Since our arrival here in the Bocas del Toro and the inbound clearance at the Port Captain’s office in Bocas town, many things happened and I also wanted to relax as well.

When we were approaching Bocas town I called the Port Captain on the official VHF channel for advice where to dock. We got a surprising reply and excellent advice from a lady in German with an Upper Franconian accent. Gosh what’s that? Somebody migrated to Panama? Following her advice we dropped the anchor and dinghied in to the the Port Captain’s office.

First person I saw was a colored lady. Does she speak German with an Upper Franconian accent??? Possible, but it would be a very special case. Quickly I found out that she was not the unknown lady. We made inbound clearance without a problem except that the bill was hefty. As for the cruising permit, we were asked to come back next week. Inbound clearance was about 150 USD for 3 person crew; crying permit goes on top.

Back on the boat, there was the request to go immediately into the marina to have access to i nternet, but I felt that my batteries suddenly were complete empty. Not single electron difference between plus and minus. I was not surprised. For 15 days I was permanently on stand-by. Sleeping twice a night for 4 hours was good but there were interruptions. Then the responsibility for the crew members draws my batteries as well.

It turned out that there is no WiFi connection anymore for this night as the office was closed. So we stayed at anchor where we were and this was safe.

Next morning we went into the marina but first to the fuel dock. After refueling, the marina captain told me that we have to wait for the high tide to go through the entry channel towards the box he had foreseen for us. I asked to please show me the boxes. Both boxes are even to shallow for MaRe. At the end, we docked just behind the fuel station. Not the best place but pretty good. Contacts to other sailors on the same dock etc were not possible in the normal, way because we were a bit outside.

First Nik needed to leave and got her flight to Germany and water taxi for the next day already. My OBM got her flight for 2 days later back to Japan.

Boat work started immediately. A topic was the water. We needed urgently water and I wanted to have clean water in my tank. Alex, one of the marina staff explained me that the water is clean, he drinks it daily, and he also told me people use 5 micron filters to get sediments out. I pretty quickly got a 2-filter-system in a hardware store. 5 microns and a carbon filter as a second filter. It works perfectly fine and tastes good.

We also took some time to dinghy over to the town and found a pretty protected dinghy dock for 2 USD a day with coming and going as often as we want. Nice people. It’s based on trust to put the money in a not locked box. The next day we had very nice conversation with the owner who told us he has 3 sons: a black, a local Indian, and a white one. Three wives, three sons, three colors.

Bocas is a very busy town. One sees plenty of back packers besides people coming obviously with their boats to the Bocas like us. In the same way it is obvious that there are very money supermarkets. All run by Chinese. Why does a small town like Bocas needs so many supermarkets. I got a possible answer a few days later from an US couple I met: money laundry. This explanation makes sense.

After Nik had left for flying home, I strolled with OBM through the streets. Houses are often pretty nicely painted. Colorful Caribbean. We also found a tiGo and a +movile shop where I wanted to go next day to check the plans they offer. On this day I just wanted to stroll around with my OBM and absorb together with her as much as possible of what we saw of the town, its people, and its life.

Then my OBM needed to leave. A very sad day, but we knew it will come. But, we had a great time from her arrival in Havana until here in the Bocas del Toro. I’m grateful for this time.
Early in the morning we dinghied over and walked to the airport. It was only a less than 10 min walk. After she needed to go through the security door, I waited outside to see her again on the way from the building to the plane. We waved good bye once again and then her plane took off for Panama City. I was alone again.

I went to the 2 mobile phone companies’ shops to see what they offer. tiGo had the best offer and was also recommended by friends, who sailed here a year ago. After talking to the shop assistant, another customer asked me if I’m from the sailboat MaRe. I was astonished. It turned out that he is the husband of the the lady with the Upper Franconian accent. We decided to have a cup of coffee and talk. Long story short: SV Sea Pearl have fair winds and following seas and always “Handbreit”.

During the last dinner OBM and I had at the little restaurant of the marina, we met a few very nice people. One of them, the mucisian of the night, even toured Japan a few years ago. We also learned that every morning there is a VHF radio call among all the boats in VHF 25 W range. After my OBM had left, I joined this group every morning and got interesting information and nice and helpful contact to the sailing couple of SV Amekaya. They sail in Panamanian waters since years. I got very valuable information about sailing in the Bocas as well as sailing in the San Blas Archipelago. Thanks Amekaya for sharing your knowledge with me.

As the internet of the marina was pretty slow and I had now my own connection, laundry was done, I knew sufficiently about the area here, and decided to leave the marina and drop the hook outside. There I did remaining boat jobs and worked on an IT task I needed to do back in Tokyo while waiting for Tob, the son of an old friend of mine from my student times in Würzburg.

Tomorrow Tob arrives.