No Shirt, No Shoes, But We Have Service: Navigating By Cell Tower in Las Perlas
Ding!
We’re on a broad reach, closing on Las Perlas archipelago. A half hour from Isla Saboga the Chief Engineer’s phone wakes up.
Large red X indicates a cell tower.
Smaller x shows weaker connection.
Las Perlas archipelago, counterclockwise from top: 1. Contadora, right, and Saboga 2. Pedro Gonzalez 3. San José 4. San Miguel, Isla del Rey 5. Víveros
1. Islas Contadora and Saboga
Ding! Ding! Ding!
It's jarring. Insistent.
Ding!
What’s so urgent? Some emergency?
He glances at it.
Ding!
It’s the DuoLingo owl, reminding him to finish his Spanish lesson.
I emit a sigh that sounds a lot like my father’s long-suffering one. So much for getting away from it all.
I’m secretly relieved. Our cruising guides are from an era of pay phones, and even those are rare. At least there’s one place we know in case of emergency.
Or Spanish lessons.
Getting away from it all doesn’t mean all the time. Maintaining cellular connection to our family and friends has become crucial in our socially-deprived pandemic world.
We want to isolate, but not from family.
Sometimes, ya gotta Zoom.
Saboga and Contadora have their own broad reach. Together, they provide an umbrella of cell service as far as Isla Santa Catalina and Isla Chapera.
We anchor off Swedish Beach on Contadora’s south side in the shadow of the tower.
There’s time to check email and get the owl off Stephan’s back.
When we’re done, we round Chapera’s northeast reef to anchor in the Mogo Mogo channel. The cell bars disappear, along with line-of-sight to Contadora, like Cinderella’s coach at midnight.
Back to cruising.
2. Isla Pedro González
Despite what the guides say, the bay is dredged to a comfortable seven meters.
As noted in an earlier post, the Pearl Island Resort marina doesn’t welcome cruisers. The marina probably won’t be happy about my shoutout but they have an unsecured wifi connection.
Just sayin’.
The village does welcome visitors. Ask around to find the woman who sells Tigo and Movistar minutes.
3. Isla San José
Sunset over Isla San Jose.
It’s 6 pm, a half-hour before sunset, as we approach Concholon Bay. It’s on the west side of Isla del Rey’s southern Concholon peninsula, the only safe anchorage cruising guides report.
The bay seems clear except for a fishing lancha, one of the brightly-painted, open boats that islanders rely on. Through binoculars, I see a line of white floats bobbling in its wake.
Bummer. They’ve just laid out the evening’s fishing net across the bay’s mouth. We’ll have to figure out where, exactly.
The lancha is on the move but, without nav lights, we can’t tell if it will cross in front or bear toward us. Its intentions become clear when someone in the bow starts doing jumping jacks, either dancing to the YMCA song or signaling us to stop.
I put the engine in neutral, though swell keeps nudging us toward them.
Now he’s motioning us to go around, between them and a reefy-looking shore.
I dunno. It’s unfamiliar territory and the light’s bad. The chart plotter thinks we have enough depth and sea room, but charts of these islands aren’t reliable. My sense of discovery doesn’t extend to finding previously-uncharted rocks the hard way.
Not worth the bragging rights.
Not even if Navionics named it Christine’s Rock.
When the four young men in Milagro de Dios see we aren’t budging they zoom over.
It’s time to solicit local knowledge. The Chief Engineer explains we need two meters of depth. They look dubious, so I ask if they’ll show us another safe anchorage.
We follow them to a spot just north of Concholon and tuck in where they indicate, behind a large rock.
“Hay señal,” the YMCA-dancer says proudly. There’s cell service.
I love local knowledge.
That’s a much better discovery than a rock.
Across the water to the west is Isla San Jose, a privately-owned island. We aren’t sure of the signal’s source, though. It could be coming from the nearby village of Esmeralda. A few days later we spend an hour near the village, trying to resurrect the signal, but find nothing at all on Isla del Rey’s east coast.
So, while I cannot swear to its location, hay señal.
Morning in our anchorage, now named Hay Señal.
“DON’T ANCHOR OVERNIGHT OFF SAN MIGUÉL.”
4. San Miguél, Isla del Rey
San Miguel, the largest town on Isla del Rey, and its cell tower.
The dings begin once we round Isla del Rey’s northeast corner, WhatsApp and Marco Polo notifications from our kids.
It’s Wednesday, family Game Night over Zoom, the highlight of our pandemic week.
Stephan says, ”Two bars.”
That isn’t enough.
He locates the tower west of a hillside village, high enough to confer service over several miles.
The trick is to find the area of maximum Zoomability. We drive around, calling out the number of bars until we find a likely spot north of the village, but it’s shallow. We’ll only have a meter of water under us at low tide, which is during the Zoom. Which is also at night.
That’s when we exhibit our worst cellular lapse of judgment, the kind of mistake you make when family is coming and you leave to meet them despite a marginal-to-crap-weather window.
I’m not going into this now. It’s much more embarrassing than discovering Christine’s Rock.
Just sayin’ DON’T ANCHOR OVERNIGHT OFF SAN MIGUEL.
Not even for your family.
At least, don’t do it in the dry season, when brisk evening northerlies and chop take over so you might be pounding on your keel all night.
You have a less dangerous, more comfortable, equally Zoom-enabled option to the west, at Isla Viveros.
5. Isla Viveros
Just head west a few minutes to Isla Viveros. Viveros is under development, which means there are a few big buildings, but work is suspended on an actual marina. However, Viveros has a breakwater and the harbor’s been dredged deeper than charts indicate.
Most important, it has a cell tower.
From San Miguél, point toward the end of the breakwater and watch the bars rise.
Pass the breakwater and look up.
There’s the tower.
Be sure to anchor behind the breakwater where there’s protection from evening breeze, chop and the reef.
Then relax. You have service.
Fair winds,
Christine
Do Tell!
At least pay phones don’t send notifications. Remember them?
