After going through the canal we spent several days anchored in the Bahia de Panama. It is not a fantastic anchorage, but it was close by and we needed the convenience of the dinghy dock – we needed to go to our visa appointments at the French Embassy!

All went smoothly at the embassy and they said that if they had any questions we would be contacted by email. Processing would take about six weeks so the waiting period had officially begun.

We were thrilled to get a text from Gimli sailing friends, John and Cindy. They were vacationing in Panama City! We connected for a fun dinner and enjoyed catching up.

We were anchored near Isla Perico. It’s a bit of a carnival area with concessions and shops. On one of the days that Jas and Alex were busy with boat maintenance, Alex gave Dylan some money to go to Panama Karting – what a nice big brother! I loved watching our little speed demon rip around the track!

After the drive shaft situation in the canal, we knew we needed to come up with a plan for a haul out. We determined that Vista Mar Marina, located just up the coast, was our best and most affordable option. The good news was that we did not have to go there immediately. The temporary fix on the drive shaft worked well enough for us to keep our plans to sail to the Pearl Islands with Alex! 

Our six hour sail to the Pearl Islands was nothing short of amazing! Perfect winds, dolphins swimming off the bow, fresh catch for lunch – just me and my three favourite people in the whole wide world!

Our first destination in the Pearl Islands was Isla Contradora. As expected the sun was setting quickly as we arrived. We were welcomed by huge stingrays swimming around us and a gorgeous sky!

Having Alex onboard gave us an excellent opportunity for me to switch roles with Jason when it came to anchoring. I was always on the helm as, on Starship, we did not have a windless (a motorized winch for raising and lowering the anchor) and I was not strong enough to lift the anchor. Morning Stars has a windless so I can now be the one on the bow at anchoring! There was a lot to learn though. The chain needs to be deployed in a strategic way and your depth determines how much chain to let out. We have 200 feet of chain with coloured plastic markers attached along it indicating various lengths. Alex did a great job of running me through the process over and over again while he was onboard. Of course, I messed up many times but he would always patiently guide me without making me feel like a dunce. Going through that process with him really showed me how excellent of a teacher he’d be. He has a great, calm method of explaining and demonstrating things. I loved having that experience working with him as I learned how to do it.

So why did we pick Isla Contradora as our first island to go to? Well, we had friends arriving shortly to spend time with us! Debbie and John live way up north in Inuvik! We met them years ago at a conference in Victoria, BC and became great friends. They were vacationing in Mexico and decided to fly down to Panama to see us! From Panama City they took a ferry to the island. It was so much fun to spend time with them in paradise and to have our boys finally meet them!

They stayed at a lovely Airbnb for four days and we were anchored nearby. We had an absolute blast together enjoying the island, their air conditioned place and sailing! They are experienced boaters as they have a powerboat back home but they have never gone sailing so it was exciting for us to share that with them. They just loved it! The Pacific was really giving us some of the best sailing conditions we’ve ever had. Calm water and beautiful winds!

On our first sailing day with them we did a short hop over to a nearby cut. We cooled off with a swim and spent time on the beach there!

With lots of day still ahead of us we headed out sailing again!

Alex and John treated us to live music that evening!

The following day was originally supposed to be a beach day but after such a fantastic sail day…we decided to hit the repeat button and pull anchor again! The winds were lighter so it was a perfect chance for us to fly our spinnakker sail for the first time!

Isla Contradora is known for being remote and having beautiful, secluded beaches. It’s small and there are few cars. Everyone gets around by foot or gulf cart. On Debbie and John’s last day we rented a gulf cart and enjoyed zipping around the island!

Sadly, we too soon were saying our good-byes to Debbie and John. We all just loved our time with them and they left with big smiles on their faces! It may be a long time until we see them again but we will continue to keep in touch regularly despite the distance. We can’t wait for our next adventures with them! 😎

Once Debbie and John left on the ferry back to Panama City, we still had a number of days before we needed to sail to Vista Mar Marina to do our haul out. Our next destination was Isla Viveros!

Isla Viveros was super interesting. One day we did a bit of a hike up to an old deserted airport runway.

The following day we took the dinghy around to the other side of the island. We found a boat that has seen better days and wondered what happened. We decided that the most likely scenario was its anchor let go in a storm.

We continued to explore and saw that the island was like a ghost town. Big, beautiful homes but very few people there. It was very hot so we were starting to fantasize about finding a place to stop for a cold beer but the only resort we found appeared to have closed down years ago.

The picture below shows what the resort looked like less than 5 years ago! We were curious what the story was on that as well but could not find much online about why it closed down. Our guess is that it was a casualty of covid.

As we sailed into Isla Viveros, we passed a spectacular looking little beach. We ended up doing a full beach day there. We had the entire island to ourselves and time felt like it stood still as we spent our day relaxing, swimming, fishing, cooking and enjoying being together. I knew too soon we’d be saying good-bye to Alex again so I was cherishing every moment!

My next blog shares our sail back to the mainland so that we could do our haul out at Vista Mar Marina in San Carlos. It was there that we finally connected with Blan and a few days later we all hugged Alex good-bye as he left to fly back to Canada. For the many weeks that followed, we worked hard at getting Morning Stars ready to head into the South Pacific!

The blog below talks about why we have decided to add the above Ko-fi button. 😊

Random acts of kindness