a trip to the central seafood market for lunch...YUM!

changing of the guard

...and just like that the girls were gone and Nancy was here. it all happened too fast for our walnut-sized brains to keep up with, but we hung on for the ride and it was a fun one.

we spent a few days in Panama city with Nancy, taking her to our fave joints and showing her the sights. she caught Canal history fever much the same way we did back in April, so we had a fun time of it.


















it was neat to visit the Miraflores locks and see them from above...and to be one of the spectators we've waved at from the locks.

all too soon it was time for the girls to head back to PC to catch planes, so we tagged along with them to say goodbye and get ready for Nancy the next day.

our last night with them in Panama happened to be our 3rd anniversary and those oh-so-very-clever girls busted out their version of the Newlywed game for us that night. it was a riot. I'm pretty sure we won. and as a bonus we hooked up with our friend Bobby who we hadn't seen since Bahia del Sol in El Salvador.

when a retrospective exhibit of our trip photos is unveiled, I believe this will be called The Sangria Period.

















"you said what was the best part of our wedding??!"

chilling out on Wizard's Beach after one hell of a hike....in true Gilligan's Island style what should have been a half hour hike turned into quite the adventure when we got lost, my shoe broke, and we found out that some paths are a *little* more challenging in rainy season than dry season. at one point we were squlching and skwooshing barefoot through stinky sticky jungle mud in swamp water up to our knees - one of those scenarios that ends up fine but while you're in it you wish you didn't know anything about bacteria, viruses, jungle diseases, water borne tropical illnesses, or creepy crawlies.

we emerged unscathed though, and the warm crashing surf made it all worthwhile.....and better yet we found the real path on the way home - which led us to yummy pizza and wine at a sweet little Italian restaurant on stilts over the water, about 50 yards from home sweet Ute.

due to my extreme neurosis about sand in the house I forced everyone to go night swimming when we got home....

one of the best things about having the girls here was .....glancing up at the same old foredeck while underway and seeing two of our best friends! what a treat!

due to the preponderance of electrical storms here in Bocas- both the in-the-sky kind and the in-Ute's-wiring kind - we didn't do much sailing or snorkeling, but we did cruise over to Bastimentos and enjoy a few peaceful nights anchored out there. Avesa, who had her heart set on snorkeling, never complained once about the grey skies, and even serenaded us on Allen's ukelele.

really, we just spent the whole visit yakking anyway, so the rainy weather didn't matter much.....

one of the first things we did with the girls was check out the Smithsonian labs here in Bocas del Toro. As I've mentioned before the Smithsonian has a huge research presence here in Panama so pretty much anywhere you turn up, the Smithsonian will turn up to - dreamy for geeks like me. The enormous, shiny, gorgeous lab facility here in Bocas has an open house every Friday, but for some reason we got lucky and that particular Friday they were having a super duper open house extravaganza. so we got to meet most of the researchers there (most of them American post docs) and hear about some really fascinating projects. My favorites were the frog dude that studied chemical defense mechanisms in poison dart frogs, and the guys that were sleuthing out a mysterious new coral disease in the area.

there are poison dart frogs all around Bocas - they may be cherry red, line green or sky blue depending on which island or beach you visit - each spot has its own unique frog subspecies! a couple days after we met frog researcher dude we were lucky enough to spot some lime green dart frogs in the forest on Bastimentos Island. (don't worry, no licking).

uh......where'd everybody go?

hi again, back in Bocas, just said goodbye to Nancy, sitting here in our hot little cabin trying to remember what it is we do around here....something about sail-ing? it has been a whirlwind, immensely enjoyable three weeks of hosting friends and then Nancy, checking out parts of Panama we never would have seen if it weren't for them, celebrating various anniversaries, birthdays, and milestones and catching up with real live human friends and family (so much better than e-mail!). we've gotten terrifically spoiled, though - we will slowly transition back to canvaswork, dissecting the boat's electrical some more, feasting on ramen and tunafish.

Thanks again Jen, Avesa and Nancy for being so generous with your time and your resources, showing us such a good time, bringing us American goodies and being such incredibly flexible guests!

Now it's time for some photos, if I can get them sorted out.....

we love the parade of visitors!

hi everybody, just wanted to let you know we are doing great...we put Avesa and Jen on planes back to the US this morning with hugs and tears, and are now eagerly awaiting Nancy{s arrival tonight. Phew! the fun never stops here in Panama....

we had a great week in Bocas del Toro with the girls, catching up, swimming, hiking, learning valuable lessons about anchoring in the oh so shallow Caribbean...hey what{s that bonk, bonk, bonk noise? oh, it{s our keel hitting the bottom....oops! it was fantastic so have so much catch up time with such good friends. thanks jen and veese for a great time! and for making our 3rd anniversary so much fun! photos to follow soon when we{re back on our own computer in Bocas. sorry for the bad punctuation but this keyboard is a fun grab bag in which the symbol printed on each button is just a fanciful suggestion for what might result if you hit it.

the boat is in good shape with the transmission giving a stellar performance, although we do have some annoying bugs in our electrical. the fun never stops! we are going to convince Nancy that it will be fun, fun, fun to work on the boat with us in Bocas. she{s a pretty good sport so I think it will work.....

so we{ll be here in panama city for at least a few days and then back to Bocas. more soon. cheers everybody, CC

Bocas Del Toro

Hey folks we made it to Bocas, Off to find our freinds, check in with the Capitania, have a few beers and some local food. Uneventful passage, dolphins, no rain, smooth running motor, 2 knot adverse current, light winds on the nose. Absolutely, fantasically, astoundingly easy passage to another paradise.

giving up our parking spot...

after nearly two months of being tied up here at Shelter Bay - and three months since we've done overnight passages - we will set sail for Bocas del Toro tomorrow morning! The engine starts, runs, and shifts - at the proper times and in the proper places. it's bliss.

to back up a step, I made it back safely from a wonderful week on the farm. My mom is doing well and I felt so fortunate to be able to fly home and help her out - it really helps one's worry level to have an in-person visit. there is no substitute.

I got back Thursday morning to learn that the wi-fi antenna at the marina had been struck by lightning while I was away. Allen actually watched the antenna - which stands barely 50 feet off our bow - get hit. Terrifying! the shock wave was, well, shocking but we didn't suffer any damage. Of course it meant no internet, and therefore no phone calls either for the last five days, so we were quite happy to see a new antenna this morning. we've gotten terribly spoiled here....we'll have to learn to rough it again when we leave.

Allen worked his butt off while I was in Wisconsin - it was like a whole new Ute when I got back! After three months of power plant issues we have two solar panels juicing ripe photons at full strength. A new cranking battery was the answer to our starter woes. And the transmission is smooth as a monkey's bottom.

Getting ready to back on the road again is fun. Fun to test drive the boat around today, turn the VHF and shortwave radios on, check the weather, chart waypoints, stow everything, read the cruising guides. Bocas promises to be a beautiful, albeit buggy, destination. Four friends fly there to meet us on Wednesday morning..with a little luck we'll beat them there but the weather is so fickle this time of year, it's anyone's guess. It's about 150 miles from here on a direct course, which we may or not be able to take depending on wind direction and the vigor of the western caribbean countercurrent. We hope that the weather will be cooperative during our time there since the charts show lots of tempting anchorages tucked among thriving reefs and dozens of mangrove islets.

Here's hoping for a quick and uneventful passage - hopefully not longer than 2 days or so. Cheers everybody - and thanks for all the support - UTE

plans, they are a chaaangin'.....

...naturally. that is what a sailor's plans do, change. and so I find myself in Wisconsin. yes, Wisconsin! no need to panic, nothing horrible going on, it's just that my mother underwent an unexpected appendectomy last week and, since she is not supposed to lift anything heavier than a fork for a couple weeks, I thought I should come home and help chuck hay bales and mow lawn and stuff like that. So last minute arrangements were made and, 12 culture shocked hours later, I find myself sitting in Rio, Wisconsin! Allen is holding down the fort in Shelter Bay, left to face our two-page, cross-referenced, priority-assigned to-do list of boat projects. poor sweetie.

so...for those of you sweet people who have been wanting updates on the engine etc....they'll have to come from my honey next time he cleans his hands up enough to touch the laptop. (oooh...better add Lava soap to my US shopping list. check).

After 10 months of spending every single moment with my husband and experiencing everything new and exciting with him at my side, it's a little odd to be back in the US on my own! but not in a bad way. just wish Allen was here to snuggle Buster with me. I'm feelign kind of guilty that I get to do so and he doesn't.

we're still planning to go to Bocas del Toro for the month of August, provided there is a good weather window to get there boat there when I get back to Panama on the 27th.

Stay tuned and take care everybody! CC

more soon. CC

red sky at night....sailor's delight

thanks Derek for sending this one.....glad you made it back to Florida safe and sound!

here's a coatimundi in case you were wondering what one looks like....

(please feed my delusion that you have at least one burning biology question on your mind at any given time)

Hi again everybody, and hope you had a great fourth! Ours was…amusing. Some of our gringo neighbors (about half the boats here are American) surprised us 4th of July morning by busting out a truly horrifying glut of Americana decorations. Who knew I would get to experience the holiday flag phenomenon so many thousands of miles from the Heartland? But in the spirit of “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” we sang corny 4th of July songs and joined the party. After all….where else were we gonna go? We’re in the middle of the jungle, for god’s sake. The marina has a shiny well-equipped kitchen that we put to good use in cooking up a feast….as a matter of fact the management was so taken by Allen’s skills at the grill that there has been some talk of us helping to open up the restaurant here. Hmmmm…maybe?

Lamentably our limey neighbors never emerged from their coccoon to receive their complementary clobbering. But we colonials partied down undaunted. My volleyball skills are improving. It’s not easy being parked and doing engine work for a month, but we have to make certain sacrifices for the boat, and if that means playing volleyball with young Panamanian firefighters every afternoon, so be it.

After the holiday it was back to the real world. Well, actually this is nothing like the real world and we feel like we live in some weird bubble, so I guess I should say back to work. The starter is still in the shop…we call every day and – surprise surprise – it’s always going to be ready manana. But we keep the faith. Life is funny here. It’s like living in a really exotic retirement community…there is even a Bingo Bus that takes us all to town a couple times a week. Everybody bitches about everybody else and tries to avoid direct sunlight. We are considered suspicious by virtue of the fact that we pretty much get along with everybody.

I think I’m getting addicted to the canal zone, if that’s possible. Being at this crossroads of the Americas is every bit as scintillating as it was when we first arrived two and a half months ago. A couple days ago a cruising family rolled in…..Mom, Dad, 13-year-old boy and 10-year old girl from Maine. They are homeschooling the kids on board, had their kids relatively late in their 30’s, and have made their living for the last several years writing cruising guides and sailing articles. We even own one of their cruising guides to the ICW! (we made them autograph it, which they found funny). Naturally I have been picking their brains about every single aspect of their life…..they are just LITTLE interesting to me (right). Within the first 20 minutes that we knew them we were already finding out which homeschool curriculum they use, which hospitals in Maine offer the best birthing plans for older moms, what it’s like cruising with kids, how to pitch articles to boating magazines. If it had been a sales presentation I would have signed on the dotted line and jumped on the baby wagon. I think Allen was a little frightened by the gleam in my eyes but I can’t help but notice he’s becoming a groupie himself. Sure makes ya think……

I’m still spending every day in the sweatshop. You might be amazed how much STUFF you need to amass to do quasi-professional canvaswork. Canvas, vinyl, binding tape, basting tape, grommets, grommet dies, bone folder, chalk pencils. Upholstery pins, industrial thread, t-square, yardstick, snap setting tool, measuring tape, velcro, zippers, zipper feet, soldering iron. Luckily we brought most of the stuff from California in anticipation of doing this along the way to make money, but every day there’s something else we wish we had. But the work itself is getting easier…I only have the urge to chuck the sewing machine out the window about 10 times a day now…down from 20+ per day all last week.

Allen has bravely been tackling jobs like fixing our colicky outboard and rewiring our wind generator. Yesterday I found him rocking and swearing and speaking in tongues after a couple of hours of trying to coil a spring back into the top of the outboard. It wasn’t pretty. Thank you, sweetie, for taking on the ugly jobs.

As for the chance to drive in reverse, we can’t work on that ‘til we can start the engine. Heck, at least our flow chart is laid out for us. A month ago we had big ideas about tackling the to-do list, but now it seems like everytime we scratch off one thing, two other things break. We’ll have to get our act together by the 22nd, as that’s when we’re planning to leave for Bocas del Toro, where we’ll host friends from CA for the first 10 days ot August, then both of our moms for a couple weeks after that…whew! If our guests are very, very lucky individuals we’ll succeed in rain-proofing and bug-proofing the boat by the time they get here. (Cross your fingers, future guests. We’re trying, I swear).

In the meantime we enjoy the jungle around us…its allure has not faded a bit. Today I looked out the window of the loft and saw five coatimundis rummaging around in the brush, their tails held high, looking like little ring-tailed lemurs. Flocks of lime green parrots squawk back and forth over the volleyball court each day. The rains have been beyond torrential the last couple days…It’s hard to believe that much water could ever have been suspended in midair in the first place. Last night I stepped out of the marina clubhouse into a wall of water, and a bacchanalia of flying, hopping, swimming, buzzing, skittering critters. Crabs, frogs, winged termites, mosquitoes, bats, moths, flying fish. It seems that everything is alive….and, inside our boat at least, festering. Towels are washed and stacked in a dry place only to be found molding just three days later. Porous and nonporous surfaces alike compete to be the fuzziest. Flies come in 17 sizes here on the isthmus. Good thing we’re nature lovers. We even had a crab appear on our DINNER TABLE the other night, which sort of crossed a line for me. On the floor, I can see, but what the hell was he doing right in between our plates? Gutsy little fella.

Enough blather outta me – picture time.

surprise! I'm a great short order cook.

patriot games

I kind of feel like we should have a caption contest for this shot, but really it ws just a stupid party game we got roped into on the 4th. maaaaaan, are we good sports.

lemons/lemonade

the good news: our transmission is in and our engine is properly aligned.

the bad news: it only shifts into neutral and forward. no reverse. good thing that dovetails with our general life philosophies. seriously though, that part is very fixable, and we should get it figured out soon. today's bigger bummer is, our starter crapped out! yup, totally unrelated to the tranny. took it to Colon today (what an appropriately named city that is - not "heart", "elbow" or "kidney" - nope, COLON) and will call tomorrow to get the prognosis.

good thing we're not in a hurry to get anywhere.....

postcards?

hey has anybody out there received a postcard from us from Costa Rica or Panama?

just asking because we sent a bunch and it seems quite a few people never received theirs...so we want to find out if anyone actually did get one.

post a comment if you did, or e-mail us...thanks! love, UTE