Over the past few days, I have been singing the song “Tomorrow” from the film, show, etc., ’Annie’ – you know the one – ‘Just thinking about tomorrow the sun will come up tomorrow’. I think Mel is tired of hearing my attempts at singing.
I have also had moments when I
remembered what my dear Mum would say ‘Things will look better in the morning
once you have had a good night’s sleep’.
But first let me go back a bit.
We arrived back at the boat after spending 6 days in Antigua and Lake Atitlan
ready to do the final preparations of Passages before we leave RAM Marina after
4 ½ years.
We had also completed all the
necessary forms and payments for the boat’s insurance. Mel was keen to do some
of the suggestions Chris, the surveyor, had made, so he set about working on
the solenoid of the gas bottles for the stove/oven. A simple modification.
However, when it came to
switching on the gas to make a cup of tea, there was no gas. A simple
modification, as this modification had caused a domino effect on the workings
of the whole gas system. Mel had started working on this modification just
after lunch time, Saturday (1.30pm) but by 6.00pm, I said to Mel ‘Stop, we can
try to find out what is going on tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a new day’. One
bonus is I didn’t have to cook as we went out for supper. There is always a
positive to a negative.
We did sleep on the matter
although I know Mel was thinking about ‘gas’ the whole night. By 8.00am the
following morning, we were enjoying a nice cup of tea. All was fine and well.
For the moment…..
We had arranged to join Rob and
Jole and a few other cruisers for a dinghy float later that day, Sunday afternoon.
A dinghy float is when we all meet somewhere on the river, join the dinghies
together and float merrily, wherever the wind or current may take you. One
obviously brings along something to drink and nibbles to share. It is a fun way
to spend an afternoon, with like-minded yachty people discussing the usual
topics. Very gender-based topics of course.
Rob and Jole were going to drive
past our boat to make sure we knew where to go. Thankfully we had arranged this
as when it came to starting our dinghy, the engine would not start. We hopped
into Rob and Jole’s dinghy and thought ‘well, we can deal with this later’.
We had a wonderful time on the
dinghy float. We started off just past the main bridge, upriver and floated all
the way into Lago de Izabal – the largest lake in Guatemala. We bobbed passed
the Castillo de San Felipe which is one of the main castles along that Rio
Dulce that was built by the Spanish but was invaded and later occupied by
actual Pirates.
Unfortunately, in my haste with
the problems with the dinghy, I didn’t take my camera/phone with me. The sunset
was beautiful across Lake Isabel – you’ll just have to take my word for it.
When we arrived back at the boat after a wonderful afternoon, Mel looked at our dinghy again. He couldn’t get it to work so decided that in the morning, he would try to take it to the main dinghy guy in the Rio who was close by. If he had to, he would row there.
Luckily, in the morning (Monday),
he managed to get the dinghy engine started and let rip until he arrived at the
dinghy man’s workshop. Mel was back at the boat less than half an hour later
with the dinghy in working order.
We had decided that we needed to
get going and to make plans to leave RAM and Guatemala. We were also keen to
see how certain aspects or equipment on Passages would work and function when
we cut the umbilical cord from RAM. Would the batteries and solar panels work?
How were the electronics. Remember, Passages had been out of the water and
hadn’t been used for almost 4 1/2 years! At RAM we had power as we were
connected to the shore power.
So, the week starting 27 March,
we decided that by Friday 31 March, we would leave RAM, go down river to a
place called Cayo Quemado and see how everything faired. From Cayo Quemado, it was
a relatively easy journey, about an hour, to Livingston where we would check
out of Guatemala, pay whatever fines we had to pay ☹
and sail to Punta Gorda, in Belize. We would spend about two weeks in Belize
enjoying the world’s second largest barrier reef, then head for the States –
Key West, to be precise, where all our new electronics, wind vane and other
goodies we had ordered and bought while at the Miami Boat Show, were waiting
for us.
Mel started checking everything
over again, while I spent a large part of the week, cutting and preparing
veggies for the freezer and stocking up our food bank. The vegetables and fruit
in Guatemala are so fresh and cheap, I sometimes felt as if I should have paid
the vendors more than what they were asking. For example, half a dozen HUGE
mangoes cost the equivalent of $2 Aussie! The HUGE heads of broccoli and
cauliflower and the size of the carrots and avocadoes! HUGE!
Passages was looking so clean and
shiny after the amount of scrubbing and polishing we had done on her. We were
very proud of how she had scrubbed up!
On the Thursday evening, we went
across to MAR Marina for movie night and to say our farewells to some of the
lovely people we had met while at RAM.
(FYI RAM and MAR marina were once
owned by the same couple – unfortunately they got divorced. She got MAR and he
got RAM).
The movie showing on Thursday
movie night was called ‘The Swimmers’. It was based on the true story of two
sisters who lived in Syria and who were training, under the guidance of their
father, to compete internationally in swimming. Unfortunately, their plans were
thwarted due to the awful war that happened in Syria. It is a thought-provoking
film about refugees and their desperate attempts to make a better life for
themselves.
Friday 31 March, we said our
final ‘Byes’ to RAM and off we were heading down the river towards Cayo
Quemado. The first thing we noticed on the boat was the depth sounder wasn’t
registering the depth. Mmmm an important function to have on a boat. Thankfully,
we knew that the Rio Dulce was consistent in its depth – at least 6 metres,
plus we had our track to follow from when we arrived in the Rio on our
navigational chart plotter, from 2018.
It was a lovely feeling being
back on the water and for Passages to be in the water. Our depth sounder was
still not registering so we thought we would get a chance once we were anchored
in Cayo Quemado. We had to motor as we were heading east, and the wind blows
from the east.
We arrived at the lovely quiet
anchorage of Cay Quemado just after lunch time as it was about an hour and half
motor down the Rio Dulce, across El Golfete – the second lake that forms part
of the Rio Dulce.
At Cayo Quemado, there is a well-known
character and place called Mini Mikes. Mike is a Texan who has been in the Rio
for over 15 years and set up a restaurant called Mini Mikes. It is very rustic
but the hospitality and tasty food is wonderful.
Well to cut a very long story
short, Mel spent the whole weekend trying to fix the depth sounder with no luck
at all. To add to our woes, the batteries were not doing too well either, so we
were having to switch the fridge off at night-time when the solar panels were
no longer effective, for obvious reasons.
By Monday morning, we had decided
that we could not go to Belize without a reliable working depth sounder and
that we needed some new batteries (two minimum) to get us back to the States.
It was a pity that we wouldn’t be going to Belize, but we knew that it was far
more important to make plans to head to the States as soon as possible, so we
could give Passages all the upgrades she so desperately needed.
Mel caught a water taxi back to
Fronteras – RAM on the following Tuesday, 4 April 2023, to buy two new
batteries, which made a huge difference to our power supply.
We started watching the weather
to see when we could make plans to leave Guatemala but, in the meantime, we
tried to enjoy the lovely surroundings around us. We would watch the local
Mayan people take their children to school in their dugout motor boats, the
young boys after school would
catch fish by casting huge nets. A few times during
our stay, we would have people come around to the boat selling fruit, lovely
carved bowls and lovely weaved baskets, or fresh baked goods.
We also spent a few evenings
enjoying the tasty food at Mini Mikes and getting to know Mike. To add to our
woes, our outboard motor for our dinghy still wasn’t working as well as we
thought it should. Mel serviced it and did everything he could. Thankfully we
were close enough to Mikes place so we could row to his place. It seems the
guys at the fuel station added double the amount of oil to the petrol when Mel
filled up (2-stroke engine). The excess oil kept on clogging the spark plugs.
Every day, I kept on thinking
that tomorrow will be better, and we had been expecting a few issues with
Passages, but we had underestimated just how many.
We saw that there was a good
weather window from Tuesday 11 April for the next few days, as we knew it would
take approximately 5 days to read Marina Hemingway, Havana, Cuba. We kept our
eyes on the weather as things always change.
We were unable to use our water
maker as the Rio Dulce is fresh water and the water maker only works in sea
water, plus we needed the new membrane which was on its way to Placencia,
Belize. We decided to head back up to RAM Marina where we would be able to fill
our water tank, so we raised the anchor on Monday 10 April and headed back to
RAM.
(Thankfully, we were able to have
the membrane redirected to 3D Boat yard in Key West, where most of our other
goods were being sent, waiting for us to get to Key West, Florida).
It was lovely to see some of the
wonderful people we had met while in RAM and to hear how they were progressing
with their boats. We were anchored back in Cayo Quemado by mid-afternoon,
preparing for our sail to Havana, Cuba. We had also contacted the agent, Raul,
who was dealing with our paperwork to leave Guatemala.
Mike came to pick us up from our
boat so we could have supper at his place on our last evening in Guatemala. The
food was excellent!
Tuesday 11 April arrived, and
just as the sun was rising Passages’ engine was switched on and Mel started
taking the anchor up, preparing to motor down to Livingston to finally check
out of Guatemala.
I was still singing the song ‘Tomorrow’ as we knew we are very fortunate to be doing what we are doing but there are times when one does become a bit despondent, when things keep on breaking. Mel and I kept on reminding ourselves that Passages had been in storage for a very long time and if we had had the opportunity to sail her during the past 4 ½ years, we would have maintained her, preventing some of the issues we were experiencing. However, the main thing is that her structure and ability to sail and keep us safe, were in good working order, so we would be fine out in the open seas. As far as the depth sounder was concerned, we kept to the path we had come in on, on the Rio Dulce down to Livingston and knew the charts to Havana and Key West were accurate, if we kept to the marked channels, we would be fine.
So, until the next update of our
adventure, take care and enjoy whatever you are doing.
Bye for
now.
Mel and
Caryn
sv Passages
A video: Cayo Quemado
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