Eastern Holandes Cays, San Blas

Friday, February 22, 2002

009-35.340 N
078-46.800 W

Ahoy from Banedup, which is one of the small islands in the Holandes Cays, which are part of the island group known as the San Blas Islands off the coast of Panama. Right now we're anchored in 8-10' of pure sand with water clear as you can imagine. There's nothing between the boats and open ocean, other than a massive reef system about 1/2 of a mile wide. The seas, which are running 8-11', pound into the reefs and send up massive plumes of spray. Cuts through the reefs let you get right to the edge, and it's an impressive site! And the color...it's this translucent milky aquamarine. I've never seen such a color before in nature, but it's beautiful.

The biggest "problem" is the current that these all of this water pouring over the reef creates. By floating along in my dinghy with a GPS, I've measured the current in the anchorage at between 1.5 and 2.3 kts! I can barely keep even with my fins on. In order to "swim" off the back of the boat you need a line to hold on to. That can be a lot of fun too, as by angling your body you can zoom over the bottom. Swimming in the reefs is very difficult due to the current, which can be zero one moment and huge the next. This is really a shame as the reefs are very alive.

There are large (6'+ )Eagle Rays which just hang out in the current. They just wait for their food to float by in the current. Yesterday I got some great underwater shots of one hanging out by Stormy Petrel. I was able to just swim above him for minutes and watch. What was kind of neat was that it had a cleaner fish working on its tail.

Had a great crab feast the other night. $1/pound, and that was twice the price of further east. The smallest crab was about 4 lbs with huge legs and claws. Yum!

I finally got my camera ordered. What an ordeal! Probably ran up $100 in sat phone bills. Now we'll see how long it takes to get here and what hassles I go through on this end...
Log ID: 173