Earthquake
28 May 2009, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
N15.39.010 /W089.00.111
We're okay. Last night just after 2:00am we were sleeping soundly with the air conditioning on inside Tashmoo. We were awoken by the whole boat shaking like a severe mast pump or vibration. Seconds later the power went out. I jumped out of bed and looked outside. There was lightning to the east. It's been super hot here and the humidity has been 100% so there was an eerie haze across the water and over the other boats. Then another vibration came. All the boats were moving around but the wind was dead calm. Cindy asked what it was? I said I think we just had an earthquake either that or a volcano erupted! One of the guards came walking down the dock carrying a shotgun and a flashlight. The moonlight lit the marina and river just enough to see. There is a young woman sleeping above the Ranchedo, which is on pilings about 15 feet above the water. I saw her up, it must have shook her very strongly. The power has been out since the quake and we've heard it was a 7.1 quake centered not far from here in Honduras. There is now a tsunami warning in the Caribbean. No real damage here at Tortugal but homes around us are damaged. Anyway we're fine.
Fair Winds
John & Cindy
S/V Tashmoo
sailtashmoo att yahoo dot com
Copyright © 2006-2009
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Comments [7]
Back to Blue
25 May 2009, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
N15.39.010 /W089.00.111
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| From Rio May09 |
Let me see, where do I start? It's been so long since I wrote anything and we've done so much! I guess I start in Utila...
Saturday May 9, 2009 - We spent the last 4 days anchored in Puerto Este, Utila's main harbor. The anchorage is huge but the holding is poor with a very thick turtle grass bottom. It took a while for us to get the anchor set, requiring me to dive and assist it digging in. Utila is a small low island and home to the largest amount of dive shops in a ½ mile that we have ever encountered. We left Utila's East Bay this morning at 9:00am. We are headed to a group of small cays on the SW side of Utila, a little over four miles from East Bay. Less than an hour later we were motoring over the shallow reef between Diamond Cay and Utila. The water went from 175 feet to 12 feet in a matter of 10 feet. We rounded Diamond Cay, a small island than actually does not exist according to any of our charts... We followed the darkest blue water to our anchorage. There were three other boats anchored here. The anchorage is actually very deep, 40 to 60 feet to be exact. We set anchor in 42 feet of water. My limit on free diving on an anchor is ~30 feet so hopefully it's set well. We let out almost 250 feet of chain rode. There is chain out of the chain locker that hasn't seen the light of day in years! It's a pretty spot. Several hundred feet off our starboard bow sits three islands. The first to the north is the non-existing island, Diamond Cay; 200 feet to its east is Suck-Suck Cay or Jewel as the locals like to call it now. And 100 feet from Jewel is Pigeon Cay. Both Jewel and Pigeon Cay are wall-to-wall homes and connected to one another by a footbridge. I guess there are several small restaurants on the two islands also. The islands are about 500 hundred feet in diameter. The white sand, palm covered western side of Utila is 1000 feet to port. 100 feet behind us is reef separating us from miles of flats. The waters are very clean and bright turquoise in color. We hopped in the water before lunch and went for a snorkel on the reef to our east that had many small fish and coral heads. Since we arrived the winds have piped up to 20 knots, making for a beautiful sunny day with a bit more wind than we need. We went into dinner at one of the local restaurants with people from the several other boats anchored here. We could tell the wind had increased as we sat having dinner. Later, on the way back to "Tashmoo" we found the wind now blowing 40 knots! It was "interesting" trying to climb aboard and lift the motor off the dinghy for the night. The wind blew hard all night. The next morning the wind died completely, did a 180 and blew 25 knots for hours.
Monday at 5:45am we hauled anchor and started our westward voyage once again. The winds were out of the NE and averaged about four knots. We motor-sailed for seven hours until we were five miles from the tip of Punta Sal. The wind increased to 20 so we killed the motor and sailed the rest of the way to El Diamante. Just off of Punta Sal our fishing rod started spooling line. Our "Bite Me" lure had something big. I jumped up and grabbed the rod. Line was peeling off the reel so fast! I yelled for Cindy to point into the wind as I tightened the drag. I had two options; either try to increase the drag or in 10 seconds "all" the line would be gone. Cindy was so excited she forgot how to turn off the autopilot! She yelled, the autopilot won't turn off! I turned and yelled back what to do! Just as she finally turned off the autopilot and started turning into the wind to slow up "Tashmoo" the line broke... I had about 20 feet of line left on the spool. Whatever it was, it was big, and it was gone. "Bite Me" was gone also. Maybe someone else will catch this fish and have a good laugh when they read the lure hanging out if its mouth. Just after 2:00pm we motored into shallow but sheltered El Diamante for the night. We did 45 miles today; tomorrow hopefully we can do 65 miles.
We woke the following day at 4:30am so we could set sail just before sunrise. We motored out of the shallows of El Diamante to the sounds of howler monkeys waking up and headed west. The morning winds where very light and from the east. After a couple of hours we decided to set the whisker pole to keep the headsail full. We set out another "bite me" lure slightly smaller than the one we had lost the previous day. Not long after we caught a really nice King Fish, yum... The wind started freshening but we had a long way to go so it was okay with me! The seas followed the increased winds and rose to 8's off our stern. We were motor sailing along comfortably averaging about 8 knots for a lot time, which is real fast for "Tashmoo" when we heard a bang and the genny was no longer poled out. Our whisker pole had collapsed! Something internal had broke. We had a fire drill getting it back in, but we managed. After it was stowed we continued west trying to make the most of the 65 miles we needed to travel. There was a squall line to the north that I think ran from Europe to Belize! It was there the whole day. Just after 3:00 in the afternoon we rounded Punta Gorda, shut the motor off and sailed 5 more mile to where we wanted to anchor for a peaceful night. Having a following sea is very tiring as the boat moves around a lot so we were beat when we finally got the anchor set. It was a long day but the Rio Dulce was in sight. Tomorrow we cross "the bar".
Thursday - We crossed the bar without incident and were anchored in Livingston Guatemala by 7:00am. Around 9:15am the Port Captain, Doctor, Immigration Officer, Customs and Port Agent came out to "Tashmoo" (when we called the Port Captain we were told to stay aboard our boat and wait for the officials to come to us). All of the officials were wearing masks. Being so close to Mexico they are taking no chances with Swine Flu. After a brief interview they left with our boat papers and passports and instructed us to pick up our paperwork in an hour. The fees had increased substantially since the last time we were here and it now cost us $122 for a 3 month permit and $187 for an additional 12 month permit. Because we will be leaving the boat in the Rio Dulce while we travel to New Zealand we opted to complete all of our paperwork now and avoid the hassle of applying for an extension in the fall. By noon we were on our way, motoring up the beautiful Rio Dulce River. Three hours later we were still a couple of miles from Tortugal Marina when Maggie from "SeaTryst" hailed us of the VHF. She was so excited we were almost there. Ten minutes later Janet from "Rock-n-Roll" hailed us. It's nice to have friends...
Monday - We had scheduled "Tashmoo" to be hauled out at Abel's Boatyard at 9:00 am this morning. She needs bottom paint. We pulled out of our slip at Tortugal and motored the mile up river to Abel's. All went well with the haul and we were very happy with the work they did (check out the photos of the "haul out"). To haul boats on the rails, four guys with dive masks go into the water with the cradle and maneuver the boat onto the cradle by diving below it! It took about 30 minutes to get "Tashmoo" set on the cradle and then she was slowly hoisted to dry dock. The guys scraped the bottom before power washing and then hand sanded. They also cleaned the prop and shaft clean of all growth and old paint. The bottom looked great; no blisters and no peeling after being in the warm Caribbean water for 3 years now. The total bill for the haul, power wash, labor to scrap the bottom, sand the bottom, prop and shaft, acid wash and wax the hull and paint the bottom with three coats of paint was $675. I wanted to tip the workers but I wasn't sure what would be appropriate so I asked around. The yard workers make between Q65 and Q120 per day. That's $8 to $15 per "day"! The boat yard makes good money but the workers don't make squat. One thing you should not do here is over tip. They come to expect it and it leads to trouble and price increases for all. I tipped the four guys working on "Tashmoo" Q50 each. They seemed very happy and hopefully it wasn't too much. "Tashmoo" has a blue bottom once again. It looks great!
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| From Rio May09 |
Two days later we were back at "Tortugal". No rest for the weary though. Russ and Janet from "Rock-n-Roll", who are also the managers here at Tortugal were going to Gaut City for a couple days and had asked if we wanted to join them. Sounded like fun so two hours after we were tied into our slip we hopped into the Tortugal truck for our four and a half hour ride to the city. Oh, I forgot to mention, Tuesday was our 25th anniversary ~ timing is everything! We spent it on the hard working on the boat, although Maggie, Bob, Russ and Janet joined us for a great dinner at Tortugal. Maggie and Bob bought a beautiful cake and Russ and Janet brought along a good bottle of Champaign. We had some good laughs and a very nice dinner and then retired to our "room" in the Tower House (we had a full size bed complete with mosquito netting and open "walls" with all the normal sounds of the jungle to keep us awake all night). So the trip to Guat City was to relax. We stayed at a beautiful hotel in the city, The Crown Plaza. It was in a very nice section of the city we had not seen before. We do live a simple life here and are usually very frugal with money but it was a real treat staying in a real hotel. It rivaled a beautiful hotel back in the states; the breakfast buffet was incredible, the pool, the jacuzzi, the casino, everything was way-awesome. We had a great time with Russ and Janet. They're lots of fun. We shopped for two days straight, enjoyed a good steak dinner and lost some quarters in the slot machines in the casino. The main purpose of the trip was to pick up supplies for the restaurant and hotel/marina. This was a task we were use to from our time at Mango Creek. Needless to say the truck was chuck full for the long trip back to the Rio.
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| From Rio May09 |
We are now back aboard "Tashmoo" at Tortugal for several more weeks before we head home to Massachusetts. It fells like we've been on the go for weeks. I think today will be an easy day...
Fair Winds
John & Cindy
S/V Tashmoo
sailtashmoo att yahoo dot com
Copyright © 2006-2009
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Mom
10 May 2009, Far Away
Happy Mothers Day! To our Moms ~ you're the best! Thanks for everything you do and for all of your love. We love you and miss you! Have a great day. We'll be flying home June 13'th so we'll see you soon!
Fair Winds
John & Cindy
S/V Tashmoo
sailtashmoo att yahoo dot com
Copyright © 2006-2009
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