Good Bye Puntarenas Hello Cocos Island

Leaving Puntarenas, we finally cast the dock lines off midday Saturday, April 10. Our little flotilla cruised out of the marina led by David, in his turquoise blue, Parasail boat, then us, followed by Mahboula.

We’d made many friends at the marina and were a little sad to say our good byes. George and Karen, on Mahboula are heading towards the Panama Canal, with plans of being back to Florida by July 1.

Our next destination is Cocos Islands, 300 miles off shore of Costa Rica. Cocos is a National Park, one of many in Costa Rica. The passage took about 72 hours, with 15 to 20 knot head winds much of the time; making for a lot of rock and rolling. We did have one day of lovely sailing, so nice not to be motoring. As promised, it’s the rainy season and we got heaps of it. While on watch, you can crunch up under the dodger and sort of stay dry.

A few facts about Cocos Islands: it is only about 2 by 6 kilometers; it gets 280 inches of rainfall a year, it has three species of bird not found anywhere else in the world, the water is a deep turquoise, and it is lush and beautiful. There are two park ranger bases, one at Bahia Wafer and the smaller of the two, Bahia Chatham, where the anchorage is located. The other boats in the anchorage are dive boats and a big ship with a helicopter, which cruises over to the other bay a couple of times a day. The big draw of this place for most folks is the diving, one of the few places that you can dive with the hammerhead sharks…not something I’ll be jumping over board for. These boats pick up tourists in Puntarenas, and Heraduras, take the 36-hour trip here to spend the next few days swimming with sharks. We had planned to do some snorkeling but so far; Al hasn’t gotten me in the water yet.

We stay for about 5 days, so we get to enjoy it and of course, to celebrate Al’s big birthday.