Ex-USA school buses have been resprayed with colourful graphics and have amped up stereos to listen to as you zoom around the city.

Graeme took this downtown Cinco de Mayo

Ready for the hull survey and new antifouling

We tried to get up on this slip on the first day we were booked (the next available gap being after Christmas) the weather was foul and we broke three lines before the Captain called to abort the mission until the next day. The cradle arms don’t fold in- the only thing holding up the boat is six lines balancing her on her keel.

Take 2 "goodbye Panama

Six weeks have passed since we were struck- the time has been spent back at Balboa Yacht Club. The FEDEX shipment of replacement electronics finally arrived. After working dawn to dusk with help from Mike, our American electrician, we have finally got to a stage where we can leave. Although we have to ignore some loose ends like the autopilot and the fact that we haven’t actually seen any insurance yet.

Graeme returned today from Costa Rica, Nicaragua and San Salvador with many exiting stories of being stung by stingrays, fast horse rides under low braches, waterfalls, volcanos and tipsy lake swimming. He’s all G’d up for the sail to Ecuador tomorrow.

Although Ill miss our postcard view of the Bridge of Americas and some great locals that work at the yacht club (and others who sell the best fish and patacones in the world), Im more than ready to sail again. The things I cherish about Panama city include the painted graphics on the public buses, the fact that every supermarket has a public toilet, the locals’ tolerance of my Spanish (Spanglish in reality), the black birds that arch their head back and screech as they defend a piece of patacone rather than craning forward like an Auzzie seagull, the remaining mossy burnt shells of French 1940’s architecture left from the American invasion in 89’in downtown Chorrillo and Park Metropolitano where you can see woodpeckers, coatis, snakes and agoutis in an ambushed jungle refuge near the heart of the city. Things I don’t like so much is the snails pace anyone who is getting paid a wage moves at, the insane traffic arrangement through the jammed polluted city, the collection of American solo sailors who are addicted to ten dollar hookers and the fact that no matter how hard your resolve you will end up at the sprawling, air-conditioned mechanical reindeer farm of Allbrook Mall. Take two, good bye Panama.