Category Archives: Cruising Guide

Information for other cruising boats. Our experiences finding places to anchor, dealing with officials, provisions, etc.

Welcome to Panama City, Panama

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Continued from yesterday… At 0400, we approached the anchorage for the large boats coming from/going to the Panama Canal. We could have done circles for two hours until dawn broke, but since the ships were not moving, were lit, and all had AIS, we were confident that we could navigate safely. 

Even though there was plenty of space for us to navigate between the vessels, we still felt quite close to the monstrous ships that we passed. 

A couple small pangas came really close to us during the twilight approach to the marina. At one point dinghy zoomed across our the bow so close that it made our hearts skip a beat. Here is a photo looking back at the large vessel anchorage as dawn broke.

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Passage from Puerto Chiapas to Panama City – Days 6 – 7.25

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Thursday, January 9 — It was another ominously grey day with light wind. The lack of wind made it very hot outside, so we again ran the AC. There was very little wind chop, but the swell had increased in the wee hours of the morning to 3 – 6 feet from our port side at relatively fast intervals, so it was a bit rolly. In the late morning/early afternoon, we went through a pass between two islands, which gave us a little reprieve from the swells.

The conditions varied throughout the afternoon and evening, but overall, conditions were pretty good. Eric saw some dolphins and Keith saw a turtle. And, we saw lots of birds.

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Passage from Puerto Chiapas to Panama City – Days 1 – 2

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Dawn on Saturday, January 4

We were up early and had Kosmos ready for sea by the time the authorities arrived at 0830. We’d thought it would only be a dog and handler doing a last-minute inspection to make sure we weren’t smuggling anything out. However, a team of four people plus one dog arrived. 

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Checking Out of Mexico and More Jungle Wildlife

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Sunrise on Thursday, January 2

Eric was at the marina office as soon as they opened. He found out that the coffee tour and the chocolate tour are in opposite directions and needed to be done on different days. The tour guide wasn’t available today, but he was tomorrow. 

The marina office said that they would drive Eric to the various official’s offices so Eric could do the check-out paperwork. Even though we weren’t leaving until Saturday, we could check out today, which would give us the flexibility to do the tour tomorrow. 

We booked the chocolate tour for tomorrow and Eric immediately got started on the check-out paperwork. There were three other boats checking out today, as well. When Eric was done filling out the forms, the marina said to go back to Kosmos to wait for the others. They’d call Eric on the radio when everyone was ready, and they’d all go together. 

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Welcome to Puerto Chiapas, Chiapas, Mexico

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Friday December 27 — Continued from yesterday… At 0940, we turned into the channel into Puerto Chiapas/Puerto Madero. 

If our understanding is correct, Puerto Chiapas is the south side of the channel, which has a large navy base and the marina. Puerto Madero is the north side of the channel, which has a small fishing village. This is a photo of Puerto Madero taken from the main channel.

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