Hazel has officially arrived. She is tied up safely at Shelter Bay Marina near Cristóbal/Colón, Panama, the Atlantic gateway to the Panama Canal. As first impressions go, this one was memorable. We met the owner of the marina, who also happens to be the man who built it. He is originally from Two Rivers, Wisconsin, and struck up a conversation the moment he spotted Hazel’s home port of Red Wing, Minnesota. A genuinely wonderful man. He even noticed a part on Hazel that needed

Planes Take You From Point “A” to “B.” A Sailboat Takes You Through the Rest of the Alphabet A squall ambushed us today. You can read all you want about them, but until one charges at you in real time, you cannot fully grasp how fast and how fiercely they arrive and then disappear. Hazel was under full sail (main, staysail, and Genoa), happily charging along at 7.5 knots in a steady 20 knots of breeze. Off in the distance, we spotted a long, dark wall. We assumed we had plent

Today we slipped past Guatemala and Honduras, and by late afternoon found ourselves off the coast of Nicaragua. This stretch has a reputation. Just last year, four sailboats were taken hostage by pirates between Honduras and Nicaragua, and overall pirate activity in the Caribbean jumped by fifty percent. We stay as informed as possible and follow every safety recommendation to the letter. Out here, that means keeping at least 125 nautical miles offshore, a buffer we have main