On to Galapagos!

Date: 4th April, 2024

Where am I? 

Latitude: 03°41.8 N

Longitude: 084°11.2 W

How is the weather?

What am I feeling?

Relief that our Canal transit passed almost perfectly (see below for why I say “almost”!) – I wouldn’t exactly say that I’ve been really stressed about the transit going to plan but it’s certainly great to have it behind us and now have an open ocean ahead! Also, I’m feeling a sense of peace as the leisurely rhythm of passage making kicks in.

What has happened this week?

On Monday, 1st April 2024, after 18 months of careful planning and anxious anticipation, we finally completed our transit of the Panama Canal – I will post a separate blog in the next few days with more detail of the planning and execution of our transit for those who are interested. 

But in summary, we completed our pre-departure checklists (which I have been tracking obsessively for some time now!) with the major tasks such as hull cleaning & certification, fumigation & certification (required by the Galapagos authorities) and final provisioning.

And we are now 7 aboard with the arrival of Per & Anne on 28th March. We had our last meal on land for a week or so at the Dock restaurant in Shelter Bay Marina on Sunday 31st March and then returned to Fujin to receive our line handler, Alex, along with 4 125’ nylon braid dock lines and 5 large ball fenders.

We were all up around 0230 on 1st April, splendidly attired in our Fujin crew sun tops, to release our power cable from the dock and set up our slip lines. We departed Shelter Bay Marina at 0315 to be ready to collect our Canal Advisor (rather like a pilot who guides the skipper on handling the yacht in the Canal Zone) at the Flats outside the marina at 0400.

The Advisor, Roy, came aboard a little late (around 0430) and we headed off to the first locks (Gatun Locks) – three locks which we entered at around 0630, taking us up to Gatun Lake. We locked in behind a Korean car carrier (Glovis Cosmos), rafted up to a Jeanneau 40DS, very similar or our first Fujin (a Jeanneau 43DS). We were happy with this arrangement as it meant that we were in the middle of the lock and not moored against the wall, with all the potential for scraping which that implies.

The transit through the Gatun Lake was straightforward, as was the descent through Perdro MIguel Lock and Miraflores Locks. There is a visitors’ centre at Miraflores Locks, with an IMAX theatre with a movie telling the story of the construction of the Canal, bar, restaurant and a couple of view platforms for tourists to view ships going through the locks. Our crew all lined up to wave to the crowd from the foredeck and were rewarded with a round of applause, which was rather amusing! Thankfully, our exit from the locks went well!

The one blemish on the whole experience was being practically rammed on our starboard side by the pilot vessel which arrived to take Roy, our Advisor, off Fujin just outside Balboa Yacht Club, on the Pacific Side of the Bridge of the Americas. The pilot boat driver was particularly incompetent, T boning us midships and damaging our starboard fold up ladder. We may also have a slightly bent ladder gate as well. Our Advisor nearly had his legs broken in the process but our line handler managed to haul him away from danger at the last moment. Thankfully nothing structural, but very annoying all the same, particularly as one has to agree to a waiver of responsibility by the Canal authorities for this sort of situation. Anyway, we will write in to raise a complaint at some point. Our trusty camerawoman, Chris, has the evidence on one of our DJI Action 4 cameras!

It was quite a moment to witness the last Miraflores gate slowly open upon the Pacific Ocean: behind us the hulking behemoth Glovis Cosmos blocking out the light and ahead of us, a high iron wall opening and swinging inward. As though we were a band of intrepid characters in a Tolkien epic, chased by orcs, escaping the old and setting forth on a new voyage of discovery. The Pacific at last! Now no barrier lies between us and dreams of giant tortoises, blue footed boobies, Darwin’s finches, long ocean passages, Polynesian islands and warm, wafting breezes!

From Panama City, there are approximately 850 nautical miles of ocean to cross before making landfall at Puerto Baquerizo, on the island of San Cristobal in the Galapagos. Having exited the Canal at around 1530, we motored down the edge of the shipping channel to a point where we were past the large ship anchorage area. Then we set a course for our first waypoint, 110 miles away to the south west off Punta Mala – great sailing with the wind 20 knots to 30 knots from the north with double reefed main and genoa sails. We made excellent progress at 8 to 10 knots of speed over the ground, until eventually having to resort to the engine at 0300 on 2nd April. Since then, we are either sailing slowly close hauled or motorsailing given low wind conditions.

We are now settling into our watch pattern – mostly 3 hour watches with shorter “dog” watches in early afternoon to ensure that we don’t have the same watch time every day – everyone gets a turn to be on watch when the sun rises, for example. I am doing my watch solo while our other 6 crew members are paired up. So 4 watch teams means one has a good 9 hours off during the night – a real luxury! If I can figure out how to do it, I will post our watch schedule somewhere on the blog.

The original forecast was that we would have to motor for 4 days to reach Galapagos – more engine time than we would like but it’s the nature of the beast on this passage. Our experience is bearing out the forecast so far. We are crossing the doldrums and El Niño continues to have some impact on the weather patterns this year. Our approach is to motorsail (ie put on the engine with the mainsail out) at 1,800 rpm (giving 7 knots of speed) if our sailing speed drops below 4 knots for a sustained period. We are not in any rush and want to ensure that we reach the Galapagos with sufficient reserves of diesel.

Fujin out!