Pleasures of the Harbor.
14 March 2011 | San Blas Islands, Panama
Mark
We are learning the advantages of anchoring in a location with many other boats (I count 26 at the moment). Yesterday we rediscovered the pleasure of meeting and chatting with other cruisers, and of course used the internet. Early this morning the same Kuna fisherman who had the big grouper yesterday (someone else had bought the whole thing), showed up with several nice sized bonito - tuna. I took the largest one and he fileted it for me before selling it to me for $10. I might have gotten it a bit cheaper if I had bargained more, but he obviously is not getting rich off this so who cares. There was enough meat for probably 3 dinners for the two of us. After he left, I skinned the filets and packaged some to freeze and some for tonight. (and the little pieces that were torn off in the process of skinning for right now!) This afternoon, the Veggie Boat arrived. A large ulu pulled up with every imaginable sort of fruit and veggie. We bought a dozen oranges, 30 limes, a large cantaloup, a large papaya, 4 eggplant, 2# of green pepper, a nice large head of lettuce (impossible to get in the tiendas down here), 2 avocados, and a bunch of bananas for $26 delivered. It would have been a lot to carry from a tienda to the dinghy to the boat had we bought them on another island, and undoubtedly would not have been as good and would have cost more. Fresh fish and great fruits and veggies delivered to your boat. Sure makes provisioning easy. There was no gasoline on the island, but when I asked, they assured me they would get some for me manana. We'll be here a few days so hopefully we can get some before we leave. The dinghy tank is ¾ full, but the 5 gallon jerry can is empty. Today we also did some exploring by dinghy. The anchorage is a large lake surrounded by reefs and many islands, some inhabited, some un-. We took the dink and visited several of the un-. We walked the beaches, found shells, and continue to be amazed at the persistence of plastic. It washes up on the shore everywhere. I guess it is a sign of the times that water bottles out number soda or beer bottles at least 4:1 now. There's a PhD thesis: Global Society as Discovered by the Trash that Washes up on Tropical Beaches. At least the research part would be fun. One island had a very strange structure that we couldn't figure out. Maybe I can ask at the bar tomorrow. There was a very nice dock that even had the superstructure for a roof (but no roof), but it ended in the oddest unfinished construction: an eight sided concrete something. The sides were decidedly not equal, but seemed to be almost random length and each angle had a spoke going in to the center. All the pieces were about 8 square and varied 8-15' long. There were concrete pilings, but everything was supported by cut mangrove sticks that had obviously been used as support when the concrete was poured. It now appears to have been abandoned. The really odd thing is that there is a somewhat similar construction an eight sided non-octagon at the airstrip on Corizon de Jesus. It too is of concrete construction, and is abandoned half built, but it is on land, not over water. Strange.