PAYBACK !

Monday 13^th June.  Chagres River, Panama.

Another glorious but steamy morning on the Chagres River.  We were all up at dawn to begin the next leg of our journey, a 50-mile trip to our next planned stop along the coast towards Bocas del Toro.

Chagres River

As I attempted to drag the comb through my shiny from sweat, and sun lotion soaked, wind tousled hair, I couldn’t help but wonder what adventures awaited us today. The sun was shining brightly in a beautiful blue sky as we motored slowly out of the river and back into the ocean.  Sadly the calm didn’t last for long, less than an hour out at sea clouds started rolling in, the skies darkened and thunder rumbled ominously in the distance.  I hate storms, I mean really hate them, and never more than when I’m out at sea; a friend of mine who also has an Oyster sailboat, has been hit 3 times by lightening, so I think I have cause to be concerned.  The sea grew rougher and rougher as the storm built, the waves were huge, and Daisy was rocking and rolling around like a cork, we were headed straight into the wind and against the current, so no sails to stop the rocking, and not a lot of speed either; it was slow, rough going.  Both Niki and I took up the horizontal position on deck, incapable of performing the smallest task.  Niki turned a luminous shade of green and I was not far behind.  Having been off the boat for 4 months this was not the gentle introduction back to seamanship I had hoped for. It took us 7 hours to reach our planned anchorage, only to discover the water was so rough we couldn’t drop anchor safely, Bob suggested we move on to the next island where there was another anchorage, “only another 10 miles” he said (I was not a happy bunny) but there was no other option open to us other than to continue on.  I had needed to pee for the last 3 hours but hadn’t dared venture below decks for fear of vomiting everywhere; the situation was getting desperate, but it was going to have to wait.  We reached the next anchorage in half-light, to find it exposed, choppy and rolly, not at all where we wanted to be in the current conditions, so the dreaded decision was made, to continue on through the night to Bocas del Toro.

The sea was incredibly rough and we were all completely drenched from the huge waves breaking over the bow and filling the cockpit with water, I was starting to feel real despair, I couldn’t believe this nightmare journey would continue for another 12 hours, when suddenly we were joined by a pod of young “Atlantic Spotted dolphins” (STENELLA FRONTALIS) that were loving the conditions as much as I was hating them.  They swam with us leaping out of the water beside the cockpit, and darting this way and that in front on the bow, leaping through the enormous waves.  They stayed with us for almost an hour, and proved a welcome and effective distraction from the dreaded storm, seasickness and bathroom needs. The Atlantic spotted dolphin is probably the most common dolphin in the Gulf of Mexico. They are really pretty, quite small at only 6-7 feet long, and have spots all over their underbelly. We couldn’t take any photos because we were all too busy hanging on for dear life just trying not to get washed overboard.

The journey through the night didn’t improve, and at one point both Niki and I simultaneously rushed up on deck to vomit violently, either side of the boat, Niki on starboard and me on port, just as Bob was heating himself up some tomato soup, OH what a bloody awful mess, but the waves were so big they quickly washed the decks clean.  Poor Bob was left to do everything by himself, and cope with 2 sick miserable women.

Around 3am under pale moonlight we pulled into a lovely lagoon, OH the peace and quiet, and still water, what absolute bliss.  We dropped anchor, and everyone collapsed into bed thoroughly exhausted. I think this trip was the payback for my wonderful day yesterday.  Was it worth it?  Ask me later right now I’m sleeping…

A RIVER OF CROC’S

Sunday 12^th June.  Location: Chagres River, Panama

Bob was the first up on deck this morning, to watch the sunrise and the creatures in the jungle surrounding us.  This is just another magical place that my husband (the adventurer) has dragged me to; although now I’m here I’m really grateful that he did. As I sat quietly watching the steam rise off the water and settle like puffy white clouds around the tops of the trees, I couldn’t help wishing that Scoop, Danni, Edi and Paige were with us.  This truly is an amazing place. The heavy rainstorm last night had resulted in a very humid morning.  Walking up on deck was like walking into a sauna, I was immediately drenched in sweat. Daisy’s air-conditioning had worked well to keep us comfortable through the night, but now phew…

The scenery surrounding us was surreal, it’s both wonderful and reassuring to still be able to find places on this planet totally un-spoilt by man, this place is as natural as Mother Nature intended.  The jungle was full of noises and activity, beautiful colorful butterflies the size of my hand, flocks of noisy parrots, kingfishers, insects and monkeys, they were everywhere you looked, easily spotted swinging around by their tails high up in the canopy of the trees surrounding the river.  The stillness of the river otherwise, was soothing to the soul, and I felt very privileged and blessed to be able to see it first hand. Bob pointed out all the small circles of bubbles rising up through the water disturbing the otherwise glass like surface. “It could be Crocodiles” he said with a smile, I looked around and there were indeed several circles of bubbles just a few feet off Daisy’s bow, I counted 10 of them.  “Let’s get in the dinghy and go exploring” Bob said!  “OH lovely” I thought, “what a great idea, lets all pile into a small soft sided boat and float around with a river full of croc’s! What did he think his name was “Dundee?”

So, anyway, after breakfast we covered ourselves liberally with anti-bug spray, (even though surprisingly there was a distinct absence of bugs) and motored the dinghy quietly and slowly up several of the smaller inlets off the river that ran into the jungle.  We stopped periodically to take photographs, and just watch the antics of all the monkeys, we saw a troop of the little white faced monkeys and quite a few of the howlers, who, according to something Niki was told, are the loudest creatures on the planet, and if the noise we were experiencing was anything to go by I would agree whole-heartedly with that.  

The river which started out about 20-30 feet wide narrowed significantly as we ventured further up it, to just a few feet across in places, barely wide enough for the dinghy, and we had to duck and push our way under the overhanging tree branches.  A couple of times spiders fell off the branches into the dinghy, this didn’t go down well with either Niki or myself, although I have to say I was actually more concerned about the croc’s that Niki was pointing out.  When something much larger than yourself, with a ginormous mouth full of razor sharp teeth and bug ugly eyes that are looking right at you, is only a few feet away from the soft sided craft your currently sitting in, it doesn’t really do much to instill confidence for your safety.  We moved quickly on, and I reassured myself that we did at least have the motor which, I like to believe can travel at light speed when required.  I had a flash back to the time Danni was with us in Los Roques, Venezuela, when we had to flee an attack of thousands of mosquitoes. The dinghy had done us proud that time.

It was an amazing morning, I felt as though I was on a David Attenborough expedition.  We rowed (well actually Niki and Bob rowed) up and down a couple of the river inlets, Bob was looking for a place to pull the dinghy up so we could go exploring, I can’t say I was disappointed when we couldn’t find anywhere, the jungle at the rivers edge was very thick, and the footing sticky mud, perfect for the croc’s, not so much for me in my brand new Coach sneakers.

We saw one of the beautiful, rare and amazing panama butterflies, each of its iridescent blue wings stretch about 4” across, sadly it flew too fast for me to catch it on camera.  The riverbanks were crowded with land crabs with huge white front claws; there were red crabs, bright blue crabs, and snow white ones, in abundance all along the shoreline and on the overhanging branches.  We stopped for a while to watch a pretty little black and white kingfisher, and I took some photographs.  The jungle air was filled with a heady scent of jasmine, although we only saw a few of the flowers.  We photographed a very unusual looking lizard sitting on one of the overhanging branches, it had a large odd shaped crest, I’ve never seen one like it before.

Daisy on the Chagres River

Beautiful Kingfisher

After lunch we moved Daisy to anchor in another spot a little nearer to the mouth of the river, we had planned to go ashore at a place Bob had read about, where there is supposed to be good access to the jungle, sadly the storms moved in and we had to retreat inside the boat for the rest of the afternoon.

It had been a truly incredible day, but over the last 4 years of this adventure, I’ve become increasingly aware that everything has its price, and every ounce of joy is often followed by a pound of despair; I’m wondering how long it will be before I have to pay for the wonderful day I’ve just enjoyed.