Mota's Post Trip Summary

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Editor's Note: This is a post sent by Mota to an email list we subscribe to. It is a summary of his trip, plus some commentary on the San Blas islands.

Hey y'all,

The Summary: I had a fantastic time with an amazing crew of people.

More Deets: I arrived on Trinidad on April 23rd, looking forward to a little bit of work to keep the fingers limber and some relaxing on the beach. Instead, I spent 10 days rebuilding fuels systems, attaching safety gear, and bleaching Rob's underwear so that the ship would have a proper flag to fly. Luckily, Herzbach showed up a couple of days later to tackle the really crappy jobs of fiberglassing the the engine compartment and attaching a light to the top of the mast. The rest of the crew trickled in, and after 10 long days getting the boat ready, we set sail on April 5. We faced light to moderate seas, which provided the perfect balance of relaxation and challenge for us newbies. 4 days later we arrived in Aruba where we relaxed for a couple of days and picked up Anne Marie.

On April 11 we headed out from Aruba for the final leg to panama. We faced some more challenging weather and some bigger seas, but since we were all pros by then, it was not a problem. Well, it would not have been a problem had we not lost the auto-pilot. For those of you that don't know, modern sailing largely consists of setting the sails and putting your direction into the autopilot. You then then let the boat cruise along as you drink your drink and keep and eye on conditions until you need to change direction - which generally occurs every few hours. Re-set the sails and auto pilot, repeat. When you loose your autopilot you now have to actually STEER the damn boat. Imagine steering a double-wide semi on an undulating, curvy road, and you may get the picture. Luckily, there is not much to crash into out there.

After 3 days of this we arrive in Panama, where we learn that we can't actually get through the canal for at least two weeks! 4 of the crew depart back to the US because they have things like jobs (weird), leaving Rob, Jeff and I to go exploring. We turned the boat around and headed out to the San Blas Islands. You know the picture that pops into your head when someone says "tropical desert island"? That picture was taken in the San Blas Islands. It is a chain of 400 little islands, about 1-5 football fields in size each, with nothing but palm trees, coconuts, and white sand. All of the islands are abutted by coral reefs. The Kuna indians still live in small palm-frond huts on their islands, collecting coconuts and fishing. Everyday they paddle up to the "cruisers" in their dugout canoes to sell us fresh fish, coconuts, avocados, and embroidered "molas." Our days were spent lounging, snorkeling, visiting with the other cruisers, watching Rob massacre the fresh fish, and then barbecuing the remains for our evening feast. I finally learned the joy and secrets of the "do nothing in a beautiful location" vacation.

After a week in the San Blas we headed back to Panama so that I could catch my return flight. Rob, Jeff and I sat down for final drinks. We had been laughing our asses off most of the time, yet could not remember a single thing that were were laughing about. We decided that the trip had been one long location joke. So, I could tell you more, but it really would not make any sense.

mota



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A Magical Day In Paradise.

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Friends,

Today was a day that will be hard to put down on paper, especially since we all use this electronic gear nowadays. Get it, hard to put down on paper...cause it's a keyboard. Funny!! I crack myself up.

Editor's Note: Expectations of wit and humor degrade at sea.

We've been holed up in a small anchorage that is pronounced "chi-cha-may", which is Kuna for "another freaking beautiful anchorage just like all the others". It is a collection of very small islands, surrounded by reefs, that create a small, well protected anchorage about thirty feet deep and two hundred yards around. The bottom is white sand, the water is crystal blue, and there were about four small cruising boats here when we arrived.



We pulled in towards sunset, dropped the hook, then decided to put out another anchor just as a precaution as the wind was picking up and we were only forty yards from shore in any direction. Jeff & Mota got in the dingy and motored away, paying out line as they went. When they reached the end of the line they dumped the anchor overboard and I tugged on it to set it in the sand, then tied it off to the bow. The idea is that if one anchor should drag the second will catch and hold you in place. The downside is that with two lines out, should the wind shift the lines may tangle around each other.

Naturally, the moment we set the second anchor the wind died, and then changed direction. By morning we had spun on our anchor twice and we needed to unwrap the lines, but I felt better for the extra protection, and am positive that had we skipped it we'd of had fifty knots blowing us into the reef. Sometimes, you just can't win.

The San Blas island cruisers, to date, have been a bit surprising in their complete lack of sociability. In almost any other part of the world, when you pull into an anchorage, all the other boats will wave cheerfully to you, raise you on the VHF, motor over to you in their dingy, or even swim over to say hi. No such welcome was afforded here. In fact, the very next morning, every single boat left the anchorage, with not so much as a smile as the people passed by.

At first we were dumbfounded. We wondered if maybe we'd violated some social norm, or crowded to close, or thought maybe they didn't like catamarans, but nothing seemed to make sense of their cold shouldered attitude. Then Jeff dove overboard and swam to the nearest island, about fifty yards away. No two minutes after he set foot on the island, a ponga filled with Kuna left the shore and headed out into the anchorage, leaving a small gaggle of children playing on the beach. We watched as Jeff walked along the shore towards them. Without any visible effort or intention, the children continued to play, but their collective Brownian motion moved them further away. When he turned and walked back toward to huts on the other side of the island, they moved back towards him, but always keeping just out of hailing distance. It was then that we noticed that four more boats were headed into the anchorage.

As each boat drove by, they would smile and wave and head in towards the windward shore and drop anchor, then disappeared down into their hulls, never to be seen again. Jeff swam back to the boat and we sat and waited to see if anyone would reappear, but no one did. So, the mystery was solved. Jeff was scaring everyone away, probably because he was a vampire. Although we didn't like this answer, the data points certainly fit the theory. Our only solution was to rid ourselves of Jeff through whatever means necessary. We began gathering garlic and looking for wooden stakes and mallets.

Being the consummate junior scientists that we are, we decided to at least test our theory, rather than get the deck all bloody again. We jumped in the dingy and motored over to the nearest boat. Out popped two cruisers we'd met days ago on BBQ island. We sat and had a friendly chat and invited them over for dinner. We then motored over to yet another boat that had also been in our anchorage, Diane on "Takes Me Away" and also invited her and her crewmate. In fact, we invited everyone in the harbor to drinks and dinner aboard Tritan. Everyone was delighted we'd broken the ice, and everybody said just how intimidated they'd been to say hi.

It turns out that for some reason there is a very unusual pattern of stand offishness common to the San Blas. Everyone else we spoke to had encountered the same attitude among other boaters, and no one wanted to take the chance because they assumed they'd be shunned like us. They were thrilled that someone had taken the initiative and it really created an opportunity for everyone to get together. Plus there was the added bonus of not having to clean up the boat after we drove a wooden steak through Jeff's heart.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. When we first arrived, before we even set the hook, a dugout filled with a Kuna family, complete with husband, wife and absolutely adorable children, pulled along side us and tried to sell us their wares. The women make colorful fabric designs about a foot square of various fish, birds and other native wildlife in a style that resembles a cross between crayon drawings and Peter Max posters.
I've yet to see anyone actually making these swatches, yet every canoe has a five gallon pail filled with them. I'm beginning to suspect that the Kuna, like any other reasonable culture, has realized the advantages of the global market and there is a small sweat shop in Taiwan somewhere chunking these out, but I can't prove anything. Jeff & Mota bought some, but I'm holding out for the higher quality Made In China version we can get at the airport.

The local fish merchant also paddled by. Today's selection included a medium sized Tuna and two Red Snapper. The last time I bought fish I had tried to fillet them myself, only to discover that my dissecting skills were about twenty years out of date and more than rusty. The last try resulted in a pieces of fish no larger than your thumb. This time I scaled the fish and took my time. I ended up with six nice sized fillets and a few miscellaneous pieces that don't count - they were oddly shaped fish. We cleaned them up and put them on ice.

On the way back from inviting everyone over, we had two of the most surreal experiences of the trip. The first was that I saw a large grey fin go through the water. A few microseconds later a very large male dolphin (maybe six or seven feet long) breached along side us and gracefully arched up completely out of the water and back in again. I've seed a lot of dolphins, some up very close, but this was incredible. It was almost as if he was saying "Hey, I'm right here. Take a look." There wasn't even a splash when he re-entered the water, and the power and grace of these animals is beyond words.

Now, that would have made our day but not two minutes after that something even more bizarre and extraordinary happened. As we returned to the boat, a Kuna family in their dugout was lying a hull our boat. We pulled up and asked what was the matter. The father reached into a bin and pulled out a TV remote control and handed it to me, saying something in Spanish. At first I thought someone has lost it on the island and he was worried about returning it to them, hoping we might know who it belonged to. After a few seconds Jeff explained that he was instead begging for triple A batteries for it, so they could watch Spanish soap operas. We didn't have any triple A batteries for the Kuna. In fact, we did have lots of batteries, but I'd sooner give them infected blankets than encourage their TV habit.

We politely explained that we'd never seen such a thing before but surmised it might be some sort of device for signaling the mother ship; we got back on the boat. A few moments later we saw an eerie blue glow coming from the island. It was their TV, which was sitting outside on the beach. There were several small Kuna children watching a Gilligan's Island rerun - but probably only because it was too much trouble to change the channel.



We then set about madly cleaning the boat in preparation for our dinner guests. We ran about the salon, washing dishes, throwing dirty towels into unused berths and vainly trying to make it look like something other than the bottom of a hamper. Short of actual warfare, there is no force more destructive of marine property than three males left to their own devices for several days in a confined living space. After much dashing about, guests began arriving, each bearing whatever foodstuff they thought appropriate or necessary for our shindig.

We were visited by a delightful couple from the States, his name was Slator and I'll be damned if I can remember hers but they were wonderful to talk to, a fabulously entertaining German couple Folksher (who was both a doctor and a CPA) and his wife MaryLou (who had met on the internet, which makes the world seem even stranger to me), John and his friend Robinson from England, Peter (whose vaguely Dutch accent might have been any of several European countries) and Diane (from "Takes Me Away") and her crew mate Sarah, also from Minneapolis. Everyone piled aboard, we made fish, cooked rice with coconut and pineapple, roasted peppers and mushrooms and had a Thanksgiving Dinner that couldn't be beat.

We all told stories, swapped details about sailing, described our lives and generally just hung out and did pretty much what we all do at Camp'N'Sons - talk about Burning Man and stupid things we've done with fire. The only downer was that everyone insisted that we were crazy not to go to Cartehaena. In fact, most of the evening consisted of Jeff and Mota asking when we were going, and everyone else egging them on with fabulous tales of welcoming wonders in every port. By the end of the evening I had said the phrase "we are not going to Carteheanna" not less then two hundred times.




The night disappeared too quickly and eventually everyone one got in their little inflatable boats and drove the fifty feet back to their respective homes. I miss them all already and it made me homesick (a little) for hot tubs and flaming turkey leg spinning. I look forward to seeing you all soon, but must warn you that, unbeknownst to me, there are actually some other people as interesting and fun as our tribe. In fact, there is some fierce competition in the world, and I hope you are all keeping in shape. I'm told that some of the best party athletes are found in Carteheana.

Hoping you are all keeping in good spirits and this finds you safe, happy and in your cups!


Cheers,

Robb


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Cheesecake in Paradise.

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Dear Readers,

I'm sorry I haven't been writing as regularly as I should. It shouldn't be hard to do, but the day seems to get away from me and I find myself falling into bed each night exhausted, too tired to even think about writing much. Everything takes a thousand times more time and effort than you think it should. Just today Mota, Jeff & I were laughing about how little we get done, how we would have done seven things before breakfast back home, how doing something as simple as making breakfast here means first washing dishes; which means first figuring out the water levels; which means noticing the leak; which means pulling up the flooring and disconnecting the hot water heater; etc., etc., etc.

Any given action can result in hours of ancillary delays that involve dinghy repairs, plumbing or finding the short in some electronics. Everything just takes a long time to do, and nothing gets done well, fast or cheaply when you are out at sea.

There is so much I'd like to tell you about, but nothing has happened here, yet we experienced so much of nothing that it fills our day to the brim. It has been a wonderful and satisfying time here in San Blas islands. We weren't supposed to come here (remember we are on a delivery, not a cruise!) and didn't decide to detour back south until we realized that we were stuck in Colon (which is a pretty accurate description of the town, BTW) for another two weeks until our transit.



We decided that we might as well spend it navigating through palm strewn, white sand islands rather than sitting in a marina (paying hundreds of dollars a day) drinking too much and playing volley ball with ten year old girls. Or, alternatively, sitting at anchor in "The Flats" (the designated waiting area for canal transit) inhaling the trash dump's incinerator output. Go figure.

We arrived in the San Blas at dawn two days ago. We had passed over them on our way here from Aruba. The sail down was frustrating as we had little wind and what we did have was mostly on the nose. That first night out there was a beautiful sheet-lighting thunder storm over Panama's Eastern coast that entertained us as we motored along. Jeff & I played guitar and sang songs and watched the fireworks show.

It was a lovely night. Later on, Mota came on watch and he and I approached the islands as the sun rose, slowly inching our way into the anchorage, trying to figure out which piece of wash covered rock matched which green palm covered island in the pictures contained in the cruising guide.

Mota keeps marking up our charts, correcting all the places that don't show rockssticking out of the ground or dead trees pointing up out of the sand. We've decided that he was born six hundred years too late. Had be been alive back then he would have been called Motatoo, The Great Cartographer and/or Day Planner Mota the Undermedicated. Below is a picture of what we believe he would look like...


No doubt we'd all be living in the United States of Amotia, and that it would have names like Diet Coke Straights, Point Frapachino, Hippy Crack Island and Long Island would of course be called "Those Sexy Mutha' Fucken' Islands".

There are palm strewn islands with reefs everywhere and it is very easy to bump into things, which is bad (lets get this good/bad thing straight) so we go slow and don't let Mota near the throttles. We've dinghy'ed around a bit and aren't anxious to move the boat if we don't have to. Actually, it is mostly because that would mean going through the arduous process of pulling the anchor back on board, which involves standing on the fore deck while pressing the button for the electric motor. The thought of this much effort sends shivers through our souls. Anything could happen if we slide down this slippery slope. It is better that we stay put and sip our cool drinks while talking to other cruisers. The wise sailor doesn't take unnecessary chances.




We're staying in an area called "The Swimming Pool", so named for the color of the water and its 90 degree water temperatures, along side ten or so other cruisers. Our position is N09,35,38 W078,40,59 for those of you with the wherewithal to look it up. The bottom is mostly white sand, our CQR anchor caught on the first try and we've not budged since, although I think I should put more rode out and maybe a second anchor, as the winds have picked up a bit.




When we were at anchor in Colon, the weather was beautiful. Since we've arrived here there has been a low pressure trough moving through up north which has brought a week of rains and winds that spring up on us each morning at exactly 9:35AM, continually catching us unaware. We scurry about the boat closing hatches and hiding books and towels. Each time we act so surprised, it is amusing how we convince ourselves of the unexpectedness of it. You just can't believe it could rain in paradise, and always at exactly the same time.

As I write this the Mother of All Rain Squalls just arrived and is blowing rain sideways through the boat.We've locked everything down now and I sit warm and dry writing this email as Jeff and Mota are dancing about on the trampoline in the howling rain having the time of their lives screaming into the storm. It is hard to explain how such a simple thing like this could bring so much joy, but it is a delight just watching them.

Last night was "Pot Luck Monday". We all dingy'ed over to "BBQ Island", which is about one hundred yards around, made of white sand, palm trees and coral. It is just large enough for a small hut and one cotton hammock, which we first discovered the day before, it was inhabited by a tall, thin, tan and beautiful Brazilian woman with the kind of accent which allows her to say things like "I hop ju no mind, I sink da barka, how ju say? boata? by mistake". You would just smile and say its okay, you really didn't like the boat very much anyway, rather than see her frown. Now Jeff & Mota have been stellar crew doing yeoman like work the entire journey, but I thought they might mutiny when she said she wanted to go to Mexico and I explained we couldn't take her. It was a tense moment, but I've prohibited them from carrying any edged weapons in the presence of pretty women - a rule that has saved my life.

Life on board has definitely had its share of physical perils. It is surprising how safe we've made our normal lives, so much so there are no sharp corners or edges to trip over. Once we've removed ourselves to this rugged world our ability to navigate becomes severely compromised. No doubt we'll all adapt as time goes by, but in the meantime we trip, stumble and bump into everything. We've all banged, bruised or bashed ourselves in numerous places learning the unexpected curves and corners of this boat. Jen started photographing all our various cuts, scrapes and subdermal bleeding, to see who had the worst impacts, but MaryAnn was clearly the winner of that contest. She could walk past a greased wall and get black and blue.

For my part I've managed to tweak my back and am now doing a great imitation of early man learning to walk upright. Soon I'll move beyond grunts and clicks and start using tools and fire, which will be helpful because the pain killers are running out.

The local native tribe, The Kuna, have been by our boat several times already. They paddle up in dug out canoes and sell fish, fruit, vegetables, whatever they think the cruisers might need. They will beg for food, water, gas, money, anything they figure you'll part with, but aren't very aggressive about it. Sort of like a cross between a quick witted street vendor and a cagey homeless person in Berkeley.

The average male adult Kuna is about four foot high, has several teeth, sometimes as many as ten, with deeply tanned, leathery skin stretched over muscle and sinew with zero percent body fat. An old male Kuna (anyone over the age of about twenty five) can paddle a canoe twenty miles in a strong head wind without breaking a sweat. The woman wear very brightly colored clothes with elaborate, beautiful wrist and ankle wraps. Those Kuna I've met on the sea all seem to have problems with cataracts, most with clouded eyes, yet I'm yet to see anyone wear protective sunglasses. I'm not sure why this is such a hard concept for them, they've got the dirty T-shirt and Jim Beam baseball caps down no problem.

We've bought a few items from them and we barter on price, but I think we may be paying way too much anyway. We need to find out what the market prices are here, lest we get labeled the soft touch boat. We bought some fish and an octopus the other day. I tried to fillet the fish, only to realize after the fact that this wasn't a skill I'd practiced since I was ten, and the fish was such that leaving the skin on would have been the correct way to cook it. Instead we ended up with bits of flesh, no piece larger than a pack of matches. We decided to make ceviche, which turned out amazingly well. The octopus we cooked up with some rice and spices, which Jeff & I relished. Mota took a dim view of this food group and politely declined. I think he has been put off the whole food with tentacles thing ever since I first showed him a tin of what he calls "El Pulpo En Brown Crayon Sauso". There's no accounting for some people's taste.

We met several very beautiful woman on the island today. I realize now what a horrible public education system I suffered through in High School. Any school that does not adequately equip its students with the skills that are necessary in later life, is, in my humble opinion, a failure and should be burned to the ground - its teachers put in stocks and the principle tarred and feathered - but I'm not bitter. Among those skills I consider mandatory is the ability to converse in at least one other common language of the world - especially when one finds themselves on a beautiful beach inhabited by several stunningly pretty women from South America whose combined English vocabulary is under thirty words.

It was the job of my 10th grade Spanish teacher, Mr. Castennata, to prepare me for just such a occurrence, and he failed miserably. Perhaps this is because I was a lousy, inattentive, obnoxious student, but in large part I think it was because he was also my soccer coach and graded my class performance on how well I did on the playing field which, given the fact that I sucked as a soccer player, meant D- grades and left me resentful and unwilling to try to conjugate the verb "communicatir" - to chat without sounding like a complete idiot.

Years later, I stood on a beach, in paradise, surrounded by several Brazilian woman, completely unable to carry on even the most basic conversation, cursing Mr. Castennata and the New Jersey Board of Education. If it kills me I will learn how to mutter such complex Spanish phrases as "I'm sorry, please say that again but slower?" or "You know, even though I appear to be retarded, I'm sometimes quite witty when speaking English".

To make this all the more annoying, both Jeff and Mota appear able to converse with them, or at least act like they know what they are talking about. I remain the slow, retarded child in the back of the crowd. Our typical encounters with anyone not of English origins involves Jeff or Mota chattering away with them in Spanish while I stand back and try not to drool on myself.

Occasionally one or the other of them will turn back and quickly translate something about the fact that whomever they're talking to just described their recent Pulitzer Book award for upcoming new fiction in Portuguese, or their travels in Peru for National Geographic, or that they have just uncovered some as yet unexplored prehistoric cave in the Andes and are making detailed sketches of it.

I nod and try not to spit on myself when I say "Si, Mucho Gusto", which I believe means, "Yah that's great" but could also mean "Zippidedoda" or "I found a dollar once" for all the odd looks I get when I pronounce it. Whomever we are talking to invariably pause just long enough to glance at me and make that 'almost wince' people do when they are trying to decide if you are a danger to your self or others. I smile back and nod a lot, which only convinces them that they are probably better off backing away slowly while maintaining eye contact.

Never the less we continue to inflict ourselves on the population and are even now preparing to go snorkeling among the reefs. I wouldn't be surprised if we meet some talking fish and I'm left having to hear Jeff explain how the fish described the sunset in terms that brought tears to his eyes, and made poetry seem pointless, all of which, of course, would be in Spanish. I'm bringing a spear gun just in case. Smart fish probably still tastes good with garlic.



Cheers for now.

Robb


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A Letter Home

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Editor's Note: Not all emails went out to our readership. Many were far too personal to publish, but we've included this one just for fun.


Hello my love,

It was great to hear your voice again, I miss you so!! Mota and Jeff are fabulous company, but I really wish you were here. Please do whatever you need to be ready to fly back down, I want to hold you again!

Please contact Mike, MaryAnn & Jen and find out how they made out and if there is anything they need or left behind and thank them again for their help and company, please tell them they are welcome back anytime. Also please contact my folks and explain my absence and that I will fly to see them as soon as we get the boat to a logical stopping point.

We are on our way to the San Blas now, wind has been low, seas flat, but that makes for slow going as we don't want to waste a lot of fuel. The stay in Shelter Bay got better in that we kept meeting more and more new and wonderful people. We almost decided to stay another night and jam with another musician but seeing the islands seemed like a better idea.

Cruising definitely suits this crew, each of us wander off and find new friends, then introduce them around. Jeff ended up fixing a computer problem for the French couple (Alaine & Madeline) on the red & white Outremere cat, and practicing his French. We could probably get jobs doing IT down here, the way so many cruisers need help. Maybe I should switch careers.

Can you please check to see which emails of mine made it through? Also, please send a message to the email list asking them not to send any emails directly to the boat address as this severely reduces my ability to use email. Ask them to send things to you instead. Also, I haven't seen anything in my email that seemed urgent, but please look over it, there was a message in there from the folks from Aruba Marina saying they forgot to bill us for something. Please tell them that I'm not able to respond just yet but we will look this over during the next couple of weeks and get back to them if there is any problem.

I hope all is well with you. Thank you so much for dealing with all this shore side shit. I realize how less glamorous it may seem, but in reality it is far more important for our long term goals than fixing the boat. Please do spend some time doing something fun this week, don't work so hard you go crazy. Remember, we both have to work a few more years before we can go sailing, you don't want to burn out just yet!

Please write as much as you want, I love hearing from you and wish I could kiss you all over.

I love you madly.

Robb



p.s. There isn't anything we can't live without, but some things that would really be nice are:

1. Lots of crystallized ginger.
2. Chocolate covered ginger.
3. Those ferrite collars you bought at the HAM Radio Outlet (black cylindrical items that snap around the radio cables) also called RF chokes. I need about ten more.
4. If you have the opportunity, please look in the three big black plastic container boxes in 5A storage - I think there may be a box or two of boat gear that got left in them - I'm especially missing two snatch blocks - the brand new one I just bought broke - I'm gonna bring it back to West Marine but I'm pissed that it failed already.
5. There should be another stash of tools somewhere around the boat - I'm missing an Ammeter (it has a plastic loop arm that can be opened and placed around wires), and a signal
6. Tracing meter that was blue and has a black plastic pointed tip. Also, I need to get my soldering stuff from Ron and bring it down here, the crap I have here is worthless.
7. If you see any discs that appear to be at all related to sailing pack them down, I'm missing one for the Garmin GPS especially.
8. A couple of those razor blade holder knives and some razors, the one I had has gone missing.
9. A reasonable amount of toy stuff, lube especially.
10. All of the T.Pratchett paperback books that are on the shelf.
11. A copy of "A Cock & Bull Story" (or whatever the title is of that book by Tristram Shandy) that was written in the 1700s that the movie was based upon.
12. The three way chess game.
13. Your breasts.
14. Your girlfriend's breasts.



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