Curaçao to San Blas, Panama

Curaçao to San Blas, Panama

Forecast was for mostly 20kn, but can't expect them to cover five days perfectly, so there were no hard feelings for the weathermen as we scooted along in 30 - 35kn, with 3 - 4m seas. Ellida was quite happy with conditions and we covered the distance with just our genoa, sailing at over 6kn in front of the wind.

Fishing was good, we ate tuna all the way and anchored with mackerel in the fridge. We arrived just off the San Blas coast a little early and had to tread water for a few hours till daylight, then made our way in between the reefs to the magical Snug Harbour. As we sailed around the last reef and started the motor to take us into the shallows it didn't. Start. For a long time. So I did all the usual tricks and finally it ran and took us to shelter but a bit too deep for complete comfort, then stopped. After a bit of poking around I found there was water in the motor and at that I became quite miserable, as one would! I did what I could to get it going again, but realised we needed civilisation, and that was a days sail away.