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| Pannel s—er, makes his ungainly getaway after doing the deed on our solar panel. |
“Birds are the wildflowers of the sea,” one sailing adventure book opined. Indeed, on a long open ocean passage, they do provide some much needed visual variety.
We were on our third day of passage from Panama to Galapagos, a couple hundred miles from land. We noticed a seagull circling our boat. Clumsily, he alighted upon our solar panel, his feet unable to maintain consistent purchase.
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| Not all our feathered friend encounters go awry. This stunning hawk (falcon?) roosted at Fort San Lorenzo, Rio Chagres, Panama. |
We watched, amused.
Some birds alight to get a rest. Some make it a social stop, with us other other birds of a similar feather. Others still look for handouts, or something they can steal.
Wait!
Was this bird planning on replicating the calling card left from another in the Dry Tortugas (click here for that)?
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| Flitting about their community of odd hanging nests, these birds warbled beautifully and did not s— on our heads. |
Perhaps the bird knew it was an empty threat. He s— and flew away.
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| These charming little fellas alighted on our boat in Rio Chagres and again in Portobelo. No calling cards left behind. |
A Chinese proverb claims “You cannot prevent the birds of sorrow from flying over your head, but you can prevent them from building nests in your hair.” It does seem, however, we cannot prevent them from pooping on our solar panel. Or our dodger.
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| Dawn off our stern in Galapagos. |
Location Location
This post was written whilst on a ~1,000 nm passage between Panama (N08.37.393 W79.01.870) and Galapagos (S0.57.924 W90.57.750), March 2-11, 2015 and stored until we regained traditional internet. We are currently in the Galapagos, Ecuador, anchored off Isla Isabela.
We were laughed at one day as we were heading in. Wind was 15 knots right on the nose. We were tacking up wind. Under power. Sails down. Everyone was hooting and hollering we did not need to tack under power. Boy were they wrong. A pelican landed on the bow and proceeded to crap I swear at least 5 lbs of rotting fish poop on deck. The smell was so bad all I could do is tack side to side . No way to go into the wind. I never got that stain off. Ken
Great story, Ken and seriously nasty stuff! One of those I-told-you-sos it would be better to be wrong on. Thanks for a good giggle and some perspective.