Tuesday, June 8, 2010 - At Sea

Happy Birthday, Gale!

We had to wait around this morning to clear Customs. Yesterday there was so much rain that it caused mudslides over some of the primary roads making them impassable and some folks could not get to their jobs. No worries, we used our extra time to post blog updates.





With the paperwork done and our new crew member, Craig, aboard, we cast off the lines at 10:30 am and set out on a l-o-o-o-o-ong passage to Mexico.

When we’d been out about 2 hours, Gale put the fishing lines in to see if anything was biting. Within ten minutes the first fish hit! It was a good-sized bigeye yellow fin tuna! Before he was able to get that one cleaned, there was another hit! Craig reeled that one in – another tuna – not quite as large as the first. Both fish were filleted out and another one hit! Mark came down from the wheelhouse to bring it in while Diane stayed at the helm. It turned out to be a fabulous “tuna day.” We lost track of how many tuna were boated and filleted out, but there were no less than eight and upwards of a dozen. The only other thing biting towards evening were the bonitas which were released back to the sea. The guys were so tired by then, the lines were brought in for the day.


For Gale’s birthday, Maureen made a small white cake and a large pan of lasagna. Gale was unable to eat any of it because he was feeling queasy and food didn’t sound very good to him. In fact, he ended up going to bed just as we sat down for dinner. We weren’t sure if it was the seasickness patch or the tuna that was making him sick but all he wanted to do was lie down.

Tuesday, June 8, 2010 - We're Off and Running!

We'll be out to sea for the next four or five days and without cell phone or internet connections. Stay tuned for our next update!

Wish Gale a Happy Birthday today!!

By the way, the Customs Officials were to be here yesterday, but due to the heavy rains, there were mud slides that blocked roads and delayed them until this morning. We will leave as soon as we clear Customs.

Monday, June 7, 2010 - FishHook Marina and Lodge, Golfito, Costa Rica

We spent the morning taking care of business on the computers. It began to rain just before noon and didn’t stop for the rest of the day. After lunch, we called a cab and had him take us to a bank to get some cash and then stop at the supermarket for a few grocery items. We had hoped to pick up some Costa Rica T-shirts, however, there weren’t really any souvenir shops around since Golfito is not a big tourist destination.

Back on the boat, we shared fresh shrimp for dinner and enjoyed watching some of our video clips of the guys catching fish and our time in Golfito.

Sunday, June 6, 2010 – FishHook Marina and Lodge, Golfito, Costa Rica

Mark spent some time up at the marina using his laptop this morning where he visited once again with our neighbor, Craig. Last night, Mark had mentioned, off the cuff, that it would be nice if Craig would be able to travel along with us to San Diego as part of the crew. Today, Craig inquired as to how serious Mark was about that offer. Well, to make a long story short, we now have a fifth crew member coming aboard on Tuesday to complete the last part of the trip with us!







Today’s adventure was a dinghy trip through the jungle. Craig had volunteered to show us the way in and at 10 am, we took the dogs and piled into the dinghy. We followed Craig in his panga, and experienced a quick ride through the jungle on a small creek. It was important to go on a high tide, because at low tide, there would be no water at all. After coming out on the other side and before Craig left us, he pointed out a resort across the way where we could get some lunch and enjoy the beach. We were pleasantly surprised to find a beautiful little resort with a restaurant, several cottages and rooms, a swimming pool and other amenities. After a great lunch, we walked to the water’s edge where we found a stunning black sand beach. We took an hour or so to swim, let the dogs run and simply enjoyed the day.

Because the tide was going out, we could not go back the way we had come and took the outside route in the open water. The seas were fairly calm and it was a pleasant ride back. We dropped the dogs off on the boat and changed our clothes before getting back in the dinghy to continue exploring a little closer to home.

During our ride, we watched a family try to bring in a large manta ray on a handline! It was surprising to us that most people we saw fishing in the small boats didn’t use fishing poles. After about thirty minutes of struggling with the ray, they were able to get to shallow water. Using the oar, they tried to kill the ray – however, when they hit it, the hook came out and the ray was gone!


After the excitement of the catch (and release), we dinghied over to a little restaurant on the bay where we had appetizers and drinks. We met a lovely family that not only owns the restaurant, but also three rental houses on the property. It was truly an enjoyable evening.

Saturday, June 5, 2010 – FishHook Marina and Lodge, Golfito, Costa Rica

While Mark was up at the marina this morning working on his laptop, he met Craig, an American from Santa Barbara, California, who has a house two doors down from the marina. He offered to take us up to the top of the mountain and we could walk down through the rainforest. He said we would see all kinds of wildlife and beautiful scenery without having to pay for a walk through a national park and he wasn’t kidding!





We spent about four hours walking down the mountain road and saw monkeys, anteaters, pumas, toucans, scarlet macaws (we think), small colorful lizards, coatamundi, blue morpho butterflies, a black and green poison dart tree frog and tree sloths, not to mention the flowers, plants, trees and breathtaking views. We met a couple of locals at the top of the mountain who showed us around the house they were living in as they worked on clearing property for an American company.















It took us four hours to walk the few miles down the mountain and we got to the bottom about 2:30 pm. We had planned to stop at a “soda” for lunch, but it was closed for siesta. Instead, we grabbed drinks from a small market and walked the rest of the way to the marina where we ordered lunch.

Craig was invited over to share our evening meal of good old Iowa corn fed beef tenderloin. Needless to say, the dinner was fantastic! We got to know a little bit about Craig and learned that he had delivered boats and sailed extensively on the West Coast. He had a lot of local information and good ideas about where we might stop along our way to San Diego.

Friday, June 4, 2010 – FishHook Marina and Lodge, Golfito, Costa Rica

The full crew was up at 12:30 am to help pull up the anchor and head out. We wanted to get to Costa Rica before 4 pm so we could do the Customs and Immigration thing before the offices closed for the weekend. Fortunately, we gained an hour since Central America does not observe Daylight Savings Time and arrived at Golfito in southern Costa Rica at 2 pm local time.

We intended to stay at Banana Bay Marina and had been communicating with an individual there. He told us he was out on the end of the dock waving us in so we pulled up to the end of a nice floating dock and threw down our lines. After tying up, we discovered that we were really at FishHook Marina – it had just happened that both marinas had people waving at us and this is the one we saw!

Clearing Customs and Immigration was a long process, but we were able to get through it before everyone went home. Of course, some “overtime” had to be paid to get people to stay. Afterwards, Gale, Diane & Maureen took a taxi back to the marina while Mark went with our agent to obtain some cash to pay the fees. We had a beer or two at the marina bar before Mark returned and then we all enjoyed a wonderful spaghetti dinner on the boat. Our agent, Alberto, stopped by a little later to deliver some of the paperwork that Mark had left behind in his office. We treated him to a plateful of spaghetti before he went home for the night.

Thursday, June 3, 2010 – Isla Coiba, Panama

Light rain and very rough seas continued into the morning hours. Gale was still feeling a bit queasy and promised to wear a seasickness patch for the next crossing. Our plan was to anchor off Isla Jicarita with Isla Jicaron as our second choice, however, because of strong southwesterly winds, we continued north to Isla Coiba where we found a protected anchorage on the northern tip of the island and dropped the hook around 4 pm. Even though it was raining, we splashed the dinghy and took the dogs to the beach for a swim and a run. As we were preparing to return to the boat, a park ranger came by in a small panga and told us we needed to register at the park office. We had chosen this particular spot because the guidebook indicated that if we stayed at some of the other designated anchorages, there would be a fee. Evidently this was still a part of the fee area and we had to cough up $100 to pause here even though we told them we were leaving shortly after midnight!! Oh well, we did get a few hours of needed rest.