Underway - halfway to Ecuador
The 1st 2 days from Costa Rica to Ecuador were fine - 6/5 was glorious all day & nite - max. 15 kt., broad reach; partly cloudy day, starry night. Then a low pressure system nobody forecast, arose on 6/6. Life got breezy & very bouncy - max.25kt. from S/SSW, max. 9'-10' SSW seas. We detoured SSE & successfully skimmed the low's leading edge. Now on 6/7 forecast is for lumpy seas & 20s wind for next 48 hrs. Also? Big thunderstorm activity expanding W from Colombia. We're squeezed betw. that & the low system we spent 6/6 dodging. Seas are still uncomfortable but all's well. Haven't run engine much but now we're @ 02.56N/081.12W, & motorsailing due S. The faster we close SW w/ mainland Ecuador, the easier our ride - in theory. m
Underway - Costa Rica to Ecuador
5.June, 1500Z position (0900, Central time): 06deg.44'N/082deg.50'W - about 110 mi. south of Costa Rica/Panama border. Entering the InterTropical Convergence Zone. West wind 5-9 kt., seas 5'-7' w/ 1'-2' chop, skies overcast w/ intermittent squalls, cabin temp=85F. Meaning, hot, muggy, rolly. But all's well & the sailing's easy. Dodging freighters all night. Haven't yet gotten rained on very much.
m
Golfito.
Spent only 3 days, not much done except provision/fuel/check-out, E-Z check-out, only took 1.5 hrs. w/ all officials. Golfito reminds me of La Paz's El Mogote - except flatter water, fewer boats, nicer view. Golfo Dulce anchorages are all pretty & nice at least in late May/early June. Wish we'd had more time but forecast is good for a 7-day passage to Ecuador so 6/4 we were off.
m
Slowed The Fox down to less than 5 kt. so as to stay well offshore Golfo Dulce entrance until sunrise. Still 20 mi. offshore when we encountered a couple of local fishing boats: wood, ~45', unlit or with non-regulation lights, not picked up by radar. No mishaps. Sunrise: entered Golfo Dulce, anchored off Puerto Jimenez on N side of gulf. Very irregular bottom but good holding & flat seas. Town looks nice but we chose to sleep after our 265-mi. passage from Bahia Culebra.
31.May: At low tide slack & on a rising tide, crossed the Gulf 10 mi. to enter Golfito. Entrance has fewer ATONs (Aids TO Navigation) than advertised but entrance is negotiable in good daylight visibility. Anchored across channel from Marina Land/Sea (aka Tierra/Mar) in 19' without incident among 4 other sailboats. Golfio is a very pretty, very rainy town.
1.June: Tim at Marina Land/Sea is THE MAN TO MEET. Generous with time & info. Land/Sea cruisers' hangout is The Place To Be in Golfito. 1st foray into town was to Customs (Aduana) in Duty-Free zone (Deposito Libre) to get permit for duty-free shopping. Goal: re-fill precious gin tank w/ Tanqueray @ US $10.21/bottle, buy the best rum ever = 4 y.o. Nicaraguan Flor de Cana @ US $8.66/bottle, & replace GB's Proctor-Silex Crock-Pot (R.I.P.). Replenish fresh produce at 1 of 3 Golfito markets. Also, 2 giant avocados bought from truck vendor for US $1.60. Bakery stop for 8 dinner rolls, 1 small loaf bread, 2 large breakfast turnovers = US $4.25. Lunch was shrimp & fish ceviche & beverages for 2, total including tip = US $11. Nice town, Golfito. Got back to The Fox just as daily downpour began: 2-1/2 hrs. light rain followed by 2 hrs. very heavy rain w/ gusts to 17 kt. Steamy inside closed-up boat but cooler at 88F than sunny part of day at 91F+.
Protip: do not enter Golfito's right-angle channel in heavy rain - you might find visibility reduced to <100'.
28.May2010. Left Marina Papagayo, northern Costa Rica, 0615. Wet & squally to 1500. Winds SE to SW 7-17 kt. w/ gusts to 22 kt., & visibility 1/2 mi. to 2 mi., depending on location of squalls. Seas SW 7' at 7 sec., rolly & choppy. Late pm, winds steadied to SW 7-12 kt as low pressure system moved N & we moved S. Along Nicoya Peninsula from Cabo Velas to Punta Guiones, 30-35 mi., had 1.5-2.0 kt. foul current while 5-10 mi. offshore. Current eased S of Punta Guiones, seas diminished, no squalls overnight. Some fishing traffic w/ nets, to 30 mi. offshore.
29.May2010. Winds WSW 5-12 kt., SW seas 4' or less. Partly cloudy skies, increasing cloudiness in pm. No squalls/rain.Crossing from Nicoya Peninsula to Osa Peninsula 30-40 mi. offshore. Position at 1710Z (1110 local time): 08deg.48'N/084deg.22'W.
It's not difficult or expensive to travel by public transportation around Nicaragua,
just logistically demanding. It happens that there is no single bus taking a direct route inland from Chinandega (the town nearest to Marina Puesta del Sol on the NW coast where we stopped in April) to León or Granada, two popular tourist destinations. Say you want to travel by bus. Bus #1 takes you from Chinandega to León. Bus #2 takes you from León to Managua. Bus #3 takes you from Managua to Granada. Granted, the longest leg any of these 3 buses takes is only about 1-1/2 hours, and it only takes about 4-5 hours to get all the way from Marina Puesta del Sol to Granada, but that's a lot of transfers when the day is hot and your Spanish is weak. I think the lack of a direct route may have to do with Chinandega, León and Granada each being located in three separate departments (similar to counties in size, and to states in terms of political functioning). But whatever.
Buses along the main Nicaraguan highways we traveled leave their towns fairly regularly (every 20-40 minutes or so during the day), and the drivers and their assistants all take care to get passengers on the correct bus - especially if those passengers are as dazed and confused like we always are. There are even these way-cool "express" vans that have their destinations painted on the side of the van; they simply wait several minutes in the departure town until the van is full o' passengers, then take off to make only one or 2 stops en route. We found that whatever the mode of public transportation, most of them are full no matter where or how frequently they run. So you'll have plenty of company. Nice.
What we did was, we took a 12-person bus-van from León to Managua that filled up with 16 people. Made me nostalgic for the vehicular safety standards I'm used to. Nevertheless the driver was a real pro and got all us passengers to Managua, safe and sound, in about an hour. At the Managua transfer point near the university we asked our driver to point us to the correct express bus to Granada. He led us to a traditional-size bus that took off a few minutes after we boarded, and got us to Granada in about 1-1/2 hours. I'm not sure it was the exact route we'd wanted and it didn't feel at all like the express we'd asked for, but it did the job. Dropped us off near Granada's hyper-busy central market, about 4 blocks from our B&B, the excellent Casa Silas.*
* Centrally located. Quiet. Proprietor Rob is an excellent host. Full breakfast. Mini-split A/C. And a nice
cool courtyard pool in which to soak after a day of hot turismo. This
place is great. Get you some.
Granada is a pretty Spanish Colonial city on the shore of
Lake Nicaragua that was burned to the ground by a 19th-century American wingnut. None of Granada's original 16th-century architecture survived the fire but the city has done its best to reproduce it. The arched interior of its cathedral is painted a cool sky blue and its outside is a brilliant yellow that's visible throughout the city, especially from the bell tower of another church in the centro.
Granada's former Franciscan convent is now a museum that
displays some fine local prehispanic ceramics and an interesting collection of tall statues carved out of volcanic rock that are reminiscent of the moai on Easter Island - just in miniature. Or maybe totems like in the Pacific Northwest, except carved from rock instead of wood. Most of the museum's artifacts appear to have been collected during the middle to late 19th century from nearby areas in and around Lake Nicaragua. That was a time when artifacts were often separated from their site without their surroundings having been thoroughly investigated. In the case of most of the ceramics and statues displayed in Granada, it unfortunately appears that no one even recorded the precise location where the object was found. Too bad - think of what might still be learned from the original sites, using modern technology.
Granada supports many nice restaurants of all kinds and the food alone is one reason to visit. Granada has old-fart style restaurants that serve typical American/Mexican food, where to blend in with the clientele you wish you were wearing white linen and a Panama hat. Granada also has vegetarian restaurants and cafes that might appeal to the more youthful traveler who prefers living out of a backpack and lodging in one of Granada's many hostels. Places where to blend in with the clientele you wish you were more hip. Personally, I'd suggest visiting the restaurants that serve typical Nicaraguan food - such as the grilled meat extravaganza you can find at Restaurante El Zaguan, a couple blocks behind the cathedral. Dang that was good eatin'.
The local taxi drivers were on strike while we were in Granada. Seems they were having a serious dispute with the city councilfolk, who wanted to make some short term income for the city by awarding new taxi medallions at a steep discount to a large number of prospective cab drivers. The effect would be to reduce the income the current cab drivers could make. Awkward. In a country in which it's obviously very difficult to make a decent living, it didn't seem to me that either the cab drivers or the local government would benefit from the situation. By the time we left Granada things were getting a bit tense, politically speaking. But meanwhile we were bummed because one of the handiest forms of relatively inexpensive transportation was being denied to us. Thus we toured on foot in the 96F heat. Oh the humanity.
On the other hand, the absence of taxis on the streets must have been a relief to all the hard-working small horses (ponies?) we saw moving
short-haul cargo with handmade wooden two-wheeled carts. One day we were even overtaken by what appeared to be a traditional funeral with a horse-drawn hearse. Nicaragua uses their horses intensively - whereas in El Salvador, we'd seen people instead of draft animals carrying most of the loads. Which is the country with better conditions - for the people, as well as their animals?
One reason for visiting Marina Puesta del Sol in Nicaragua is that it's a secure place to keep your boat while traveling inland for a bit of turismo. Nicaragua's about the size of New York state, so travel from the coast to the big city takes only a few hours, even via public transportation. We were prevented from enjoying Puesta del Sol's onshore facilities during the first several days The Fox was there (just after Semana Santa in mid-April), due to the presence at the resort of some highly-placed vacationing political dignitaries, so a road trip was definitely in order for us.
The Puesta del Sol marina/resort has a service vehicle that occasionally drives to the nearest town, Chinandega, for supplies and if the marina staff know you're headed their way you'll most likely be welcome to ride along with the driver and either return to Puesta del Sol when he does, or catch a bus or bus-van out of Chinandega if you want to travel further to places like León, Managua or Granada. We hear there's also a public bus that leaves the Puesta del Sol area once or twice in the morning and returns to the marina area once in the afternoon. And if you're really lucky, you might catch a ride with Puesta del Sol's owner and resident, Don Roberto Membreno*, when he goes in to town to run errands. We got really lucky: Don Roberto kindly gave us a ride all the way to León. What a pal.
* Don Roberto is a nice fellow with a lot of entertaining information to share, so if you meet him, buy him a drink at his own bar and listen to his stories. Ask him about geothermal power plants.
León is a Spanish Colonial city boasting a university and Central America's
largest cathedral. Once we got there we stayed at Posada Doña Blanca, a B&B located a few blocks from the cathedral. Full breakfast, mini-split A/C in the room, center courtyard, and much more. Very comfortable despite the high April heat in the upper 90sF. Braving the heat to look around the centro district we saw some of the renovated Spanish Colonial structures (some well-restored, others...not so much) interspersed with more modern architecture such as the university's buildings. Narrow Colonial streets contrasted with the modern politically-oriented murals for which León is known, some of which depict León's Kent State-style shooting of students by the Nicaraguan military under Somoza back in 1959.
The cathedral in the pic directly above has unusual architecture with what
we hear is an excellent rooftop view of León's many other churches and nearby volcanoes. Sadly, we didn't go up on the roof, but inside the cathedral we saw the lavish white-marble tomb of Rubén Darío, Nicaragua's favorite modernist poet and León native, with its weeping lion. Personally, I thought the lion theme ("león" in Spanish) repeated inside and outside the cathedral was pretty cool. We located the city's excellent art museum/gallery, the Ortiz Gurdian, 3 blocks west of the cathedral across from Iglesia San Francisco. The Ortiz Gurdian comprises 2 restored Colonial mansions located across the street from each other, and the buildings themselves are worth the price of admission - the actual exhibits, which include collections of traditional art and modern Central American artists' works, is a total bonus.
Speaking of bonus, the bartender at Hotel La Perla is a highly skilled professional who quickly adapts his technique to his customers' unique preferences. Like most bartenders in Latin America, he made martinis the traditional way from the 1950s, with lots of vermouth. But by our third round he was making them The Propane Chef's way: very dry, shaken-not-stirred. La Perla's chef is likewise first rate and open-minded - so if you can, have a bit of a splurge and go to La Perla for cocktail enhancement and dinner. If you order a martini, order it very dry and mention our name - it won't get you anywhere, but La Perla strikes me as the kind of place where name-dropping is expected. So you might as well start.
We didn't have much time in León - just 2 nights - and we were going to be traveling by bus for the rest of this road trip, so this was one of the few times we actually hired a tour guide to drive us several miles to the ruins of León Viejo. This was the original location of León, founded in 1524 and abandoned in about 1610 when the nearby volcano Momotombo simply wouldn't stop already with
the ash belches and the earthquakes. León Viejo is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and many structures are now protected from the weather by corrugated metal roofs. As you might be able to see in the view on the right, these roofs are painted with blue-and-white symbols to alert aircraft not to bomb the site. Such are the sensibilities of a country whose civil war is still a recent memory.
Our tour included a quick trip to the shore of Lake Managua for a closer look at Volcan Momotombo. Here in this pic we see the choppy whitecaps of a mild Papagayo blowing across the lake and its black volcanic sand beach, headed toward the Pacific Ocean to mess with various watercraft.
Brick making is common in the area between León and
León Viejo, all of it done by hand. It is hot, hard, heavy work done for very little pay. Each hand made brick is sold for only a few cents.
Before our personal tour took us back to León, we stopped for a typical Nica lunch at a typical Nica roadside diner. Because I am an idiot I neglected to take a photo of a licky-delicious Nicaraguan quesillo - a corn tortilla in which is placed a circular slab o' homemade white cheese the same size as the tortilla. You roll it up, hold it vertical, cram in some marinated sweet onions, a bit o' hot sauce, and a generous dollop of fresh cream. You stick the bottom end of the wrap in a plastic bag to catch the drips, which is never a completely successful maneuver. And, with the use of many napkins, you enjoy. One quesillo keeps you going for hours. Costs about 75 cents.
Said goodbye to an excellent shell beach at Puesta del Sol, Nicaragua. Hoped for a dawn departure on 17.April but port & immigration officials did not arrive from Corinto to clear us out of Nicaragua until 1130, coincidentally at low tide. Day was hot & windless, left after lunch, no problems exiting Puesta del Sol's well-buoyed entrance channel. Motored more than 50% of the 145 miles to Costa Rica's Bahia Santa Elena. Arrived next afternoon & anchored in 32' without incident in west bight of large Santa Elena bay. Swam in the relatively cool (79F) water. Nice. 10deg.55.712'N/085deg.49.034W.
19.-20. April
GB took another morning swim. When back on boat, he noticed an 18" yellow-bellied sea snake swimming past the boat. And a second, bigger one...and a third. Many individuals & groups of up to 9 sea snakes, to about 2+ feet in length, surrounded The Fox for most of the day. Possibly breeding activity. "Fishes of the Pacific Coast," Gar Goodson, Stanford University Press (1988), describes Pelamis platurus as "A very venomous sea snake occasionally reported along the Pacific Coast...." and "...one of the most widely distributed venomous sea snakes in the world." Whee. Deferred further swimming & snorkeling. Relocated 4 miles to east bight of bay.
No sea snakes there, but large numbers of docile bees thirsty for fresh water. Despite the adverse critter experience at this time of year, this bay offers good shelter with lots to do - parrots holler in the trees, beachcombing is good on nearby beach to NE of bay entrance. But definitely take care entering the water in Bahia Santa Elena to swim, wade, snorkel or dive. And watch out for roving howler monkeys ashore.
22.April
Bahia Santa Elena to Bahia Huevos, Costa Rica. 42 miles. April ("wintertime" in these parts) continues to be hot & rainless throughout Central America. Much of the trees & shrubs ashore are brown & dry. Anchored in center of Bahia Huevos but afternoon SW fetch impelled us to reanchor in the calmer east cove in 18.8'. Howler monkeys barked at one another at sunset. Calm night. Delightful anchorage.
23.April
Drove 10 mi. shortly after sunrise from Bahia Huevos to Playas del Coco to officially check in to Costa Rica. Anchored just outside mooring field NW of bay's center reef. Seas calm, anchorage comfy - from what we hear, that's unusual. Announced arrival on VHF 16 with port captain, then dinghied ashore to exchange documents with Port Captain, then Immigration, who likes to see all members of crew to match faces to pictures on passports. After Immigration, took taxi (US $40, split 50-50 with s/v Curare who was checking in at same time) to Customs office near Liberia airport. After Customs visit, back to Port Captain to exchange more documents & receive national zarpe for travel within Costa Rica. No fees charged for Immigration or for national zarpe. Total time for entry: 4 hours.
NOTE: As of 23.April 2010, Port Captain, Immigration & Customs in Playas del Coco operate only from 0900-1600 M-F. If you arrive like we did on a Friday, start your entry/exit process at 0900 so that you can complete it in one day & before the weekend office closures. Use a taxi to get to Customs office, which is located a white building about 3 km from Liberia airport.
24.April
After provisioning in Playas del Coco in the a.m., headed SE 10 mi. to Bahia Guacamaya. Anchored in center of bay in 25' without incident (10deg.31.183'N/085deg.47.535'W). Seas calm. Snorkeling marginally adequate: few fish, limited diversity. Eco-lodges & many howler monkeys on shore. Picturesque bay, calm overnight with slight rain/thunder/lightning - rainy season soon coming.
Discovered The Fox's refrigerator had failed. Much meat sacrificed to Neptune's minions.
25.April
Decided to continue SE despite lack of refrigeration. Propane Chef has dry/canned stores aboard sufficient to reach Ecuador a few weeks hence. Raised anchor, exited bay. GB then discovered that alternator packed it in too - is now draining starter battery instead of charging it. MS reviews options, considers imminent heavy weather forecast within the next 7 days, reviews distances to towns with potential availability of mechanics, assesses potential prices for moorage & mechanical services, and diverts The Fox 20 miles back to the NW and to Marina Papagayo in Bahia Culebra - the nearest, most secure, least expensive option. At US $2/ft./night. Turns out, one gets lavish treatment for lavish prices. Details soon coming.
It was time to say farewell to El Salvador. What better day than April 1, for cruising fools like us?
On Marina Barillas manager Heriberto Pineda's advice, we planned our departure for an outgoing tide, intending to reach the estuary's entrance and long sand bar about midway between high and low tide. It was fine by us that this all was set to occur at 0500 (that's five in the morning for you landlubbers out there, i.e., not-quite-sunrise); we cruisers enjoy an early start. Much to our surprise, the Salvadoran Immigration official on duty that morning was also comfortable with this departure time. In the pre-dawn darkness he very cheerfully wished us and our good sailing buddies on Curare a bon voyage and a que le vaya bien as he stamped our passports and handed us our zarpes for the first port we'd reach in Nicaragua. Barillas: a truly excellent port for entering and leaving El Salvador.
The Barillas panga pilot started us off as soon as it was light enough to see. Curare followed and The Fox took up the rear. Spring tides notwithstanding, the surf over the bar at the estuary's entrance was actually flatter and calmer than it had been when we'd entered on March 12, and back then it had been a piece o' cake. Sweet.
We intended to coast-hop to Nicaragua and see a few anchorages in the Gulf of Fonseca en route. Sailing was possible given the weather but an incident the details of which shall remain undisclosed occurred aboard The Fox, causing the beautiful main sail to tear just above the first reefing point in the center of the sail. Let's just call it "user error" and move quickly on.
So yeah, we motored 50 miles to the anchorage of Amapala in the NE corner of the Gulf of Fonseca. Skies were hazy, day very hot. Anchored in 26.6' at 13deg.11'N/087deg.53'W. Guide books and other cruisers' blogs reported this to be a rolly anchorage even in calm conditions. They are correct. Strong spring-tide currents prevented optimum use of stern anchor. Stern anchor dragged & fouled with main anchor chain. Required only 5 minutes of GB's superhuman strength to un-foul, but GB still made MS promise to never use stern anchor again, anywhere, ever, forever and ever amen.
2.April2010 Left Amapala. Hot (mid-80sF at 0630) & hazy. Motored 22.0 miles to Isla Meanguera in Gulf of Fonseca. Anchored at Meanguera del Golfo on SW side, reputed to be the calmest anchorage in Gulf of Fonseca, which we needed for repairing main sail at anchor. Despite strong currents and the very welcome daily thermal breezes to the low 20s, anchorage was indeed very calm. Repairs to main sail ensued. Water too murky for swimming, also many jellies drifting by.
5.April2010 Successful main sail repair. Detailed post soon coming. Left Meanguera del Golfo at first light, alternating sailing with motorsailing as wind varied from a maximum 15 knots to less than 6 knots; once out of Gulf of Fonseca wind steadied to the SE.
Crossed the bar at Estero Aserradores in midafternoon to enter Nicaragua at Marina Puesta del Sol. No pilot needed - channel is deep & sufficiently marked (though a few channel buoys were missing) and minimum depths at shallowest point of channel (just to starboard of NW sand spit) are reportedly 8 feet; we showed 11 feet at time of our entrance. Marina Puesta del Sol manager Dorian Espinoza facilitated entry with port captain, Immigration & Customs officials the morning after our arrival. Difficulty: we & the other marina guests were not allowed to use any of the resort's onshore facilities for security reasons: seems the President of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega himself, was there, spending quality time during the Semana Santa holidays with family and friends. We later learned from Puesta del Sol's owner that the Prince of Denmark has visited here, too. We like that The Fox rubs elbows - at a safe distance, of course - with visiting heads of state. After the heavy hitters departed, the Puesta del Sol resort was all ours. Including an awesome beach full o' seashells - the best I've seen since the Sea of Cortez.
8.April-13.April 2010 Road trip inland to visit Leon and Granada in Nicaragua. Via bus, bus-van, tour van, and private car. Details soon coming. m
During our whirlwind road trip around El Salvador in March, we saw lots of cool things. Things like volcanoes, Mayan ruins...and fresh pupusas like these, made with your choice of either corn or rice flour (my advice: try both). The best deal we found for pupusas was at one roadside stand we stopped at for breakfast. We got coffee for the 4 of us (steamed milk on the side, which seems to be the classy Salvadoran way of serving milk with coffee) and a total of 5 pupusas split among three of us, for which we paid all of $3.35. Having a fresh, filling breakfast for about a buck per person is reason alone to visit.
I noticed that with but one exception, everywhere we went we saw livestock in the fields or being moved along the roadsides, but not being used to pull or carry loads. People carried loads - women on their heads, usually; and men on their backs or strapped to bicycles. I suppose your average Salvadoran horse or burro has lots of other work to do besides schlepping cargo.
In terms of public transportation, we saw that the preferred method for short trips was to stand up in the bed of a specially-outfitted pickup truck ("camioneta"), as shown in the pic on the right. Certain towns featured the ever-popular-with-me miniature Moto-Taxis, as seen on the left.
However, the camionetas and the Moto-Taxis are but drab alternatives to the coolest ride that El Salvador has to offer: their fleet of the most awesomely tricked-out buses ever. The average Salvadoran bus is brightly painted, with lots of fancy chrome, multi-colored reflectors of all shapes and sizes, and lots of custom detailing. Some buses even sport shark fins along the roof. They aren't the yellow Blue-Bird buses that took your sorry self to school back in the day.
Speaking of tricked-out vehicles, here's a couple of views of a hearse I happened across in a Salvadoran highland town. It looks like everything funereal can be unbolted and removed, in the event more earthly cargo needs transporting from Point A to Point B.
El Salvador has a lot of jungle in it, so let's look at some of the flora and fauna. Below, you see a pensive spider monkey, a portrait of a lizard I haven't yet identified; and flowers that may be types of morning-glory and pitcher plants.