It’s what I’m eating and drinking right now while writing this narration.

Stayed a few days in Cartagena, a town, especially the old town and district Getsemani, I like very much. Stayed intensively in August, when I was there by plane. Seeing it again and at night was good. It was a good feeling.

Beside this I had to arrange a few things and walked a lot from shop to shop to get some things. Among them a faucet for the STB forecastle head. The only 8 month old one, which I bought in a chandlery in St. Maarten stayed leaking. Now, friend who comes next week bought one in Germany and brings it along. Thanks Ste for that!

Today, i wanted to cast off lines at 1200 but it was almost 1400 until I left the dock to go around the head of the dock to the fuel station. Once MaRe’s diesel tank was filled up, i left finally. Until now, I made almost 50 NM with the motors. I could set the genoa to get an additional speed of up to 0.6 KN. Not much but it helps.

The wind direction is not really as forecasted, the ECMWF, SPIRE weather models are closest to the wind I’m having. GFS is also not to far away. PWE, PWG, and UKMO are pretty off. Experience shows that the ECMWF is most often pretty good. SPIRE is good for off-shore sailing, like now. Since a few days I’m watching the weather forecast and it did not change significantly. Conclusion: I have to motor all the way and if I’m lucky, I get a bit of wind from STB. So far I have it like this. Let’s see how it develops.

Wind waves are at level 2, between 10 and 50 cm. Swell is about 50 cm but very short coming from different directions.

Until about hair an hour, there was a lot of lightning but further away mostly. Only once i change the course by 20 deg to get some distance from a lightning area at STB. This lightning center was nice to watch. The lightning was behind the clouds. A flashy background illumination of the clouds, which made the cloud structure visible.

More later, when I’m less tired.

The night was good sailing. Average speed around 6 KN.

Since daylight I can see the sea and waves again if looks confused. Two swells are meeting each other at a shallow angle. Therefore MaRe sways a bit left – right. Swell sometimes reaches 2 m. MaRe just lifts her bums and lets the waves pass under her. She is a good and strong lady.

I’m a bit tired. But in the afternoon, when being securely moored in Club de Pesca Marina, I will take a sleep.

Wind is forecasted to stay around 15 – 20 KN TWS. Curious how it will blow in the marina when docking.

It’s 0134 MaRe ploughs with an average of 6 KN through the nightly sea. Peak speed was more than 8 KN. Wind waves are still around 50 cm, swell is only about 1.5 m, but not very long yet.

Only the genoa is set as AWA is mostly 140 – 150 deg STB.

The wind increased pretty much as forecasted by the ECMWF and SPIRE weather models. There were also some squalls. From one MaRe got a bit of rain. The other ones delivered just a bit more wind.

It’s just a nice feeling sailing like this through the night. The clouds hanging partially high and partially filled with lots of water, pretty low. Their illumination from the moon above them draws interesting painting. Occasionally there are flashes in the distance. All in all something I never got while sleeping in my bed.

In the early evening hours I got a confirmation mail from Club de Pesca Marina for a berth.

As a sailing friend who is already in Cartagena, gave me the phone number of an clearance agent he used, I’m already in touch with the compulsory agent.

Thus on board of MaRe all is fine. And wind, please keep blowing!

Since this morning I’m on my way to Cartagena, Colombia.

During the morning hours a very little bit of wind to pull with the genoa about 1 KN additionally. Wind waves were down level 1 and a nice swell was rolling towards MaRe from about 50 deg PRT.

Wind went down, genoa is furled up and MaRe is running with her engines hoping that late the afternoon the promised 10 – 15 KN eine from WSW will finally come.

Until then a throwback to yesterday.

From the Cayos Chichime I sailed with of these islands to the southern area of Cayos Hollandes. For about 25 % of the distance, I could use the genoa additionally. This gave me about 1.5 KN speed increase.

The Cayos Hollandes are said to be mostly uninhabitated. This in contrast to the Cayos Chichime where even very tiny islands are inhabitated. If you want to go one of the Chichime islands, you have to pay 3 USD per person. Quite expensive just to walk along a sandy beach for about 50m.

Thus, I cruised around with the dinghy and had a look from boat.

The first thing one sees is that islands are very clean and warm maintained. No garbage lies around.

On one islands there is tiny grocery, on another there is bar, where foreign sailor don’t respect the conservative dress code of the Kuna. At another island they are said to sell SIM cards. If it’s extremely small and reminds me to a piece of land to build a house in Tokyo.

The entry to two, as “good” described, anchorages starts from SW and leads through a narrow passage, but with deep enough water, between Calubir and Ogoppirdup island. The first anchorage has quite deep water; about 15 m and more. For the 2nd anchorage, called “swimming pool anchorage”, one needs to keep 2 shoals at PRT. After having passed the 2nd shoal, I searched and found a good spot to drop the anchor at and 3.5 m and gave about 28 m off chain. Almost factor 8 with a sandy, thus good holding ground. In shallower water I typically use more chain than 5x water depth.

The surrounding islands are bigger then in the Cayos Chichime. Here and there are houses to be seen. Maybe in the sense that only a very small part of an island is inhabitated, the Cayos Hollandes are called mostly uninhabitated.

In the early evening hours a local came by and offered coconuts bread for breakfast. As departure was scheduled for latest 0700, he delivered at shortly past 0600. A coconuts bread has the size of a bun or a “Brötchen” für the ones who know about German bakery. 9 breads for 2 USD, is fair.

Then the anchor got up and I carefully followed my old track outside.

Now, after 45 NM, I’m still waiting for the wind being “promised”. Currently the SPIRE weather models describe the current wind situation best, followed by the ECMWF model. The GFS is a bit off, and PWE, PWG are pretty off. According to SPIRE I should get 10 – 15 KN in about an hour to two. Let’s see!

At 1730 the anchor was dropped in nice sandy patch of the seabed at about 5 m depth. Pulling back with 1500 RPM, the anchor did not slip at all.

A nice sunset behind an island close by at PRT side. To STB corner of about 120 deg, there is a small inhabited island. Distance about 100 m. People at the island can be seen. Cottages look simple. This doesn’t mean people are not healthy or not happy. We often think we need certain things and in reality we don’t need them at all. We just don’t recognize how much we are manipulated in magazine, TV commercial, special offers the Google search engine, Facebook etc. shows us.

To STB side at about 60 deg there are a few islands, which are overflowed by the sea due to rising sea levels. Tomorrow I will try to go there. Wonder if I may get a permission to go at land.

For years I was dreaming about going to these islands, now I’m here. What kind of impressions I will carry with me when I leave this archipelago.

As planned I left the marina at shortly past 0930.

Wind is not the best, AWA 40 – 50 deg PRT and AWS 7 – 8 KN STW. This is achieved with the genoa well trimmed gives additional 0.5 – 0.7 KN.

As I want to arrive with still bright daylight I don’t want to use main and genoa. This would reduce STW by about 5 KN; estimated.

Had today my experience with the absolutely inefficient Panamanian bureaucracy. Unbelievable. Most of the people don’t know what they need to do and many people are sitting around and simply don’t do anything; I even would not be surprised if some of them only came to visit their friends being employed.

I needed to go by taxi to Colon (70 USD) to get a document, which was, until recently, available here at the customs office of the marina.

Today, I was also lucky because Ari, the lady, who drove us to Colon, helped me with the helpless administration staff. Persons in charge of issuing a common document needed to get advice by phone or from other people in the room.

One young lady, she used an old electrical type writer, entered as country of registration for our MaRe “Polen”. I never mentioned the word “Polen” at all. However while she filled in the document she was busy talking to her colleagues/friends. Fortunately the one who filled in the important document wrote “Alemania”.

I feel it also shows the quality of the only 6 year compulsory school system. Everybody can read and write, but not more. Only a small percentage of the population gets more education. A good system for the corrupt upperclass to keep privileges for themself and the majority of the population at low level of education and income.

Tomorrow morning I need to go to the immigration office at Portobello for outbounce clearance.

Hope to cast lines tomorrow by 0900 – 1000.

Today, at around 1130 h I just ordered a meal in Puerto Lindo, when i got a call from Wikus that he is in Linton Bay Marina. 24 h early than we discussed yesterday on the phone.

I rushed back – a bit more than 2 km to walk. He opened engine- saildrive area and didn’t find what he expected: a problem with the damper plate he replaced.

At the end we found the problem. The engine mountings got a bit free play, and at low RPM the normal engine vibrations make the rattling noise I heard. He says that’s not a big problem as this only appears when the engines are around idling and low RPM. At normal crossing RPM the engine doesn’t vibrate it same way, thus the noise cannot be heard.

We decided that he gets the engine mountings for both engines and than we plan a day, when I’m in Linton Bay Marina for a day to two. Then he replaces the mountings on both machines.

Additionally, he placed a piece of rubber between the saildrive mounting, the 3rd support for the engine-saildrive unit, to damp the vibrations at low RPM.

Tomorrow, I make outbound clearance in Portobello and then cast off the lines for the San Blas archipelago.

…until yesterday’s arrival in the bay of Portobelo.

When I reduced speed to look for a good spot to drop the anchor, i heard a rattling noise from the PRT engine, the engine & saildrive which was repaired. I was shocked and the happy day was gone.

I checked in more detail were the noise comes from and found it comes from the area where the engine is connected to the saildrive. Exactly the area where repair work was done.

I called the technician, and got the advice to sail to Linton Bay Marina. (I’m currently on my way to this marina.) There he will have a look tomorrow. I hope he really comes tomorrow, Sunday. Please keep fingers crossed!

After final preparations in the morning I left the mooring C-dock No 10 berth at Shelter Bay Marina to move to the fuel station.

Fuel station is boat, which provides diesel fuel and oil for commercial vessel and if needed for yachts as well.

Refueling had to be done carefully as the nozzle to be put into MaRe ‘s tank has no automatic switch off mechanism. Thus careful listening is needed. I made it without spilling diesel. Luckily!

It was interesting to see how many papers with several duplicates and printouts were needed to pay a simple refilling Waste of paper due to inefficient workflows.

At 14:20 I had permission from Cristobal station to cross the traffic separation scheme at the entrance to the Panama canal. I had to wait for 2 ships to pass before we could cross. For the Matilde Schulte, Singapore, I needed make a circle and pass behind her stern.

Then we used the autopilot in TRACK mode and MaRe follows the WPT laid out for the route.

Destination of the day, the bay of Portobello, which should be reached at around 1800 h.

Sailing not possible as we have the wind around 20 – 30 deg on the nose from PRT. I hope for tomorrow. Wind forecast for the day and tomorrow was no wind or max 5 KN. Wind decided not to make the forecast correct.