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Banditos on board!!!!!!

Yesterday was spent lanquishing in the Nicaraguan police department, which of course was a deviation from our planned intinary!

A bandito was spotted helping himself to some of our equipment, and off 2 other boats in the bay.

To cut a very long story short you a few of you may be hearing from him on our Satellite phone!!! Ha Ha no not really he's in prison. We saw him get dragged in and thrown in the cells.

Anyway getting the paperwork has taken a day and a half, and we are almost on the staff of the Police dept as we've been there so long. Due to the high winds and driving rain the power kept going out as they were preparing the report.

Anyway we are planning on getting out Nicaragua tomorrow high winds permitting.

On the good side of things the bandito damaged the door , but did not damage US or any ports or hatches that would make the boat unseaworthy.

Attack of the killer bees

Not all is perfect in Paradise. We've been invaded by El Salvadorian/ African bees,

they have taken up residence in the mast, we tried to wait them out , but no they LOVE us.

We hired a "Bee man" to come and help, he donned his mesh mask, and we hauled him up...........

and moved away to a safe distance. Eventually we got the all clear...............and guess what they

are all DEAD, but now we have residual paranoia, everytime we hear a hint of a buzz,

we jump up and start listening for buzzing in the mast.

We are escaping tomorrow before they return, we are heading for Golfo de Fonseca.

Getting to know El Salvador

This is where we are moored at present Bahia Jiquilisco Lat 13 07 000N, Long 088 25 200W , we are in the top left corner, behind the boat with the sail up ( they were trying to get the bats off their sail!)

Its hard to think that the people we have met here, were until relatively recently killing each other in a civil war.

We set off a few days ago to rent a car and see some more of El Salvador, some of Guatemala, and Honduras. To cut a very long story short, it is either very pricy or impossble to take a car from one country to another, so we thought less is more, let's just explore El Salvador. We could have taken numerous buses, but we've had our fill of wrestling a backpack on hot sweaty buses, then being besieged by touts when you get off , hey that's why we bought a boat!

Anyway we love the country and the people, they are eager to help lost gringos, and a few words in Spanish brings out the smiles, and more helpers. We did OK on the whole. San Salvador was crazy, fast and polluted, the countryside was poor, but beautiful.

We needed to catch a bus back to the small town near our boat, and we couldn't find the departing bus terminal, we sped around the City asking everyone, but could make no sense of where it was, eventually we asked some very stern looking Police who instantly broke into smiles, and had us follow them in our car..............when we got to the station they drove in with the lights on, and had guns at the ready whilst we asked the bus times. We thought maybe they needed the guns to protect themselves...........who knows, because we rolled up the next day and it was just fine.

We made it out of Mexico and past "the BEAST of Tehuanatepec

We are so happy to be here, and in one piece, after

crossing one of the most hazardous areas on this coast.

The reason it is so risky is that the Gulf is

influenced by winds from the other side of Mexico,

and when the weather is bad on that side gale

force winds funnel through the mountains, and

people can be blown up to 500 miles out to sea!

We had been watching the weather very closely

because it blows almost constantly, with short

lulls. We spied a good "weather window"on the

forecast and scrambled, literally running around

dragging big jugs of fuel, water and food on board.

All sails up and engine roaring we set off to face the

beast and hooray it was napping, we sneaked by

heads stuck over the siderails, noses into the

wind like two bloodhounds sniffing the breeze to

detect a shift to the north which would mean the

beast was stirring.

We chugged along merrily for 500 miles, loving

every minute of the passage. Some of our boat

pals weren't so lucky, one boat who set off before

had 65 mile an hour winds, and had to scramble

into a commercial port at night, and take shelter

amongst the rusty shrimp boats. Another who left

a couple of days later , was hit by high winds

because his engine was broken, and he turned

into a sitting duck!

So now we are moored 9 miles up a river in

El Salvador, the closest town is Usulatan which

we visited yesterday. It was splendid! They call

El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Honduras the

forgotten middle of Central America. It really

feels different to Mexico, the people are not as

used to tourists, so we are made very welcome.

There is great povery here, endless civil war,

hurricanes etc have pounded the place, but the

people are cheery and friendly. We are planning

to leave our boat in the river, drive or bus it to

Guatemala, and Honduras to explore inland,

just trying to work out the logistics now.