Category Archives: Pics

Back in civilisation (?)

Posted on Friday May 4th, 2012 by dafdaf

After one complete month that we spent in Kuna Yala, we’re now back in the so called western civilisation. The contrast couldn’t be any bigger. The San Blas islands, little sand patches with palm trees and beautyful corals and now Colon, a stinky town with rotten buildings and lots of noise.

After seven months that we spent on islands we’ve now put our feet on a continent for the first time since leaving Portugal. Right now we lie in the Shelter Bay Marina where our kids spend the day in the pool and the djungle begins right after exiting through the marina door and one can hear howler monkeys and lots of birds all day. There are crocodiles (!!) in the harbour water and we meet many sailors that we ran into on other islands in the Caribbean. All discussions are about the channel, the date when to leave and what is still to be done at the ship. Really pleasent to be with many other sailors again.

And we’ve been very busy since arriving: We’ve done all paperwork for the passage, the ship is measured and fenders and panama-lines are rented. We also did our biggest shopping until now and got groceries for about 900 dollars on board. Enough to last until Tahiti we hope. Gui was at the doctors and got antibiotics for her otitis of the middle ear – so in the next weeks there’s medicine instead of snorkeling…

Tomorrow we’ll leave the marina and sail towards Portobello where we’d like to persuade the Kira to follow us into the Rio Chagres. And as soon as we know the date for the passage into the Pacific, we go back to Colon to get the Rancho Relaxo out of the water and do new antifouling and take care of a few little rust patches on the waterline. Mmmmh.

Posted in Animals, LosLocos, Pics, Plants, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | Comments Off

Past San Blas and towards Colón

Posted on Monday April 30th, 2012 by dafdaf

10 days have passed. Andres an Yoko have left with a speedboat towards Carti today in the morning. We’ve got ten amazing days together. Unfortunately we had a lot of wind and rain during the last days but still managed to have a lot of fun !

We’ve been to the Cayos Limón, Cayos Holandes, the ‘pool’, back to Cayos Holandes West and back to Cayos Limón. We went hunting with the speargun and had nice fish for dinner, we saw big rays and we saw our first shark while snorkeling ! – A nurse shark with about two meters length; it’s not dangerous, they say.

On another day I helped an italian skipper to get out a grouper with about 35 kilos. Amazing fish and very tasty !!

Too bad, our friends have no more time. Today the sun is blasting again and we could stay for another while. – but – we will leave for Porvenir today, to clar out of San Blas. Tonight or tomorrow we’ll sail towards Colón to get our ship out of the water and do anti-fouling and fresh paint. After that we’ll prepare for the canal passage.

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Viola’s 4th birthday and visitors from Argentina

Posted on Saturday April 21st, 2012 by dafdaf

Yesterday we welcomed Gui’s brother with girlfriend on the Rancho Relaxo and today is Viola’s 4th birthday. We spend an hour on the internet to enable our family to send their wishes and afterwards we’ll sail to the Cayos Holandes to spend the birthday at the wonderful beach !

Posted in Kids, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 11 Comments

Time to say goodbye (again)

Posted on Wednesday April 18th, 2012 by dafdaf

Alone again…

The last two weeks were beautiful. – Being together with our friends, diving together, having parties or just talking about everything there is… But now all started to go west towards Portobello and Colon, to start the tiresome paperwork connected with the canal passage. We on the other side will have visitors and we’ll stay two more weeks in these beautiful islands of Kuna Yala.

So right now, we’re not doing much and hang around in the Cayos Limón. Tomorrow, we’ll sail to Carti where Gui will leave with a 4×4 to go to Panama City, where she’ll pick up her brother and his girlfriend.

Otherwise there isn’t much happening here. – The wind has disappeared again and it’s incredibly hot and moist. The only chance to not go crazy is to spend as much time as possible in the water. Heh.

Posted in LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 1 Comment

Many new posts and pictures

Posted on Sunday April 15th, 2012 by dafdaf

There seems to be something wrong – our last four posts were not published on our blog, so now that we’re connected to the Internet for once, I’m doing a big update of all the infos of the last weeks. I’d have a ton of photos but the connection is too slow to upload them all.

Right now we’re back in the western, ‘civilized’ part of Kuna Yala and are at anchor at the Cayos Limon. And there’s a little bar at the beach that has satellite connection and internet – unbelievable.

Well. Enough talk… Here come a few pics from our crossing of the Caribbean Sea:

Posted in LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 7 Comments

Off towards Panama !!

Posted on Wednesday March 21st, 2012 by dafdaf

After checking out we’ll leave the Dominican Republic and sail towards Panama. The destination is El Porvenir in the San Blas archipelago. Belonging to the people of the Kuna, there is no infrastructure, no power, no internet, no shopping and no garbage disposal. It is said it’s one of the most beautiful spots on our planet and still looks the same as it did hundreds of years ago.

The trip is roughly 800 nautical miles and should therefore take us 7 or 8 days. We’ll have our sattelite phone turned on every day at 12:00 UTC while sailing and we will update the blog via shortwave radio. As we now should be able to receive comments some kind of communication should still be possible. But don’t expect an answer on the same day. Hehehe.

Details about the communication can be found on the page ‘Contact’ – but only for logged in users !

Posted in Amateur Radio, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 2 Comments

Nightly dinghy-shopping and the pirate vessel ‘La Grace’

Posted on Tuesday March 20th, 2012 by dafdaf

It was late in the evening when we came back from shopping and had to move lots of beer and an enormous amount of little shopping bags into the dinghy. What once was a logistical nightmare is now quite normal and we managed to get everything aboard dry and safe.

Something quite mysterious happened while we were away from our ship: The stern of the Rancho Relaxo was full with dead bees. And the dinghy was full of them ! Hundreds, maybe a thousand dead bees, all cut in half or somehow else destroyed. We have no idea what might have happened but we’re quite lucky that we weren’t aboard when the massacre took place.

Next day we saw a beautiful tall ship in the anchorage and I immediately recognized her as the ship that we saw in Las Palmas in November. Back then it vanished before we could have a closer look but this time Bruno and me took the dinghy and entered immediately !

The first thing that amazed both of us was that they have cannons on board ! And not only that – we were greeted by two boys in full pirate costume – with real daggers. The second thing that I found quite astonishing: This ship is actually just two years old ! Has been built in Egypt and is now cruising the seas as a school ship that also takes charter guests. The vessel is running under the flag of the Czech Republic which is as uncommon as the austrian flag, hehehe. The friendly crew showed us around and we spend mazbe two hours on this beautiful sailing vessel. Nice !

Posted in LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 2 Comments

Guillermina can dive !!!

Posted on Monday March 19th, 2012 by dafdaf

After Bruno learned to swim, Gui couldn’t wait any more and finished her PADI Open Water course. So now she too is an licenced diver ! Yeah !!!

I joined her on her first dive in the ocean and took a few pictures. Unfortunately the site wasn’t that exciting and the visibility was not too good. But we had a lot of fun and there are cannons, anchor and other things from a ship lost in 1752 down there. We saw lion fish and lots of other colorful little creatures.

After four wonderful days in the hotel together with Gui’s parents we’re back in Bayahibe and started to prepare ourselves for the crossing towards Panama. It’s not yet decided but I think we might leave on tuesday after checking out in Casa de Campo. Our friends on the SY Kira are right now underway to Cartagena in Colombia and the timing seems good to meet them in the Islas san Blas in a week or so. And the hopes are high to also meet with the SY Tamora and the SY Thor since both of them are right now in Bonaire and wait for good weather to go to Panama, too. Sounds like there’s gonna be a big party soon !

Posted in Learning for life, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo | 5 Comments

Bruno can swim !!!

Posted on Thursday March 15th, 2012 by dafdaf

Despite MANY good events in the recent days this has to be the headline. For a family living on a sailboat this is by far the most important thing and now it happened: Bruno learned to swim ! It’s difficult to tell who is more happy about that – the parents or the kid himself.

And for me it’s difficult to find a beginning. As always – many things happen at the same time. My family is back. And they brought along the grand parents with whom they spent a week in Miami. Now we’re enjoying a holiday in the midst of our holiday-like journey. Gui’s parents invited us to spend four days together in a wonderful hotel near Bayahibe.

The Rancho Relaxo is alone at anchor in front of the Marina de Guerra who promised to keep an eye on our floating home and our dinghy while we enjoy the all inclusive club and have Campari-Soda and Caipirinhas at the pool.

Today Gui started her PADI diving course and tomorrow we’ll go diving together somewhere out on the sea. I don’t know exactly where, but it’s gonna be fun and I’ll bring along the GoPro to make pics and videos ! That’s all for now. It’s been a long and eventful day and I’m the only one awake right now as all the others fell asleep right after sunset.

Posted in Animals, Kids, Learning for life, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo | 3 Comments

Last night in Bayahibe

Posted on Sunday March 11th, 2012 by dafdaf

Wow ! A week has already passed ! Tomorrow I’ll sail the Rancho Relaxo towards Casa de Campo marina to pick up my loved ones in the afternoon.

Not much has happened the last days. I got about 20 kilo clothes washed, dried and stowed away. Today I cleaned the ship on the inside and repaired a few little things. Finally I found the little crack in a waterfilter that got replaced, a vent of the engine broke and was repaired. And the funniest thing: Just before leaving Viola or Bruno put a lock-code on my iPod ! – Couldn’t use it anymore. ARRR !! The only chance would be to connect it to the computer it was first synced with (which doesn’t exist anymore) or to erase and reprogram it – resulting in the loss of about 55GB of good music. So I tried all of the 9999 possible combinations to the lock. Since Bruno mentioned that it was something with nines, I started from the back.

Now guess what the code was ? Eh ? Well…. 0003. Maybe I should have started from 0000 that would have been faster. But – hey – I got my music back ! Rock’n'roll !!

Posted in Apple, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | Comments Off

Alone at the bar…

Posted on Friday March 9th, 2012 by dafdaf

…not really at the bar but more so in an internet- (or as called in the 90′s: cyber-)cafe. Hehehe. Yeah, internet through the good ol’ network cable.

I wish, I could tell some amazing stories of the lonesome sailor in Domrep but actually I’m quite bored and feel lonely. As said before, there isn’t much to do in Bayahibe. I’m cleaning the ship, got two gigantic bags with laundry to the shore and now I’m in the net, trying to get an old website of a friend to work.

Posted in Net, Pics, Rancho Relaxo | 5 Comments

A cake a day and the teeth go away !

Posted on Monday March 5th, 2012 by dafdaf

The captain found a nice place to hide: no internet and no network coverage. That’s a good beach to get older without anyone noticing.

Gui and the kids are up early on the 3.3.2012, decorating table and cake and drawing a nice birthday card. The skipper is 38 and gets a massage under palm trees for his back. Bruno tries the first piece of cake and – CRACK – what was that ?!? Bruno’s first milk tooth just came loose. Bruno is extremely happy as now he is ‘older’. Loosing the milk teeth was one thing he was waiting for with great excitement.

After breakfast we leave for the beach and have a wet landing thanks to a little swell that developed during the night. Viola’s life vest got a little too wet and – PFFFFFFF !!! – transforms from a little red thing in a big yellow one. Well, at least we know that it’s working. Heh.

Posted in Kids, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo | 8 Comments

Pics from the Isla Saona

Posted on Monday March 5th, 2012 by dafdaf

As promised, I’m gonna post some pics of one of the most beautiful beaches we’ve seen so far. (The others being: Islas Cies, White Island and Barbuda). I guess, I’ll just skip the text as the photos will speak for themselves:

There are more photos on our Facebook-page. I hope my repaired Macbook will be back soon, then I’ll upload a ton of pictures on our gallery.

Posted in Kids, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 1 Comment

Isla Saona – teaser…

Posted on Sunday March 4th, 2012 by dafdaf

We’re back in Bayahibe after two nights on the wonderful island of Saona. Tomorrow I’ll post more photos, right now just a teaser for you.

Posted in LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | 1 Comment

Quiet days in Bayahibe

Posted on Wednesday February 29th, 2012 by dafdaf

Not much going on here…. Once again I cleaned the bilge and made a few improvements to the interior of our home. Gui took Pinguin for a test sail. She’s now infected with the virus of Dinghy sailing. Yay !

Tomorrow in the morning we’ll leave for the Isla Saona to spend two or three days there before we’ll separate for a week. And I just found out that the Isla Saona “…is promoted amongst European visitors as the setting for the famous Bounty chocolate bar adverts…” Great !

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Sterling-regulator installed and on to Bayahibe

Posted on Tuesday February 28th, 2012 by dafdaf

On our last trip we had to run under engine for an entire day. In cases like these it would be nice if the alternator would fill up all batteries to 100%. But this is ususally not the case. Therefore we installed the new, digital Sterling alternator regulator that will now handle the charging. I installed it together with Bruno before leaving to Bayahibe so we could test it on the way. It works great !!

So now we are in Bayahibe – just five miles east of the marina but it’s much nicer to be at anchor again. Although the village here doesn’t provide much. There is a small shop and a few restaurants, a cyber-cafe (where I’m at, right now) and a dive shop. The beaches are crowded with large skiffs with huge outboard engines. Those drive the tourists to the Isla Saona that’s around the corner. This island will be our next stop. It must be beautiful as every day hundereds of people are going for a trip there.

What else ? Well there are only six days left for Gui and the kids until they leave for Miami. Huh, then I’ll be alone here in this little village – just me and the Rancho Relaxo. Well – could be worse.

We spent a nice afternoon at the beach where we found a palm tree perfect for beginners. Everybody tried to climb and saw how difficult it is. We didn’t even get to half of the height, but still we managed to do a few quite good pictures. Hehehe.

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Carnival in Casa de Campo

Posted on Sunday February 26th, 2012 by dafdaf

While the crew of the Rancho Relaxo is busy washing clothes, putting new cables across the ship, repairing the bathroom door, backing up all laptops…. The harbour is being transformed and guests and employees alike prepare for the carnival show tonight. Not much to write about… Look the pictures:

Posted in LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo | 1 Comment

Driving a car with five years

Posted on Saturday February 25th, 2012 by dafdaf

Another child’s dream has come true: Today Bruno with his five years drove his own car ! And this he did on streets with traffic and all that.

Well, we aren’t in the capital but still – Hhe drove very well and quite save. The other cars are cautious because the whole area around the marina is a big holiday-village with lots of golf cars driving around. So we got one of these electro-golfcars for ourselves and Bruno squeezed himself behind the stering wheel, replacing the captain and rode with us through the countryside and on the streets of ‘Casa de Campo’.

In the afternoon, Gui called us on the VHF. She left the marina at 04:30h in the morning to go to Santo Domingo where she received her visa for the U.S. (finally !) Thus Bruno drove us back to the marina, we picked up Gui and went to Alto de Chavón where we had a pizza and a beautiful view of the river. Of course he didn’t go straight but found a few ‘shortcuts’ through the field. Hehehe.

Oh .- and Altos de Chavón is actually not a real medieval village but was built in the 80ies. But still very nice.

Ah – and in the morning, the captain once more put on the diaper-shoes and cleaned the bilge. One of my favourite occupations.

Posted in Kids, Learning for life, LosLocos, Pics, Travel | 1 Comment

Cleaning the ship and a stroll with Pinguin

Posted on Friday February 24th, 2012 by dafdaf

Today in the morning as Gui was busy getting everything together for her Visa application, the kids and me were strolling through the marina and looking at a very beautiful ship that’s lying on the next jetty. A beutiful and big schooner with the most amazing stern I’ve seen so far. But how unfortunate – the ship has not been moved in more than four years ! And nobody takes care of it. So it’s rotting away…. Poor thing  – they should give it to us, we could use a little extra space. Hehehe.

And then we were doing something we never did before: We CLEANED the Rancho Relaxo and her tenders ! While most of the boats around us are not sailed but only cleaned, we usually do ot the other way around. We sail a lot and let the spray and the rain do the cleaning. But since the water in this marina has too much chlorine to put it into our tanks, we used it (a LOT of it) to make the deck and cockpit white and shiny again. We also cleaned our two tenders and finally found the little hole where our deflatable has been loosing air the past two weeks.

After that much work we took Bruno’s little ‘Pinguin’ for a ride. We left the marina and went out to sea. But not very far as our destination was the river Chavon which we sailed up for about an hour. Unfortunately I couldn’t take any nice pics as I was busy handling the boat and the two kids at the same time. But it was a lot of fun and both kids enjoyed it very much.

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The cruise to the Dominican Republic

Posted on Friday February 24th, 2012 by dafdaf

Sorry for the delay… But after three months of anchoring we finally arrived in a marina. And as it is… there’s NO Internet ! Pah ! On pretty much every anchorage we had access to the net using our amazing WLAN antenna – but here, where we actually pay for services like these there isn’t any net available. So now I sit in a bar while Gui and the kids watch a movie in the cinema. Also not too bad.

So here are a few pics. Not too many as there wasn’t much happening during the trip. The kids did some artworks using batting and glue while Gui and me were handling the sails. And this we did quite often. It’s amazing how the Rancho Relaxo changes during a few minutes. Passat sails up, down, Blister to starboard or to port. And the last night we were sailing on the wind. Especially our batteries liked these last hours. The wind generaor was working hard and the energy supply of our ship was filled up during those hours.

Which brings me to the next mood point about that marina: Of course they have different power connectors in the Dominican Republic but why don’t they provide adaptors for us poor european sailors ? Well, the sun is shining every day and the solar panels should do for now.

Posted in Kids, LosLocos, Pics, Rancho Relaxo, Sailing | Comments Off