Passage notes: Isla Bayoneta to Panama City, Panama (Las Brisas Anchorage)

Logbook

• Port of departure: Isla Bayoneta, Panama
• Departure date and time: Friday, April 18, 2014 at (0730)
• Port of arrival: Panama City, Panama (Las Brisas Anchorage)
• Arrival date and time: Saturday, April 19, 2014 at 12:30am (0030)
• Miles traveled: 47.2 nm
• Total travel time: 17 hours
• Average speed: 2.7 knots
• Engine hours: 1260.9 begin – 1262.2 end – 6.5 hours (for some reason the odometer got turned off mid trip)
• Fuel consumption: 24.0 – 21.0 – 3.0 gallons used
• Fuel economy: 15.7 mpg
• Tides and currents: High tide at 5:45am, low tide at 11:50am, high tide at 5:55pm, low tide at 12:15am – crazy currents.who knows.
• Weather: The forecast predicted 10-15 knots from the N/NE in the morning, dying down to 5-10 knots (light and variable) in the late afternoon and evening, rebuilding to 10-15 knots N/NW from early morning on Saturday.

The final stretch of our journey south. Serenity will go no farther than Panama City…with us as her crew, anyway.

Passages are emotional journeys. In one passage you can experience every single emotional state in rapid succession: joy, sadness, pride, love, fear, excitement, boredom, longing, awe, anger, fulfillment, defeat, reverence. When you live and travel on the ocean a moment of complete and absolute beauty can quickly turn into a moment of dread. Feelings of fear can fade into fits of laughter. I can not recall a passage that beckons forth only a single feeling. This particular passage encompassed the whole, messy emotional spectrum. My words can not do it justice.

We departed at the end of an outgoing tide with hopes that the incoming tide would help push us towards Panama City. Once we motored clear of Isla Verde we raised sails in a very light (5-8 knot) NW wind blowing from exactly the direction we wanted to travel.

The first several hours of the trip were pleasant, though progress was not really a word we thought or uttered. We passed time by reading, watching the horizon, playing games, fishing. A Sierra chomped on our lure near Isla Santa Catalina, but managed to free itself as Jeff pulled in the line. This was okay by me because I planned to make pizza bread that we would (hopefully) enjoy while at anchor in the Gulf of Panama with a bottle of wine and view of the skyline, a dream I clung to long after it became an unlikely outcome.

We made progress to the North with a very light, pleasant headwind, and tacked West just South of Isla Santa Catalina to clear Isla Saboga. Not long after lunch the wind started to increase and swing around to the N. Finally we had a really good sailing wind that let us hit the perfect angle and maintain 5 knots or more of speed. We were chewing through miles. At the current speed and angle we would be in port by 7 or 8pm. The dolphins came out in droves, leaping with abandon in the 4-6 foot waves we were charging into. A troupe of whales passed by on their way North, offering greetings through puffs of mist and tail slaps. We caught and released at least three more fish.

In the raucous wind and seas the sail tore, not a serious tear, but one that needed attention. No matter, with just our jib we were still making over four knots on a good heading. I repaired the sail as Jeff played with the wind. The dolphins and whales entertained us all. Stephanie laughed at their antics. “You can’t buy this!” I shouted over the wind. “Sailing upwind in the Gulf of Panama while one of your best friends sews a busted up main sail and dolphins splash all around you. This is only gonna happen once!” Each moment only happens once. There are no repeats. If it’s beautiful, if it’s terrible, if it’s mesmerizing, if it’s frightening. If it fills you with joy or sadness. What we see, what we feel, how we react, will only be this way this one time.

At that moment there was elation and there was pride and their was joy and there was love and there was excitement and there was awe. That moment was full to the point of bursting. I scurried below to begin the pizza bread…a meal no sane person should ever attempt to make on passage since it involves lots and lots of lots of chopping. But I had been dreaming of this meal all day. It’s a meal I hold in high regard since, in my family, it’s what we eat for holidays, for Christmas and for birthdays. It’s a meal for celebrations, for joyous occasions. The bread was ready to bake, we were 10 miles away, the sun was setting, we could see the city lights emerging on the horizon, we were making over 5 knots. And then the wind changed.

Rather than 15-20 knots from the N, allowing us to keep a NW heading…we now had 15-20 knots from the NW. Right smack dab where we wanted to be. Add another 30 minutes and we were now climbing impossibly large square seas and our speed had slowed to 2.5 knots. I expected the reduced fetch to result in smaller seas as we neared shore. Not the case. We could either zig zag towards our destination, adding miles, adding hours, or we could charge into the seas under motor. We doused the sails in the darkness and the motor roared to life.

It took nearly 6 hours to go those last 10 miles. At times we were barely moving faster than 1 knot as the stacked waves shoved against us with violent force. Stephanie curled up on the port-side setee, and attempted to cope with the maddening movement by sleeping (I think she succeeded). I turned to a can of Pik-Niks for consolation. Tack crawled into Jeff’s lap and would not budge without extreme provocation. I baked the bread with 15-20 knots on our nose, slamming into square waves, but no one was in the mood to eat it. It was an atmosphere of suffering, not one of celebration.

Any elation that buoyed me earlier in the day was now being systematically squeezed from my body. I was deflating under the weight of it all, shriveling, empty, just a hollow shell of a person trying to fill herself back up with Pik-Niks. “I think I’m done.” The final exhale. It took almost all the energy I had left to say it.

Jeff thought for a moment. “Yeah. Hard to believe we’ll spend over 15 hours going 40 miles. It’s hard to feel like it’s worth it sometimes. I can think of so many other ways to spend those hours.” There was a hint of humor in his voice. Trying to make a heavy moment just a little lighter while still espousing truth. It’s his specialty.

The howl of the wind, the smashing waves and the lumbering motor brought what would otherwise be a quiet, intimate conversation to a crescendo.

“It’s hard not to feel defeated.” I offered.

“Don’t say that. Look how far we’ve come. We’ve come all this way. We made it to Panama City. Panama City!” He motioned to the skyline, bright lights drowning out the stars, the outline of skyscrapers crisp against the black sky. “We’ve seen so many incredible things. We’ve learned so much. It all depends on your perspective. You don’t have to look at it as defeat. Don’t paint that picture. No one sees it that way but you.”

He was trying to resurrect the positive side of me, but she was dormant.

“I feel defeated.” Was the only response I could muster as I plunged my hand back into the can of Pik-Niks.

We pulled into the busy anchorage, tired, cold, disconnected. The insides were thrashed from my haphazard dinner production. The front hatch had not been closed properly and the waves that washed over our foredeck had drenched our bed. Jeff laid out trash bags, covered them with a dry sheet and passed out. I opened a bottle of wine and Stephanie sat with me as I drank and tried to revive the Harmony who would cast this all in a different, more positive light. Truth be told that Harmony was pretty exhausted.

But as has always been the case, sleeping helps me start anew, so Steph and I finished up a glass of wine and I snuggled up to Jeff in our trashbag lined v-berth.