It's no longer lonely out here. It's night one of our passage from Cartagena, Columbia to the San Blas Islands in Panama. I allowed 40 hrs in the light winds forecasted to get us into the shallow and partly uncharted waters of the islands so we would have an early morning arrival after two nights at sea.....but we have wind. It's a beautiful sail and once again I may have to slow Ooroo down. We have phosphorescence in our wake...or is it the reflection of a million stars.

Ships heading to the Panama Canal have been passing on a regular basis, sneaking up astern and powering on to one of the worlds busiest seaways. They are alight like large cites but sound is lost to the wind.

This is my favorite part of sailing. And when I can write and ponder. But my newest crew member in his excitement decided to stay awake and chatter. Words added to the night are lost on me. I just crave that solitude that comes with a night sail.

After each paragraph I scan the seas for the next ship to pass. They make good company, a spectacle and show of power. The time flows quickly when they cross our path.

Now only one light is visible ahead, a light that has been slow moving with within 2 nm of us. I suspect it's another sailing vessel and I'm going to catch it even though the other boat doesn't know its a race.

The day was calm sailing with the exception of one rain shower that appeared with the biggest pod of dolphins I have ever seen. The wind allowed me to steer towards them, however they saw me coming and headed my way....at speed. I have never seen dolphins jump so high and so often. We had about 50 swimming all around Ooroo, taking in tuns to swim in our wake. They would zip off and return launching themselves skywards. They stayed for more than an hour. I through a line off the back and swam with them. We were spell bound.

The night however was all together different. Scary in fact. We had to slow Ooroo and wait out the morning. At 9pm thunderstorms surrounded us and I don't know how to explain it but I thought we were caught in a void of wind and current. I pulled in the sails knowing that winds between storm cells can be severe and started the engines. The GPS started to spin in all directions while the auto pilot kept announcing it was off course. We came to a dead stop in 15 to 20 knots, with 2000rpm on both engines I wasn't moving at all...we were stuck. I even let out the head sail to see if we could break free from what ever had hold of us. Still the boat speed was nil. I woke the ever dependable Tim just to see if I was imagining it. The storm cells and lightening danced all around, the rain came in heavily. One of my depth sounders showed that it last picked up depth at 8m when we hadn't been shallower than 800m. I thought we may have caught another net. So once again I through a line in and had a swim...and it wasn't comfortable. The boat was rocking, it was pitch black and I didn't like the idea that a fishing net may be under us with the predictors that sometimes follow them.

My torch showed nothing around the props, rudders or the rear of the keel. I wouldn't swim forward to check the bow.

We couldn't go forward so I asked Tim to back her up....and we slowly moved. Eventually we turned and altered course away from the "whatever". Logic says it was current but backing out was like freeing ourselves from mud. It wasn't some sort of whirlpool because we didn't spin. Only the GPS did that. Even a net at this depth would have some give.
The closest land was a Cayo Diablo AKA The Devil.

The current was strong as we could initially only make 2 knots out of there and I wanted out because the lightening was to close. I eventually sent Tim back to bed, set the head sail and steered at the best angle to add speed to take Ooroo away from the cells. We had a wonderful light show for the next two hours. It's now 2am and dead calm. ETA San Blas 7am.

I never again will be lonely at sea. There is something always out there.

And then We were hit by lightening.