Panama.

People often ask me what it’s like sailing across the Pacific with 3 girls. Well….it’s a bit cramped but it has its compensations. They don’t call me Captain Dick for nothing.

Six weeks at sea had left the girls as fresh as daisies. I on the other hand was worn out, nut brown and leathery, a cross between Michael Caine and the Ancient Mariner. We hit the California coast off Mendocino as predicted (good job Nyum) but decided not to make landfall. Our experience in Maui with US Customs and Immigration had made us wary. Instead we headed for Baja and points south making our first stop in San Blas. Franciscan friars led by Friar Junípero Serra headed out of San Blas on their quest to colonize the Californias.

 Puerto Vallarta, Zihuatanejo, Acapulco, gold, la mordida, the wind blew us gently down the sloping coast of the Americas until we sighted Darien and the fabled city of Panama. Big office buildings and stuff. You wouldn’t know it now but Henry Morgan really did a number on that place in 1671.

“An old Negro with mackintosh, solar topee and rolled umbrella and gaiters limping along the dock wharf – why are there always these old men limping along wharves?.....Hot rain, coconut palms, pelicans.” From Through the Panama,  Malcolm Lowry.