February Update!

February 4, 2010
Icarian is situated in Esnesdup in the Naguargandup Cays in Kuna Yala, Panama! In other words 'Paradise'! We arrived back in Kuna Yala on January 10th after a 35 hour passage from Cartagena, Columbia. The passage was relatively good with winds from the NE varying from 15 to 20 knots. Our seas were in the 8 to 10 foot range and on our stern quarter so kind of rolly. We arrived in the Eastern Hollandes at 10:30 p.m. and with the previous tracking on our GPS and radar we were able to anchor right where we wanted to be.
Brian has been in project mode having now replaced a lower rigging wire and checked out all the rest of our rigging. He installed a new 'Tacktick' wind speed and direction instrument on our masthead. This unit is wireless so no wires to slap in the mast. He has also replaced two turning blocks with ones twice the size and was not too surprised to see some of the bolts on the old ones just break off. Now no worries!
He had to trouble shoot a problem with our generator as it spewed oil all over the engine compartment. It had blown a tiny ¼" plug which he then had to find in all the muck under the engine. He did find it and now the generator is working like a charm.
Marilyn learned a lesson on packing the freezer. She thought that because we had all our meats pre-frozen that packing them tightly together would be just fine. Well freezers only work well when the cold air can circulate around the food otherwise it thaws. Luckily the lesson was learned and only a quarter of our supplies had thawed.
We are into the windy month here in Kuna Yala and those people with wind generators are very happy. Icarian tends to anchor behind lovely islands out of the breeze where the waters are very tranquil. We have done some snorkeling and swimming and Marilyn has been into water aerobics around the boat.
At the moment there are about 180 boats enjoying the San Blas. About 100 of those are just passing through en-route to the Panama Canal from Europe.
There have been two, "around the world rally's" pass through the area with many boats enjoying a 15 month round the world tour together. They seem to be having a great time and have lots of interesting boat names to amuse us.
So that is it from Paradise for now. Happy Sailing everyone!