Shelter Bay Marina

Seabiscuit Blog 26-Oct-2013

Location:  Shelter Bay Marina, Panama (Caribbean side of the Panama Canal)

Since our summer visitors left, Dave and I have been taking it easy, enjoying our cruise from Portobello back to Bocas del Toro and enjoying some of the activities in town while we were there.  We’re “on the road” again, this time moving from Bocas del Toro to Shelter Bay Marina on the Caribbean side of the Panama Canal.  We’re still trying to decide the best time to go through the canal, either mid-November or early February, depending on non-boat travel and holiday plans.  But… That’s the nice thing about living on the boat, we can play things by ear and make our decisions to go or not to go when the time comes (weather dependent, of course). 

After posting the last blog from Portobello, we did some exploring and re-provisioning in town.

Fort Entrance, Portobello

Swallows sitting on our fishing
pole, Portobello Harbor

Fort Look-out Tower, Portobello




We stopped a few places along the way back to Bocas.  The first was the Rio Chagres.  The weather was over-cast as we were entering the river so we had to pick our way in.  There are some shoals near the entrance coming from the north and we bumped bottom a little before reversing and going in further on the west side.  Once you get past the fort at the mouth of the river, it is deep and wide and there are no issues navigating up river.  We woke up the next day to a group of capuchin monkeys feeding in the trees near our anchorage.  They were very entertaining to watch as they swung from branch to branch and tree to tree. 

Capuchin Monkeys, Rio Chagres

  We took the dinghy out and explored some of the estuaries, looking for more wildlife and birds.  We saw a curious looking lizard that runs across the water on its hind feet while standing upright. Back at the boat, a canal pilot and his wife were coming up river after a day of exploring the fort ruins and they stopped by for a chat so we picked their brains about going thru the canal and whether or not it was safe to swim in the river (the guide books say watch out for caymans!)  They said swimming shouldn’t be a problem so after they pulled away, we both jumped in the river to cool off before dinner.

Exploring in the dinghy, Rio Chagres



Seabiscuit at anchor, Rio Chagres

From Rio Chagres, we did a long day trip to Escudo de Veraquas, arriving after dark.  We did some fishing along the way and caught a nice tuna and had sashimi and grilled tuna for dinner.

Dave with tuna

Sunset, Escudo de Veraquas

The next day we cruised back to Bocas and into the marina.  We fished along the way but didn’t catch anything.  We arrived at the marina about 4:00 p.m. As we were pulling into our slip, we lost all power on the boat.  Good thing we were already lined up and just needed some sternway to finish coming in.  We had noticed during our trip back from the San Blas that the batteries were not holding a charge.  We tied-up and settled in and went to happy hour on the dock.  It was nice to catch up with everyone and to tell tales about our adventures in San Blas.  The next day we did some tests on the batteries and confirmed that the house batteries were bad.  Since they were bad and the engine start batteries were the same age, we decided to replace all of the batteries.  We tracked down the right size and type and ordered twelve new batteries from La Casa de las Baterias.  They confirmed that they could deliver them early the next week.

 

On Friday night, there was a fair in town so we went with Hary and Matilda from the marina.  They are an Austrian couple who have been rebuilding their boat, preparing to sail north to Guanaja after hurricane season and after their boat repairs are complete.  We wandered around the fair, drank some German beer from a local brewery, had some supper and watched the locals enjoy the traditional costumes and dances and the carnival rides.

Food booth at the Fair



Girls in Traditional dresses



Traditional Dress Display

Kids enjoying a carnival ride

 



Carnival ride

Then it was back to everyday life, provisioning after the trip, filling water, doing laundry and washing down the boat and preparing for receiving the batteries and maintenance on the gen-get-home engine.  We took some time to swim and cool off most afternoons.  Somewhere along the way Dave caught a summer cold and was sick in bed for a few days. The new house and engine start batteries arrived on Tuesday morning.  We had to move twelve 50 pound batteries out of the engine room, up on deck, to the dock and then to the end of the dock where our 12 new batteries were delivered in a water taxi.  Then all 12 new batteries were carried back to the boat and lifted back into the engine room and hooked up.  All has been working well since then.

 

Mary, the marina owner, takes good care of the marina and had her workers replacing rotted lumber in the dock structures.

Marina Dock being repaired

Hary and Matilda had been waiting for a new haul-out facility to open up so that they could get some work done on their sail drive and other mechanical systems on the boat.  It finally opened and they made their way out of the marina to the haul-out facility.  Hary had arranged for a friend with a panga to help tow them to the facility, but that didn’t work out so one of the local water taxi drivers ended up hauling them over. 

Hary and Matilda leaving the marina

Hary and Matilda hooking up with
a local water taxi for a tow to
the haul-out facility

 

Hary and Matilda being towed
past Bocas del Toro

 

Then, I made another trip to Angola for a few weeks.  While I was gone, Dave did the 500-hours/12 month maintenance on the gen-get-home engine and stocked up for our trip east.

We left the marina on Sunday morning in a slight drizzle and headed towards Oktoberfest at Rana Azul.  They were set-up for a big crowd, with roast pork as the lunch special, homemade pretzels, plenty of beer, a DJ followed by live music, and the owner, Joseph, wearing his lederhosen.  We stayed most of the afternoon, talking with friends and enjoying the atmosphere.  I forgot my camera and didn’t get any pictures, but you should be able to find some on Rana Azul Facebook page. Interestingly, there was a British TV crew being hosted by a local British expat  taking footage for a documentary of some kind that will likely air in January on BBC.

We left Rana Azul Monday morning and went to anchor outside of Red Frog Marina so that we could do some body-surfing at the beach.  It rained most of Monday afternoon so we decided to stay an extra day.  We did have some maintenance to do as our bow thruster failed to work when we were leaving the marina and our anchor light didn’t come on while at anchor near Rana Azul.  So, we worked on the bow thruster Monday afternoon... it turned out the solenoid was frozen.  We figured that happened when we lost power pulling into our slip at Marina Carenero.    We went to the beach on Tuesday morning.  There was nobody else on the beach when we arrived so we had the waves to ourselves.  We swam and body-surfed for a couple of hours, then had lunch at the Palmar Tent Lodge.  When we got back to the boat we repaired the anchor light.



Dave studying to repair the bow thruster

Dave body surfing, Red Frog Beach

Wednesday morning we left Red Frog in the rain and cruised to Escudo de Veraguas, fishing along the way, but no luck catching anything.  We arrived at Escudo mid-afternoon and did a little maintenance.  The pump for the stabilizers had stopped working along the way, so Dave disassembled the pump and replaced the impeller.  Then we jumped off the swim platform for a quick swim/cool-off and an inspection of the bottom of the boat.

Sunset, Escudo de Veraquas

Western Break-water, Caribbean side
Panama Canal

The next morning we left and cruised offshore, fishing along the way (no luck) to our next anchorage, near Punto Limon along the mainland coast.  Not much to see there, but a place to stop for the night.  The anchorage was a little rolly; it rained during the night and cooled things off some.  Friday morning we fired up the engine, heaved anchor and headed to Shelter Bay.  We arrived just after noon, pulled into our slip, tied up, checked into the marina and had lunch at the restaurant.  Thursday night was our 15^th wedding anniversary but we decided to wait until Friday to celebrate; we cooked a gourmet dinner of smoked pork chops and rice and shared a bottle of Prosecco.  Today is chore day, laundry and boat cleaning and settling in to the marina.  We plan to stay here at least three weeks and then we’ll decide what’s next.

Cargo cranes, Caribbean side
Panama Canal, Note the cayuco
with a sail in the foreground