Two days ago the Chilean Navy training ship Esmeralda arrived with the young sailors standing in her rigging. We were up at the Yacht Club with no camera at the time, so I do not have photos of their arrival; but in the evenings the ship is lit up and a pretty site from the dock . This is about the third time that one of these training square riggers has passed by while we have been here. We have seen the ones from Columbia and Venezuela as well as this one from Chile.
Last week a small group of cruisers went out to a local Mexican Restaurant for Mexican food and a good time. We got a chance to visit with friends that we have met along the way and had moved on elsewhere but had come to Panama City for various reasons. One couple is getting ready to take their boat thru the canal, another had flown in from Bocas del Toro for a doctor’s appointment and the rest of us are just here and all getting ready to possibly head to Ecuador for the rainy season in Panama and the dry season in Ecuador.
While I was in the states helping my daughter and parents and enjoying my grandson, Bill finished up and started projects that we hope to finish before we leave the big city of Panama with all its supplies and stores. Since I returned bringing some much needed parts south with me, we have finished fixing things and have now started with checking out the many systems that have not been used since we tied to the buoy here at the Balboa Yacht Club last May.
We both made trips to the top of the mast to check out the rigging, replace the sun-brittled lens of the tricolor light and to install a repaired antenna. Bill has also spent many mornings curled up in the engine room checking out steering parts and refrigeration tubes, replacing engine zincs and making final adjustments to the finally-repaired Kubota genset engine. The genset now works better than is has in years!
We have also been enjoying visiting restaurants with our friends, so it has not been all work and no play.
Soon after Easter, we are hoping to leave here and spend some time in the Las Perlas Islands before heading south to Ecuador in early June.
