Panama - LBM yet another month on the hard, and a visa run to Costa Rica, stuff happens

It’s been over a month since I last posted. As usual a lot has happened.

As it’s approaching the festive season, I got busy soaking fruit in Brandy, for a few weeks, for my annual Xmas Fruit Cake.

For those that make Fruit cake, I can highly recommend my sisters advice, to bake it in a box.

This recipe, which I’ve used for 45 years, is usually baked in a 9x9x4” pan.

I now make the same recipe in a ‘normal 24 can beer box”, well lined with more cardboard and parchment/brown paper. It makes a 2 1/2” high cake which is fine for us, as I cut it into thirds, and use one third at a time.

Easy clean up.

Work continues on the boat, and Nicholas has at long last started with the jigsaw of reassembling the Starboard Front Cabin, which was taken apart over a year ago. Frustration of finding the correct pieces of wood to reassemble everything - lots of swearing emanating from the cabin.

In Panama, we only get a 90 day visa, however we can overstay the 90 day visa up to 180 days (and pay a $50 per month overstay fine), then one has to leave the country, called a Visa Run by Cruisers.

We decided to do the run to Costa Rica, a 1 1/2 hour flight. So on Thursday 13 November travelled to Panama City with Taxi Jack (our Boat worker Marco’s brother), did some shopping and then Jack dropped us off at our Hotel in Panama City, driving back to Meshugga, Linton Bay with our packages.

Crown Plaza Hotel near Tocumen Airport in Panama

Arriving in San Jose in Costa Rica, we hired a vehicle from Hertz, and set off on few day tour of the country.

Three days of sightseeing, turned far more exhausting than we’d planned and hoped for, as roads are poor, and mostly single lanes. The interior of the country is very hilly.

We went to the South Coast, the Pacific Ocean side, first to Jaco.

We’d not decided exactly where we’d stay, so arrived in Jaco, drove around to get a feel of the area, and then stopped for a drink and booked at Paradise Jaco.

It was a lovely small hotel, right across from the beach. Hotel rooms were a little dated, but nothing that hassled or offended us. With a Balcony, WiFi, Breakfast, Coffee facilities and Mini fridge in the room, excellent breakfast included too. It was perfect.

Pool, Kids Pool, Tub, with seating, Pool lounges, chairs, table and swim towels.

In Jaco we found a super Pizzeria who made excellent Margaritas and Pizzas, Nicholas had a Calzone, and me a Vegetarian pizza.

We did a short drive north of Jaco to the new Safe Harbor Marina, as it might be a stopover place once we go through the Canal. It was disappointing, a Gin Palace Fishing Boat Marina, with all Slips too narrow for Meshugga’s beam. But an absolutely fabulous Resort, homes etc really well appointed.

Next stop was Quepos, and again were disappointed in the beaches, which were pretty black, both from Volcanic ash and pollution. 

The village at Jaco was definitely Backpacker orientated, and Quepos was horrible. Did not even take photos.

We drove around more sightseeing and then stopped enroute at Orengina as it was getting late, poor roads, and rain had set in. Took no photos of our hotel. But it was fine.

On Sunday night we needed to stay near the airport for an early morning flight back to Panama.

Hampton Hilton Hotel, which is close to Santamaria Airport.

Nice hotel, superbly clean, well appointed. On arriving in our room, Nicholas took the coffee machine out, off its shelf and the coffee pot fell and shattered. I immediately called the cleaners, who were still on our floor, and they replaced it, and even after I reported it to reception, we were not charged for the breakage.

Breakfast included, but our flight was so early, that we just opted for coffee and had breakfast at the Airport Lounge.

One of the main reasons we selected this hotel is the easy location to Hertz drop off. Which we did the night before, and then used the Hotel Shuttle at 6am to get to the Airport.

Arriving back at Tocuman Airport, Panama, Jack picked us up and we did more shopping at stores we don’t have in Linton Bay or Colon, and then again the 2 1/2 hour drive back to Linton Bay.

- An exhausting 5 days of traveling!!!

We got back to Meshugga on Monday night. Tuesday we started sorting out stuff aboard, and at about 10am, we heard the most almighty crash and Meshugga shook. I thought a rogue vehicle lost control and ploughed into Meshugga. 

Rushing outside, we saw that the Monohull behind us had fallen off its chocks.

I’m sure it’s going to be a bun fight between the Yacht Owners Insurance and Marina Insurance companies as to who is liable.

We next had an appointment in Panama City on Thursday at 6am, so that entailed driving to Panama City on Wednesday (yes the day after the boat fell), staying overnight, up early for the appointment. This time we hired a vehicle in Linton for the two days.

Against our friends advice of where to stay in Panama City proper, I booked us into the Best Western Hotel as it was a 10 minute Uber to our early appointment next day. As you all know, Nicholas and I are not morning people and I couldn’t face a half hour possibly longer from Panama City proper. We were advised to Uber and not try get parking.

Best Western was not too bad, a Junior Suite had a lovely lounge, and kitchen area with coffee facilities, microwave and mini fridge.

But we found it super cold, and the Hotel technicians could not get the Aircon to be warmer or switch off, so they moved us to another Suite, slightly smaller, but fine, and it was really cold until we got the Aircon to stop pumping out super cold air. They delivered extra duvets to us to cuddle in the Lounge, until things warmed up.

We got back from our early appointment in time to have breakfast at the Hotel, and then Again did more shopping in Panama City before driving back to Meshugga. (2 1/2 hour drive).

The drive was going well until about 40 minutes out of Linton Bay, a Huge thunderstorm started. There was no where to pull off the road, so Nicholas drove very slowly with all our lights on. 5 minutes past Portobelo, (about 25 minutes before Linton) we came up a rise I saw something in the air, and suddenly a fire on the side of the road. Nicholas stopped the car (remember he was driving slowly), and sticking my head out of the window, getting soaking wet, saw that it was an electrical cable just above the roof of our vehicle and an electrical pole across the road 100m in front of us. We were the first car. We reversed, and pulled off the road, lights on, and sounding our horn for the next vehicle arriving after us.

These photos were taken after the rain stopped and Enza (the national electrical company) arrived and made the electricity ‘safe’, and put out the electrical fire.

4 1/2 hours later, the electrical authorities Enza had cleared the cables from across the road, and a local truck was found to pull the concrete pole, to at least clear part of the road.

We ended up getting home at 11pm, after leaving Panama City at 3pm, usually a 2 1/2 hour drive.

So, luck is on our side:

- The boat that fell, did not hit us.(The boat was going to be put beside us, and for ease, as she was only out for a couple of weeks, the marina but it behind us).

- The electrical pole did not hit our vehicle. (If we’d been a minute earlier we’d have been struck)

Panama - Linton Bay, Painting bubbling Aluminium

We are still on the hard at Linton Bay Marina in Panama.

Nicholas noticed some paint bubbling on aluminum parts, and so Nicholas and Marco uninstalled the two helms to take the cone housings off, and disassembled the boom strut to remove the fitting where the boom strut attaches to the mast.

Marco sanded all the items as well as areas on the mast.

Then Nicholas spray painted 3 coats of primer and two of top coat.

Marco mixing paint

Undercoat being sprayed on

Mast being sprayed

Re-assembled and all looks great

Yard dogs, Riley and Kayley, our loyal guard dogs, that we help feed and look after

Panama - Linton Bay Marina - 1 year on the Hard 😳

It’s been over 5 months since I posted an update.

In May, Nicholas approached the critical 180 day Panama visa restriction period which included his 90 day overstay, and had to leave Panama for a Visa Renewal Run. I, having gone to South Africa in January was well within my 180 days, but Nicholas did not want to travel alone, so I made arrangements for us to do a little Vacation to Columbia, our destination the historic town of Santa Marta.

Santa Marta sits on the northern coastline of Columbia and is recognized as the oldest settled area in South America by Europeans. I booked us an Ocean View room with a Balcony at Hotel Bonita, in the Old Historic District of Santa Marta, and the hotel arranged Taxi pickup at Airport Santa Marta a 30 minute drive away, so we did not have to deal with the pushy vendors charging Gringo prices.

Hotel Bonita

Our room was lovely, with cool air conditioning, heavy curtaining to cut out the afternoon sun, and double glazing to cut out the noise of the Boulevard which comes alive with Locals and Tourists every evening to watch the amazing Sunsets. Santa Marta is located in a bay, with excellent protection from the prevailing winds - which is the major reason Santa Marta was settled.

Our Balcony and view

Amazing sunsets

Our location, in the center front of the Santa Marta Historic District

For 5 days we roamed the streets, took in the sights, museums and historic buildings, retuning to our hotel room every afternoon to escape the intense heat. After watching the amazing Sunset from our Balcony we’d go out to one of the Local restaurants in the Historic area and experience the street night life in the Historic District.

Not all buildings have been renovated

Wall Art

IGY Santa Marta Marina

Fresh Mango Juices

One road outside of the Historic District is chaos with numerous motorbikes and street vendors

Evening wandering, looking for some place for dinner. This ‘hole in the wall bar’ made the Best Margaritas

Live bands perform in the Parks in the evening

By then we’d done and seen it all, time to leave and no need to travel here ever again. Been there, done that.

Back at Meshugga, I was extremely relieved to find that this time she was intact, and we had not been robbed (like when we went to Chicago in November last). Prior to leaving I had been ultra careful, ensuring every cockpit and fly bridge locker was padlocked. Every hatch, doorway securely locked, and jammed wood into the sliders to prevent intruders from forcing the locks, and sliding doors open. We told no one at the Marina, the security staff or any Cruiser that we were leaving the boat unattended.

The weeks and months since have rolled into each other. Work is slow. Getting materials, equipment, spares takes time. Workers are slow. The weather is Hot, Humid and Summer is the Rainy Season. Nights bring heavy Rain, Thunder and Lightning. Scary sometimes and I worry we’ll get hit again.

Life on the hard is frustrating and exasperating. Every task which should take 2-3 hours takes days.

Looking through my photos, I see that I have stopped taking photos of ‘boat work’. It’s all just too much.