We have spent the last few days hanging around town and over at Gato's house. After a delicious meal of Conch, he took us out in his launch (boat) over to Crab Cay to swim and sit around. Their granddaughter was with us, so we had plenty of entertainment. He then took us all the way around the island to come back to our boat - great to see it from the water.

We have been watching the weather forecasts very closely and have picked tomorrow as the day to leave for Colon. The wind is expected to be light, so we will be motoring for a good portion. The wind is supposed to pick up Wednesday so hopefully that will give us a boost. I have enough fuel, so we can motor the whole way, but it would be better if we sailed. We expect to leave at 10:00am along with Kokopelli and expect to arrive in Colon Thursday morning. There is the worry about squalls. A Catamaran pulled in here two days ago and they had blown out the jib and a good portion of the main. We did not talk to them, but heard they got caught in a heavy squall with 35 - 40kts and were not ready for it. Kokopelli has radar and we have AIS, so between the two of us we should be able to spot the storms and ships.

When checking the engines over this morning, I discovered that the alternator bracket on the port side was broken. It was easy to remove and I took it up to Gato's house and he got it welded back together in no time. This is the third time I have had a problem like this on that engine. The first two times the bolt sheared off and now the bracket......

We have had an absolutely fabulous time here at Providencia and we are little sad to be leaving. But we are also looking forward to Panama and the trip back to Canada to see our family.

I will update the blog at least once a day while traveling to Panama.