Newsletter March 2004

"Those old sea dogs are off on another zany adventure"

Yes, you guessed it, the crew of Pipe Dream is back on the boat and off on another sea adventure. After extensive medical examinations in Bocas del Toro, Panama, we were given a clean bill of health. Jutta and I were extremely worried we had developed webbed feet from all the stink’n rain. We returned on February 9 from our trip to Ecuador in hopes to find a weather window and sail out of Bocas del Toro. We would do anything to escape Bocas, and Pipe Dream finally vacated the harbor on March 16 without a good weather window. For the past five weeks it rained almost every day and we finally made our break. To be honest, we really motored out of Bocas and 40 hours more to reach San Andres Island, Columbia. We were motoring into 20 knots of wind right on the nose with six to eight foot churning seas. As if that wasn’t enough, we also had to fight a 1-2 knot current. Pipe Dream’s hull was making the most ungodly sounds slamming down into troughs of waves, it sounded like a fat lady plopping down in a church pew on Sunday morning.
On Feb 11 we arrived at San Andres Island after slogging for 46 hours. For those of you in Yuma Arizona that’s the sun up twice and the moon up twice. And no, for those land lubbers, we don’t drop the anchor at night in the middle of the ocean and go to bed. We also couldn’t find any hotels along that stretch of ocean to take a quick nap. Approaching San Andres, we had finally reached the land of painted waters. All we could see was turquoise in hundreds of different shades. We could see the bottom in 20 – 30 feet of water. I had always appreciated looking at bottoms but this is a whole different enchilada! We anchored in front of Club Nautico, put down the dinghy, and went in for a cold Colombian beer and a greeting from the Port Captain, Customs, and Columbian Immigration. Check-in took 15 minutes and we were legal tourists in Columbia. For those of you who flunked geography, San Andres and Providencia are resort Islands belonging to Columbia, although they are off the coast of Nicaragua.
San Andres is a busy resort island with commercial beaches, duty free shops, beach bars, restaurants, and water sports of any kind, inhabited by approximetly 7,000 people. Three or four airlines fly in daily bringing tourists from around the globe. Jutta and I spent two weeks in San Andres working on the boat, going to discos, dining out, and just play’n. . A special treat was the movie theater – air conditioned, surround sound, stadium seating – where the waiter brings your order of popcorn and soda to your assigned seat. Where in the world do you get that kind of treatment for $2.50?

After two weeks of thoroughly enjoying the busy resort life, we moved on to Isla Providencia. This mountainous island of 2000 souls is fifty miles to the north and very different from San Andres. The downtown consists of about two city block and provisions and supplies are very limited. The beaches are beautiful and mostly deserted with few small hotels.” We spent three days in Providencia enjoying the “tranquilo” atmosphere, riding a motor scooter around the island, and renewing old friendships with the twelve other sailboats in the harbor. There were cruisers in the bay we had met two years ago in El Salvador, and it was fun comparing our different experiences and travels.
On Saturday morning, April 2, the crew of Pipe Dream sailed out of Catalina Bay on the Island of Providencia bound for the Bay Islands of Honduras, 400 miles away. We hoisted and trimmed the sails, which is sailor talk for raising them up and adjusted. Our intermediate stop was the Vivorillo Cays, 150 miles east of the Bay Islands. For two days and nights we had the most incredible sail since leaving San Diego four years ago. The seas were almost flat, we had a light easterly breeze and a full moon at night. We have finally reached the land of sailing ships. During the last three and a half years cruising the Pacific Ocean we would sail a couple of hours on a ten to twelve hour passage, if we were lucky,. Pacific in Latin means tranquil sea or waters and that’s exactly what it is. On the Caribbean side the trades blow continuously. We are jazzed, we are sailors, we now have the wind!
We are now anchored in the middle of the ocean surrounded by a coral reef with eleven other sailing yachts. Jutta and I are finishing the newsletter, and enjoying the clear water, snorkeling, sun and the breeze. Pipe Dream sits in calm waters while we look out across the reef at the ocean breakers pounding the reef in its endless struggle to beat it back Tomorrow we will sail to the Bay Islands of Honduras, stay a while and then on to Belize.
I would like to point out that my first article “How to Find a Cruising Mate” was published in the March issue of Latitudes and Attitudes. We are waiting for notification on the second article submitted. As you can probably guess we have made it to the big bucks. When we get our seventy five dollar check we will be in tall cotton, playing like the idle rich, spending the publisher’s money, never having a financial worry again. Now, being a new member of the literary guild, the readers of our newsletter should consider themselves lucky. The printed word comes gratis, from the bowels of Pipe Dream. Not only is the newsletter free, you also receive a full share of bull “dung” with every e-mail (“dung” for those at Merillat). With a smile on our faces and a cold beer in our hands, we bid you farewell.

From the Decks of Pipe Dream
Ferdy and Jutta