Marina Life

4/23/11 - We pulled into Shelter Bay Marina 10 days, 2 hours and 35 minutes ago. Our routine is fairly simple, wake up, brekky, pool, jungle walk, lunch, pool, afternoon drinks, dinner, cards and bed….it sounds like paradise at first with nothing to do but hang out on a luxury yacht in Central America soaking up the sun but it’s not. We’ve possibly another full week to wait before our official transit time through the canal and it’s not too different from waiting at the DMV but in 90+ degree jungle weather. Imagine, all the crews waiting on their respective boats and then a mast begins to move, the faint sound of an engine revving and a few deckhands running to and fro at their captain’s orders while the rest of us look on sadly accepting the fact that they will be heading through the canal and out into the Pacific while the rest of us wait another day in the jungle.

Shelter Bay Marina

That’s not to say that we haven’t made some interesting acquaintances along the way and even some friends. Their stories are as diverse as the countries they represent and the following is just a quick sampling of what’s taken place here in Shelter Bay during the past week.

HIPPIE DELIVERY
On our second day in the marina we meet the hippie delivery crew, 7 of them delivering a cat similar to ours. A captain, 3 guys and 3 girls; one of whom looked like Captain Jack Sparrow…unfortunately it is one of the girls that I’m speaking of. We met in an abrupt fashion, them screaming as I look up to see them crash into the concrete slip just next to us…the captain for whatever reason had allowed one of the inexperienced girls dock the boat and dock it she did. The boat was alright but she was completely embarrassed and there wasn’t much anyone could say to console her so the captain said, “why don’t you grab the hose, refill our water tanks and maybe you’ll feel better afterwards.” Well, that didn’t work so well either because 45 minutes later I hear the worst sobbing and crying ever and came to find out the poor girl had filled the diesel tanks instead of the water tanks….so after an hour or two hand pumping the water out she went to shore a mess.

THE IRANIANS
Two Iranian women from Norway created a bagel company and after being endorsed by the Crown Prince their business exploded. So they bought a boat named MAD and decided to sail around the world which was going fairly well except they bought one of the cheaper boats available so it is constantly breaking and causing problems. Then to complicate matters, their captain abruptly quit just days before their departure through the canal. There they were with a coveted transit spot and no one to captain their boat and still some work left to do before they could leave. In a frenzy they search the marina and find a nice Portuguese fellow who was more than willing to guide them through the canal and out into the Pacific. However, after two straight days of drinking and not a sober minute in between they quickly realized they needed to fire this newly acquired captain and find another. Which they did, an Italian who couldn’t speak English, Norwegian or Farsi leaving quite comical scene for a quick test cruise the following day with the captain yelling in Italian at two Iranian women who have no idea what he’s saying. Then if that were not enough when they returned to port tired and stressed FedEx arrived with a much needed part for their boat. Except when the delivery guy tried giving the parcel to the captain he refused saying, “thees boat ‘Mad’ not ‘Fedex’.” Apparently, this confusing exchange went back and forth until the delivery guy walked away intending to return the package to its source. Then about two minutes later the Iranian girls could be seen running frantically down the dock yelling and screaming, “don’t let him go!”

SOLO SAILS
Then there is Jack Jansen, who has become one of our good friends while here in port. He too is Dutch and has sailed solo from the Netherlands aboard the Tin Hau. He pretty much sets a course and some radar alerts while sailing that will wake him up if another ship is detected on the same course as his. He then rises, changes course and then heads back to sleep. Jack is quite the adventurer and as someone who has travelled the world solo myself (but by plane) I’ve got to say this takes some serious guts for sure.  Hopefully our travels will cross again in the future as he has a similar course to ours until we do we will be following along on his blog.

BOW THRUSTER DINGHY’S
The other day while below deck I hear some wild commotion outside and run out to see a 58′ Benetau trying to do a 3 point turn in the middle of the basin between our boat on D dock and the other across on C dock. The captain is yelling in Spanish and the boat is sporting a Spanish flag…slowly but surely nearly every boater in the marina walks out onto their bow to watch this full flung circus play out. A younger Spaniard in a dinghy at the Captain’s orders is ramming the bow of the ship in an effort to turn it towards their intended slip. And then after hitting the bow the captain would yell something more and the kid would race all the way around the boat and then ram the stern…this procession of going back and forth was making everyone in the marina laugh. Finally, another boater jumped into his dinghy and raced over to help. So now two dinghy’s are ramming this large yacht as its captain tries with all his might to direct it into the slip, nose first. They finally make it in and miraculously don’t hit either their starboard side or bow in the process, except they aren’t finished yet. When they went to hook up the shore power line it wasn’t long enough to reach the power panel so they had to back out and do it all over again much to the marina’s enjoyment…and yes, I even took video of it.

Dinghy in Action

SHIPS FLAG DOESN’T EQUAL SHIPS TONGUE

So while the above mentioned boat was turning around a crowd began to grow at the end of their slip and this included Danny and Bram from our boat. While enjoying the comedy Danny & Bram noticed an attractive gal on board and began discussing in their native Dutch what they thought of her and felt no need to watch their words as it was a Spanish ship. This went on for 5-10 minutes with the boats crew clearly within earshot until finally one of the crew member’s called out to the attractive gal a question….in Dutch. To Danny and Bram’s utter disbelief she too was Dutch and decided it was probably time to return to our ship! This one had me laughing for at least ten minutes.

Anyway, as you can all see…even though we are more than excited to be on our way there is some action keeping us entertained at the marina. On one last note the 175′ Tiara pulled in the other night…what a beautiful boat! It has a 205′ mast and has a cruising sailing speed of 10 knots apparently it can be chartered for $175,000/week…too bad I don’t have an extra $175k anyway, if you love sailboats you’ve gotta take a look at this beauty on her own website Tiara