As you may have heard Mainland China reported no new Covid 19 cases yesterday. Both China and South Korea have dramatically reversed the incidence of new cases in about one month. It remains to be seen if the United States is disciplined and united enough to do the same. The graphs are from the NY TIMES.
Carol and I ventured a walk to the lake yesterday. The day was dreary, foggy, completely overcast with a cool wind blowing off the lake whose water temperature is 35ºF/1.7ºC.
There were more other people walking than usual, but that is to be expected when almost everyone is at home. We swung wide whenever we encountered others.
Yesterday we placed online orders to be picked up at a supermarket and a liquor store. The liquor store order was ready in an hour. The supermarket assigned us a time slot of 6:30–7:00 PM on Sunday. Presumably more people want groceries than liquor, or perhaps the liquor people are just more efficient.
My friend Hugh has just returned from Panama. He had planned to take his Crealock 34 SEA CHANGE through to the Pacific, but he emailed me this morning: as we arrived the government started shutting everything down. First Shelter Bay, which I intended to sail to today from Panamarina. Then 14-day quarantine for all boats in the “flats” before transit, then no landing on the Pacific side, and finally closing the offices that provide zarpes. So we bailed and I am back in the Midwest, staying home.
Hugh also sent a screen shot from the Marine Traffic site, with which I was not familiar, showing the boats and ships already in the Pacific. Purple are yachts. Red tankers. Green cargo.
https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:-102.2/centery:10.1/zoom:4
He added that the French are requiring all yachts that reach French Polynesia to remain at the first island where they make landfall.
I checked GANNET’s passage log and see that I departed Balboa, Panama, on March 14 last year. Panama is among the places I would least like to be stuck.
