Finally Some Canvas Work Is Nearing Completion.

Finally the first Canvas Project, of the four, I had given Foo Foo is nearing completion. It was ordered six weeks ago and should have been completed four weeks ago. Foo Foo is highly unreliable and the usual mentality, to always asking for more and more money, without delivering. Did he do a nice job? The answer is no. He made the front of the mast cover extremely complicated and messy, and as usual, by far too tight. Well we will have to live with it, but we need at least two persons to install it and to dismantle it. He has to come back Wednesday with the missing pieces. But I have no longer the energy to fight his incompetence, and he has, in my opinion, been well paid for the job done. Those of you that understand French might change his name slightly from Foo Foo to something a bit similar and reflect him.....?

A lot of Sunbrella material has gone into the front cover (please see the below photo) and I think I will not get the cover over the boom, as it is likely to take too much space for the storage. In any case Foo Foo would take months to do that project, so that will have to wait.

A Cute Monkey Crawling Across The Street At La Playita Marina.

As I was returning to La Playita Marina last Thursday evening - after the sailors Pizza evening - this cute and very slow moving Monkey was crossing the street. I had to stop the traffic so it could safely cross the street. It was not at all scared even though I used the flash and it just kept crossing very slowly and looked at me from time to time. It must live in the trees behind the parking lot.

Days after I found where it was hiding and it sleeps hanging down on the power pox at the parking/Marina place/ The following photo is badly showing how it sleeps with its eyes closed and hanging in its front arms.

Phboto TBA

At Anchor At The Playita Ancorage On The Pacific Side Of The Canal. Some Photos From The New Hard Rock Hotel, Panama City.

 New Dawn at anchor at the La Playita Bay, Panama City.

I was invited by Virginia and Scott for dinner last night at a Danish woman's very nice apartment in the expensive district on Panama City and had to meet them at the new and huge Hard Rock Hotel. Here are some of the photos I took in the hotel lobby. They speak for themselves.

New Dawn's Panama Canal Transit 10-11 March 2014.

Here we have our Identification Certificate and should be all set for the Transit as I have paid the USD 2.100 cost for New Dawn.

We received our pilot with quite a delay and had to wait from 13:30 to around 18:00 till he arrived. This is normal in Panama. Then the cargoship arrived and had to go first into the Gatun lock and we followed behind it.

 Here the first lock gates close behind us.

 Starting to go up. These three locks raises us about 26 m to be level with the lake.

 We spend the night in the lake and were in the middle of the jungle, with loads of noise from the different Hauling Monkey in the tree tops on both side of us.

The following morning I was up at 05:30 as we were not told when the next pilot would arrive and we did not know the transit time for the Miguel Lock. The pilot arrived at 08:00 and we had a transit slot at around 13:00. The distance to the single Miguel Lock was about 30 Nm and we had 4 hours to sail across the lake and the Cut.

 John (USA) enjoying the ride and was my third line-handler. John is looking for a boat to sail to Australia and has a time pressure, which might not be suitable for me.

 This is Virginia (Panamanian) and her boy friend Scott (USA) from the US Embassy, that offered to do the line-handling.

They are dredging the Canal to accommodate the much larger ships, as I described in an earlier Blog entry. If you look well at this photo, you might spot the head of a Crocodile of about 2 m long just in the surface. I did not manage to get its "saw tooth" tail in the photo, but it was there as I fetch my camera.

Our fellow cargo ship arriving after us. In the downwards locks, we had to be in front of the cargo ship. Note the distance on each side of the ship. They are called Panamax Ships, which mean the Maximum size for the Panama Canal.

 Here we are descending the Miraflore lock, which consist of two locks and we end up in the Pacific.

 Our last Miraflore lock and we arrive in the Pacific.

Our pilot depart at the Americas bridge.

The only screen shot, I have received, of our Miraflore locks. Being the biggest boat of the two of us, it was New Dawn that  had to steer us all and also use the engine as we go from one lock to the other.

Monkeys, Crocodiles, Vultures, Eagles, Wild Parrots, etc. All Around Us.

Shelter Bay Marina is located on the edge of the Jungle used earlier by the US to train their elite soldiers for Jungle fighting. The Marina has cleared some of the Jungle to give space for the hard standing, where New Dawn was.

Many mornings at sunrise I could hear the Monkeys screaming, signaling that something was going on around them. Parrots can "talk" very loud and Eagles were hoovering above us all day. The Vultures were generally on the ground and were disgusting to watch when they were eating what-ever-it-was. Last trip back from the Supermarket in Colon, I watched a rather big Crocodile sitting at the river bank with its mouth wide open and taking a sun bath.

Yesterday, I went with a Scotch friend, Kerry, for a two hour hike into the Jungle and we heard the Parrots and many Monkeys close to us. As we passed them they were giving their screaming and we concluded that it was the "Monkey News Channel" and warning the other that we were around. It sounded like there were several groups and as they were usually high up in the trees but probably within 15 meters of us, it was impossible for me to get any good photos of them.

If you look well at the lower half  left side of this photo you might see a brown Howling Monkey and its fingers of the left hand sticking up.

This photo and the following one, you might see another Monkey  sitting slightly to the left of the middle upper side. The below photo he is still there at slightly to the left of the middle of the photo.

Not easy to get a good photo of this one. If you look well at the center of the photo you might see a, in Danish, "Muresluger", but I have not found the English name. It is that animal with a long nose that stick it into Ant hides and eat the Ants. Competition to leave a comment to the one that find the English name.

Here are two Parrots. They make noisy cries and don't fly very elegantly.