Hi Scott -

Would you tell more about these long lines? It sounds like  they actually
float on the surface. Is that so?

Best,

John
"Seahorse"

Last night we had a wonderful transit  with the exception of a game of dodge
the long lines for an hour or  so.

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John asked:  Would you tell more about these long lines? It sounds like they
actually float on the surface. Is that so?

Well sure!  Honestly the long lines are probably THE most troublesome aspect
of traveling at night along the Pacific coast of Mexico and Central America.
To start, the fisherman that put these out are in small fiberglass boats
called Pangas.  They are 20 to 26 feet long with a tiller controlled
outboard motor, often 100 to 150HP.  There are usually two or three
fishermen in the boat and they leave for the fishing grounds about sunset,
returning at dawn.  We figure they fish at night because its cooler and
they can do more hard work then if it was during the heat of the day?
Anyway above Costa Rica these boats and their lines are completely unlit.
More often than not they do not show up on RADAR, I dont know why?  If I
can see flocks of birds, why cant I see a Panga with a huge chunk of
outboard and 3 guys onboard?

So these guys run anywhere from 5 to 100 miles off shore and lay out the
lines made of 3/8ths inch poly.  Every 10 feet or so a 5 or 10 foot fishing
line with hook and bait is attached.  Every 50 or 100 feet there might be an
old milk bottle or pop bottle as a float.  Dont ask how we know so much
about the line, you only have to pull one or two out of your stabilizer fin
to get REAL familiar with them.  Funny, but the two or three we have snared
didnt have any fish on them?  Anyway, the tricky part is these lines seem
to be about a mile long.  At one end is a small buoy or if your really lucky
a buoy with flag about 6 feet off the water.  Mexico seemed to favor red or
orange while Costa Rica and Panama seemed to favor an old black GLAD bag.
At the other end is the panga and the fishermen.  99 percent of the time
there are NO lights of any sort.  In Costa Rica they pretty much had lights
at least on the panga and even on the end of the fishing line, however the
middle of the line was never lit.

Now you would think these guys would stay clear of things like the rhumb
line from La Paz to Mazatlan, or the entrance to major marinas or harbors,
but no, they seem to concentrate their efforts in these locations.  Also
imagine these long lines are run out in all different directions.  It wasnt
unusual to come across a line and follow it along to find the black flag,
you go around it and in a few hundred yards you run into another.  It can be
really frustrating, again, especially at night.  We hung two at night and
got really lucky that they didnt snare our prop.  When we caught them Id
run to the back of the boat and pick up the line with a boat hook, then Id
cut it and let one end go first, and then the other, praying it didnt hang
on the fin.  Each time they went free.  Oh, you would also think the panga
fisherman would come and help you miss the line.  Well about 60 percent of
the time the panga would race out to guide you around and the other 40
percent of the time they would just watch.  We did have one instance where
we think we went over a line and didnt hang it, but its really hard to
know.  Also, its possible that we ran a few down at night and the spurs cut
them.  I seem to remember a boat hung a lobster pot line off baja and had it
stop his engine.  They were able to fix it in Mag bay by going over the side
and cutting it loose.

Anyway, thats the story about long lines.  We really hate them and there
really isnt much we can do about it.  Oh, a story worth telling, one night
a group of 3 or 4 boats were going across the Sea of Cortez ( I think)
anyway about 2:00am Linda was at the helm of Wayward Wind when I noticed a
small radar blip in front of us about a mile ahead.  We had the practice of
communicating amongst our little fleet and keeping an eye out for each
other.  Well no one else had their radar tuned so they could see this guy,
but I clearly had a real target.  About = mile before we got to him he
started to move very fast (25 knots) right at Linda.  I started an almost
continuous dialog with her advising where he was and how fast he was coming.
She actually went out on the bridge and could hear him coming, but couldnt
even see him.  As I watched he closed on the boat, slowed down and followed
less than a hundred feet off her stern.  I immediately started heading in
her direction and eventually the boat broke away and headed off.  It was
either a panga or a drug enforcement boat.  We never saw a light and never
got a response to our attempts to hail the boat.  If it hadnt been for the
fact Linda actually heard the outboard motors I wouldnt have had any proof
there was anything even there.

After hearing stories about other boaters being approached from behind at
night Im pretty convinced these are drug enforcement officials.  You can
see them in the marinas and they seem to spend most of their patrol hours
out at night.  I can tell you this, it makes it really hard to think about
having a firearm onboard.  This is exactly the situation you would be
tempted to go to the back of the boat and unload a few slugs as a warning
shot.  I can assure you if those are drug enforcement officials your going
to find yourself boarded in a heartbeat and having to explain why you have a
firearm on board.  Anyway, just one of those random thoughts.

Sorry for the rambling note, but it was nice to capture these thoughts while
anchored in Benao Cove preparing for a rounding of Punta Mala at first
light!

Scott Bulger, Alanui, N40II, Seattle WA

At anchor in Benao Cove, anticipate Balboa Panama arrival 1:00am 4/7