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JESSIE'S

ATLANTIC CROSSING

WELCOME BACK

BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS! COCONUT

MILK RUN

KEEPING IT REAL IN

CUBA

BEATING TO THE

GALAPAGOS GREAT PANAMA

MISADVENTURE

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In th

there isis issue less tha n

33%

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ing! And we did it O N PU Most o RPOSE! th e r boating magazin es h 65% adave over s. Person Responsible for This Bob Bitchin bob@cruisingoutpost.com

Editor at Large Sue Morgan sue@cruisingoutpost.com

Boat Show Queen Jody “Bitchin” Lipkin jody@cruisingoutpost.com

Staff Infection Tania Aebi Contributor Zuzana Prochazka zuzana@cruisingoutpost.com

Life Aboard Queen Mother Robin Stout robin@cruisingoutpost.com

Web & Art Guru Richard Marker rich@cruisingoutpost.com

Media Princess Tabitha “Bitchin” Lipkin tabitha@cruisingoutpost.com Marketing & Video Darren O’Brien darren@cruisingoutpost.com

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Boat Show Slaves Jessie Zevalkink & Katie Smith (Also Godmothers to the Oﬃce Cats!)

Intern Copy Editor Natalie Shorr

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People Who Helped Us Create This Issue John Arrufat Capt. Robert Beringer Suzy Carmody Capt. James F. Cash Lee Chesneau David Crafa Kyle Danielewicz Tom Dymond Emily Gazall Jeﬀ Goldfarb Ekaterina Golovina Michael Harlow Jack Mooney Jessica Lloyd-Mostyn Yvonne Palkowski Robert Scott Morgan Stinemetz Jeﬀ & Brenda Thornton Sam Whiteleather Rene Yap Jessie Zevalkink

People Who Didn’t Help Us At All Donald Trump Hillary Clinton Queen Elizabeth Kim Jong Un

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Contents

The ﬁrst novel ever written on a typewriter? Tom Sawyer!

Issue #23 Summer 2018

Special Stuff in this Issue Welcome Back to the BVIs Bob Bitchin The Atlantic Crossing Jessie Zevalkink The Coconut Milk Run Bahia Todos Santos Happy Dinghy Keeping It Real in Cuba Beating to the Galopagos Islands The Fabulous Tuamotus Colorful St. Martin/St. Maarten Emily & Grace on the Great Loop Great Panama Mis-Adventure Women at the Helm Miami Cruisers’ Party

13 36 42 53 58 60 73 92 98 104 134 150 158

Regular Stuff in this Issue Attitudes Bob Bitchin Outpost News Another Way Tania Aebi What’s Out There: Monohull -Hylas H60 What’s Out There: Multihull - Bali 4.3 What’s Out There: Power Cruiser - Greenline 48 Lifestyle Latitudes & Attitudes Bubba Whartz Morgan Stinemetz Book Review Capt. James Cash Life Aboard Robin Stout Talk of the Dock Zuzana Prochazka Cap’n Cap’n I Found It at the Boat Show Weather Lee Chesneau Tech Tips Captain Pauly Bosun’s Bag Mackie White Cruisians

8 18 32 66 68 70 80 110 132 142 144 148 153 161 166 170 184 193 194

CRUISING OUTPOST (USPS 011-950) IS PUBLISHED QUARTERLY BY CRUISING OUTPOST, 9353 Oroville Quincy Hwy, Berry Creek, CA 95916. Periodical Postage paid at Berry Creek, CA and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to CRUISING OUTPOST, PO Box 15416, North Hollywood, CA 91615-5416.

™

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Attitudes

Forget the health food. I need all the preservatives I can get.

By Bob Bitchin

Each issue I search my alleged mind for something that will give you food for thought, while at the same time explaining what it is about cruising that makes us all want to go out there. Out there, where waves try to kill you and sharks try to eat you and somehow, we still think we are having a good time! So this month’s edification will be about equality; something we, in the States, thought we had conquered, yet it always seems to be a problem. As Tom Lehrer so eloquently put it in a song back in the sixties: “Oh, the poor folks hate the rich folks And the rich folks hate the poor folks All of my folks hate all of your folks It’s American as apple pie.” But guess what, boats seem to be the great equalizer! I remember one of the best New Year’s Eve parties I ever attended (key word here being “remember”) on the beach in English Harbor. We’d just sailed across the Atlantic and were buddy sailing with a 72’ custom Swan named Jugra. It was the royal yacht of Malaysia. Really! It turned out that Idris, who at the time was the Raja Muda of Selengor, Malaysia (essentially the Crown Prince), was an avid sailor and Harley rider, two things we had in common! So we raced (lol) across “the Pond.” Yes, he kicked my butt. Seems a Swan is a bit faster than the Taiwan Turkey I was sailing (a Formosa 56). But I digress... So, we arrived in Antigua about eight days after Jugra made it into Barbados, where he had some meetings to attend. But, we agreed to meet for New Year’s. A few days after Christmas, Jugra arrived in English Harbor and dropped anchor about 75 feet behind us. Perfect. In the next couple days Idris arranged for one of the better restaurants on the beach to close for New Year’s Eve for a private party. It’s good to be the King (or Prince, in this case)!

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So, New Year’s Eve arrived (after “Christmas in the Caribbean” which, in Antigua, is better than most), and that evening we hopped into the dinghy and headed ashore to the party. At this time our “crew” consisted of myself and Jody, and our crew from the Med: a young surfer named Sean from Huntington Beach, CA, who we called “Gilligan,” and two young ladies, sisters actually, from Australia. As we beached the dinghy and walked up the beach into the restaurant we saw it was pretty crowded. It seems Idris had made some friends in the few days he’d been on the island. This is where it got fun. Now, try to picture two teenaged (18 & 19) sisters from Australia, a young surfer from SoCal, a Crown Prince, his “Man” Richard, his Captain and wife from New Zealand, a jolly Scotsman who owned the local pizza place, and his wife from Germany. Also in attendance were two punk rockers from Great Britain, one of whom had a Mohawk hairstyle sticking over a foot into the air, Stephan and Estelle who sailed in from South Africa, a few of the local islanders, sailors from France, Sweden, Canada, and a “professional varnisher” from Bequia. To top it all off, add a 6’4” 300-pound tattooed biker. It was, what you might call, a very eclectic group. But ya know what? We all hit it off fine. In fact, better than fine. We had basically all “proved ourselves” by taking on the ocean on major crossings - the great equalizer. As Mark Twain once said: “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” And in so doing, you will join the brotherhood of adventurers (and adventuresses) who have found the life at sea to be the one great equalizer. Once you have crossed an ocean, you join the less than 1% of people on Earth who will ever get to experience such an epic adventure!

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Scrub Island, February 2018.

SAIL BVI ONCE, SAIL FOR LIFE. Go full speed ahead and let the freedom of the British Virgin Islands fill your sail. Charter your own private exploration, with captain and chef if desired, to over 60 beautiful islands.

pg 12 BVI ad.indd 1

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Join the Outpost in Saying

“Welcome Back” to the

British Virgin Islands Join the Celebration! November 15th thru the 30th, 2018

On the following page s you will f ind spe cials on our by-the-cabin charters, bareboat charte rs, dr ink s, me als and re sorts. The BVIs are “Ope n For Busine ss” and want you to see how they have come back! www.cruisingoutpost.com

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He lp We lcome Back the BVIs

Welcome Back to Paradise! The people of the British Virgin Islands are back, and they want to show you how they have come together to rebuild our cruisers’ paradise. Now it’s up to you! They need you, the cruisers, to come help them and celebrate their unbelievable accomplishment! Those of you who have sailed here know that the big reason we all keep coming back is the people. Now the people are asking you to come and see the results of all their hard work! So come join us and the people of the BVIs for a two-week celebration. This two-week “Welcome Back” promotion is being supported by the BVI Tourism board. They are offering you plenty of incentives: special rates on bareboat charters, slips, meals, resorts and rooms. Make your plans early.

Knocked Down... The British Virgin Islands are well established as the sailing capital of the world. I think that is pretty undeniable. But recently the BVIs, as they are affectionately known by all who cruise there, have undergone some pretty horrible weather. In 2017, Hurricane Irma was the strongest storm on record to exist in the open Atlantic region. Irma was also the first Category 5 hurricane on record to strike the Leeward Islands, with winds up to 180 mph, and the second-costliest Caribbean hurricane on record with an estimated 65 billion dollars in damages. It was followed by Hurricane Maria two weeks later. Maria was the thirteenth named storm, eighth consecutive hurricane, fourth major hurricane, second

BVI Welcome Back Specials for November 15th thru 30th, 2018

10% Discount Off Rally Fees! The Salty Dawg Rally from Hampton, VA to the Caribbean Departing on 11/3, to arrive in the BVIs by 11/15. www.saltydawgsailing.org

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10% off all Instruction & licensing at the BVI base, location on Scrub Island. www.offshoresailing.com

Special rates during the event. www.proteuscharters.com www.cruisingoutpost.com

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Novembe r 15 thr u 30th, 2018

Ginger

Virgin Gorda Scrub Island

Beef island

Little Camino

Tortola

Great Camino Guana Island BVIs Looking South Category 5 hurricane, and the deadliest storm of the hyperactive 2017 Atlantic hurricane season. At its peak, the hurricane caused catastrophic damage and numerous fatalities across the northeastern Caribbean with winds up to 175 MPH with over 90 billion dollars in damages. As you might well imagine, the damages were devastating. Whole islands were totally stripped. Jost Van Dyke had to be evacuated, as there wasn’t a single building still standing. Nothing to eat, no clothes; in general the island was wiped clean! ...But Not Out! But the folks of the British Virgin Islands came together as a shining example of how well a people can bounce back from major disaster. Stories of survival and sacrifice started coming out of the islands before

the first hurricane was even over. Now it’s time for cruisers to come back, see the results of their efforts and support their progress. On Tortola the devastation was about as complete as it could be: electricity down, infrastructure gone, food and water in extreme short supply. But the people came together to get things up and running. As an example, all of the Pusser’s Restaurants were destroyed. So owner Charles Tobias, a decorated Marine Fighter Pilot in Korea and Viet Nam, gathered all his employees and brought them to the centrally located Pusser’s place in Road Town. Using generators and propane for boiling water and cooking, they had it up and were serving free meals to those on the island in just a couple of days.

BVI Welcome Back Specials for November 15th thru 30th, 2018

Free Night & Champagne Conch offers a “free night” stay aboard with free champagne to all charters during this event! w w w.conchcharters.com www.cruisingoutpost.com

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Aaaargh! Get your free 8oz Voodoo Rum Punch with a purchase of any food item. Ye be limited to 1 per customer, but that should do it! w w w.corsairsbvi.com

Cruising Outpost 15

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He lp We lcome Back the BVIs

Join Bob & Jody and the Outpost Staff

Hurricane History In the twentieth century the BVIs had 13 hurricanes. They came in two groups. They had ﬁve hurricanes from 1916 to 1932, and then only one during the next 57 years. Between 1989 and 1999, seven hurricanes struck including six in four years, from 1995-1999. Then they went another 11 years without any hurricane strikes. They experienced two in a row in 1995 with Hurricane Luis, followed nine days later by Hurricane Marilyn. Then came 2017. Hurricane Irma was followed fourteen days later by Hurricane Maria. These last two were among the largest hurricanes on record for that area of the Atlantic. A Little Help from Our Friends The BVIs are the most popular sailing destination in the world, deservedly so, as it is one of the most beautiful

Share The Sail BVI Nov. 17-24, 2018 Special discounted rates for the “Welcome Back to the BVI” event www.cruisingoutpost.com/sharethesail

BVI Welcome Back Specials for November 15th thru 30th, 2018

20% Discount The Nanny Cay Hotel is offering a 20% discount during the event. A great boutique hotel. www. nannycay.com/hotel

16 Cruising Outpost pg 13-17 The BVI's edited.indd 4

Save $250 on any new MarineMax Vacations power catamaran vacation booked bet ween Nov. 15-30, 2018. www.marinemax.com

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5/4/18 2:00 PM

Novembe r 15 thr u 30th, 2018

areas to sail on Earth. It also has some of the best sailing weather for most of the year. Add to that, over the past couple hundred years the island lifestyle has become sought out as something every sailor should experience at least once in their lifetime. As a result, the people of the BVIs’ lives depend on tourism and never have we, the cruisers who love the islands, been so needed. So make sure you are there to help the people celebrate their accomplishments. You will find discounts and specials from charter companies, resorts, events and restaurants all over the islands. Take a few days, take a week, or whatever you can do, but come join the celebration and let’s all get back to doing what we love, cruising the British Virgin Islands! Sailing from the States? Join the Salty Dawg Rally A lot of folks sailing to the BVIs will be joining the Salty Dawg Rally. It’s been going on for a few years and gives people a chance to join and sail to the BVIs with a group. The Fall Rally will depart from Hampton, VA near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. The departure date is November 3, weather permitting. The good folks at the Salty Dawg are offering a 10% discount for those who want to join them sailing to the paradise we all know as the BVIs. For more info on the Welcome Back Celebration, Share the Sail and the latest discounts, go to www. cruisingoutpost.com/BVI. Don’t dream your life, live your dream, in the BVIs!

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Cruising Outpost 17 5/4/18 2:01 PM

AT L A NT I C C R O S S I N G What it feels like to cross an ocean for the first time, double-handed across the North Atlantic

It took me five days to find my smile, sleep pattern, and energy.

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By Jessie Zevalkink

Departure: Royal Newfoundland Yacht Club At 3:45 a.m. my alarm confirms the thing I’ve been waiting to have confirmed for five months. It’s time to sail across an ocean. I wipe my puffy eyes and stand up to turn the kettle on an arms length away, scooping generous amounts of coffee into the French press. In need of a strong brew. Out of my peripheral vision I catch a shooting star which arcs so far across the morning sky that I have time to twist my head and follow all the way to the horizon. I take this in as a welcome token from the sea. I thank it, and carry on with my morning regime. By 4:09 a.m. we push the bow of Desirée off of the Royal Newfoundland Yacht Club dock. No one is around to wave good bye. Secretly, I am thankful for this. I surprise myself in feeling… nothing. As if we are departing for another day trip. I’m not necessarily thrilled. My tummy isn’t churning. I do not feel fear. I oddly don’t feel much. Five months of anticipation and I have exhausted myself of every emotion.

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Three icebergs float the horizon and appear contradictory to the day’s temperatures. I check the water temp; its one degree above freezing. They shine shockingly white. Each one appears and disappears into the swells. They are a kind reminder to keep alert. We have 300 miles until exiting the ice limit. I don’t notice when the coastline disappears. When I finally register that I won’t be seeing land for weeks it doesn’t bother me. I’m almost relieved. We are simply along for the ride now. I see the next iceberg on the horizon, adjust the main and the genoa, and tweak Penny (Hydrovane) the slightest bit to steer straight for it. It takes three hours to reach the little berg on the horizon. We sail questionably close to its storybook features. It’s not little anymore. Utopian in its figure. Classic in its coloring. Inviting in the way you envision having a picnic on its timeless slopes. I want to stay and explore. I want to peer under the sea to understand its entirety. At the same time it’s making me nervous. Its beauty intimidating, the kind that makes an entire room go quiet. I feel privileged to be in its presence. We watch it undulate in and out of the sea as long as we possibly can.

Only two out of seventeen days there was sunshine. The rest was overcast and rain.

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Crossing an Ocean for the First Time A humpback whale breaches 1/4 mile to port. It launches from the sea dropping my jaw and lifting my arm to point. My reaction startles Luke as he reckons something is wrong, but he sees it before crash landing the surface. Its size immeasurable. Its power inconceivable. Its brief moment on stage striking. I can’t add up the glories of day one, and I feel a very subtle shift in my gut. I know how these things tend to balance out. As my first graveyard shift begins the subtle shift takes a sharp turn. Upwards. Outwards. Stuck in between the back of my throat, threatening to come out of my nostrils. I am sick. Again. Again. And again. I put water in. It comes back up. I put a cracker in. It comes back up. Ginger ale. Comes back up. What does it want, quarters? I prevent myself from trying this. Someone has hooked up a macerator pump to my mouth and is pressing the button. Over four hours I drain my body of everything that is not securely attached to the walls of my stomach. I move onto dry heaving and count down the minutes till I can wake Luke up. Good morning Luke. Want a kiss? Your turn.

On the 4th of July, I put on my favorite outfit and celebrated in the middle of the ocean on my watch all by myself. It was the best four hours I’ve ever had.

Becalmed

I’ve taken the days, and I’ve taken the nights, put them in a blender and hold down the “whip” button. I don’t remember their individual flavors, but together they taste of monotony in four-hour increments, with the occasional leftover chunk that requires chewing – or should I say, work. The ocean is a very odd place. There is a simplistic pattern in sailing the ocean. It brings you right down to basic survival needs. Safety. Rest. Water. Food. That’s it. There is not much thinking beyond these four needs. Every four hours we go through the motion. We are a third of the way across the Atlantic Ocean. Tonight is blacker than a cave with no exit. No moon. No stars. Completely becalmed. It wasn’t long ago I imagined a situation like this – how nice it must be to sit in a rocking chair in the vastness of an ocean, far from your living room. To go nowhere. To ponder life afloat the deep salt sea. To rest atop a mile of water that somehow sticks to the earth. I thought this could very well be some kind of moving experience in which I would learn something important about myself, about life, about the sea, maybe find some answers in the silence to questions I didn’t even know I had – I don’t know. Here I am, the human in this so-called-beautiful situation I imagined, feeling far from peaceful and meditative. I am frustrated. Fiercely frustrated.

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The sails flap like curtains hanging in the back yard. Air rolls through the canvas one end to the next snapping the mainsail taut. It goes silent while the air rolls off the edges and the canvas becomes a loose T-shirt hung upon an anxious body. A swell lifts the starboard side and snakes underneath the hull until we rock back to port to compensate. All contents aboard shift with any spare space. Our first gale passed nearly 24 hours ago and we sailed swiftly downwind with just the staysail, Desirée perfectly balanced in 38 knots of wind. But the leftover swells… mmm… they are still here. Roll. Snap. Silence. Rock. Shift. Repeat. The hangers in the closet. The dishes in the cupboard. The cups in their shelves. The Binoculars hanging from the lamp. The sour milk in the ice box. The fruit in the basket. The water in the tanks. The insides of my tummy. The weight of my body. The brain in my head. Swing. Smash. Silence. Slosh. Shift. Repeat. You know you are becalmed when you start taking selfies.

Cruising Outpost 39 4/30/18 3:53 PM

t u n o c o C The n u R k Mil

Many people choosing to set off and sail full time do so with a big dream in mind, a goal that captured the imagination to the extent that it urged them on to cut the docklines. And countless of us out cruising share the same ambition: to tackle the South PaciďŹ c Ocean. Sailing the South PaciďŹ c has the reputation of being that much further, wilder, more exotic and more remote than any previous boating a lot of us have done closer to home. From the shores of the Americas to reaching harbour in New Zealand or Australia some 7,000 miles later, the clock is ticking to explore the numerous islands 42 Cruising Outpost

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The Cruise That Has Launched More Dreams O f Wo r l d C r u i s i n g T h a n A n y O t h e r !

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The Coconut Milk Run sprinkled across this vast expanse of blue before the cyclone season comes round again. That’s a lot of water to cover in around nine months of travel and the pressure to keep moving on can make it feel like a watery conveyor belt. Those choosing to spend more than one season of their cruising adventures in this sea and dedicating several years to sailing here can be more leisurely about their passage-making, but will still need to be mindful of where to tuck into once the tropical storms start up. This is an ocean that will test your skills in selfsufficiency as, in all likelihood, your nearest port for any major repairs or parts needed will be several weeks’ travel away. Any boat crossing from the Pacific Coast of the Americas all the way through to Australasia should be pushing off for the crossing in great shape, thoroughly well maintained, rigorously checked and carrying spares and extras of as many things as possible. This is not only in case of any repairs to damage necessary en route, but in order to allow yourself the possibility of plans changing without being limited by your stores on board. It’s an ocean that may well require that you sail with additional crew as some of these distances are far greater and may take much longer than any the boat or her crew have previously attempted. That means that camaraderie is an integral part of a Pacific journey. It also holds some special milestones to be acknowledged. An equatorial crossing and passing the international date line may both occur on the way and it’s important to celebrate the sailing achievements that such records signify. The reliable consistency in strength and direction of the trade winds has meant that there are certain well-trodden routes from east to west that have been traversed by sailors for several generations. Choosing the right time of year to depart is critical to a smooth passage and most time their trip to allow for their arrival in French Polynesia once cyclone season has finished. Watching the weather to pick your window for leaving is only one element of the strategy, as a 3,000-mile trip from pushing off until making landfall in French Polynesia means taking on a good three or four weeks at sea. Making effective use of GRIB files, weathergrams, weatherfaxes, SSB radio forecasts and Pacific rally radio nets is an art form in itself. It requires a certain amount of pre-departure practice to become adept at

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The Cruise That

analyzing and interpreting this data to best serve you and inﬂuence your sail plan. You’ll also be tangling with the ITCZ, most commonly referred to as the doldrums. What you will experience here may be a far cry from its sailing legend as being an area where you will most likely be becalmed. The International Tropical Convergence Zone is the area lying roughly over the equator where the prevailing weather systems of the northern and southern hemisphere converge. Yes, the winds may be light and the sea still in this zone, but the benign conditions in these latitudes are sharply contrasted with the short, violent squalls that you are likely to experience here too. The wind plays a ﬁckle game of too much or too little

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Has Launched More Dreams O f Wo r l d C r u i s i n g T h a n A n y O t h e r !

which inevitably makes it hard going to make progress getting away from this band of weather disturbance. Though many boats may choose to loll in the slack wind, the crew even taking turns to enjoy a tentative mid-ocean dip, there are many more who cut their losses and crank on the engine in order to speed their way out of the confusion and into the steady southeast trade winds which will kick in at about 2° south. A departure from Panama affords you the opportunity of visiting the Galapagos Islands. If taking this route then you’ll enter the ITCZ early on in the voyage, along the 500-mile stretch between leaving Panama and arriving in the Galapagos. If attempting this early enough in the sailing season, around January or February, you could even further detour your Paciﬁc exploration by cruising another 2,000 miles on a beam reach to take in Easter Island on the way, then the relatively unknown little pit-stops of Pitcairn Island and the Gambiers before arriving in French Polynesia once their cyclone season has ended in April. Or, if sailing out from further south in South America you can even take in the Juan Fernandez Islands on the way to Easter Island. All these interesting breaks in the journey can make for a welcome respite from a long voyage and are opportunities to experience truly unique wildlife and culture. But, as they are really only small dots in the ocean, fresh produce and provisions

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Tales of a Happy Dinghy The dinghy is one of the sailor’s most important tools. Whether it’s rigid, inflatable, big, small, fast, or slow – a dinghy is a vessel’s only connection to land when not tied to the dock. Spending so much time in the dinghy sure wears it out quick; the dinghy on Lady Carolina went from practically new to basically derelict in the span of just five years. Breathless – the nickname our perpetually-leaking inflatable Caribe adopted as its condition continually deteriorated – lived a happy life full of adventure... • The time we hit a sand bank while on a full plane and, instead of the outboard getting stuck in the sand, the engine tilted upwards and the skiff skimmed/jumped over the top of the bank to deep water on the other side. All of this was quite a surprise to all passengers on board. • The day the engine failed on our sailboat, Lady Carolina, and the dinghy pushed our baby away from the evil, menacing reef. • You know those waves surfers only dream of riding featured in Hawaiian tourist magazines and computer screensavers? Well, imagine a dinghy in one of those waves. Now imagine people in that dinghy wanting to stay upright. Good times… • The hundreds of times you have taken us fishing were, honestly, fishing was a very bad idea. • Oh Breathless, do you remember us bashing through the chop during a 40-knot windstorm in the American Samoa Harbour so that my brother and I could go to McDonald’s? I sure do; we hit one wave so hard that my face was whipped into the pontoon in front of me. I thought I broke my nose. • All the nights we spent together using the oars to stay off the crashing reef while everybody else grabbed delicious lobsters off the sea floor. •Do you remember when we filled you up with 500 cans of beer to bring to Lady Carolina at anchor? Imagine if one of the pontoons had popped – chaos.

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By: Kyle Danielewicz Illustration by Rich “Magic” Marker

• You were a godsend when our watermaker failed. I remember how, whenever we were running low on water, I would borrow all the water cans I could from all the boats in the anchorage. Then, together, you and I would carry water back and forth between the water tap on shore and the boat. It took almost a year for the watermaker to be fixed – wasn’t that horrible? • I remember how scared I was when one day, I returned to the beach where I’d left you while doing some errands and, instead of you being there waiting for me, you were gone! Turns out some teenagers had taken you for a little joy ride – but not before they discovered the engine wouldn’t start! I found you a few miles down the beach, abandoned by the thieves. • Do you remember going out at 6:00AM to rescue that sailor who was stranded off the island of Nuku Hiva? That was the most scared I’ve ever been in a dinghy. We never should have been out in that weather. • Wasn’t it fun when I jury-rigged a broomstick into a mast and attached a windscoop to push us downwind? The only issue was getting back to Lady Carolina… • We were always so good at playing bumperboats at the busy dinghy docks. Where there was no space for anybody else to park a dinghy, we made our own space.

Our Breathless is far from what she used to be – deflated pontoons and a destroyed engine are all that remains of our marine steed. In this cold Vancouver Island water, I would never be caught dead riding Breathless farther than 50 feet offshore for fear of pontoon seams ripping or a major engine fire. I’m not actually sure what to do with you – most people think you’re a wreck but, to me, you hold so many great memories. I dread the day I must throw you in the garbage. You will be remembered, Breathless. Thanks for keeping us safe all those years.

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5/2/18 4:32 PM

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Cruising Outpost 59

5/4/18 10:20 AM

Keeping It

Real In

Cuba

By Yvonne Palkowski

I pull my bike over onto a narrow stretch of golden sand dotted with scruffy palm trees and construction debris. It’s not exactly a postcard view, but it’s the closest thing to a beach that I can find near Marina Hemingway in Havana, the capital city of Cuba, the only communist outpost in the western world. There’s a local man spearfishing in the shallows. “Pescado?” I say, mining my limited Spanish. “Si,” he says, showing off his modest catch. We sit on the beach for a while making small talk in few words and exaggerated gestures. His name is José and he’s 38 years old, a fisherman by trade. He asks if this is my first time in Cuba and I shake my head. The Caribbean island has long been a favorite winter getaway for Canadians like me, lured by cheap holiday packages selling an intoxicating mix of unlimited sun, rum, and some of the best live music you’ll hear in your life. But in my half-dozen previous visits, I’ve only ever stayed at all-inclusive resorts—manicured playgrounds for tipsy, sunburned foreigners—and I longed to see the ‘real’ Cuba. So when the opportunity arises to help move Jolly Good, my uncle’s Gulfstar 47 Sailmaster from Havana to Varadero, 80 nautical miles to the east, I eagerly hop aboard. The short passage allows plenty of time for exploring the vibrant capital and the northern coast’s sleepy towns and beaches, like the one I find myself on now with my new friend, José. It’s late morning and the sun is getting higher, so I buy a couple of cervezas to help cool us off. José reluctantly accepts one, then abruptly disappears into a ramshackle concrete house down the beach. Was it something I said? Twenty minutes later, just as I’m guzzling the last of my beer, he’s back with his freshly cooked catch for us to share.

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Grilled white fish drizzled with lemon and fragrant green herbs, it’s by far the best meal I have in Cuba, which, to put it politely, isn’t known for its cuisine. And in a country where the average monthly salary is just $25 USD, I’m struck by his generosity. Later that afternoon, José takes me snorkeling and I learn just how hard won our lunch was. I don’t www.cruisingoutpost.com

5/1/18 4:45 PM

Beach at the western tip of the Varadero peninsula have my fins with me and he insists I use his only set. The chop and current are against us as we swim towards the reef about 200 meters offshore, kicking furiously through cerulean blue water cresting in small whitecaps. Along the way, he points out an octopus den, and tries unsuccessfully to wrest away its stubborn occupant. www.cruisingoutpost.com

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Around the reef José has set up fixed fishing nets, a nuisance to cruisers but this man’s livelihood. Together we laboriously empty the fraying nets of seaweed and the odd plastic bottle. Tired and empty-handed, we head back to shore as the orange sun falls towards the horizon. I gather my things to leave, and José presents me with some polished conch shells and a sand dollar. “Vuelve pronto,” he says, come back soon.

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4/30/18 4:04 PM

Lifestyle A Look at Why We Do What we Do

Ever wondered why people love the boating lifestyle? Well, here in the Lifestyle section folks from all over the world give an insight into what it’s really like out there. If you have a photo you think tells a good tale, why not send it to us? We prefer you send a digital pic, in as high resolution as you can. Tell us who took the pic and where it was taken. We will probaby throw it into our “digital pile” and pull it out someday. We won’t send you any money, but you will be famous worldwide! Email to: Lifestyle@ Cruisingoutpost.com.

By Terry Sovil, underway

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Cruising Outpost 81

4/30/18 4:04 PM

By Gary Peterson, Mexico

By Jim of a red sky early evening at Selby Bay

By Richard Holiman

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4/30/18 4:04 PM

By Doug Shipley of daughter & friends, Annapolis

By Vinnie of Julie sailing their 1981 Shannon ketch, Free Spirit, on Lake Erie in Ashtabula

By Drew & Sharon Gober

By Jeff Reiner

Taylor Swift in Dinghy

By Chuck Cropp

By Jessica, crewing in Maine www.cruisingoutpost.com

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Cruising Outpost 83 4/30/18 4:04 PM

By Ken Anthony in the San Blas Islands aboard Sail Joana

By Deena Mitchell, passing through Angels Gate

By Chris Stokes of â€œthe family out for a sail.â€?

Marla aboard S/V Long Windid, anchored in Rangiroa lagoon in front of the Kia Ora Resort

By Amy Norton, first bare boat charter

By Captain Joe of Wendy snorkling

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4/30/18 4:05 PM

By Jeff Kolod of Debbie enjoying her coffee, sailing away from Ft. Jefferson anchorage

By Brian Duckett of Remi Taylor on Las Lunas, Berkely, CA

By Brian Duckett, Berkeley Marina, SF Bay, CA sunset www.cruisingoutpost.com

pg 80-91 Lifestyle edited.indd 7

Cruising Outpost 85 4/30/18 4:05 PM

Cruising St. Martin /

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5/1/18 3:50 PM

n / St. Maarten The Melting Pot Island

By Robert Scott / S/V Honeymoon Forever

Every once in a while, when cruising, you come across an island that is so complete in all things cruisers look for that it becomes almost impossible to leave there. I’m talking about St. Martin / St. Maarten, the half French, half Dutch island that lies in the northern part of the Leeward Islands. Although this island is barely seven miles in each direction from its center, it is perhaps the most inviting and diverse of all the Leewards: two nations, one island, three official languages - French, Dutch and English, and three currencies - Euro, ANG and the USD. All of this, combined with a population that is worldwide diversified, and you have an incredible melting pot of an island capable of fulfilling all of your cruising needs.

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Cruising St. Martin / St. Maarten

To start your stay you have many choices of marinas and anchorages. On the French side you have Marina Fort Louis, located in Marigot Bay on the northwest side of the island. You also have the entire Marigot Bay as an anchorage. It has a nice sandy bottom for good holding. You can clear in right there at Fort Louis Marina. Good wifi access is available for a fee. You are close to good shopping for food and supplies with several well-stocked markets within walking distance of the dinghy dock. Also close by is a small Budget Marine located by the Sandy Ground Bridge, and a small Island Water World located inside the marina complex. Marigot Bay can get a bit rolly and choppy in the right weather conditions, and please be sure to lock your vessel when going ashore, and secure your dinghy safely at night. North of Marigot Bay is Baie Grand Case, which offers good anchorage and is full of great restaurants in the small town of Grand Case. North of that is Anse Marcel, a smaller bay that offers great holding and protection, although for fewer vessels. It also hosts the Radisson Blu Marina which is extremely well protected, small, and somewhat expensive as it is considered to be a 5-Star resort facility. Travelling east around the northern tip of the island and then dropping south, youâ€™ll come to Orient Bay and Green Cay. There, you will find excellent holding and good shelter from the winds if you tuck in on the southern end of the bay. There are some services on land outside the beach area. You should note that Orient Beach is a clothing optional beach so you may see more than you bargained for.

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5/1/18 3:51 PM

The Melting Pot Island

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Continuing down the eastern side of the island you will come to Oyster Pond. It’s advisable to enter this anchorage area in the daylight hours as there are breakers on both sides of the channel. Further inside the pond you will find the bases for the Moorings and Sunsail. Five miles south and one mile east of there brings you to the city of Phillipsburg which sits in Groot Baai. This is a huge open bay and is where the cruise ships dock. There is plenty of good anchorage on the western side of the bay along with big beaches, lots of shops and restaurants, but please make note, the whole town lives and breathes by the cruise ships. We’ve encountered times when a lot of places were not open because the cruise ships were not in port. Three nautical miles northwest of there is Simpson Bay. That completes the island loop, so let’s get back to the two main cruising grounds of the island: Marigot Bay (French) and Simpson Bay (Dutch). Internally, they are connected by Simpson Bay Lagoon. You can enter the French side of the lagoon using the Sandy Ground Bridge (channel 16) on the south side of Marigot Bay. In there are two

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other decent marinas, Marina Port La Royale and Bobby’s Marina. The bridge opening times for outbound and inbound traffic (outbound precedes inbound) are 0900, 1430 and 1730 hours. Sundays and Public Holidays - 0900 and 1730 hours. The French side of the lagoon is an excellent anchorage area with close proximity to all of your cruising needs. They are a just a short dinghy ride away from wherever you are anchored. Beware, at times, of the wind blowing off the Witches Tit! On the Dutch side, for anchorage areas you have Simpson Bay (north and south) and Simpson Bay Lagoon. The French and Dutch Lagoons are separated by the Causeway Bridge. As of this writing the hours of operations/ openings for the Causeway are: Daily - 0815, 0945, 1015, 1145, 1545 and 1715 hours. Simpson Bay, outside of the lagoon, is vast with plenty of good anchorage available. It also is beachlined on both the north and south sides. It, too, can be very rolly and choppy at times and you are advised to also lock your vessel while away from it and to secure your dinghy at night. The Simpson Bay Bridge on the Dutch side operates on the following

Cruising Outpost 101 5/1/18 3:51 PM

Confessions of an offshore sailor By David Crafa Success always occurs in private, and failure in full view.

brought up passage weather. It didn’t look good. I stared at my watch. To make the weather window I would have to leave Montauk two days earlier than I had planned on if I wanted to make it to Hampton, VA, to rendezvous with the Salty Dawgs. If I didn’t leave now, I would be facing 40 knots from the southwest clocking northwest. I wasn’t ready and I knew it. I had been mentored by the best offshore sailors out there: Steve Black, Hal Suphin, Davis Murry and Jim Tingley. I had spent several seasons sailing with Jim on a Hylas 70 sailing to the VI and back. I thought I knew what I was doing before I met Jim. I didn’t. I was now sailing my own Hylas 54 named VanishingPoint. I remember Hal Suphin saying, “You don’t get what you expect, you get what you inspect.” This, now, was reverberating through my head. This year was different. I was still recovering from a severe concussion. Two crew cancelled at the last minute. I was double-handing and leaving prematurely, but what could happen? It’s only 280 miles. Every year I leave Montauk with those thoughts in my head and every year I get beat up. The difference is most years I’m better prepared to get a Montauk beat down. As we rounded Montauk point the first sign of trouble was obvious. The waves were ominous. I took a few pictures to send to my girlfriend. Look at me! I’m a bad ass! I didn’t say those words, but the sea heard me and she was about to take me back to offshore boot camp. Within one hour my only crew member was out of the game with sea sickness. She was wearing a

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5/2/18 4:16 PM

scopolamine patch. Mr. Bad Ass wasnâ€™t wearing one at all. Seasickness can happen to anyone under the right, or wrong conditions. It happens when youâ€™re exhausted, dehydrated, hungry, under physical duress, hypothermic, or mentally fried. I would experience all of those conditions over the next 24 hours. On the south side of Long Island the waves were stacking up out of the northwest. We were reefed, but I noticed the rail was in the water more than usual. I decided that it was time to reef again. I pointed VP into the wind and pushed the furler in button ... nothing. Jammed! I headed downwind to let more sail out. The jam cleared. I reefed and swung the boat back on course. The bilge alarm came on. The float switch was jammed in the on position by debris inside the bilge. I cleared it. The pump shut off. It was raining heavily. I had to stay focused on radar targets. The Montauk fishing fleet was out there making crazy Ivan maneuvers that would make a Russian sub commander

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Cruising Outpost 111

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Sailing under better conditions

proud. To make matters more interesting, torrents of water were smashing onto the foredeck at flash flood speeds. Seawater was shooting into the cockpit like a firehose. The bilge alarm came on again. The secondary bilge pump’s float switch was stuck on again, but this time it wasn’t running. I still had the main pump, but I was bearing down on the Montauk fishing fleet so I went back on deck. The bilge alarm fired again. The float switch to the primary pump was now stuck on. I cleared it. There was water trickling down into the bilge from the port side. Was there water on the low side of the boat? I had the bright idea of flattening out the boat. As I brought the boat into the wind a new alarm went off. The high bilge alarm sounded like an injured animal. I could see there was a lot of water down there! Primary pumps failed! I cursed the fact that the secondary was down. There was debris floating everywhere. I pulled the pumps out to inspect. They were fouled with sludge! Seasickness building, I grabbed the emergency manual pump handle. I yelled for my incapacitated crew mate. She

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got up and I told her to pump. She was bewildered because instead of waking up from a nightmare, she was waking up in one. I keep a map of the through hulls taped to the Nav desk. I know it by heart. I started at the bow and worked aft. No leaks. Dripless and rudder post bearing were good. I decided to try a quick fix. Hammer in hand, I gave the failed secondary pump a shot on the casing and it sprang back into action. YES!! But where the hell was the water coming from? The engine was still running. The exhaust hose? I checked it. I could see water. I shut the engine down. Seasickness had set in. I was fighting it. The water stopped. I noticed that on the port and starboard sides of the exhaust hose there were plastic tubes that were intermittently streaming water. Where did they go? The lazarettes? Meanwhile back at the bilge, the primary pump had failed. The secondary pump that I performed CPR on with a hammer was the only pump now. I reached my hand down through the flotsam and jetsam. It was completely fouled. I cleared it and I turned the engine back on to check the exhaust hose. No water. The engine was out of the equation. I clipped into the jacklines and inspected hatches. The port laz was not locked down and had taken some water. Back in the bilge I could see the bottom again, so I put the jib back out. I was exhausted and seasick. I was devolving. Grunts and groans were all I was good for. We were almost at the mouth of the Chesapeake and I couldn’t be more relieved. Prior to docking we found the fenders were impossibly wedged into the sail locker because it was filled with seawater. Now it was all starting to make sense. “You get what you inspect, not what you expect.” The sail locker wasn’t closed properly. The forensics revealed that the sail locker didn’t drain because it was fouled with debris. The boat was bow heavy and taking on water with each wave. That caused the deck to be awash and the lazzerettes to take water. The boat was heeling more because there was seawater entering the sail locker and finding its way to the low side of the boat where the bilge couldn’t be effective. There’s more debris inside boats than one might think. If you take water like I did, you’re going to quickly find that your pumps will fail. Repeatedly. I strive to have at least as much trouble shooting skills to get out of situations as I have the stupidity to get into them. It’s important to know the boat’s not in peril when you’re exhausted, seasick, mentally fried, dehydrated, hungry, pissed, scared, you name it.

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5/2/18 4:17 PM

HOOK & MOOR

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As we tied up to the fuel dock at Bluewater Marina, I was ready for a cold one. My crew mate and I zombiewalked over to the Dawghouse. I had that thousand yard stare in my eyes. I didn’t see any familiar faces, but then I heard a voice through the crowd. It was Linda Knowles and her husband Bill. A welcoming site indeed. I had arrived safely in Hampton despite my best efforts to the contrary. VanishingPoint, the kind teacher and strongest crew member, bailed me out again. I relearned many lessons that day and I finally got that beer.

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Cruising Outpost 113

5/2/18 4:18 PM

A SAILING TRADITION OF HARD KNOCKS By Sam Whiteleather

t’s just my uncle and I on the boat and even though I’ve been out plenty of times with him sailing on Lake Michigan, I still can’t remember how to raise the sail. I feel a little guilty as my elder clamors onto the deck, fixes the lines and cranks the sail up the tall mast. But I can steer the boat and know enough to hold directly into the wind as the white sail meets blue sky. The sail bucks wildly until I roll us downwind. It gives a couple of hard slaps, then holds tight and flat as Uncle Dave eases down from the upper deck into the cockpit. I feel the warm lake breeze hit my bare legs as the boat gently rocks up and down, tilting on a mild heel from the push of the steady wind. The bottoms of my bare feet grip the floor of the cockpit as I lean back to pull on the tiller to keep the boat straight. Many times I’ve watched Uncle Dave steer the boat by moving the tiller with the slightest pulls and pushes. I try to emulate the controlled movements, but still find myself occasionally pulling like a five-year-old child walking a stubborn dog. When I arrived at the slip this morning I noticed small pieces of brown crumbled dirt on the deck and that a piece of trim was missing from along the outside edge of the walkway. Normally the boat’s gel coat gleams white and broken hardware or trim is quickly fixed. This summer was anything

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but normal however, as this was the summer my grandfather passed away. I know that if it weren’t for all the time spent with Grandpa in his last weeks and managing affairs after his passing, the boat would look just as good as ever. The very last time Grandpa was on the boat, I had to walk him down the dock holding both of his arms while he shuffled along behind me. I stood on the top of the dock ladder and Uncle Dave stood on the boat and we lowered all 130 pounds of him into the cockpit. We motored through the harbor and out past the breaker walls, but the waves were too big for Grandpa so we came back in. I learned how to sail by sailing a mini-fish on a lake in northern Indiana that my Grandpa lived on. He’d coach me from the shore as needed, although I tended to learn my lessons the hard way. He’d yell things like “point higher into the wind” if I was having trouble gaining ground in a strong wind. Even though I was out in the middle of the lake, I could hear the heated irritation in his voice. A good half hour would go on with him yelling unheeded instructions until I would figure it out. And sure enough, Grandpa would be right. After my Grandpa passed, the mini-fish was given to me. It resides in my garage awaiting the day when my kids are old enough to try their hand at the tiller.

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5/2/18 4:18 PM

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Before we started out I asked Uncle Dave what the waveATN_SPINN_Cr_Out_2012_FINAL.indd 1 10/29/12 and wind forecast was for the day. He said he didn’t know, but we would ﬁnd out what the lake was like once we got out there. Every time I come up for a sail, my Aunt Judy tells me Airborne Mold & Odor Eliminator about the last time she had to call Uncle Dave and tell him to get his ass off the water because there was a huge storm on the radar. He would come in like she wanted, but I’ve never known him to get excited about the weather. Except, perhaps, for the time he went out on Mother’s Day with my cousin Darin and his wife and almost didn’t make it back. He recounts how the waves were so big that his 30-foot boat was pitching back and forth violently, and when the bow would drop to descend a big wave he Controls Odors, Bacteria & Mold wasn’t sure it would come back up again. On a couple of All Natural - Safe - Effective different occasions he and Darin had to go down below Longest Lasting Protection because the motor quit. The boat was pitching hard while Strongest Tea Tree Oil Gel Available they worked in a conﬁned space around diesel fuel. They Lowest Cost Per Ounce took turns going down because they kept getting sick, the vomit mixing in with the diesel and the pitching boat to create a mariner’s worst nightmare. They eventually made it back to the harbor. My cousin’s wife vowed never to go www.TeaTreePower.com on the boat again. She thought they were all going to die. 949.858.8820 I know it must have been pretty bad for Uncle Dave to mark the conditions as noteworthy. ™

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Cruising Outpost 115

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Our Great Panama M

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4/30/18 4:19 PM

a M i s ad ve n t u re I am still trying to get my head around our transit of the Panama Canal. It was the quintessential bitter-sweet experience. “Sweet” because getting to and transiting the Panama Canal just seems like a big accomplishment. I imagine most of those with an interest in sailing have always considered a transit between the two great oceans (sorry Indian, Arctic, and Southern, you gotta try harder) to be a bit of a horizontal Everest. Personally, I never thought I would be able to include it in my short list of “have done’s” (which includes such notable events as visiting the Detroit Wonder Bread factory and a tour of the estate of Samuel W. Frances, the inventor of the Spork [U.S. Patent 147,119]. But, about 10 years ago Carolyn and I decided to go cruising on Third Wish, our Norseman 447, and all of a sudden a Panama Canal transit seemed attainable. “Bitter?” Because, well, you’ll see. The Panama Canal Authority (or “God” as they are known in those parts) scheduled us to transit the canal (and thus the continent, albeit the skinny part) on March 5, 2017. The Canal Authority requires that you have four line handlers on board to take in the slack on the lines connecting your boat to the side wall of the lock chamber as you “lock up” (rise from one water level to the next in a series of locks), or to feed out the line as you “lock down.” This is important because there can be tremendous turbulence in the locks when you combine both the prop wash from the gigantic cruise ship in front of you and the millions of gallons of water ﬂooding into or out of the lock chamber during a transit. Thus, in the right conditions, it’s like being in a washing machine. Our only line handlers were my wife and our good friends Tom and Nick. That meant we only had three line handlers, and thus, needed to hire a fourth. For $150.00 our Canal Agent, Roy Bravo (the guy who arranges your transit with the Canal Authority), supplied us with the remaining “professional” line handler. I am a self-described “A” type personality. Look in my wallet. All the bills are both face up and in descending order based upon denomination. Thus, to ensure we would not be late, on March 5th I was at the dock at 5:25 a.m. to meet both Roy Bravo and our line handler, Omar Santizo. Roy introduced Omar to us as “his best man.” (Yes literary buffs, this is foreshadowing.) I introduced myself, walked Omar back to our boat, started the engine, untied the dock lines, and headed out to the prescribed Panama Canal Advisor rendezvous point. (Note: you are also required to hire an “advisor” from the Canal Authority. The advisor is the liaison between you and the Canal Authority while you are transiting. He tells the captain where to go and when to go there. (In exchange you are required to both pay him a handsome sum and feed him hot meals while he is onboard.) We spotted the pilot boat carrying our advisor about an hour after arriving at the rendezvous point. The advisor jumped aboard and we were off. Before I go on I should explain what a Panama Canal transit entails. It is about 45 miles from the Paciﬁc to the Caribbean through the canal. WWW.CRUISINGOUTPOST.COM

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These two oceans are basically connected by a man-made lake (Lake Gatun) in the middle of the Isthmus. Think of the lake as a “water bridge” over the mountain passes that were flooded when the Chagres River was dammed. Because this “bridge” is about 90 feet higher than the oceans on either side of the Panama Isthmus, you need some mechanism to lift a boat up 90 feet to access the lake. This “lifting” is accomplished by a series of three locks on either side of the Lake. Each lock consists of a 100-foot-long chamber with 100-year-old watertight doors on either end. When locking up, the doors open, the boat pulls in, and the doors close. The lock chamber is then flooded with water, which thus raises the boat about 35 or so feet. Once fully flooded, the doors at the other end of the chamber open and the boat pulls forward to the next lock. After three locks the boat is at lake level. A boat transiting south to north (from the Pacific to the Caribbean) locks up through the two Miraflores locks and then again through the Pedro Miguel lock. The boat then motors through the Culebra Cut and out into the lake. At the north side of the lake the boat then enters the Gatun locks and “locks-down” through the three chambers in Gatun. In its infinite wisdom, the Panama Canal Authority decided two important things regarding our transit: (1) we would be going through the locks “center chamber” and (2) we would be placed right behind a very large cruise ship with a very large propeller that would be turning each time the cruise ship had to move from one chamber to another. A center chamber transit requires that you enter the lock chamber and maneuver close to each of the chamber’s walls in order to receive messenger lines that are delivered by guys standing on the top of a wall about 50 feet above your boat who throw down a very hard rope ball (a “monkey fist”) attached to which is the messenger line. In a perfect world, your line handlers then tie the messenger line to the 100-plus-foot canal lines you rented from your agent. Those lines are then pulled up the chamber wall by the Canal Authority workers who in turn tie your 100 foot lines to large, wall-top bollards. This ballet is repeated for each set of locks (of which there are three). Once comfortably aboard, our canal advisor asked the question on the lips of all canal advisors: “When’s

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breakfast?” It was, thus, with “Quiche Carolyn” and coffee in hand, our Advisor started us into the canal with these immortal words: “murph slouff dernfubers...” Having been in Latin American now for three seasons, I quickly realized this was not Spanish, but fractured English spoken by a man happily stuffing his face with Carolyn’s egg and bacon delight. Our confused looks caused him to swallow and try again. “See that huge cruise ship? Follow it into the first set of locks.” I looked to my left and, sure enough, there was a MASSIVE cruise ship steaming our way. Lacking an internal edit function, my involuntary response was, “ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME”? It was at this point that I realized two things: (1) Carolyn has very strong and pointy elbows and (2) they hurt when they make contact with your rib cage. Taking the hint, I immediately followed up with, “Yes sir, I will follow that cruise ship into the locks.” Thus, we entered our first lock, maneuvered close to the starboard chamber wall and prepared to receive the monkey fists. They came down fast and furious, but our line handlers were on it. They received the messenger lines and tied them to our rented anal lines which were then quickly hauled up the chamber wall by the canal dudes. I then motored across the chamber where we repeated the monkey-fist rhumba for our lines on the port side of the boat. (Except on the port side one of the dudes on the wall hit our solar panels with the monkey fist. Fearing Carolyn’s elbows of death, I remained silent.) Within minutes, the water level in the chamber started to rise. It’s amazing how fast the water floods in. The water level quickly rose about 40 feet, the doors at the far end of the chamber opened, and the cruise ship put power to her props and inched forward out of the first Miraflores chamber and into the second. Within an instant we were hit with turbulent, swirling water the likes of which I had not seen since that unfortunate “swirly” incident in my middle school boy’s bathroom. In spite of the churning water, our guys were able to tweak the lines to keep the pointy end of the boat facing forward. Once the cruise ship distanced itself from us, the Canal Authority guys on the top of the wall removed our lines www.cruisingoutpost.com

5/1/18 6:03 PM

from the wall-top bollards and walked the lines forward as we motored into the next chamber. The process repeated itself two more times; once in the second Miraflores chamber and again in the Pedro Miguel chamber. Once out of Pedro Miguel, we motored out into the Culebra Cut, which is an artificial valley cut through the Continental Divide in Panama. We motored through this eight-mile-long cut and at the little town of Gamboa, entered Lake Gatun. We spent the remainder of the day comfortably motoring through the 20 or so miles of the lake until we arrived at the Gatun locks, the literal gateway to the Caribbean. Although we arrived at about 3:00 p.m., the Canal Authority refused to permit us to enter the last set of locks. Instead, we were directed to the “Holding Pen,” an area of the Panama Canal where boats sometimes needlessly spend the night in the lake tied to a big buoy wondering why they are needlessly spending the night in the lake tied to a big buoy. Within minutes of tying up to the big buoy, our canal advisor was picked up by the pilot boat. His parting comment was that another advisor would be at our boat at 10:30 a.m. the next day, and that we should be untied and ready to enter the Gatun locks at that time. We woke up the next morning at 8:00, made breakfast, ate, and generally readied ourselves for our 10:30 a.m. rendezvous with the canal advisor who would accompany us through the Gatun locks. For reasons which, to this day, continue to confound us, out next canal advisor did not show up until 4:30 in the afternoon. (Yes friends, the canal is a lot like Washington D. C.—all the friendly charm of the North coupled with the efficiency of the South.) Once onboard, he directed us to untie from the buoy and tie up to the wall in the lock entry area. Ten minutes after tying up, a canal employee appeared and told us that there was yet another change in plans. We were now to be the last boat transiting the canal into the Caribbean that day. Thus, we were ordered to untie from the canal wall, back out of the lock entry area and wait until 6:00 p.m. to enter the Gatun locks. Aside from the drama of having to back up our boat in the Panama Canal, the practical www.cruisingoutpost.com

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implication of this plan change is that it was going to be dark when we exited the canal. To make matters worse, a norther had kicked in with 25- to 30-knot winds. On Third Wish our policy is to never enter a marina after dark if we have never been to that marina before. The primary reason is that there are many, many obstacles in and around marinas, both above and below the water, all hard, and many pointy. And given that marinas are located along the shoreline, you are always in a shallow water situation when you enter. None of this can be seen in the dark. Thus, night entries are to be avoided like the plague. Consequently, when we arrive to a new destination at night, we simply stay out to sea and sail back and forth in sufficiently deep water until daylight. Not wanting to enter the Shelter Bay Marina at night, I asked our advisor if we could simply spend the night in the lake again and transit the locks in the morning. His answer was an unequivocal “no.” This prompted a call to our Canal Agent, Roy Bravo, who previously directed us to meet him at Shelter Bay Marina as soon as we arrived. I expressed both my concern about entering the Marina after dark and my desire not to do so. He first told me that it was an “easy” marina to enter at night. He also assured me that Omar, his man on our boat, has entered the marina hundreds of times in the dark. He promised us that if we followed Omar’s directions, everything would be fine. Omar also assured us that this was not a problem (and yes, for the literarily astute, this is more foreshadowing). Thus, against our standing policy and our better judgment, we decided we would carry on to Shelter Bay once we exited the canal. Our trip down the Gatun locks was effortless. Although we were center-chambered, we were in front of a massive ship this time, so that the prop wash from the super-ginormous Panamax ship locking down with us was not an issue. As we anticipated, however, it was dark by the time we began dropping down in the final Gatun locks. We were, nevertheless, ecstatic when the last lock doors opened up and we were, finally, in a new, albeit dark, windy, and choppy ocean.

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4/30/18 4:25 PM

Ah, the month of February. A time for lovers and a time forâ€Ś women to get out on the water and show us what they have! On the south shores of Florida, in a quiet little city called Fort Pierce, the women did just that as they manned their vessels and decorated the waters of the Atlantic with sails of white. No, not in protest of anything, but in a hands-on competition of wits and skill. These women were competing in the 24th Annual Betty Jo Memorial Women at the Helm Race. This long-standing, competitive race, is a www.cruisingoutpost.com

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Women At The Helm

By Jeff & Brenda Thornton

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Women At The Helm

memorial to Betty Jo Porter, an avid sailor and first female Commodore of the Fort Pierce Yacht Club. Since its inception, the race has encouraged women sailors of all ages, to participate in the offshore rivalry. Although men may serve as crew onboard, only women are allowed at the helm during the race.

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This year’s race started with a fleet of seven competitors, all vying for the coveted Betty Jo Award Trophy. Mostly made up of cruising sailboats, there was also a lone catamaran, the Sea Hawk II, who was favored in the race based on her past performances. But, never underestimate the power of a determined cruising sailboat owner.

Diane Korbey, captain of Déjà Vu, a 35-foot Freedom sailboat, took the lead early and raced with the intrepidity of a skilled skipper. She quickly emerged from the pack and steered her course for a perfect position to tack toward the first mark. The other skippers followed suit and the race was on! As they headed toward their first mark, Diane O’Toole, aboard Varmint, a 40-foot Beneteau, closed the distance to race neck-and-neck against Sue Bremmer, skipper of My Weigh (a 37-foot Tartan), and Janet Woodrow, skipper of Westly, a 36-foot Catalina. As racers rounded the mark, the light winds proved to be a challenge for the heavier boats. The scene off the coast quickly became a sea of white, as the seven competitors adjusted their sails to race wing-andwing during this final leg of the race. The other boats threatened to overcome lead vessel Déjà Vu during this final leg. But Korbey, undeterred by the competition, sailed to victory a full 3.1 minutes before her closest rival. Battling it out for second place was Janet Woodrow on Westly and Anne Kern on the lone catamaran, Sea Hawk II. In a demonstration of dexterity and skill, Woodrow squeezed out the cat, taking second place.

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5/4/18 9:30 AM

18th Annual Miami Sail and Powerboat Show & Cruisers’ Party

t was kinda funny. As I was about to introduce Isabella Stefania, who was opening for Eric Stone and his band, I realized that she had not yet been born when Eric and I started working together doing these Cruisers’ Parties at the boat shows! Our “Cover Girl” from the previous issue had just finished cutting her first album in Nashville, so I figured it would be great to have her open, and it was! She rocked the opening and added a bunch of new fans! This year we moved from Bayside to Virginia Key. The night of the party things got a little “mixed up” as the Atlantica, where the party was being held, “forgot” to tell their people there was a party. So, a lot of people who showed up were told there was no party. But for the 250-300 people who actually stuck around, the party went very well. We actually had beer left over! A first! Also, this year we had hot dogs and pizza as opposed to just pizza. No one went hungry! The raffle went well, with the Educational Tall Ship Foundation ia an ef St receiving the proceeds. The top prizes were from Forespar, who Isabella c ri E e th r fo g donated one of their new PureWater+ filter systems, and from Seaopenin Stone Band Tech Systems which donated one of their hand-held Icom radios.

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Local boaters joined in on the fun.

Conner and Adam from Edson got here sucked into helping with the tickets, Jeff! t. Cap by d being photo-bombe Okay guys, try to relax.

ed Some of our Wounded Warriors join us as well!

Would you buy a raffle ticket from this group? LOL

Did someone say â€œfree beer?â€?

Come on... try to have a good time!

The bartenders did a great job!

The Icom radio winners (center) with the new owners of Sea-Tech Systems

in These folks own the No Name Bar one! cold a for in Stop e. ustin St. Aug

Eric & Eric Stone rocking out!

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