Rio Dulce to Tres Puntas, Guatemala

2/22/15

Our "Solita" (middle boat) is the
launcha we use in the river.

Sunny and very little wind on our nose

Our time in the Rio has ended and we are both so ready to get out of this river. The green of this country is overwhelming and we are looking forward to the aqua blue of the Caribbean.  Don't get me wrong, it is beautiful here and there are many things to see and do, but we are ready for some salt water.  We slipped out dock lines around noon and left Luvy's marina.  Luvy and his family were very wonderful hosts and took great care of our baby while we were in the states.  So, muchas gracia Luvy and we will see you again in June.

Island Sol with the Shade Tree up....making her really a cool boat!

We motored through Lake Golfete then through the gorge passing simple palapa huts and people in dug out canoes call cayucos.  Some cayucos have outboard motors but some are driven by human power.  The Guatemalans along the river are fisherman, catching mojarra.  We finally reached Livingston and crossed the sand bar at 4:00pm, which was high tide, so our boat with a draft of 4'10" motored right across.   This sand “bar” is large and continually changing with the river flowing out, we have bumped over it in the past, but today was easy peasy.

We motored on about another 2 hours and anchored behind the peninsula near Tres Puntas.  It seems now that our jobs are set when it comes to anchoring.  Charlie is at the bow and I am at the helm.  He directs me via walkie talkies on when to go forward, to go into neutral or to go into reverse, in order to set the anchor.  I am always reluctant to get behind the helm, but I am slowly gaining more confidence with practice.

As soon as we got the anchor set and secured it was already dark and up comes a boat of 3 guys 15’ from our boat and in their broken English told us they were fishing.  This was a little disconcerting at first, but sure enough that is what they did for the next couple of hours.  We must have anchored in their best fishing spot and they were probably just as unhappy with us as we were with them.  I hope they caught what they needed.

We slept really well that night and the next morning we were off to our next destination…Ranguana Cay, Belize to meet our friends Jerry and Susan on s/v Vida Dulce.  Again, we do what we mostly do and motored the entire way as we had no wind, and if any came up it was on our nose.  The sea was very rolling with large swells which made the trip not very pleasant.  But, the water is now 2000’ deep and very dark blue.  A pod of 4 porpoise followed us out of our anchorage early this morning, always a good sign.