Cruising with Soggy Paws
Soggy Paws is a 44' CSY Sailboat, and has recently set sail on a 10 year around the world cruise.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Isla Contadora, Las Perlas, Panama
Monday, Sep 15
Anchorage Position: 08-37.91N 79-02.39W

We left Taboga about 8:30 for the 40 mile run to the Las Perlas islands. We had chosen an anchorage on the north coast of Contadora, because someone told Dave that there was good diving there. The guidebooks talk a lot about the winter weather, but they don't say much about the summer weather. And we don't know the normal weather patterns here.

We had a nice day motoring across. We trolled two fishing lines, and did get several hits, but all the fish we pulled in were Bonito, which aren't very good eating.

When we arrived at the anchoring spot, it looked OK. Here again there were moorings in the anchorage, but also a couple of anchored cruising boats. So we picked a spot between empty moorings and anchored in 25'. Checking my trusty electronic tide table, we were at high tide, with a 15 foot tidal range. That means that at low tide, our 25' depth will shrink to 10' !!!

During the evening, dark clouds started to build. We had a pretty good lightning show after dinner. We were a little apprehensive about what the weather might bring during the night. But the weather held until early morning, when we really got hit... hard rain and lots of lightning and thunder very close by. We filled our water tanks and put the valuable electronics in the oven. Fortunately, no direct hits from the lightning.

The forecast was for strong SWly winds, and we were a little exposed to the SW. We heard a couple of boats on the net talking about Isla Pedro Gonzales. We remembered reading an SSCA letter from another cruiser saying that Pedro Gonzales was the best anchorage they'd seen on the whole west coast of Central America.

So when the rain let up, we set off for Pedro Gonzales.

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