Monday, May 31 1999 - en route to San Blas

Hello folks,

Rolling along, still making passage to Panama. Grey sky and white topped waves this morning but the sky has cleared now (afternoon) and the sea back to its usual beautiful Prussian blue. The swell has died down somewhat. We passed a few large tankers and container ships this morning but have the sea to ourselves at the moment - not even flying fish or any birds to break the monotony of the view.

Today has been a back to normal ‘work day’ on board for everyone, that means Michael is fine tuning the computers, Trevor is catching up on his paper work, Monika and Angelica are tidying up and sorting out inside, Rudi is editing the material we shot yesterday and I myself am working on an article on Brown Pelicans, in between trying to be creative in the galley.

We don’t have any pictures that are appropriate to today so we thought you may prefer to see a few more views from yesterday.

Tern looking for fish

We have been attempting to further identify some of the bird life from Los Roques. The terns which we watched on Saturday we think are Caspian terns, although according to our reference books here, there seems to be a size discrepancy - they were smaller than the size given for the Caspian Tern and were actually more similar in size to the Common Tern. They did not however have similar body postures. If anyone out there could advise us we would be most grateful.

Julians beach

We also thought you would like to see the Laughing Gulls again, fighting for their pick of the catch out on Julians beach.

Late afternoon, there is a little more to see outside at present. We are just passing the rocky islands of Monjes del Norte and Monjes del Este. They are away in the distance, but even from here you can see them rising straight up out of the ocean. They must be monstrous structures up close.

Monjes del Este

There’s really not much else to report on today so please forgive me for being brief - some days there is more to say today is one of the less-to-say days.

Signing off until tomorrow

Janet