Well I’m not going to go in to perfect detail at this time but here are the basics. I figure I need to arrive in Australia by November and will encounter mostly expensive food in the South Pacific. Based on those assumptions the general consensus among budget mindful sailors leaving Panama is to buy as much food as you can, or enough for 6 months. I think I have accomplished that after three taxies full of food. Basically I have around 25lbs of spaghetti and pasta not counting the 60 packages of Chinese noodles. Another 20 lbs. of rice, couple pounds of sugar, and flour, maybe 5 cases (24 each) of canned veggies, Chile, beans, corn, peas etc. Plenty of spices, coffee, dried milk powder, Soy-meat stuff, some other dried food, but that’s basically the bulk of it. Fresh stuff is just a few lbs of cheese, lunch meet and chorizo (sausage), I have a very small fridge but generally don’t use it all of the time but I have almost enough meet and cheese to get me to Galapagos. Then there is the produce, I bought a lot of extra veggies since I have other friends that have already been in the Perlas Islands for a week and need to restock, so I figure I bought about triple what I needed, 50lbs potatoes, 50lbs onions, 15 lbs tomatoes, 15 lbs cucumbers, 10 lbs limes, 10 lbs carrots, apples and bananas, 6 pineapples, 20 garlic cloves, 5 lbs green peppers, about 50 eggs, and I cant remember what else! I also brought about 4 cases of beer, 15 liters of wine, 5 gallons of rum (for trading). I have 50 gallons of water, I plan to up that to around 60-70 after leaving the Galapagos for Marquiesas. My diesel tank holds 15 gallons and I carry another 20 gallons in four jugs, so that’s 35 gallons of diesel, plus I have three two-gallon gasoline jugs for the dinghy outboard motor, I only filled one with gasoline, and one with diesel, so total Diesel is really 37 gallons, most I’ve ever had on board, and around 2 gallons of gasoline. 2 gallons alcohol and 5 gallons kerosene just for the stove. Not to mention 8 rolls of toilette paper, 6 rolls of paper towels, two cases of Coca-Cola. 10 liters of fruit juice, UGH how did I fit it all!? Well you can. I probably could have even fit it and kept the V-birth empty if I wanted to jam-pack all of the cockpit lockers. However I Think salsa is REALLY heavy, about 4 inches deeper than the original waterline, the top of the white boot-stripe that is normally well above the waterline is more or less submerged. This makes cleaning the bottom a pain, weird seaweed grassy stuff grows on the waterline and has to be scraped off regularly in addition to the scraping of the bottom. I guess that’s to be expected, I haven’t even mentioned all the extra equipment like wind vane, solar panels, 4 anchors, 250’ of anchor chain at one pound per foot, life raft (80lb) dinghy and outboard (100lb), the list just goes on and on, I didn’t even realize myself until I started writing this!!! OH, probably 50lbs in charts and guides, another 25lbs in novel type books, over 300lbs in batteries making up the 600amp hour battery bank. Its amazing salsa isn’t already sunk! The best part about having all this crap on board is that salsa is still sailing great! On a trip here I averaged over one knot faster than a 35’ boat, and in 15kts of wind I can still sail upwind almost close-hauled at 6kts, so everything seems just fine!

I feel good about making the jump into the Pacific in the next week. I think I’m ready, Salsa is ready, there are a few very minor jobs that I could skip or do underway. All major systems and equipment are working great. Biggest concern is the ITCZs / Doldrums that have captured half of the boats currently in route to the Galapagos and forced them to drift for a few days or use their motors. That’s why I’m waiting here, maybe up to a week in hopes to find a nice weather window to take me all the way, wish me luck and you can expect an update in a few weeks from Galapagos. Maybe by then Ill have some of the retro-blogs from Colombia and San Blas. Wow, once again I really feel like I’m getting underway for the first in nearly a year. Thanks again to everyone that has been reading along, thanks to James and Mae for there help with the refitting and guidance! And especially my family and friends who have always been supportive of me. Ill try to keep hitting the spot-check satellite tracker one or twice a day, don’t freak out if it doesn’t work sometimes, and if someone has a radio and wanted to reach me Ill be checking into the Panama Pacific Passage Marine Radio net at 8143 LSB at 9AM Panama time (1400 Zulu?) , and 6PM as well once underway. Otherwise just send an email and Ill do my best to respond from Galapagos. WISH ME LUCK!! This is Salsa signing off except for the satellite position updates.

Filed under: sailing • Trip

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