This newsletter began as a correspondence between my father and myself and Christopher and I began our adventure on our boat. Dad has had Multiple Sclerosis for over 50 years. It was chronic progressive so he declined gradually over time until really only one arm worked. He would toggle his electric wheelchair over to the table and peck away on his Web TV keyboard and would send out the most incredible correspondence to folks all over the world. Many also had MS and Dad became a source of inspiration to them with his ingenious ability to adapt to his lengthily illness and still maintain a bright and witty personality. Dad wanted me to go on an adventure and report back to him. And so I have. He started forwarding my emails to him onward around the globe. And he would research our next destination and let us know of anything interesting. It was such an incredible great feeling to come into port and have emails from Dad waiting at the local internet cafe. This past year Dad complained that we were spending too much time working on the boat and should finally get on with our adventure. He wanted emails about exotic places and things ... especially critters. And the jungles of Central America are full of critters. So as we left El Salvador this past November, Dad was with us in spirit waiting for the reports. And so here is our report to Dad which we are sharing with you.

Our departure from Bahia del Sol, El Salvador was another perfect bar crossing with only small swells at the bar itself while other boats had to crash through big waves. We had another good sail south bypassing the Gulf of Fonseca preferring to go directly to Costa Rica. We landed after several days of nonstop sailing at Santa Elena which is a preserve without any human habitation around the bay. Finally wilderness that surrounded the boat. We swam, snorkeled, hiked into the surrounding jungle, did laundry at a small stream and critter watched. Dozens of new birds to identify including flocks of Amazon parrots that looked like flying fat green mangos as they frantically flapped their stubby wings to stay aloft. Hiked to up a stream with other cruisers to dive and swim at a waterfall. One morning the sounds of crashing and breaking tree limbs announced the approach of a large troupe of Capuchin monkeys. And a fruiting tree attracted a troupe of brown Spider monkeys with their little black babies. A big Olive Ridley turtle floated up. He was just dead with his mouth still pink. Christopher tried CPR on the poor creature to no avail. Who knows why he died but likely from eating a plastic bag thinking it was seaweed which is a common cause of death of turtles. We spooked a Northern Tamadura anteater who looked like a big furry lizard as he crashed out of a tree and scurried away. Lots of jaguar and tapir tracks but no sightings. This is the type of anchorage we have been seeking since Alaska.

We spent Thanksgiving at Playa del Cocos enjoying the company of folks we have cruised with for a while. This is a small wantabe touristy community but has some still wild outer edges. We lurked up an estuary to see many birds including the funny looking boat billed heron. The middle of town had a troupe of spider monkeys and an amazing array of trogon and oriole birds in bright colors. We poked down the coast stopping in small anchorages. The coloration of the Central America variegated squirrel is astonishing and every flicker in the landscape revealed another type of bird. Evenings were spent pouring over various bird books to figure out what we had seen that day. The folks were friendly, anchorages rolly but quiet, lots of swimming in warm clean bays, and the country full of new sounds and sights. We watched a vaudeville show lasting several hours of a shrimp boat being unloaded via panga skiffs onto the beach to the buyers trucks. Dozens of people manhandled 50 pound net bags of shrimp tails which were poured into crates, iced, and loaded into huge boxes on the back of flatbeds as the captain gestures with enthusiastic abandon about his shrimp and the buyer picks up and pitches down the shrimp with signs of disgust.

I grew up near a military airbase and am quite familiar with the roar of a F 15 fighter jet as it banks in a turn. Heading south from Cocos, I often heard the distant roar of the jets and puzzled over what military jets would be doing in Costa Rica when Costa Rica does not have a military. Then one day in Bahia Ballena while hiking up a streambed we came across a group of howler monkeys. The big dark male aggressively came down the tree towards up and tried to pee at us and then "roared" the throaty rushing sound of a banking F-15 jet. Military Monkeys?!

Isla Jesusita and Puntaraneous. Costa Rica is known as the land of the thieves. How true. Thieves tried to steal a cruiser's dingy and motor at Isla Jesusita but it was padlocked. So they came back the next night armed with their handy new bolt cutters only to find the cruiser had left so they stole another cruisers dingy and motor. $7000 to replace that setup! Then a couple of days later the thieves tracked down the first cruiser, boarded the boat at night while the folks were sleeping below, cut off the padlock on the outboard motor and stole that one too. Many outboards and dingys have been stolen from cruisers over the years. Thieves will slip aboard the boats and rummage through deck lockers stealing anything they can. Each cruiser will have a Costa Rica rip-off story even if it is consistent over charging on restaurant tickets. How sad for Costa Rica where thievery is not a crime but an art.

Quepos is a delightfully simple old traditional town with blocks of storefronts occupied with active established businesses. It was a rolly enough anchorage that we sported many bruises from being pitched about in the boat as it bucked in the swells coming into the open roadstead. Yet there was a huge beautiful pier left over from the defunct banana export days and it was nice to be able to land a dingy and not get wet. We took the bus to Manuel Antonio preserve and had a couple of the most incredible biologist guided tours. We are great at spotting critters but the guides knew what to look for and knew the animals in the park. We saw several two and three toed sloths with a couple that the guide termed "really moving" which takes on a whole new meaning when applied to a sloth. It means that they were not dead asleep but were showing some possible signs of life! There were bats and birds and the run on water Jesus Christ lizard. Three raccoons sized big medium and small rapidly rampaged through the beachgoers snagging anything eatable or of interest acting like an unruly teenaged band. Coati strolled the trail with the people and Capuchin monkeys brashly hung out near the trails with poor tired mother monkeys hauling heavy babies on their backs. Iguanas were everywhere and were not shy at all. A real treat was to see a rarely sighted wood rail who seemed to be traveling with a coati mother and baby. We saw endangered Squirrel monkeys doing their majestic long leaps from high treetop to treetop. As we left the park something caught the eye of the guide in a back yard. The owner invited us in and we spent a delightful few minutes with the little Squirrel monkeys right in front of us. Manuel Antonio will likely be one of our most favorite critter stops with a large concentration of tropical animals in such a small area.

Bahia Drake was a place where we could spend some time if the anchorage was more secure. The deep water in the bay leads to a wide shallow shelf where the waves stack up steeply right where the boats would anchor. For the first time since in years, Alaskason's stern anchor was deployed to keep the boat nose into the waves to keep the boat from severely rolling from side to side. Dawn came back from a tour to find Christopher off exploring and Alaskason determined to go to the beach. The bow anchor had broken out from it's hold in the bottom of the bay but thank goodness the stern anchor held as the boat did a 180 towards shore. Another boat, Mirage, had kept an eye on the events and provided great assistance to get Alaskason reset. Sailors are always anxious about leaving their boats for any length of time as there is always danger of dragging, sinking, or being pilfered. We do not go for more than a few hours and will go out of our way to climb to a high point to "check the boat". We did do several hikes into the Corcavado wilderness and enjoyed the jungle flora and fauna. Reading or watching programs about these places do not begin to give one a sense of being in the middle of it all. Every turn revealed an astonishing array of flowers and colorful leaves popping out from the ground to the tallest tree. Dozens of vocalizations from birds, bugs, and critters surrounded one. A guide halted our march on a trail and poked a forked stick under a small overhang in the middle of the trail and pulled out a small but deadly Fleur de Lance snake. No bigger around than a thumb and only a few inches long, it would kill with one bite. Yet a large group of people ahead of us stepped over the ledge unknowing. Long minutes were spent observing a pair of turkey like Great Curassow with their fancy head gear that were once thought to be extinct in Costa Rica. We would have loved to sit for a long while every few hundred yards to let the jungle move around us. But we rushed headlong on through the trails, anxious about the boat, snakes, and impending darkness obscuring our way back to the boat and enjoyed snatches of wonder.

We did not do boat work at the beginning of this season but pulled anchor instead to begin moving southward. So now we headed for Bahia Gofito de Dulce to get to protected waters. We still are in Costa Rica where thievery is an art so theft from the boats would continue although all of us are getting more wary. It was wonderful to sleep with the boat gently turning in the tide instead of pitching noisily in the rolling waves. We have settled into a routine of working on the boat then taking a day off to hike in the jungle. Projects included installing two new opening window hatches in the wheelhouse top for ventilation, installing chainplates for the running backstay, rerouting the fuel tank fill hose out of the cockpit instead to the side deck to give better engine room access and the never ending Ceatol coating to protect wood surfaces. Our bird sighting list is growing slowly as we spend alot of time observing each new discovery amazed at its activity and coloration. Gofito is a desperate town where the main employer "abruptly" left after strikes and "civil unrest". We like the town and anchorage but are often warned about "activities" that would endanger our personal safety. We are not sure what all that means and would consider joining the growing American expatriate community here but for other distant ports beckoning.

Now we are preparing to again enter remote areas of the West Coast of Panama. It will likely take us 3 to 4 weeks to work our way to Panama City where we will spend some time stocking to cross the Pacific this fall then on the Ecuador to store the boat for a while. But remember that our boat card says "Man Plans and God Laughs".

Christopher and Dawn of the Sailing Vessel Alaskason.

Please consider this newsletter a FINAL NOTICE to those of you who have not responded to receipt of this newsletter. We address this letter individually for many reasons including email screeners and privacy. It is a labor of love that, remember, began with me corresponding with my father. Dad was so encouraging about this journey and made me feel like a little girl wiggling with glee at her Dad's approval. And I am over 50! I would always look forward to a bunch of emails from him waiting at a new port of call and would rush to find an internet cafe for a Dad Dose. Dad encouraged lots of people even as the horrors of MS controlled his body. He was a magnificent human being. My father died just before Christmas and there will never be another email from him and he never got this report he so desired of critters and adventures. But you have responded with such enthusiasm that we will try to continue what began with a fathers love of his daughter.

Dawn