sy Timoneer

Saturday, April 22 Time: 1035 local
Position: 16’50 N 099’54 W
Docked stern to at Club de Yates, Acapulco Days run: 253 miles (21-1/2
hours)
Weather: sunny and warm

News:

Timoneer arrived at 1035 local time at the Club de Yates in the Western end
of Acapulco harbor. Completing the 1040 mile journey from Costa Rica in 3
days and 18 hours for an average speed of 11.55 knots. Our route was
almost exactly the same as the old Timoneer’s passage up this coast in 1995
although we shaved 8 hours off their time. We motored 8-10 miles off the
coast for the last 250 miles catching one more tuna before arrival this
morning. Everyone onboard is well.

John

Friday, April 21 Time: 1200 local
Position: 15’41 N 096’05 W
Course: 248 T Speed:11.9 kts Days run: 280 miles (noon-noon)
Weather: Sunny and slightly hazy

News:

By late Thursday afternoon Timoneer passed the shoreline of El Salvador and
was closing in on the Southern coast of Mexico and the Gulf of Tehuantepec.
The Gulf of Tehuantepec is famous for having Force 8+ winds (34 – 40knots)
an average of 140 days a year with the gale season running from October
through the end of April. The winds originate from weather systems in the
Gulf of Mexico and cross Mexico’s landmass at its narrowest point, the
valley of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Two tall mountain ranges funnel and
intensify the wind across the land where it sweeps out into the Pacific for
300-500 miles. Most cruisers opt to hug the coast with “one foot on the
beach” using the lee of the beach and shoreline for protection. We went
with the same approach although our weather information suggested settled
conditions. Timoneer sailed 3-4 miles offshore to avoid the smaller
fishing boats along the coast at night, planning to close the gap if the
breeze filled in. None the less we made sure everything on deck was tied
down and stowed the boats interior as well as possible just in case. In
the end we had calm conditions and a smooth trip. At noon today we are 235
miles from Acapulco and should arrive Saturday morning.

John

Thursday, April 20 Time: 1200 local
Position: 14’08 N 092’04 W
Course: 315 T Speed:10.8 kts Days run: 285 miles (noon-noon)
Weather: Sunny and humid

News:

Timoneer motored throughout the evening 70 to 80 miles off the coast of
Nicaragua on our North Westerly course towards Mexico. It was a very
uneventful watch and for the 24 hour period we spotted only one fishing boat
and the breeze never rose above 9 knots. The wildlife is pretty
impressive in this stretch of ocean as we have seen many turtles, rays
jumping out of the water, and huge schools of fish with the water boiling
all around. Aboard the boat we took advantage of the light air and calm
seas by systematically unrolling the sails and letting them dry out to avoid
any molding problems that may become a problem with all the rain we had in
Costa Rica. We finished the bolt rope repairs on the mizzen and hoisted
and furled the mizzen half a dozen times adjusting the tack and clew
lashings each time. With the adjustments the sail seems to be rolling up
much better as we had a lot of bunching on the front end of the mandrel
causing problems. On the fishing front we had a billfish attacking the
teasers and leaping out of the water behind the boat, but it refused to bite
any of the lures. As a last resort Penny took some fish out of the freezer
for dinner and like clock work 20 minutes later we caught a 25lb Wahoo.
Needless to say the frozen fish went back in the freezer and we had Wahoo
steaks for dinner.

John

Wednesday, April 19 Time: 1200 local
Position: 11’24 N 088’09 W
Course: 307 T Speed:11.5 kts Days run: 235 miles (20 hours)
Weather: Sunny and humid

News:

Timoneer departed Los Suenos Marina, Costa Rica at 1536 Tuesday afternoon
for the 1040 mile journey to Acapulco Mexico. The sky is clear and there
is almost no wind. Motoring at 11.5 knots the hydrodynamics of the keel
give the boat only a slight rolling motion in the long low Westerly swell.
Bevan and Kent have pulled out all the stops in an effort to catch some
billfish, acquiring some ballyhoo (halfbeak) bait fish from the sport
fisherman in Los Suenos. Ballyhoo are small fish into which you insert
hooks and attach leaders for trolling. Both rods are set up with the
ballyhoo, to attract fish we are also towing two “teasers” which are big
lures with no hooks trailed close behind the boat to attract fish.
Unfortunately as of noon today we have had only one strike which was gone in
a split second. Generally there has been plenty of wild life as we have
seen lots of dolphins, and about half a dozen turtles floating on the
surface. Some of the turtles are quite large with shells 4-5 foot in
diameter. This morning Penny, Annette and Brit have been cleaning the
interior and Kent and I are sewing a repair on the mizzen luff tape.
Everyone on board is well.

Tuesday, April 11
Docked at Los Suenos Marina, Costa Rica
Position: 09’39 N 084’40 W
Weather: Sunny with occasional showers

News:

Timoneer departed Golfito harbor at 1700 Monday evening bound for Los Suenos
Marina in the Bahia Herradura. Yet again there was no consistent wind as
has been the case all the way from Panama and we motored throughout the
evening. The trip was uneventful with only a few course alterations for
fishing boats. Timoneer arrived at Los Suenos at 0800 and was docked by
0830 Tuesday morning. We are the one lone sail boat among about 150 sport
fishing boats. Los Suenos is close to the international airport in San
Jose and should make a good base if we have guests that would like to visit
next fall. The marina is very nice although reports are that a bit of a
surge results from Westerly swell so I will have to check the weather at
that time of year.

John

Monday, April 10
Anchored in Golfito Harbor, Costa Rica
Position: 08’37 N 083’09 W
Weather: Sunny with rain clouds in the distance

News:

The boys washed the boat this morning and then we upped anchor and headed
the 8 miles North East toward the entrance of Golfito Harbor. I was
prepared with my best Spanish for my radio call to the Port Captain on
arrival but received no reply. Eventually I contacted the Banana Bay
Marina who advised us that the entire week is a holiday in Costa Rica.
Banana Bay was very helpful and organized the immigration and customs
paperwork to get the boats “National Zarpe” which is kind of a cruising
permit that lets you go to the next port in Costa Rica. It sounds easy
enough but because of the holiday involved chasing officials down for
signatures all over town which ate up most of the day. A couple of the
crew ventured into town just as another torrential rain storm came through
and dropped what I would guess was 2-3 inches of rain in a couple of hours.
I was interested to see a 45 ft powerboat in the marina named “Nantucket
Sleighride”, and had to take a few pictures of it. Looks like we will
leave this evening and head up the coast to Los Suenos.

John

Sunday, April 9 2006
Anchored position: 08′ 32 N 083′ 17 W
Weather: Overcast, hot and humid

News:

Timoneer is back at sea again after transiting the Panama Canal into the
Pacific ocean. We departed the Flemenco Marina at 1000 Saturday morning
for the 400 mile trip to Costa Rica, winding our way though the moored ships
and out to the sea buoy in the flat calm sea and no wind. The anchorage
off the Pacific side of the Panama Canal looks like a city as there is a
least a weeks waiting time for big ships as this is their busiest time of
the year.

This is my first trip with the new chart plotter software and
I am very impressed by the AIS (Automatic Identification System) displayed
targets on the chart plotter display. It neatly displayed all the AIS
equipped ships in the anchorage and underway as far out as 60 miles. The
first leg was more southerly than you would expect as we have to clear the
Punta Mala headland before turning more North and West.

We put out the fishing lines hoping to land some fish for dinner, we caught a small
Skipjack tuna at 1600 and then two big eye tunas as the sun set.
According to the cruising guides it is still the dry season for another
month but boy did we have some rain and lightening all through the night.
The lightening was quite spectacular lighting up the mountainous coastline.
It continued to rain most of the morning as we approached Gulf Dulce, Costa
Rica and our destination of the anchorage at Puerto Jimenez. I put the
fishing lines out between rain showers and we caught another 3 Big eye tunas
which were cleaned and promptly vacuum packed and put in the freezer by Penny.
We changed up to some big sized lures to see if we could catch some billfish
which we will take some pictures of and release.

Timoneer arrived in the anchorage at Puerto Jimenez at 1623 Sunday evening averaging over twelve
knots for the trip. Everyone on board is well.

John

Wednesday, 01 March 2006
We crossed the line between the breakwaters on the Atlantic side of the
Panama canal at exactly noon – to the minute! This gave us exactly 100
hours at sea since leaving Antigua and an average speed on 11.64 knots for
the passage. We are now anchored on “The Flats” in Cristobal harbour about a
mile from the yacht club. We had the usual problem of dragging anchor here –
it is amazingly bad holding!
The last day of the passage saw much more wind and we charged in with a
poled out genoa and a big following sea. We put the fishing lines out once
we came in on the coast as we have caught tuna here before but no luck
today. We will sail to the San Blas on Friday afternoon once we have our
guests on board so hopefully we will catch some fish along the way. We are
all happy and healthy and looking forward to the islands
Regards = PHil

Tuesday, 28 February 2006
Noon Position : 12 28N 075 47W
Course: 245 degrees Speed: 13 knots Days Run : miles

Weather : Warm and windy Wind : 070 degrees at 22 knots
News: We are now bowling along with a poled out genoa, small main and full
mizzen in rough seas with lots of white caps. As predicted the wind and seas
have picked up on the corner of Columbia and we are running hard, DDW (dead
down wind). In these conditions it is impossible to stop the boat so we do
not have any fishing lines out which is keeping Penny from complaining!! She
said we could catch one tuna, that was all and yesterday we caught two
simultaneously so we overstepped our quota. No worries, we will get plenty
of seafood in the San Blas which we are all looking forward to, and as is
the tradition, we had good sushi last night with fish still left for more
meals.
We have also caught the current again. At times last night we were up to
13.6 knots but then we would drop out of it and be back at 12 so we surmised
that we were perhaps on the edge of it. Anyway it all helps and we are
looking forward to our arrival in Colon late tomorrow morning local time.
The boys are scrubbing the decks in preparation and the girls are cleaning
up down below.
PW

Monday, 27 February 2006
Noon Position : 13 12N 071 13W
Course: 250 degrees Speed 11.4 knots Days Run: 266 miles
Weather : Sunny fine and clear. Wind : 070 degrees at 14 knots
News:
Contrary to expectations the wind and seas have decreased and also moved
dead astern. This is now giving us an apparent wind over the deck of 3 to 5
knots so definitely no good for sailing. We just have a reefed mainsail up
to dampen the rolling and it is quite comfortable. The other interesting
thing is that we seem to be getting a mild counter current which was also
not expected.
All of this means that conditions are good for fishing so we put out the
lines and promptly caught two blackfin tuna and Penny made us take in the
lines again – they were only in the water about an hour! We are promised
sushi tonight.
We are seeing quite a bit of traffic as we are passing just north of the
Maracaibo Basin where most of Venezuela’s oil comes from. We are also being
sqeezed in towards to coast so getting some of the Panama traffic. We passed
a 40 foot yacht also headed for the San Blas this morning and had a long
chat on the VHF radio. He was doing 6 knots and we were doing 12 so it did
not take us long to get past.
Everything going well and we expect to arrive in Colon about lunchtime on
Wednesday.
Regards = PW