1man1boat

I’m in my underwear, on my back, in a pool of diesel, glistening in sweat, yanking on a fuel hose. My feet are sticking up out of the cockpit locker. My head is under the diesel tank. “You fucking bitch,” I yell as loudly as I can. My ears hurt because there is nowhere down here for the sound to go. I hate this fucking boat. “You piece of shit whore, you’re not worth 25 cents!” With that the hose pops off the tank and my face is sprayed with diesel.
I have been working for over a week to fix “Ventura’s” fuel problem. Every once in a while, the engine just dies. Not because there is a problem with the engine, but because there is a fuel blockage somewhere. The last time it happened was June 3, about six miles from Panama City. It had been a night of thunder, lightning and total white-out, blinding rain. And ships everywhere, black, throbbing monsters that sneak out of the night, so close you can hear their engines, a guttural menace that feels like animal lust or hate. One passed by so close I had to look up at its nav lights. I could smell it. It’s engine throbbed, and I thought that must be what it’s like to die in the jaws of a lion, it’s breath on your neck and the sound of its heart the last thing you ever hear.
In the midst of all that the engine died again. I changed fuel filters. That bought a couple of hours. Dawn. We’re in the tidal current off Taboga Island, only six or seven miles from Balboa, Panama. Dozens of ships are at anchor, chained, but still hungry and dangerous, since we are drifting and there is no wind. I finally discover I can run the engine at low RPM, so we motor in to Balboa at slow speed, alongside the channel that enters the Panama Canal, under the watchful (I imagine scornful) eye of Flamenco Signal Station, who control vessel movement near and in the canal. Finally, on Sunday, June 3, we pick up a mooring at Balboa Yacht Club.
Now that’s a place. People don’t come to Balboa Yacht Club, they end up here. It burned down 10 years ago, so it operates out of a temporary bar. We’re talking a corrugated steel roof on poles. No walls, just a run-down bar and a few cheap tables with plastic chairs. They serve beer, rum and Coke in carafes, and the worst food known to man. (Keep in mind that while I singlehand I contentedly eat cold Chef Boyardee spaghetti straight from the can, so for me to say food is lousy….) Behind the bar is an ancient household refrigerator (you remember the ’70s when household appliances were colors like avocado green and pee yellow) and young women who never, ever smile. But I kind of like the place anyway. After all, a bar isn’t about decor, or even smiles. It’s about stories. And everyone here has a story.
Panama collects misfits the way gearbox oil collects slivers of worn metal. These are people too odd for the machinery of modern life, so they end up telling stories to strangers. There’s the guy who once made a living smuggling contraceptives from England to Ireland, who delivered a boat for a Polish prince and nearly died in a storm, only to be rewarded by the prince’s party at which Keith Richards and the rest of the stones showed up. And there’s the guy with a limp who’s been in the Zone (back when it was a Zone) for nearly 40 years and tells stories about everyone but himself. I asked him how he got the limp and he said, “Oh, it was a mix-up once.” Someone else told me he had been in the military. “He used to jump out of things,” I was told. Some mix-up.
And then there are the taxi drivers. They hover around like fruit flies. To be fair, they are the most optimistic people on earth. Each one claims he can get you anything. Need a 1-1/2 inch bronze hose barb? No problem, the place is just over there, he’ll take you there. Eight dollars per hour to drive you anywhere. Of course it’s all bullshit. The taxi drivers have no more idea where to get that bronze hose barb than I do, but they happily drive you from hardware store to plumbing store to car parts store in search of it. I am sure I could have told one of these drivers I wanted a perpetual motion machine and he would have told me the place is just over there.
I am sorry to leave Balboa Yacht Club, with it’s scratchy Salsa music, drumming rain and mangoes falling off the trees and rolling down the corrugated roof while everyone waits to see if it was ripe as it falls off the edge.
It took me over a week to get my engine running smoothly. Eventually I had to replace the diesel tank. I don’t know much about Panama City, since I spent my time there contorted inside a boat, but I do know all the places to buy fuel hose, barbs, filters and epoxy. Finally, it is time for the canal, a 40-mile serpent that swallows sailboats whole.

We’re approaching the Panama canal, about 150 miles distant. It feels like were in the middle of a freeway, riding a bicycle between lanes. Big ships are everywhere, passing us on all sides. There is no traffic separation scheme here, so the ships pass each other port-to-port, starboard-to-starboard and they overtake each other (and us) on whatever side seems like fun. I won’t be sleeping much the next night or two….
It’s gray and raining. It’s been that way pretty much since the beginning of May. To anyone thinking of retiring down here, I suggest first sitting in the shower for a month before you make up your mind. We decided to pass by the Western Panamanian islands, though they are supposed to be nice. But we’ve had enough of watching howler monkeys, toucans and orchids in the rain. We got all the jungle we could handle in Costa Rica, and the beaches aren’t attractive in the rain. On the other hand, sitting in a dry restaurant after taking a warm shower in Panama City is very attractive.
We should arrive in Panama Sunday morning. Most of the official offices (immigration, customs, canal authority) are closed then, so me may have to hang out for one extra day so that we arrive on Monday. In any case, we’re almost there!
David and Gunilla