Panama Yachting Services had already decided that it was time for James to retire from heavy physical rigging work when this job came along. At 76 and with his 77th birthday this month, it was time for James to stop going up masts and let younger, stronger people take over the physical work. Now, Shelter Bay will be providing the people who measure and install Selden products under James’ supervision.

Panama Yachting Services will continue to help to visit yachts with our local knowledge gained over 40 years in Panama, and, work as a sales outlet for Selden – advising on the selection of the Selden range of masts, rigging, and roller furlers, etc. Our role in the future will be to act solely as sales agents for Selden, Rolly Tasker Sails and Lalizas marine products, as well as De-Bug magnetic fuel purifiers.
The stays ordered for Uldis were the wrong length.

We are not sure how this happened. First time ever! We replaced them at our cost and paid for his rigging to be installed. We did not consider we were responsible for his marina bill, because delays were due initially to the fact that he had metric turnbuckles that could not be used with the imperial studs supplied by Selden. Sorting that out took time.

Uldis did not understand that it was not possible to fly in new studs from Sweden to match his turnbuckles and swage them in Panama. Selden supplies imperial studs and good swaging machines were not available outside the USA. Then there were delays caused by festive events – Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year when the US suppliers closed down. We met his request for a letter for migration and offered any other assistance he needed.

Posted on behalf of SV Kandu.

The $185 Permit is required for all yachts navigating Panamanian waters for more than three days. Acquiring one:

1) Linton Marina, the Port Captain provides you one on the spot without additional charge.

2a) Shelter Bay Marina, for $50 cash, no receipt, the Port Captain will arrange and provide you your permit through the Linton Port Captain, 1-2 days. You provide him the $185 cash.

2b) Shelter Bay Marina, for $25, receipt provided, and $185 cash, the marina office will process your permit through the Colon Port Captain, who in turn, sends the request to Panama City. Once complete, the marina driver collects the permit from Colon, 5-10 days in total.

3) Solo, you can take the Shelter Bay Marina shuttle bus to Colon Port Captain’s office and initiate the process yourself, communicating directly with the office yourself, and boarding the shuttle yourself to collect your completed permit.

Line Handlers
Recommend volunteering for another’s boat transit and then hiring at least one of your agent’s professional line handlers, $100 per handler all in. Not only do they prep and handle lines and fenders, but they can also re-enforce your preferences with the advisors and canal workers. Note: For your volunteers, a pre-arranged taxi back to Shelter Bay from Balboa is $100.

Lines & Fenders
Recommend renting them. No more tires, only real fenders are provided now, 8 of them. Four extra-long polypropylene 7/8” lines. For $12 cash tip, a Balboa Marina tender will collect them from you as you pass by.

After Transit
Balboa Marina; If you can get a mooring ball, per night is ~$50. Marinas are expensive. Playitas said $150 first day, $2/ft/day after that. Anchoring, remember they have a 15-foot tidal range here.

Erick Galvez is a popular agent here in the marina. We’re using him and are very happy with his service. English speaking, quick and thorough email responses.

All the best,

Eric
s/v Kandu
Shelter Bay, Panama

Feedback from Robert Burn:

We are now in Shelter Bay Marina near Panama where the tariff for our 16.7 vessels is US$80 per night. We are funnelled here because we are transiting the Canal, and it is all much easier this way!

Erick Galvez has been very good and has us going through in five days from arrival. We had to weld up our stern fairleads to satisfy the PCA inspector Jose, a cheerful fellow.

The transit for our vessel is $1300 and with fenders and ropes and one experienced line handler, it came to just over $2000. The boat measured more than two feet longer than the registered LOA, which may explain why I am spending more on paint.

South America is better than the Caribbean in many aspects, much to do with the people. Peru is reputed to be the most convivial.

We are heading to French Polynesia and there seems there are a couple of others heading that way too.

Reported by S/Y Sannsipapp of Norway:
Panama Agent for packages.

I have the pleasure of recommending a good agent that makes all the hassle with receiving packages etc. from abroad go away. What this company does is having all sent through a PO box address in the USA, making import to Panama a lot easier. They charge not much for doing it, and the service is priceless.

They take care of all paperwork, customs, clearance etc. for you and come to deliver the goods to on your boat, nearly wherever you might be. We had such a good experience with this guy.

The company has at least two offices in Panama City. Coray A Ward, Mail Boxes Etc, tel 507 2256254 or 66243216, c.ward@panamambe.com, http://www.mbe-ca.com

Axel H K Wold
S/Y Sannsipapp of Norway

SAN BLAS ISLANDS – TRAVEL BAN ON NON-BOAT OWNERS
Reports from cruisers in the San Blas Islands are that for about a week now, the Congresso that governs Kuna Yala has banned the travel of non-boat owners into the region.

As the charter trade is totally unregulated here, large numbers of Charter vessels have proliferated, possibly outnumbering the private boats. Any business venture by anyone other than a Kuna in the region is illegal per Congresso law.

No charter guests can be transported by taxi to charter boats at the mainland docks or by water taxi to boats at anchor. Offending operators are being fined up to 500 USD.

Returning boat owners who have either pensionado cards for legal residence in Panama, or have their Cruising Permit and crew list, are managing to get back to their boats.

Air travel to the two airports in the Western San Blas has not been available for the past 2 years, so SUV travel from Panama City on the Carti road is the only method of visiting Kuna Yala.

The resolution of this problem is unclear at this time and one larger tour operator is involved in a legal battle over this, but they do not think it will be resolved for at least a month.

I wanted to give some positive feedback for Puerto Armuelles as an entry and exit port for the Pacific side of Panama.

We cleared in and out of Panama there with no hassle at all. The port captain filled out all the forms, copied all our documents and helped us with our crew list… We obtained all of our exit papers in about 45 minutes and when we came in it took about an hour to clear.

There is good holding in about 25 feet of water by the banana dock. Basically an easy in and out stop with good shopping, diesel available at $2.00usd a taxi ride away and friendly efficient service.

I don’t speak Spanish.. but they all understood what I wanted and helped a lot. The very positive experience there.

A further report from Karsten Staffeldt – 1 August 2017
Transit of the Panama Canal – Small vessels inclusive yachts (Less than 125 Ft. LOA)

Please be advised that the Pilot Organization at the Panama Canal has notified the Canal Authorities that they should have more control of the transits by small crafts inclusive yachts, which presently only requires an Advisor.

The negotiations are in the early stages, but if the Pilot Organization is successful and a regular Pilot will be required, no doubt the transit cost for the small craft will increase considerably.

Shall keep you advised of developments.

Karsten Staffeldt

Panama Canal delays have only gotten worse since February. We were measured on Monday, April 10th and were given a date of May 9th, 29 days out. Our agent says next week, after Easter, there may be an improvement, so I’ll update you if things change.

We used immigration in Porvenir last December 28th, 2016.
The officer asks us for 105 USD per person to obtain the visa for 6 months.
With the help of our friends, who had obtained a visa a few days before, we were able to enter for free – as the new law permits.
Beware that not all the officers are aware of the new law.

18 June 2016: Reported on the San Blas Cruisers Facebook Group

The Port Captain at Linton Bay Marina (Puerto Lindo) has all the stamps required to check you in for a year.
The cost to check in is $195 payable in cash only.

The Port Captain in Portobelo does not have the stamps for the cruising permit, therefore you would have to go to Colon or to Linton Bay Marina for that.

There is no immigration office at Linton Bay Marina as of today, but it is coming soon.

The closest immigration place from Linton Bay is in Portobelo where you can check into the country.

If the immigration office in Portobelo does not have a special visa, the one that costs $100, then you have 72 hours to get it, either in Colon or in Panama city.

The stamp obtained in Portobelo will be good for you to travel to the country for 72 hours.

There is no bank in Linton Bay (Puerto Lindo) or in Portobelo, but there are banks and ATMs in Sabanitas, which is on the way to Colon or Panama city.

If you’re short in time to a provision in Panama-City, we could surely recommend Chris Burillo (email: chris.burillo@gmail.com) to, take care for provisioning.

All fruits and vegetables (coming from the fresh market) were of excellent quality and price, meat comes vacuum packed and cooled, and all supermarket items were delivered according to our request.

Chris is a great person with a big interest in sailing…
Delivery was made exactly on time, everything well packed.

If contacting him, do not forget to order some honey, this is really delicious!

Rob and I aboard our Oyster 406 used the services of AYS, Associated Yacht Services to arrange our Canal Transit. Alessandro RisI and Josimar of AYS were professional and friendly and did all the running around for us including clearing out and our Zarpe on leaving.

Their email responses were prompt enabling us to sent scanned documents to them while we were still in Curacao. Shelter Bay is a safe and friendly place to stay, with good haul out and boatyard facilities and John Hallen, the manager, and his staff are welcoming and can organise most things.

Our Advisor, Regis, directed us to the free anchorage on the canal side of Flamenco Marina, which although noisy at times is an adequate spot near the La Playing harbour end. We dragged in fine silty mud when we anchored further south. Most yachts take their tenders into La Playita pontoon, but since January the charge for leaving it there has been $57 per week and you CANNOT pay by the day.

Portuguese Man ‘o War
At this time of year, these creatures can be seen in this area.

If you are stung by one (also applies to a lionfish, coral, stingrays etc.), the best remedy is HOT seawater.

Any chemical agent, or change in PH, or Salinity, or chemical composition, will trigger the stinging cells to fire more venom. For many millions of years, these things have evolved to exist in a narrow temperature band, but by increasing the temperature, it simply turns the cells into protoplasm, like soup.

The target temperature is about 50 C or 122 F, but just try to get as hot as you can tolerate.

From San Blas Cruisers Facebook Page:
We arrived in San Blas 2 weeks ago, and we have paid:

105 USD P.P. for Visas (our 12-year-old daughter was free)
200 USD cruising permit for 1 year
20 USD P.P. / month park fees (our 12-year-old daughter was free)
20 USD per boat/month park fees.

Posted on behalf of SY Two Oceans:
Filling water in San Blas, Panama is a bit of a problem. The options we found were:

Nargana
Look for Paco’s house in the anchorage between that island and Corazon de Jesus. His man, Apollo, brings water from Rio Diablo and using a bucket fills your tank. Typical cost – 8$ for 50 gallons. They also sell gasoline.

Squad up
A small concrete dock, very close to the beach at position 09 27’.301 N 78 59’.947 W has a tap. Desperate for water we agreed to pay 25$ for 70 gallons.

Rio Azucar
A busy dock at position 9 25.846 N 78 37.72 W has a tap. They charged 5$ for tying to the dock and 15$ for the water, regardless of quantity.

There used to be a working tap near the dock of Carti Tupile at approx. position 9 28.56 N 78 57.71 W, but we found its pipe broken. No water available in Carti Sugdup too.

Miki Barzam on “Two Oceans”

Information from Karsten Staffeldt:

Yachts going to Panama simply to transit the Panama Canal
Regulations are somewhat “cloudy” with reference to the 72-hour rule mainly being applied to commercial vessels transiting the Panama Canal, which most do within 72 hours, and for which no navigation permit is required and no crew visa.

Vessels transiting the Canal also do not need to undertake domestic clearance between the Caribbean/Pacific Terminals.

Some yachts using agents have been able to pass the Canal handled the same way as commercial vessels, however, this is only possible if the yacht in question has transited previously and registered with the Canal and is ready to transit on arrival in Panama.

We worked with Roy Bravo from Emmanuelle Agencies and it was great. We had some problems, parts were cleared quickly, the canal transit went smoothly and he solved our problems when we were not correctly checked in at the San Blas Islands. Thanks to Roy we were able to leave in time.

By the way, we thought Colon to be much nicer than Panama City. You just have to know where to go and where not to, and you have to speak Spanish or ask someone to help you out.

PANAMA CANAL –Passing March 2015

Our agent was Oliver – we can his service highly recommend!
Oliver is a multilingual yacht agent from Belgium, offering his services in Shelter Bay, Porto Lindo, Porto Belo and Panama City. We met him in Porto Belo, that save money for taxi and marina.

Oliver is a great help for spare sourcing, provisioning, gas filling, local information and other logistic needs. He speaks fluent German, French and Dutch. It was nice to communicate with him in our mother tongue,

Oliver is punctual, reliable and reachable anytime by phone +507 6602 0498 or by email
info@oliveryachtservices.com.

Agent for Canal- March 2015

We would thoroughly recommend Roy Bravo of Emmanuel Agencies. He replies promptly to emails. His fees and costs are very transparent with no surprises. he was very helpful on other non-related matters and went the extra mile to ensure the canal crossing was smooth and fun.

He can provide excellent line handlers, and we would recommend having at least two ” professional, for their experience, language [dealing with pilot etc]. If you can have Daniel as lead linehandler he is a top guy.

Roy even drove me to the hospital on our arrival and spoke to the reception to organise my treatment. Later on, when we decided to go to Galapagos he organised a fumigation certificate at short notice.
Thoroughly recommend

We needed to transit the canal within four days of arriving at Shelter Bay Marina in January 2015. Many thanks to Roy Bravo, the agent who made it possible by organizing all the paperwork, ropes, tires, and line handlers. Very professional, experienced and helpful. Responds to emails at any time of the day or night. Provides advice on the transit details. Highly recommended.

On our way around the world, we have reached Panama. Now having read a lot about re-stocking here either side of the canal, we thought this is the place. However, we are very disappointed to always hear the sentence “no lo Tenemos” we haven’t got it.

So sailors are advised to purchase spare parts before arriving here. On the other hand, if you are lucky to find what you need then the price you have to pay is quite reasonable.

Patrick Heini

I have just had a sail repaired in Portobelo bu Casa Vela which is located on the water front to the right of town, looking fro. the water. Good service and the repair well done, Catherine s/v Gentle Rain II

Panama City Cruisers Connection, Deb Meh 507-6153-2089

Provides reasonably priced Bed and Breakfast in Bella Vista, transport throughout the country including personal taxi service in Panama City.

Will purchase food and beverages by order and deliver. Locate and purchase parts and provide guidance on where to get boat work done.

All excellent services at reasonable rates.