May 2009

Bocas Del Toro, Panama
We leave the never ending blasting reggae music of Jamaica behind us and for the next six days fall into the rhythm of three hours on, three hours off watches - only the hypnotic crushing noise of waves against Nikan is heard. On night watches, under incredibly black sky sprinkled with blazing stars, to keep awake, I interrupt this meditative sound by listening to the Spanish lessons on MP3, trying to etch in my aging grey cells some new vocabulary I will need in Panama. But here in Bocas, there is a lot of English spoken, but nevertheless, I try to practice my new Spanish vocabulary as much as I can. I will get more chance of that once we go a bit inland. We are in marina now on Isla Carenero, just a few minutes by boat from Isla Colon, the main island in this archipelago. We are entering the rainy season here, basically it’s hot, humid, and sand flies, locally known as chitras, are dining on us in full force daily!! Yesterday, I learned they only live for 45 minutes, but believe me, in their short life they get very, very hungry! Real estate seems to be booming around here, and from what we hear everywhere in Panama, expatriates, mainly from USA and Canada are building their fantasy tropical gateways. We have seen some on our walk yesterday, and even here, in the marina, they are boaters looking for their perfect piece of land. For now we are wiping the salt from everywhere, cleaning the sails and next week we are going inland for a little trip - we hear it’s a beautiful area, lush, tropical and even cooler in the mountains. We will also visit David, the main city of this province for a taste of some civilization, although it’s quite touristy here as well, minus the stores. We’ll keep you posted….

April, 2009

Port Antonio, Jamaica
Yah Man, we are still in Jamaica. Yah Man, music blasting 24-hours a day, Yah Man, the same tunes, same rhythm... Respect Man, food is spicy, jerk pork, jerk chicken, curries...spices melt and mingle in our mouths - a big change from the Raoul’s country! It’s lush here, green folliage and flowers of incredible colours everywhere… Blue Mountains just step away. This place was made famous by the actor Errol Flynn, who said Port Antonio was more beautiful than any woman he had ever seen – hmmm…maybe he really didn’t look around that hard, it has it’s charm, but… Still, it is the safest parish of this country and it’s free from tourist crowds. This was a thriving banana shipping port, even as far back as 2003 when we stopped here, but now due to global competition this industry is gone. Port facilities here are modern and guarded around the clock. We took advantage of their new yard and pulled Nikan out to see what’s going on with the keel coating protection. Surprise! - the damage was more extended than we suspected. We had to redo the entire underwater protection, 6 days, 14-hours a day working under the blaring sun, 30+°C – not an ounce of fat on J-P’s body left. Can’t say that about my aging middle age figure! There is always something to fix or maintain. Like one of the fellow sailors said: “People think we are retired and on vacation, but man, this is work.” and I have to agree, although now we should be good for a while…till something else goes. We had a great day rafting on Rio Grande. Rafting here means sitting on the bamboo raft with a guide and gently flow down the river with a stop for a beer, home made lunch on the river bank. After a month here, we are slowly getting prepared to head towards Boca del Torro in Panama, about 600 nautical miles from here, which should take us between four to five days. As they say here, later….

March, 2009

Port Antonio, Jamaica
We say good-bye to our friends in Cuba. Before leaving communism behind, we rent a car and visit Santiago. For sure we would be still lost, wondering around the signless countryside, signless city, if it wasn't for the never ending mass of hitchhikers that direct us. There are no signs anywhere, except propaganda billboards and if you don't follow the main highway, it's very easy to get lost. We drive a family with their sick baby to the hospital in one city, another sick woman with an infection after her cesarean and with her new baby to another hospital, in another city, students to university after their weekend with the family in some village....endless, we always try to stop for a woman with a child. These people sometimes wait for hours for a bus, and it has been known - personally by J-P (when I was in Toronto) - that sometimes bus doesn't show up at all! On the way to Fort El Morro J-P makes an exception and picks up two young, cute, sexy girls who visit the place with us. This is a bit of diversion for them. as there is not much happening in people's life, except maybe dreaming about a bottle of good shampoo! I get fed up with the never changing propaganda signs and wonder if majority of people are really, really brainwashed, as signs are not only in public places, but in the city we see them on private doors, windows and always it's the same something or death. Good-bye Cuba!!
We arrived to Port Antonio, Jamaica after uneventful passage of 2 1/2 day. J-P discovered some damage on the keel coating protection, so that has to be fixed here, before we continue to Panama. There is no shortage of fruit here, or vegetable. and although grown on this island, is more expensive than in Canada. And finally Internet! We are enjoying everything that free market has to offer us here and J-P is trying to gain some weight he lost in Cuba, ice cream in on his daily menu. I just have to watch that he doesn't over-do it!

February, 2009

Puerta Vita, Cuba
We are in Cuba – that is, J-P is in Cuba, I am once again in Toronto, finalizing the sale of my mother’s house. Nikan is anchored in front of the marina in Puerto Vita – amazingly they let us do that without any charge, while we are using their facilities, like cold shower and toilet without any toilet paper (like everywhere else in Cuba, even with their good education, sanitary conditions are deplorable). There is no other boat here, except the catamarans that take tourists from nearly hotels for a cruise each day. There is a restaurant here as well, the village itself, with a population of about 500 has one questionable bar and one store for locals with empty shelves, Cubans are not allowed to the marina at all. When we arrived here there was an Australian couple, their sailboat packed with all kinds of items, like 50 pairs of shoes, reading glasses, clothing, dishes. They have been to Cuba before and came prepared, unlike us! The eye of the hurricane passed through this area last summer, taking off with some roofs, walls and destroying the crop - this is a very poor village (except for the few lucky ones with relatives abroad) - but entrepreneur spirit prevails with some, and we get invitations for meals, in exchange of money, clothing or whatever. We are happy to help – these people are no beggars, insisting on giving something back, be it some vegetable from their garden, artisana, or some service. My listening to Spanish on tapes pays off, and I can communicate quite well. The average salary here is between 10-20 CUCs (1 CUC = $1.39 Canadian!!), a typical meal for a tourist can be found for 6-15 CUCs. All the essentials for a decent living can only be bought in CUCs and for western price (things like detergent soap, shampoo, sanitary napkins – no CUCs, you have to use rags, and wash them by hand! not too many washing machines in these houses). They get some rations from the government, like 5 eggs a month per person, 40 g of beans, or 1 toothpaste per family!, their typical ration lasts for about two weeks, so there is a lot going on to survive, we can’t imagine what, or how - but smile is always there and good humor as well. At least they are not starving here, we see some vegetable and fruit trees in their gardens, as well as chickens, pigs, goats, sheep roaming around. Horses are still used for transportation in the country and I am admiring how magnificent the riders look on their beast. The countryside is stunning. We already visited Holguin, fourth-largest city in Cuba, full of diesel fume and in need of restoration. Sico could literally sell thousands gallons of paint, although the fading and pealing paint has its charm. We are planning to visit some other places once I am back, and if we ever get on Internet in Cuba, will keep you posted!

January 20, 2009

Long Island, Bahamas
Long Island, most likely our last stop in Bahamas. The last two weeks we hopped from island to island, traversing through Exuma Cays with its many shades and tints of blue water…light blue, sky blue, turquoise, navy, sapphire blue…you name the hue and it’s somewhere here. The crystal clear water, besides making it so easy to observe the rich sea life, allows us to navigate safely around the many shoals and coral heads. Food in Exumas is incredibly expensive, everything arrives by boat and there is no agriculture on these rugged little islands. We didn’t buy red pepper for $8.50 a pound, neither did we treat ourselves to milk for $9.50! (dried milk is nothing to turn the nose up to, and that gives us so much more space in our fridge for other stuff one can obtain on these island, like cabbage, or maybe some carrots!). Small loaf of bread, that tastes more like a cake, sells for $6US! And so, we are proudly reporting, that today, we successfully baked our second loaf of bread! Czech recipe I obtained from Internet was my contribution, while J-P did his part in this process by mixing and all the five minutes of kneading required for a heavenly taste. We will never be without decent bread again! Also our first - converting salt water to drinking water. Our Reverse Osmosis Water Maker is performing as advertised. And so we will never stay dirty for too long again! We are quite self-sufficient now – the sun (solar panels), yeast, flour and some fish – we can survive whatever, wherever! Here on Long Island there is even some agriculture going on - right now it’s a season for papaya, tomato, okra – and all this for pennies! Finally some decent prices! Today, once-a-week ship arrived from Nassau, with all kinds of goodies, so tomorrow, with a crew from “Chenou”, that we sailed here with, we are renting a car and besides admiring beauties of this island, we will hit some food and liquor stores to stock-up on essentials before heading to Cuba. We read in American paper there is food shortage in Cuba (propaganda?) after getting hit by three hurricanes this summer (possibility?) We will let you know.

January 9, 2009

Highborne Cay, Bahamas

Finally, the first fish – just for two, small Amberjack, on the way to Royal Island, and first lobster (2), which I spotted while swimming around Nikan, always with my goggles on, keeping a sharp lookout around me for imagined or maybe real? danger from watching too many adventure movies in the past. Still, it took J-P good half an hour to spear them out of their holes and they made an excellent supper (barbecued) on a New Year’s Day. We couldn’t have had it fresher than that! And just before that we spent hours searching the reef, while all this time they lived their soon too short life just few meters away from us. Next we sailed to Spanish Wells, prosperous island with easy going and friendly locals, almost empty food store after the holidays, with a ship full of provision due sometime soon. We were lucky to meet a friendly local who offered us a lift in her golf cart (which we really didn’t need, one can probably walk around the whole island in an hour!) but with a bucket full of tomatoes from her daughter’s garden and she very generously shared with us, as the ones in the store were half dead. Golf carts and cars create no stop procession on the main street, which we found quite amazing, considering how small the island is. Few days later, after zigzagging for a full day over the sand bank full of coral heads and shallow water on the way to Exuma Cays, we stopped for several days in Allan’s Cay (one of the remaining habitats of iguanas in the Bahamas), just relaxing and fishing every day on surrounding reef with zilch result! Too many boats, it looks here all fished out. There are about six Canadian sailboats here, definitely outnumbering Americans. Only “Voila” we are travelling with is English speaking. Tomorrow we will move to a marina for a day to touch base with civilization (understand Internet!), to update this blog, do some laundry, and to see what provisions we can find. Some fresh fruit would come handy. And! J-P decided to update his culinary skills by baking some bread, unfortunately we couldn’t find any multigrain flour here (oh, why we didn’t shop more on American continent!), only white variety of anything and everything is available here. But more on that next time.

December 24, 2008

Port Lucaya, Grand Bahama Island
December 16, we made our first jump of 40 hours, basically motoring in a calm sea to Palm Beach and the next day perfect conditions found us crossing the Gulf Stream to make our entry to Bahamas in West End Marina, Grand Bahama Island. Our plan to move right away to Eleuthera was interrupted with weather broadcast of cold front (= strong winds) and so we decided to await more pleasant weather in Lucayan Marina. Just as we and the sailboat “Voila” (friends from Quebec spending winter in Bahamas) started to salivate (remember Pavlov’s dogs?), J-P’s first effort at fishing ended in disaster and the nice, fat, colorful Mahi-Mahi escaped at the moment of being pulled on the deck. Oh well, there’ll be many other times….We are spending the Christmas here, as the cold front is followed by SE winds and as we are moving in that direction, we have to wait for the wind to turn around. We wish you all restful and peaceful holidays.