The Agua Clara Locks Visitor’s Center

There was no visible sunrise on Thursday, February 13.

The day started with a power outage. It lasted less than an hour, and there was another outage later in the day that only lasted for a few minutes. 

On the day that we’d arrived, Eric immediately regretted not backing the boat into the slip. He has been wanting to flip the boat around ever since, but given how shallow the spot was, it has simply been too windy to do so safely. Today the wind finally died. Flipping the boat around went smoothly. We are all happier with the boat backed in – the ventilation is better and its easier to get on and off. 

After lunch, Eric and Keith went for a walk, then Eric ran a kids D & D session. In the early evening, we had dinner with Basik again. After dinner, Eric and Keith played Civilization with the Ocean Posse group online again. 

On Friday morning, the full moon was glowing brightly before the sun rose. 

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More Lying Low at Shelter Bay Marina

On Thursday morning, February 6, Eric finally felt rested enough that he was ready to tackle some not-so-fun engine room projects. While Christi and Keith did school, Eric changed the oil on the generator. 

Eric also arranged to have the bottom cleaned. It $3.50 foot, but considering the guy was literally cleaning with one hand while holding a speargun with the other hand, we agreed that it was worth the money. He was also wearing a full wetsuit, which had to have been hot given the warm water temperatures here. 

In good news, he found one of the mats that had fallen overboard last week. It had a lot of growth given the amount of time in the water, but Eric was able to clean all the growth off. 

It was now day four of no water, and people were getting desperate. The marina had arranged to bring in three tanker trucks of water to fill up the boats. They injected the water into the pipes. When we (and everyone else) turned on the spigot, very little — meaning virtually none — water flowed out. It seemed there wasn’t enough pressure to force the water to flow through the pipes.

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Lying Low at Shelter Bay Marina

On Sunday, February 1, we were extremely jet lagged and moved slowly all day. Since we were out of perishable food, we wanted to take the marina bus to town to go to the grocery store. While we were in San Diego, a rally of boats arrived that had crossed the Atlantic together. Between the rally boats, the Ocean Posse boats congregating here, and the boats that still hadn’t been able to leave due to continuing adverse weather, the marina was jam packed. The bus didn’t run on Sundays, and was already full for Monday. Sign-ups hadn’t started yet for Tuesday.  

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Flying Back to Panama and the Ocean Posse Party

On Saturday, January 25, we all woke up before 0600 PST, despite going to bed so late. Even though we were in San Diego for a week, our body clocks never fully adjusted to the time change, and we felt off-kilter all week. We mostly focused on taking care of “life chores,” the most exciting of which was getting Keith’s braces removed.

On Friday, January 31, we flew back to Panama via a red-eye through Miami. We had been warned that Panama will not allow people with a one-way plane ticket to fly into the country. Like many countries, they welcome tourists, but they want proof that the visitors don’t intend to overstay their welcome. We were told that we’d likely be forced to purchase a ticket back to the US prior to boarding the plane. 

Prior to leaving Panama, we’d gotten a letter from the marina stating that Kosmos was docked there. Eric attached it to our US Coast Guard vessel documentation showing that Eric and Christi owned Kosmos, along with a crew list with Keith on it. 

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Keith’s Perspective on the Panama Canal Transit / Le point de vue de Keith sur le transit du canal de Panama

The Panama Canal crossing was very tiring. We woke up at around 3:00 in the morning. Our friends arrived soon after. We left the marina at 4:00 to pick up the advisors. I went back to sleep, so I don’t know when they got on board. 

Bridge of the Americas

La traversé du canal de panama était très fatigante. Je me suis levé vers 3:00 du matin. Nos amis sont arrivés juste après. Nous sommes partis de la marina à 4:00 pour chercher les conseillers. J’ai re-dormi, donc je ne sais pas quand il sont arrivés sur le bateau. 

Pulling into the lock to tie up to the wall

Mom woke me up for the first lock. I didn’t have to do anything because we were rafting with another boat, so I just watched.

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