Awaking to the ever present swell which was particularly bad at this anchorage, the thought of reaching Cartegena in the morrow sent excitement through my veins. This was amplified by the fact that back in Australia it was dads 50th b'day and I really wanted to be on land to call and say Happy B'day. I was truly ready for a much needed shower to remove the accumulating layer of salt and sunscreen from my body. It had almost been 2 weeks since setting sail from Panama and the once dreamy expedition through the San Blas had now become somewhat of a chore with long hard days of nothing, unable to read due to the rocking, unable to stand for fear of falling. Even the simple pleasure of taking a leak was to say the least a task but one I did not mind as it occupied some of the slowly passing time.
The previous day the boat had began to fill with water in the engine bay, this had caused a bearing to go bad and cause a horrendous noise only comparable to a mixture of nails on a chalk board and a blender. To stop the noise a belt on the on of the generators had to be cut. It was now up to the crew to heave the 70kg anchor from the sea floor as the anchor reeling device was powered by the now not functioning generator. It was an effort to balance on the raising, falling, rocking, rolling bow let alone orchestrate a 3 man tug-o-war with this dead weight. With one man almost overboard, 30 aching fingers and at least one put out back we won the tug-o-war and secured our opponent in his place upon our "sturdy" vessel. Victorious it was time to begin what we hoped would be the second last leg of the trip which was to see us arriving that evening at Isla Fuerte.
The day was once again filled with copious amounts of nothing. Watching birds skim effortlessly between the peaks and troughs of the swell (some times they were actually fish with wings go figure) I noticed Colombia sitting on the horizon, below clouds that caused a slight worry, I was not in the mood for a storm, focusing back on the fish birds the worry disappeared as quick as it had come. The wind was not in our favour this day so we were painstakingly tacking back and forth at angles allowing us to use the lift of the wind to move indirectly toward our destination. The captain gave up his position to let me have a go behind the wheel, it is hard to keep a straight heading with lag and swell constantly countering your every move. Fighting a losing battle I slowly managed to veer enough off course that the captain decided to take back charge so we didn't miss our anchorage. Retiring into the cabin away from the salty wind, I managed to find a spot to chillax away the remaining minutes.
Approaching the entrance to the bay in which we were to spend the night, it was a race against the sinking sun. As the light faded the captain started up the radar which had previously been hidden behind a plastic cover. Using the positioning equipment the captain struggled to maneuver the boat between the reef hidden under the surface. Sitting inside conversing with my fellow boat buddies, it was noticed by Liam that we had missed the turn into the bay and for some reason yet to be known had passed on by. Shortly after Rod (one of the crew) popped his head in, with a concerned look upon his face and a waterproof bag in hand he calmly said "everybody please collect together anything of value that you do not want wet and place in this bag" to be continued......
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