Rio Dulce and checking into Guatemala

Rio Dulce Guatemala

By Capt. Scott Buckley

This is April 2018 and we were anchored off Cabo "Tres Puentes" Guatemala after sailing down from Placencia Belize and had a forecast high tide at the Rio Dulce inlet of 1.5 feet at 7:10AM the next morning.  We needed the high tide to cross the bar at the mouth of the river to get into Livingston Guatemala to check into the country.  Crossing this bar was a big milestone for Tamera and I.

Map from Placencia Belize to Tres Puntas

Cabo Tres Puntas to Livingston Guatemala

Our plan was to get underway a 5:00AM the next morning to make the 9 nautical mile (nm) trek to the shallow bar and cross it at high tide. The evening was beautiful and we enjoyed a nice dinner and swim before retiring for some sleep.

The anchorage at Tres Puntas with SV Rainbow's End in the background

Tres Puntas Anchorage beach

The winds thru the night began increasing but the bottom anchoring conditions were good and the anchor was holding well so there was not too much concern at first.  Through the night the conditions remained good but by early the next morning the winds had picked up. At around 4:00AM the following morning we received a distressing call from Don on our buddy boat SV Rainbow's End that the weather looked bad and they wanted to know what we should do.  In fact the winds and sea had picked up allot (30 to 35 knots) thru the night and became squally and the boat was pitching around great deal but nothing to disturbing.

What was disturbing was the wind direction.  The winds had shifted from the east northeast to the southwest which was the direction we needed to go.  That meant the winds would be on the nose and we would be beating into large seas.  Rainbow's end continued to call on the marine VHF radio wanting to know about the weather conditions.  We had just woke up and were orienting ourselves to the new conditions so I had no immediate answers. I turned on the radar to have a look and saw a very large squall to the west that measured 18 nm across.  The squall was now on us and looked like we would need to pass thru it to get to Livingston.

With the new wind direction we went from being anchored behind the protection of the land to being anchored off a lea shore in deteriorating conditions.  I said we need to get the anchor up and get off this shore.  Tamera agreed and relayed the plan to SV Rainbow's End who also began picking up their anchor as well.

Picking up anchor in these condition is difficult and dangerous but Tamera is an exceedingly competent mate and we work really well together.  Sorry there are no pictures but we were entirely too busy being exceedingly competent and working well together or it slipped our minds.

With the wind on our nose in the 35 knot range the seas were large and slowed SV Kooky Dance to 3.0 to 3.5 knots instead of her regular 6.0 to 6.5 knot range.  That meant the 9 nm trek to the mouth of the Rio Dulce was going to take 3 hours instead of less than 2 hours.  It also meant we would miss high tide.  The bar at the entrance to the Rio at low tide was only about 4 ft and we drew 5' 6" so we needed the 1.5 ft tide that was predicted.  If we missed it we would have to wait until the next morning.  So we pushed on and encouraged SV Rainbow's End to keep up as they were falling farther and farther behind.  While that may not be a problem for them as they only had a draft of 4' 10" it had been the plan that they would cross the bar in front of us and relay the depth they saw.

Our other buddy boat SV Arawa had cross the bar a few days before and had run hard aground and had to get a boat to pull them off and tow them into Livingston.  SV Arawa indicated that the tow boat (a local fisherman) towed them off the bottom and pulled them more toward the north of the standard rhumb line.  SV Arawa only draws 3" more than SV Kooky Dance.  So we took the way point supplied by SV Arawa and programmed them into the chart plotter the night before and I had planned to pass a little north of the rhumb line described by their way points.

As we push on the time of the high tide came and went and we were now looking at a falling tide.  If we tried to cross the bar now and ran aground we would have to wait for the next high tide the next morning before we could hope to get off ourselves.  In that time we could get blown further into the shallows or we could try and get a tow from a local boat.  We had heard the locals could charge between $100 and $150 depending on whether they have to use one or two boats to free your vessel.  While it is not a huge cost it was one we were hoping to avoid.

As we approached the bar we stayed in contact with SV Rainbow's End and I relayed my frustration at missing the tide.  While they could still cross the bar with their shallower draft they did not want to check into Guatemala without us.  They spoke very little Spanish and were counting on me to act as their interpreter once we got in.  They suggested I call the Rio Dulce Cruiser radio net and see if we could get some guidance.  Even though Rio Dulce was 22 nm away I gave it a shot and got a response from motor trawler MV Chickcharnie.  I relay our predicament  and he asked us our draft.  He indicated that we might make it and that we had to decide quickly.  He also said that we should attempt to cross the bar going as fast as we could.  WHAT!

A boat (not mine) shown hard aground courtesy of Google images

Normally when heading into shallow water we adopt the approach to proceed very very slowly.  That way if we run aground the boats speed and inertia will not be so great as to drive up on a bar and make it very difficult to free the boat.  Additionally we looked at the tide and make sure we don't have a falling tide so that if we do get stuck time will not be our enemy.  I have run aground more times than I care to remember and the one time I ran aground on some rocks in the Bahamas and I could not get the boat off under her own power I simply waited for the tide and in about 45 minutes SV Kooky Dance floated free and we sailed away.  The "go slow" approach has been a winning strategy for many years of sailing.

In this case this lunatic on the radio was suggesting we head into shallow water at full speed.  Not only that there were others listening in on the radio conversation and AGREED with that "go fast" strategy.  They were all mad.  Turns out Don on MV Chickcharine is a really good Captain and all around good guy but at the time I was quite sure he was a couple of beers short of a six pack.

Our original plan was for SV Rainbow's End to cross the bar in front of us with their shallower draft and relay the depths to us.  Rainbow's End was still well behind us and to wait for them to get ahead of us would mean losing even more of the tide.  I had to make a decision quickly whether to attempt to cross the bar or not   I told Tamera we were going to go for it and to relay that to SV Rainbow's End.

So I increased the throttle to 3/4 full throttle (I just could not do the full tilt bozo approach) and in we went.  The depth started coming up from 15 ft to 8 ft.  That meant there was only 2.5 feet under the keel.  Then it went to 1 foot under the keel and the boat was speeding at near her hull speed with just 6 inches under her.  Everything in my being was screaming we had to stop this.  Tamera was just as tense, and then the depth showed 0 ft under the keel and SV Kooky Dance continued at her best speed into certain disaster.  Tamera asked what was the depth now and I could only respond; "Don't ask".
Then we hit.  SV Kooky Dance started slowing down briefly and then started accelerating again.  We were accelerating, what madness.  Then we hit the bottom again a little harder this time and I bumped the throttle up because we were loosing speed.  My hand was on the throttle and I wanted to pull it back but fought the urge.  And then we really hit.  SV Kooky Dance was rapidly coming to a stop.  The bow was pulling down and both Tamera and I were being thrown forward from the deceleration and just when I thought it was over for us and we were hard aground the bow popped back up.  It appeared we were stopped but I looked at the water and saw some bubble that were moving slowly aft.  With the throttle at full SV Kooky Dance was moving forward.  I just waited and in about a minute SV Kooky Dance began accelerating.  We were free.

We continued on and only bumped one more time but not nearly as bad as the last one.  The water depth started registering a couple of inches under the keel and then an entire 1/2 ft.  I eased the throttle back and suddenly took a deep breath.  Both Tamera and I had been holding our breaths.  It also dawned on us that we had just crossed the Rio Dulce entrance bar.  That was a HUGE milestone for us and we start hooting and giving high fives to each other as our tension levels decreased.  I don't think either of us could get the grins off our faces.

Approaching Livingston Guatemala

We made our approach into Livingston and got an anchorage quite close to town.  As I had mentioned the winds had been quite strong and due to the closeness of land on this side of the bay the seas had been very small but Livingston was not known to be a good anchorage so we were a little worried as we dropped the hook in 7 ft of water.  We set the anchor well using the engine and waited to see if it was going to hold.  It did and in the short time (10 minutes) while we prepared the boat and our check in documents the wind completely fell away to less than 10 knots.  We had to laugh at the irony.

View of the quay side at Livingston from our anchorage.

We called the agent, Raul, on the VHF radio and informed him we had arrived and wanted to check in.  We had already hoisted the "Q" courtesy flag and Raul informed us to stay on the boat and he would bring the officials out to us.  We also informed him of SV Rainbow's End arrival.

Raul is a cruiser friendly agent that can help you check in (for a fee of course) and also has boats standing by to tow grounded vessels across the bar.  His contact information is below:

Raul Morales Veliz

Tel:+502 79470888 /

mob. +502 55109104

,VHF Channel 16, 68

navieraservamar@gmail.com 

Raul's story is an interesting one and may be the subject of a future blog but that can wait for now.  For now it is enough to say his services are very professional and easy for the cruiser.  His office is about 1 block in from the municipal dock next to the restaurant BuggaMama's.  You can't miss BuggaMama's from the water and is the big blue building near the left side of the photo below.

Arial shot of Livingston, Guatemala.

Somewhere along the line someone had asked Raul to send a boat out to help us across the bar.  This boat was now coming along side our boat to be paid.  Even though we did not need him or ask for assistance he did show up with his very capable boat and crew to assist.  I gave him $20USD and that seemed to satisfy him.  I also sent him over to Rainbow's End.  This was actually a little mean of me as the crew of SV Rainbow's End did not speak any usable Spanish and the crew on the tow boat did not appear to speak anything else.  Soon the radio call came in from Rainbow's End to see if I knew what these guys wanted.  I explained, they paid the same and everybody survived.  Don on SV Rainbow's End informed me they they would give me a ride in to the dock in their dinghy in exchange for some language help ashore.  That was very cool with me and we stopped preparing our dinghy for launch.

Soon a launch approached us with the officials and we invited them aboard.  They seemed reluctant at first but soon were all sitting in the cockpit.  Raul introduced himself and the officials.  He laid out the check in steps and then offered his service which I readily accepted.  I invited the customs officials to inspect the boat however they declined.  Raul also informed us how much money we would need to complete the check in and that was around Q$2100 or about $290USD and that we should get local currency.

Raul took our boat papers, Belizean Zarpe and passports and said to come by his office in about 2 hrs.  Raul and the officials soon departed and headed over to SV Rainbow's End.  I called them on the radio and told Don that Raul spoke very good English and what to expect.

We had been informed that petty theft was a little bit of a problem in Livingston so Tamera and I had decided that she would stay on the boat and I would go shore alone.

Don soon swung by and picked me up and we headed into the shore to get local currency and complete the check in.  Don used his ATM card and I went to the bank to change some US dollars.  Changing money was a little more involve than what I was used to.  Guatemala has had a money laundering problem and to combat it limits how much local currency can be convert to "effectivo" or the local currency the Quetzal or "Q".  That limit is currently $500US per month and was the amount I was trying to change.  I needed my passport to do this and Raul already had mine but I had some copies of my passport on me at the time.  After some back and forth it got done and I met back up with Don and headed for Raul's office.  There we secured a 90 days visa for all of us and 90 day import papers for the boat and instructions on how to renew those for a longer stay.  Don and I returned to the boat all checked into Guatemala.  

Livingston Guatemala

Again Tamera and I were ecstatic as this was another major milestone in our adventure.  Tamera wanted a picture of her raising our Guatemalan flag as officially checked into Guatemala.    

Tamera hoisting our Guatemalan flag on SV Kooky Dance

It was around noon when we returned to the boats and Guatemalan weather was living up so its reputation of being very hot.  We decided to have some lunch and a cold beer before getting underway to our next destination at Cayo Quemato or as it is sometimes called "Texan Bay" about 7 to 9 nm up river.  To do that we would need to pass thru the gorge which is a very picturesque section of the river that is enclosed on both sides by very high cliffs that are 300 ft high in some places.

The gorge will be the subject of the next Blog so this will be it for this one.

Belize to Guatemala

Fig. 1. The is the route from Cay Caulker thru port stuck to

 St. George Cay

By Capt. Scott Buckley

Well when I last updated this blog it was when we were checking into Belize at San Pedro on Ambergris Cay.  The events that transpired there were really the last of the difficult times regarding customs and immigration.  I cannot say if it is because were we getting better at it or they where just a series of unfortunate events but we were to learn that our experiences were not that uncommon.
As I write this I am sitting in Upstate NY house sitting and looking for some work to make a little money for the cruising kitty.  We have been to Belize, Guatemala thru the rainy season and then back to Belize for 3 months of prefect cruising and then returning to Guatemala where we stored the boat while we did things in foreign places.  So to get started lets jump back to where the last post left off.

We were still traveling with our buddy boat (Arawa, Sea Mist and Rainbows End) and somehow I had become the leader of this rag tag group even though my intension was to be a submissive follower of the vastly greater cruising experience of my buddy boat partners (more on this later).  We plan to travel next to Cay Caulker.  It is a well know tourist destination and a place we could provision the boat.  We were running low on some essentials.  The trip was only about 13 or 14nm(nautical miles) and we raised anchor the next morning after the sun was well up for good light and slowly made our way down south to Cay Caulker.  The approach to the anchorage was straight forward and we dropped the hook in about 7’ of water.  We dinghied ashore and walked around and saw the sights and bought some very expensive food provisions for the boat.

Fig. 2 Yummy vegetalbes

Fig. 3 The cruising guides info on Cay Caulker

Fig. 4 The dusty street on Cay Caulker.  No cars here.

Fig. 5 Police station

Fig. 6 Main st. in Cay Caulker

Fig. 7 Post Stuck.

We planned the next day to go down to St George’s Cay and had an obstacle of some shallow water for the next day thru a pass between two cays called Port Stuck.  By the way the difference between a cay (pronounced Key) and an island is that both are bodies of land surrounded by significant water, or islands, however a cay is always a low profile island. The controlling depth thru Port Stuck was stated at 6’ and we drew 5’ 6” so it was going to be close.  Add to that the pass is very narrow and the cruising guide we were using was about 10 years old.  A cruising guide is a book incase you got confused and thought we had kidnapped a child and were forcing him to tell us where to go but, now that I have said that, stealing a child and forcing them to be your local guide may be a workable idea.  While the guide's age was not the problem it did reference sticks sticking out of the water and to only pass these 10 yr old sticks (keeping them close) to starboard. This was concerning due to; 1. the reference was ten years old, 2. they were sticks, 3. this area is prone to hurricanes, 4. did I mention that they were sticks and no where in the definition of stick is the verbiage “HURRICANE PROOF”.

So off we went in search of Port Stuck hoping to not get stuck at Stuck.  So with the aging guide book and our general nervousness we decided to line the boats up in order of draft of the water they drew under the keel.  That meant the first boat would be Sea Mist at 4’ 3” draft and then Rainbows end at 4’ 10” then Kooky Dance at 5’ 6” and finally Arawa at 5’ 9”.  So as we approached Port Stuck SV Arawa and SV Kooky Dance had to slow way down to let Sea Mist and Rainbows end pull ahead.  Remember we had, as a group, agreed to a plan about boat order however as Sea Mist and Rainbow’s End were closing the distance they also began slowing down further to the point that Greg (SV Arawa) and SV Kooky Dance were nearly motionless in the water.  This is not as easy as it sounds when under sail.  You cannot turn off the wind.  You cannot throw the sails into reverse.   I was tempted to get on the radio and entreat them to get a move on and get thru the cut but apparently they had other intensions.  Sea Mist began heading way off course to the east from the guide book's directions and Rainbow’s End was now heading the wrong direction to the west when the course thru the cut was south.  On SV Kooky Dance the 1st mate and I had decided that Tamera would man the helm (drive) and I would go up to the bow and watch for obstacles because we believed I was much better at reading the water color for depth contours.  With Sea Mist off course and Rainbow’s End heading the wrong direction we had no choice but to proceed ahead and go thru the pass before the others.  The water looked very shallow in all directions.  A called back to the helm and asked for the depth from the instrument display.  Tamera reported first 7.5’ then 9.7’ then 2.6’.  We knew what was happening.  In shallow water with a hard bottom the depth-o-meter or fathometer sometimes suffer from a phenomena called multi-pathing.  The fathometer works by emitting a sound pulse into the water and then listening for the echo off the bottom.  The fathometer measures the time from when the pulse was emitted to when the echo off the bottom was received and determines the depth by multiplying that time by the speed of sound thru water.  When the bottom is hard and very close as in it is when in shallow water the echo return is very strong and will bounce of the hull of the boat or the surface of the water and go back down to the bottom and return back up and get received by the fathometer.  These are false echoes and our fathometer is kind of stupid in that is does not reject false echo and gladly reports them as erroneous depths.  So we got out the lead-line.  A lead-line is a length of rope with a weight at one end and marks along is length.  We mark our lead-line in red from 0 to 6’ and anything over 6’ in green.  I deployed the lead line and read 6’.  Told the helm to call Sea Mist to the west for their depth even though they were behind us.  They reported 7’ so I had the helm steer 20 degrees to starboard and took another lead-line reading.  6’ still no improvement.  We called out depths to Greg and Candy on SV Arawa, who were following close behind us and he confirmed the same depths.  That meant I had only 6” between our keel and the hard bottom and poor Greg only had 3”.  We got thru somehow and we even saw sticks.  They were all over the place.  

I am pretty sure the choreographed boat dances by Sea Mist and Rainbow’s End were intentional but made to look like confusion in order to trick me into giving up following them so they could then follow me.  This cleverly choreographed boat maneuvering meant to look like total confusion was executed on numerous occasions and it was not long before I caught on to their scheme.  When I confronted them about it, they were acting unconvincingly innocent but not entirely surprised at the accusation. 

So sailed on down to St. George’s Cay with SV Kooky Dance and SV Arawa in the the lead.  We anchored in 6” of water on a very grassy bottom.

We did not stay long at St. George’s Cay and sailed next to Colson Cay where it was reported to be good snorkeling.  The winds were good and we decided to NOT wait for the other boats and let SV Kooky Dance do her thing.  She flew with the wind at 6 knots and we got to the Cay by noon and picked an anchorage next to a reef.  We had not been snorkeling since Mexico and Colson Cay did not disappoint.

Fig. 8 Colson Cay reef

Fig. 9 Colson Cay reef

Fig. 10 Colson Cay reef

 
That afternoon we moved the boat to anchor closer to the Cay and put some distance between us and the coral reef for the night.  We moved back to the reef the next day.  We stayed there for 2 days and snorkeled both days.  On the second day I caught some lobster for lunch and dinner.  There was some bad weather coming and we had planned to sail down to Sapodilla and then Placentia but because we stayed and extra day at Colson Cay we changed the plans to sail all the way to Placentia (41 nm) from Colson the next day.  We hauled anchor at 7:00AM the next morning and SV Kooky Dance lead the way.

Fig. 11 The Ascension Fleet in hot pursuit of SV Kooky Dance  

In the middle of the days the winds eased and that let the other boats catch up as they were motoring sailing (sailing and using to motor for more speed) and not just sailing. In the after noon the winds picked up again and SV Kooky Dance was off again.  The rest of the fleet planned to sail around and enter Placentia from the south but the crew of SV Kooky Dance chose to sail thru the narrow cut at the north end of Placentia harbor.  The Cut was a bit tricky and narrow at first but proved to be quite manageable.    Like most harbors entering it for the first time is always a tense.

Fig. 12 The northern cut entrance into the 

Harbor at Placentia, Belize

Fig. 13 The approach to the northern cut into Placentia Harbor.  The is a sand bar to the right of the cut (hard to see in the picture) making it very narrow.

We actually stayed in Plascencia for the next couple of weeks.  Plascencia was a big goal destination for us and there was much to see about this place.  We had laundry to do and some boat repairs to complete and that being said it did not stop us from having some fun while we were there.

Fig. 15 The famous Yoli's Bar at Placentia

Fig. 14 Smoothies

Fig. 16 SailFish Resort where they had free Wednesdays for /cruisers. 

Fig. 17 The Ascension Fleet gang right before a good old street 

fight between me and that lady in pink (Pam).  It was close

and if I had worn good shoes I might have not lost so quickly.

Fig. 18  Don from SV Rainbow's End

Fig. 19 Rowing into the dock at Placentia

On about the 26th of April 2018 we checked  out of Belize with customs and immigration to begin working our way down to Guatemala.
We sailed from Plascencia to a point or cape of land sticking out in Amatique Bay in Guatemala called Cabo Tres Puntas (three points).

Fig. 20 Cabo Tres Puntas is that finger of land at top center and the sand bar and entrance to the Rio Dulce

is to the southwest.  That distance is about 9nm.

 It was another 40nm sail from Placentia and was pleasant sailing. From hear it was only a 9 to 10nm trip to the Rio Dulce River outlet at Livingston.  Where we anchored down at Cabo Tres Puntas the fathometer showed we were in only 15’ of water but the bottom looked dark through the very clear water.  When I dove down to check on the anchor set I found the bottom was covered with a very dark brown sand and I saw the most sand dollars and starfish I had ever seen.  Unlike the coral sand in Belize, that was nearly white, this sand was dark (probably Vulcanic) so visual navigation here would be a very different game and the water may appear to be much deeper than it actually is.
Even though we were in Guatemalan waters we had not officially checked into the country.  To do that we would need to sail to Livingston Guatemala at the mouth of the Rio Dulce.  To get there we would have to cross a shallow bar at the river’s outlet into the Bay of Amatique.  The next morning we had a 1.5 high tide at 7:05AM so we planned to leave the anchorage a 5:00AM and sail the 9 nm to the bar off Livingston.  The winds were light and from the east so we may end up motoring the next morning.
This place was beautiful and I wondered why we had not heard more about it.  Early the next morning we would learn a little more of why this was not a particularly good place to hang out.