that engulfs the back of the boat. On Thursday afternoon, day 2, we had a knock down! We found ourselves parallel with a breaking wave. As the wave hit us it knocked us down, we just carried on down the wave until the mast was in the water. Thankfully we were both harnessed on, I was sitting in the cockpit and ended up backwards with my head and shoulders in the sea, Paul was standing at the helm and was hanging onto the winch. It all happened very quickly, as soon as we were knocked down the boat quickly righted itself. It left us quite shocked! We didn't manage any sleep that evening as the winds were gusting 50 knots and we feared another knock down. Paul spent the best part of 18 hours at the helm trying to anticipate when the next wave was going to hit us. We did have two more knock downs in the early hours of Friday morning, unfortunately for us we had three waves with our name on! Paul has made a friend of one of the Andersen 58 ST winches, which is the first thing he grabs hold of as the boat lurches over. We also had a couple of waves over the back of the boat that fill the cockpit and we were left sitting knee deep in water!

A lot of the other rally boats have experienced similar conditions with another 3 boats having knock downs. Also three other boats Bali Blue, Briet and Lucy Alice all have hydro vane self steering units fitted, which the manufacturers say are suitable for seas found in southern oceans, all three boats have had their shafts bent and are waiting for new ones to be sent out. We all have a tale to tell!

We have had some more 'over board' incidents. On the first knock down we nearly lost the man over board sling, it was being dragged along only held on by its strap, and after the boat righted after the second knock down the horseshoe life ring was missing, the dinghy was realigned on the deck and the cruising chute was hanging on by its tether. Then incredibly as the day went on the wind and waves decreased and our nightmare sail was nearly over. We had a leisurely sail throughout the evening giving us time to reflect on what Jackamy and our bodies have gone through over the last 98 hours.

We left Bonaire 4 days ago with Blue Magic but we sailed a different course to each other and at 4 am this morning with 30 miles to go our paths crossed and we sailed in together. We had been warned it would be a lively passage, but never anticipated being in a gale for the best part of it. We have since found out that this passage is called the Northern Cape Horn and is one of the top five worst passages with Cape Horn being no.1. I'm glad I didn't know this fact when we set out, 'ignorance is bliss' or perhaps 'forewarned is fore armed' I don't know.

The San Blas islands are absolutely beautiful, what a reward after a horrendous sail. We have put our clocks back an hour so are now five hours behind UK.