The Pacific coastline of America, at least from San Francisco to Panama, is not the easiest to cruise by sailboat. There are occasional long distances between harbors, and more of those anchorages than otherwise are open to the perpetual swell that abides in the Pacific Ocean. To sail south along it becomes an exercise in patience, planning, and endurance. That’s not to suggest for a moment that it’s not worth doing—I’ve never cruised anywhere that wasn’t at least worth the visit—but there’s far more challenges there than cruising the Caribbean or the east coast of the US.
The brightest spot in that whole area is, of course, the Sea of Cortez. The absence of ocean swells opens up a lot of anchorages that would otherwise be marginal. The desert scenery is breathtaking, the water alive with fish, and miles of empty beaches are perfect for gathering undamaged shells. The arid climate is difficult to truly appreciate until you sail the humid jungle shore to the south—a place where nothing fully dries, the insects are a plague, and the muggy heat oppresses both day and night.
It’s not until you leave the Sea of Cortez that you realize you could spend years happily cruising in there—we could have, if not for the wanderlust that drew us further down the coast. From about San Blas, where the desert has given way to jungle in earnest, the coast as far as Panama can be daysailed, if one doesn’t mind some rolly anchorages, with only a handful of exceptions. Truly quiet harbors, though—the sort where you could build a house of cards on the salon table—can only be found by going way up estuaries or into deep inlets.
Those options pose a problem of their own: many estuaries are guarded by a bar across which swells will break. Navigation aids are non-existent, and several require a local pilot, which marinas located inside are usually happy to provide. Gaining quiet water inside an open bay often means going really far up, then finding an island to hide behind. Once there, chances are there will be no services or town of any sort ashore. All very well, perhaps, unless you’re dying for something fresh to eat or something cold to drink.
Once the fearsome Gulf of Tehuantepec has been transited and Mexico left behind, everything becomes more distant, and difficult, and primitive. Guatemala has only one very expensive, very small harbor on the Pacific coast; El Salvador’s harbors are guarded by fearsome breakers until you reach the Gulf of Fonseca, which for all its splendor is thin on groceries and services; Nicaragua’s one decent harbor is filled with official corruption and brazen burglary. Costa Rica is a mixed bag until you get to Golfito, and after all that, it’s a relief to get to Panama and have affordable supplies, security, and decent harbors all at the same time. There still is, of course, the endless rain, the crushing mugginess, and the army of stinging insects, but on the whole, Panama takes the prize for the best cruising south of the Sea of Cortez.
I wrote an article for Cruising World magazine, while down there once, about the endless rumors afloat regarding small boats and Canal transits. Everything from claims that no boat under X amount of feet long was being allowed through (the number changed with the teller, usually something two feet longer than what you had), to the firm belief that a minimum of 8 kts of boat speed was required, to the claim that Gatun Lake was running out of water and No One would Ever get through again. We’ve heard them on both sides of the canal the several times we’ve passed through, and fortunately knew enough to carry on and find out for ourselves.
It’s almost a shame to commit to the transit and leave the Pacific—given the cost and bother, you shouldn’t transit until you really want to get to the Caribbean, because backtracking isn’t easily feasible. I would have loved to kick about the Perlas Islands, the Colombian coast to the south, and cruise again the Panama coast back as far as Pedregal, but Ganymede was going to need a haulout and re-fit, and we needed to be heading back toward the ‘States and some kind of income. And really, once south of pacific Mexico, it’s easier to carry on to Florida than to return to California.
So what’s the draw? Difficult, swelly, buggy shore—why not bypass it entirely, and just do several long passages to the Canal, like so many do? Well, because the sun rising between smoking volcanos in Nicaragua is a sight worth seeing; the tumbledown beach palapas everywhere have incredibly good food; there are trees groaning with mangos, water teeming with fish, waterfalls, solitary beaches. Shafts of sunlight in the steaming jungle after a downpour, parrots, burros, iguanas. Finding fresh bread in unexpected ports; tacos, pupusas, meat pastries, sausages—for every disadvantage, every discomfort, every danger, there’s a tenfold reward. It’s what adventure is all about, and that coast has it all in spades.