Route to Panama 18 February 2024 – Nearly there.

Joyce and I had the 8.00pm to 11.00pm slot and although the wind was dying we were still able to make more than 7 kts by going closer to the wind and sailing a beam reach (where the wind hits the middle of the boat), which is one of the fastest points of sail. I had checked the weather and the wind was due to die almost completely by 5.00am. Our shift passed quickly with one tanker passing but little else.

After the shift I went to bed and was woken by the engine being started and it was 5.30am. The wind had died so we were now having to motor the last 150 nm as there was little wind for the next few days. We tried to motor sail with the main up but it flapped due to the roll from the waves so we were just on the engine. If you recall from previous blogs my propeller has two options gori and normal. Gori is more efficient and this means that you go faster with less revs. However it is best used in flat seas. It is all about the tilt/angle of the propeller. In order to get it into gori the boat has to be going and moving backwards. I put her in gori and off we headed for Panama. The plotter indicated that with on our set current speed that we would get there between 7-9.00am on Monday 19 February 2024.

I went back to bed and let Keith and Jonas continue their shift and Joyce and I took over at 8.00am. It was a cloudy clammy morning and Stormbird was damp and covered in salt after a number of days of spray and waves coming a bit over the side. We cleaned the binnacle and tidied up the lines and running backstays and got some sense of order again. It was quite different to have no heel and only a little roll from a wave passing under us which had now reduced considerably. We had a bacon and egg sandwich for breakfast and David made some porridge.

The day improved with the sun shining and we were just motoring along mile after mile. Panama seemed tantalisingly close yet we will not be there until tomorrow morning. It is sort of frustrating but it gave us the day to sort things out, charge devices as the engine was on and we got better sleep due to the quieter conditions. We continued the shifts and when not sailing it seemed we had little to do but chill and have our thoughts.

However we had a nice salad for lunch which we could eat on the level for a change followed by watermelon which was now very good. We were able to read and chat etc. We saw very few tankers and I wondered how long it will take before we can transit. I emailed the agent Alex and told them of our arrival time and he thought we would have to wait until the first week of April. I hope not and there is nothing that I can do now but will meet the agent tomorrow to see what I can do. The Oyster Rally, which is a large number of boats is waiting as well. I can only hope that we will have some luck and get through at the end of March 2024. The delays are being caused due to the fact that the Panama Canal is a freshwater canal and water levels in the last years has dropped so they cannot open the lock gates as many times a day as they used to. Apparently some cargo ships are deciding not to use it and some are being told they cannot come as heavily laden as they used to be.  It is somewhat annoying but hopefully things will turn out right otherwise it may interfere with our Galapagos plans. So let’s keep everything crossed.

There do not seem to be any other sail boats around or much life. I saw one dolphin this morning to say hello but then it lost interest. We cannot fish as we are going too fast and there is little bird life either. Despite this we are all looking forward to getting to Panama and we are going to the Shelter Bay Marina which has a swimming pool as well, which will be different.

Keith cooked a good chilli con carne and rice which we eat whilst we discussed things on our bucket lists before we die. We look forward to our arrival in Panama at breakfast tomorrow.  

 Distance run to noon 24 hours 177nm.

The blog will continue as we head off to Panama and beyond.

If you have any comments or suggestions about the blog do email me on hine.nick9@gmail.com  I can only upload one picture a day and visit our website www.stormbirdgoesglobal.co.uk