The Picton Castle lay in the stream off the Balboa Yacht Club right next to the channel for the Panama Canal for some time as we prepared to head out for the South Pacific Ocean. Rain every day, often in torrents, sometimes with thunder and lightning. Drying sails was hard but had to be done lest they rot into black compost on the yards. The BYC was a fine “base camp” but not to be confused with the New York or Manchester Yacht Clubs. Plenty of cabs standing by to take folks into Balboa or Panama City for shopping, provisioning or sightseeing.
A neat spot in Balboa is the fish market, very clean and well lit and, of course, overflowing with fresh fish right off the boats moored just nearby. Interesting wooden craft suggesting origins in dugout canoes, but proper planked up motor boats.
Provisioning is a big job. And enough machetes for those in need at Pitcairn Island. Ship’s cook Donald and his team spent days at Panama’s answer to Costco, as well as the fresh fruit and veggie market, filling cab after cab.
In between the rain we actually managed to get the ship painted white again. Nice job the gang did, took three coats to overcome the black of two years. we needed to get a permit to paint our ship from the environmental folks, glad they are on the job. She looks right white and she will be much cooler in the tropic sun we will be seeing a good deal of from now on. Having a launch service made our painting project go a lot swifter as we could stay on the job with needing to break off for boat runs.
Folks got to see much of Panama City; craft markets, cafes, elegant restaurants, Panama hats and molas made by the Kuna, the charming Old Quarter of “Casco Viejo” built after Henry Morgan sacked ‘Old Panama City’ still in ruins on the outskirts of town and well worth a visit. He wrecked the place in the 1600’s for gold and there the ruins lay to this day.
One last thing we needed to before heading onward and that was topping up our fuel. we cast off our moorings and headed to a barge anchored out among all the huge deep water ships also anchored off Panama. 6 tons or 2,000 gallons later and we sailed away from the barge under sail, made our way past lovely Taboga Island (where Paul Gauguin spent time before finding Tahiti) and we were gone, headed to the South Pacific to see what is to come over the horizon in this immense blue ocean.
