PANAMA: THE 90 DAY CRUISE PERMIT
My first glimpse of Panama comes on the morning of the 8th day of our crossing. Torrential rain pours down in such thick sheets that both the radar and my eyeballs are rendered useless as navigational tools. But the rain falls in waves, and every so often we get a glimpse of land. Thick green rain forest covers every inch. No sign of human habitation. We are flying along at about 8 knots under sail, heading for Panama's port of Colon, situated at Atlantic entrance of the Panama Canal. Our catamaran 'SHIMMI' is sailing beautifully, sliding through the rain with the grace of a swan. For 5 days we had been running ahead of a tropical depression, with big confused swells and gale force winds keeping us awake and worried. Now Chantal and I are staring across the port bow, excited about finally making landfall. Then the curtain of rain parts, revealing a gigantic container ship, brushing past us at 25 knots, its nose cone creating a beautiful perpetual A-frame peak, bending the ocean over its back, like a massive Orca sliding through the water. We stand and watch breathless and in shock. One degree to starboard and the ship would have run us down without missing a beat. We reduce sail and veer sharply to port. Get ourselves out of this shipping lane. Welcome to Panama.
I never actually formally planned a surf exploration of Panama's pacific coast. So when we did eventually arrive on the Pacific side I was not all to sure about where to go...in fact, I did not have a clue. I tried to decipher some garbled anecdotes off the wannasurf website. Jarvi and a few other mates sent me some swell info which got me started. But I knew no-one in Panama, or so I thought. Turns out that one of Chantal's old tennis-scholarship buddies is a surfer from Panama. Had I found my 'inside man'? Not really. I tried to milk this oke for info, but he did not know that much, apart from the few obvious spots. But I showed him a chart, explained to him what was land and what was sea, and he put his finger on an island not too far from Panama city. At this point I had not surfed for about 3 months. We bought SHIMMI in Fort Lauderdale and we spent a solid chunk of time fixing her up and sailing her down to Panama. Then getting her through the canal was an expensive and time consuming hack. By now Chantal and I were amping to get away from cities, officials, diesel mechanics, marina owners and of course their credit card machines. We had done our fair share of so-called surf exploration in the Mentawais on the Indies Explorer, and I was keen to kick off with a semi secret sure thing, as opposed to immediately heading towards unknown islands which 9 out of 10 times yield nothing. So this little island, only 3 hrs driving from Panama seemed like just what the doctor ordered.
And I must mention here that its quite something to finally see a perfect wave reeling off from the deck of your own yacht. With no-one else around. The first time this really happened for me was when we came around the corner at Asu Island with the Indies Explorer during 1999. It was perfect 6 foot barrels and no-one was in the water. We stood for a while on deck, just gob-smacked. But this little Panamanian island reef break called Chepilo did not look so good when we first got there. We arrived after dark and we had to anchor off as the actual anchorage is circled by reefs. The next morning revealed a wave which at first glance looked a bit slow and fat. What I did not factor into the equation was that a 5 meter drop in tide may have an effect on 'slow and fat', turning it into 'hollow and fast'! Chepilo turned out to be a perfect little 2-3 foot wave, similar in shape to Mossel Bay Inner Pool, running down the side of a gorgeous keyhole shaped island. It broke on a rock bottom, and even though the Panama tidal range is over 5 meters, the wave remained surfable during all tides, even though it did have a few personality changes. It was a great wave for someone who recently turned 40 and had not surfed for a while. Little bit of a barrel or re-entry on take off, followed by a few big cutties as the wave eventually runs off the shelf. But I was surprised to find that there was virtually no major coral growth around this island, even though it lies within 8 degrees of the equator. And this my friend is a vital clue to understanding Panamanian surf on the Pacific side.
My theory, based solely on observation (and a few very deep barrels), is that the worlds best waves are on islands fringed by massive coral reef systems. Indonesia and the South Pacific Islands are two obvious examples. If you dive under the waves in Indo you will find a massive and flat moss covered thingy, usually with a few drainage furrows here and there. This is not rock. It is a type of coral reef or layers of coral reef which grow in the wave zone. Waves act like a giant pair of hedge clippers: If during a long flat spell a piece of coral manages to outgrow the rest of the bed, then the waves will just mow it off when the next swell comes. The waves keep the reef flat. By the same token, if there is a big hole in the reef, this will eventually get filled by coral until it grows to the height of the surrounding reef. Eventually the hole will disappear and the reef will be flatter with one less imperfection. These beautiful flat reefs are what has created the worlds most beautiful waves and I am not going to wax lyrical and start naming them here. If you've been to these places you will know. Off course there are quite a few other really perfect waves which don't have coral bottoms. But they were made entirely by chance when the geological landscape was originally formed. They have hard rock bottoms, often improved by the arrival (like J-Bay) or departure (like Pipeline) of sand. But the wave is how the wave is. Therefore automatically any area out of the tropics fall into this category like most of the waves of South Africa, Australia, California and Europe. But, the significance of this little theory is that there are areas of the world virtually on the equator which have minimal coral growth. Pacific Central America seems to be a case in point. And I found this out the hard way by checking out every single one of Panama's south facing Pacific Islands. And there are about 50 of them.
Myself, Chantal and our two sons Josh and Indie found the world's most beautiful islands in Panama. Virgin rain forest grows down to the waters edge with almost none of the palm trees which have invaded so many other tropical islands. Howler monkeys were diving through the canopy and colonies of scarlet macaws were squawking in the tree tops. Fishing was happening on a level that we have never before experienced. We released most of the fish, keeping only a few yellow fin tuna and spanish mackerel. Make no mistake, we found surf. Isla Silva catches the brunt of the southern hemi swells, and we surfed a big triple overhead Factory type lefthander which folded itself over a few mutant slabs, breaking plenty boards and egos. We drank long Balboas (The Bintang of Panama) with the boys and girls of the Morro Negrito Surf Camp, swapping yarns and comparing scars. A nearby rivermouth turned into a superbank lefthander on a medium swell and low tide. We visited and ex penal colony Island where a few years ago some prisoners swam out to a yacht and had a throat slitting party. We navigated up a few chocolate brown rivers, expecting any moment to either run aground or bump into Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim in the flesh. Instead we got our mast caught up in a cable, bent our prop on a massive floating log, got chased right onto SHIMMI'S transom by 2 big bull sharks and surfed ourselves into a state of arch eye, fucked shoulders and total dehydration. One black night, whilst at anchor, I heard the sea kick up hard, it sounded like we were in for a gale. When I got up on deck, I found no wind, just a school of game fish going bezerk around SHIMMI, both hunter and prey attracted to our stern by the dim light emmitted by our chart plotter!
Our three and a half year old son Josh has learned to swim and surf, all in the space of a few weeks. I push him into the wave on one of my short boards, he jumps to his feet and rides all the way to the sand. Turns out he is a goofy footer. How can one describe the stoke on a kids face when they suddenly realize what it is all about? Our other son Indie is now 10 months old, he has now spent most of his life on board. We are lucky parents because soon we will all be surfing together. Chantal's surfing career blossomed in the Mentawais, only to be interrupted by the births of our two sons. She finally dusted off her old 6'8 and glided down a few bombs at Isla Figuera. The stoke was back!
But after all is said and done, Pacific Panama does not have the abundance of coral reefs which I believe is the essential ingredient for barreling perfection. The lack of coral may be due to the big 5m tidal range (which will expose and kill the coral at low tide) or the continental run-off (which clouds the water and inhibits photosynthesis). I don't know. But when you rely only on primitive and ancient volcanic forces to form the reefs upon which the waves must break, without any nice coral to fill in the gaps, then you severely limit your chances of finding perfect outer island waves. But this does not mean that you should stop looking around this area...it just means that the deck is a bit loaded against you. I have heard that Nicaragua's beachbreaks are world class, not to mention a few of El Salvador's right hand point breaks...we plan on exploring up the coast of central America as far as El Salvador before making a U-turn and coming back down to Panama. If all goes well we will cross into the South Pacific during April of 2009.
But for now our next stop is Costa Rica. One of the first waves that we will check out is the legendary Pavones. We will keep you updated!
