Panama - San Blas Islands, Back at East Lemon

After Cayos Holendes, we had time to waste before returning to Mainland for Jenny to make her flight on 26 July. We had enjoyed the anchorage at East Lemon, so we returned there. No sooner than we’d anchored, Attie of the small island came to say Hello and ask if he could get Fresh Drinking Water again. - - No Problem for us.

Way back in 2018, when in Sarasota, USA, soon after we’d anchored and not yet furled sails away, we were hit with a Buster of 60 knots of wind, which pulled our Genneker out and pretty much shredded it. We had to buy a new one, at huge cost, however were able to selvage a many meters of Laminated sail cloth with the intention of making Sail Bags or something…..

We’d noticed that many of the Guanas have sails on their Ulus, but Attie did not, and he seemed quite improvised, living in a hut with;

Attie and Family’s Hut

His wife

His 4 daughters, ages 12, 8, 4 and 3

His wife’s mother

His wife’s sister and her daughter

His wife’s grandmother

His wife’s bother

That’s 11 people in one hut!!!!

Attie, seated, and some of his family

They have another Lean-too where they store water both for body washing, laundry etc and containers of drinking water

A Pig and some Chickens (two)

So we asked Attie if he had a sail, as he had to paddle everywhere, and he said No and that he did not have the funds to purchase one. Further establishing that his Ulu did have a Mast, and that he had the Boom and Gaff Rig Pole, Nicholas and I decided we’d make him a Main Sail and Jib.

A little googling to get a Sail Pattern, and measuring Attie’s Mast and re-sizing everything, we were set. Nicholas and I took sail cloth ashore, and with Sharpie/Koki, measuring tape and Straight edge we measured out a Main and Jib and cut them out.

Back aboard Meshugga, I hauled out my trusty sewing machine and got to work.

Nicholas and Attie attaching the Main to the Mast

Next morning Attie took Janna, his wife, for an early morning sail to test out the sail

I then made the Jib

Attie used the full sails to fetch water from the adjacent island

Sailing past Meshugga with full sail laden with containers of non-potable water. Great to sail back to his island instead of paddling. Just saying!

No sooner than this task was done, and I was packing up all my equipment than Attie came to see Nicholas asking if he had any Resin. Nicholas went ashore with Attie to ‘see’ the problem and it was that his second Ulu had a huge hole in the forward part and the bow was seriously cracked and broken.

Nicholas to the rescue…..

Thankfully we had a large container of Resin and a big roll of Fibreglass

Cracks filled with Epoxy, and hole filled with a large chunk of fiberglass and epoxied in

Aft section glassed, busy with front section routing and fairing

Whilst Nicholas worked, I visited with Janna, her sister, mother, grandmother and the kids.

They were most kind and showed me their Mola work (sewing and embroidering) scenes on fabric which the sell. The grandmother gave me one as a gift.

The older daughter, makes bracelets with seed beads to sell, and also gifted me one

Final Farewells, Attie collecting Potable (drinking) water from Meshugga

Attie had arranged to take me for a sail on his Ulu, but it was not going to happen with no wind