Through the Panama Canal with Colin, Pierre, Leanne, and Christian.
I’m have a supremely hard time accepting that October is already over. Time is moving far too quickly for my liking because October/November straddle cruising seasons – hurricane season and rainy season are coming to a close – and that means it is really time to start the trip back home. October was PACKED probably because we knew our time was finite and there were so many things we still wanted to do! I made a feeble attempt to sell my wares (greeting cards featuring my photography) at the local market in Boquete – something I had vowed to do at the beginning of the month. Our friends were my primary customers and were much better about pimping my product than I was.
In the middle of the month we took a bus down to Panama City to enjoy the hubbub without the hassle of our boat. We line handled for our friend Colin through the Panama canal and went on a quick trip in the Caribbean before heading back to our own boat. After a quick and (nearly) final goodbye to our dear friends in Boca Chica we started our farewell tour of Western Panama revisiting places we loved and visiting a couple new places we didn’t want to miss out on. October was harried, but all good.
Here’s the quick recap in numbers!
75 … miles traveled
10.3 … hours put on the engine
4.1 … gallons of diesel used
18.3 … mpg, fuel economy
0 … nights at sea
31 … nights at anchor
0 … nights on a mooring
0 … nights on a dock
381 … days since Serenity has stayed overnight on a dock
500 … amount of cardstock Harmony bought to make greeting cards
600 … number of photos Harmony had printed to make greeting cards
200 … number of cards Harmony made to sell at the Boquete Tuesday Market
$10… cost per booth to sell food and crafts at the Boquete Tuesday Market
$75 … USD, total cost of having a booth at the Boquete Tuesday Market when you account for food, lodging and transportation
$3 … USD, price per card
20 … number of cards sold at the market
-$5 … amount of profit Harmony made from her one attempt at being a card vendor…it turns out she’s kind of a crappy salesperson when it comes to selling her own stuff…she’s better at selling other people’s stuff (but the cards did pay for one last trip up to Boquete!)
50 … number of cards Harmony sold altogether
40 … number of cards bought by friends (kind of reminds me of selling friendship bracelets to neighbors as a kid…I think they just took pity on me 🙂
31 … length, in feet, of our friend Colin’s boat SV Vagabundo
7 … people, including the “pilot,” who were aboard SV Vagabundo for 2 days
$984 … cost of a 31 foot boat to transit the canal
$800 … deposit to transit the canal, this amount is refunded if the transit goes off without a hitch
947 … pictures Harmony took while transiting the canal
30 … the number of pictures Harmony hopes to select from the 947 to share with you (culling is the hardest part!)
100 … years that the canal has been in existence – Panama celebrated the anniversary this year
15 … years that the canal has been under Panamanian control, the USA transferred control in 1999
6 … locks that separate the Atlantic from the Pacific
48 … miles, the distance of the canal from one ocean to the next
7,827 …. miles saved for a boat going from New York to San Francisco if they transit the canal rather than going around Cape Horn (Source: World Wildlife Fund)
$375,000,000 … USD, cost to construct the Panama Canal (Source:
60,000,000 … pounds of dynamite used to make the canal (Source: World Wildlife Fund)
25,000 … minimum estimated casualties during the construction of the canal – approximately 20-22,000 died during France’s first attempt and about $5,600 died once the US assumed control (Source: History Channel)
13,000 … number of ships that use the canal every year (Source: History Channel)
4 … percent of world trade transported through the canal (Source: World Wildlife Fund)
16 … percent of US trade transported through the canal (Source: World Wildlife Fund)
$450,000 … the highest fee that has been paid to transit the canal (Source: History Channel)
$5,250,000,000 … USD, cost to expand the Panama Canal to accommodate super tankers which can transport up to 14,000 20 foot containers – nearly 3 times the size currently accomodated by the canal (Source: History Channel)
1,312 … feet, length of the largest cargo ship – it is 194 feet wide and can hold 18,000 20 foot containers (dang) (Source: History Channel)
163 … square miles, the size of Gatun Lake where we spent a night before exiting the canal – Gatun Lake was formed by damming the River Chagres (Source: History Channel)
52,000,000 … gallons of fresh water used every time a ship transits the canal, the water comes from Gatun Lake (Source: History Channel)
13,000 … number of troops that invaded Panama in 1989 to support 12,000 other US troops in the arrest of military dictator Manuel Noriega on charges of political corruption, drug trafficking and human rights violations – Noriega is currently held in a prison on the banks of the Panama Canal (Source: Biography Channel)
2 … Caribbean islands visited aboard SV Vagabundo, Isla Linton and Isla Grande
4 … number of cruising boats we saw in Western Panama in October
24 … number of cruising boats at the Isla Linton anchorage alone (we saw many more masts poking out from other nearby anchorages)
2 … kayaks on board SV Vagabundo to transport 6 people and all their stuff to and from land
90 … miles from Colon to the San Blas Archipelago – our original plan was to make it all the way to San Blas, but it started to look like a bit of a stretch once we finally got to Isla Linton – not enough days!
378 … islands in the San Blas Archipelago, which is an independent state within Panama ahlso known as Guna Yala (Source: San Blas Islands)
50,000 … approximate number of inhabitants on the San Blas Islands – the islands are primarily (maybe exclusively?) inhabited by the Kuna people (Source: San Blas Islands)
1925 … the year the Kuna people staged a successful revolution against Panamanian control and were able to assert their independence (Source: Wikipedia)
72 … number of (cold!) beers enjoyed aboard SV Vagabundo
3 … bottles of rum consumed while aboard SV Vagabundo
1 … bottle of Maracuya vodka consumed while aboard SV Vagabundo
1 … days in which Harmony thoroughly regretted the previous night of drinking, unfortunately this was also the day that Harmony and Jeff spent pretty much all day on buses
3.5 … approximate hours from Guaira, where Vagabundo was anchored, to Panama City by bus
22 … total hours of travel by bus to get from SV Vagabundo back to SV Serenity
13 … days that our friend and water taxi extraordinaire, Alan, watched after Tack while we were gone
11.3 … volts registered on our house bank (batteries) when we got back to Serenity…something had gone awry with the charge controller in our absence and had been dumping energy rather than putting it into our batteries
27 … pieces in the game of Kubb, which is our favorite beach game and a game we taught our friends in Boca Chica (Harmony originally learned it from her relatives in Denmark)
$10 … the cost to replicate Kubb at a local muebleria (woodworking shop that specializes in furniture) so we could leave a set with the kiddos
16 … number of kids who turned out for a final afternoon of games, including Kubb and soccer (our friend Perry is the only adult brave enought to play soccer with the kids…though I think Jeff also gave it a go)
6 … friends who celebrated our farewell with us at Hotel Boca Brava
175 … approximate number of days that Boca Chica was our home away from home port