DAY ONE - DEPARTURE FROM PANAMA

We have just left for Galapagos...faark what a start...apparently a dik storm on the carib side...sent us some 45 knot tail winds...we did 15 knots with 3 reefs...with a maintained boat speed of 10-11 knots...then a lazy sheet ripped up one of the hatches, a mainsheet block exploded setting of a chain reaction which ended up with a mangled jammer (ripped right off the deck), one batcar out of its track, 2 broken battens etc. This all happened after I like a stupid doos thought the wind was dropping so shook out the reefs too soon...but i fixed all that...this tail wind is fucking with my head...then the wind started dropping so we were sailing wing on wing which is also not relaxing...then the wind dropped completely so we dropped the sails and started motoring...then another 20 knot tailwind NE came through by which stage i could not deal with the mainsail again so only used the jib which is way more relaxing in dead down wind conditions. We could not really change our angle as the sea was short horrible and following. Then i put a handline out on a bungy cord...BOOM...the bungy gets vaporized and my handline which now has only one turn around the bimini base goes crazy, eventually the plastic spool with the rest of the line goes overboard...i like a stupid poes grab the line which is still around the pole with my bare hands and now I can hardly type, we got the marlin next to the boat but he eventually snapped the leader...but he was toast too, just lay in the sea next to the boat for a while before slowly sinking down and swimming away...which was fine cause i was going to release it anyway although i would have liked to have kept that lure. Small purple and black one about 1 hour before sunset 50 miles off Panama in 2km's depth. Too deep to dive crays here. As we were hauling in the marlin the wind swung through 180 deg to a 15knot SW. Andy is man down sea sick (not too bad, just way to much adrenaline and rough seas). Chantal and I put full sail up and now we are slipping along nicely at 5-7 knots with 10-15 knots of wind at 35 degrees off the bow. We have made really good ground, since leaving Pedregal we have been able to head directly for the Galapagos...we have about 600 miles to go and we should be there within 5-6 days (we hope!). Ja it was a crazy first day. Kiddies are all fine, we are sailing lekker comfortably now i just hope Andy is OK to take over from me at midnight otherwise it going to be a long night. But the moon is up and there are cold beers in the fridge. Trevor our position right now is 07deg34.171N and 083deg271W, our heading is around 210 deg. I am heading for San Cristobal Island in the Galapagos. Please see if you can get any info on what caused this 45knot NE wind....it seemed exactly like a Papagayos or Tuantepec wind...it certainly woke us up on shimmi.