Cruising West
24 November 2012 | Gaigar Lagoon, San Blas, Panama
Sunny/cloudy/squally, min 78F, max 85F, water temp 80.5F, Wind NE@5-15, 25 in squalls
Evening Squall Approaching
No change in the weather. We chat with Chris Parker (our weather guy in Fla) on the SSB radio just about daily. The weather is weird. Boats are sitting everywhere waiting for a weather window to travel. There are about a dozen here waiting to head north and up in San Andres and Providencia, about 350 miles north of us, there are the same number waiting to head down here. When the weather breaks it will be a busy stretch of ocean! The end of November normally sees the end of rainy season and the winds shift eastward and squalls disappear, but this year seems different. But Chris says late next week should see things change.
It hasn't been a problem for us. We left the Coco Bandro Cays and headed for Nargana where we bought a few groceries, including the only Pineapple (pinya) in town, some eggs (huevos), etc. But the main reason for the trip was dinghy fuel, which we got. So we're fine until we head back to Shelter Bay next week-end.
From Nargana we headed for the Naguargandup Cays, a group of cays stretching about 15 miles along a reef. The plan was to anchor at the easternmost one, Cambombia, and spend the day snorkling the reef. But after we worked our way in winding through the reefs, we decided that it was too deep to anchor comfortably. The only place we could anchor without being too close to either the cay otr the reef was 50', too deep for good holding in our nightly squalls. So we moved on to the western end and anchored in beautiful Salardup, where we spent a week last year. Here we found a comfortable spot and settled in just as dinner came by.
Two fishermen sold us a lobster and a crab, so plans for spaghetti Bolognese were shelved. Next morning we moved back down the cays to Myriadup and anchored for lunch and a swim. But again it was not an overnight anchorage, so for the night we moved to the very well protected Giagar Lagoon.
Today is blustery, so not sure of our plans. But we need to be near El Porvenir for Tuesday to get our Zarpe to return to Shelter Bay later next week. That has to be Tuesday as both Monday and Wednesday are holidays. November is holiday month. Not sure what is being celebrated Monday, but Wednesday is Independence from Spain. Earlier in November we had Independence from Colombia Day