Volcano Trip

Well our friend Gary finally made it here. Had trouble with his passport the first time he tried to come. Had a passport card not a passport book, where you can get it stamped. We were there at the airport to meet him. Didn’t want him trying to navigate the problems coming from the US the first time to Central America, trying to get the right bus from the airport to the river here, not speaking the language, exchanging money, the shock of it all. It’s easy when you get the hang of it but the the first time it can be a little unnerving. Our friend Gary is not the type person that sends Christmas cards. He just pops in to our lives from time to time. He was there when we were building the “Pamela Ann” had a hand in it’s construction. Gave us some of our prize processions for the boat like our little wood heater. Was always on our side when some people “when we were building our little schooner” were not. So now our problem was how to show him as much as we could in the little time we have left here. As it stands now we are leaving the river here in Guatemala around July the fourth. There will be a high tide to get us across the bar in the river. We decided to take him to see Antigua, see a volcano. We went to our favorite hotel where they have a little place you can set outside and watch the volcano puff, sending up smoke. The morning we were to go see the volcano that day, I thought Pam was for some reason shaking my chair as I set in the lobby drinking my morning cup of hot Earl Gray tea. I looked around and every thing was swaying. We were having a 4.3 earthquake. Now that is a way to get your day stared and impress a friend just coming in from Maine. Later that day, it was raining as we stared to go up the mountain that is the volcano. I was worried that we wouldn’t be able to see much.We took a horse, Pam and I. Gary walked and our guide took us a long way up near the top of the volcano with clouds rolling in and out.

In the clouds

We had been there before but not this high. As the volcano puffed we could see rocks or something coming out with the smoke and as it drew dark the something that was coming out was glowing red.

Zoom in and you can see hot rocks going up in the air

Big glowing red maybe rocks things. What ever it was, it was impressing and hard to film in the dark, riding a horse down a steep mountain trail in the dark is kind of impressing too. But “what a day.” An earthquake and a volcano doing something ( we don’t know what it was ) all in one day.

Lava left from old eruption. Last eruption, November 2014?

Will there be a day with Gary here or on our old sail boat trip more exciting. I hope I can handle it if it is. Were going back to the US. New Orleans, Louisiana in hurricane season. Its a long way back. Home made boat with Volkswagen Rabbits diesel car motors for auxiliary power, very little money. Sailing our little schooner like it a schooner from old times but I’m not worried. “What could be exciting about that?”

A Happy Volcano Day “

Tourist Again

We have got our friend from the US. We are in Antigua, Guatemala. We are trying to take in the sights. Below is some of the things we are seeing. We are going this afternoon to the Pacaya Volcano.  So we don’t have much time to do a lot of writing.

Pam and Gary at the town square.

More on the streets

Another street in Antigua

Buying bread. HUM,HUM

Mayan man selling his carvings. He may be 4 feet tall.

Work Week

We are still here waiting on a friend to get here as crew and a weather window. Mainly high tide to get over the bar in the river and our friend to get his passport straiten out. When Pam and I were really young we dreamed of some day doing something like making sails as we set out to traveled the world and what that would be like in some place like this. Were still up the river in Guatemala. The Rio Dulce. One thing I sometimes fail to mention is how many countries the sailors out here come from. We have a friend that we did sail work for and now we visit when we can. He is from the Czech Republic and his girl friend is from Argentina. She is beautiful but so little. We have a friend and his family from Austria we plan to go see if we make it to another friends house in England. Wouldn’t that be something if we ride a motor bike from England to Austria. The list goes on but this week we have been cutting up a used sail and making a sail for a sailor from the Ukraine and the sailor that brought him to us is Russian. We have done a good bit of work for the Russians here. We are real popular with the French too. We have done a lot of sail work for them. They always demand there sails be done right. The Ukraine sailor needed a main sail bad. His sail was so sun damaged it couldn’t be fixed. We had a large used jib Pam had got in a trade. So to make him a sail we had to take the jib apart and reshape the cloth in to a main sail. We did so much work on it we put our company decal on it.

 “PAMELA ANN SCHOONER CO”    Logo

It fit perfectly and other than being good but used cloth the sail is cut like it is new. Draft set to their boat. Reefing points to there sailing needs. We know we have had a set of our sails to make it to Europe and back because we repaired the main after they were back. A tear in a reefing point where they had it tied to tight. We were anchor out in Mexico and a boat came by with the decal “Pamela Ann Schooner Co” in plain sight on their sails. Maybe that is too close to bragging but it made us really proud to see sails we made out there going. Now here making our Russian friend, the Ukraine sailor a sail under the palapa is maybe a dream that keeps coming true.

Reviewing the old and new sails with Russian and Ukraine friends

Here is Pam sewing on sails with our Guatemalan neighbors little dogs sleeping peacefully on a sail bag as she sews.

Dog sleep while work go on

When our neighbors leave their little house, all four of them ( Mom, Dad and two young girls) on a small motor bike the dogs come and stay with Pam.

We have play time too

Is that a sailor and sail maker’s dream or what? Making a sail in a place like this. The iguana that messed on my tools was back this week still messing but I moved my tools over, out of the line of fire. The early morning roar of howler monkeys is a constant reminder we’re still in a sailors paradise. Why would any one want to leave a place like this? I have ask many a sailor why they left the places they said they were crazy about and never get a good answer but all cruisers know the answer. Maybe some day seeing what is just over the horizon won’t be so strong but for now having a good steak in the US when we get back and maybe some day soon walking the cool damp streets of England won’t be so bad either. If we make it back to the US to refit the boat then go on,that will be 7 more sails we made that made the trip to Europe, that is if we can count our own sails.