The latest news from Dyllan in Panama:

What a crazy time the last while and where to start. We are still in Bocas del Toro in Panama. We have made such great friends here and we are constantly being asked to stay and offered jobs. Between working on the sale of the yacht we have both been doing odd jobs and keeping ourselves busy. We took another trip to Panama City to do some official documents down there and had a great trip.

Last week we had a huge tropical storm that hit the islands hard. The wind was blowing us around at 160km/h and the rain was pelting down. At 1am on Tuesday morning we got hit by a 6.8 earthquake! The ground shook violently, people were running down the main street in the storm in their pyjamas. The next morning it was chaos and to top it all we started getting super tides that were flooding the islands.

We lost power, cell phones and internet for 5 days and the storm continued. The roads that come from the mainland that supply all the food and fuel to the islands got damaged in the earthquake and then washed away in the floods. The tiny airport had damage to the runway so no flights. The town is now running out of food and drinking water. Power locally comes from a diesel generator that only has a day left then its in the dark. Lucky we are self sufficient as far as power so we are ok but we are also running out of food fast and there is nothing to buy in town. The ATM's has all been emptied so you cant get cash either. We cant drive or fly out of here and the storm is still raging so we cant sail out of here either! Not quite what we imagined for Caribbean sailing!

But we are fine and ok, there is still the odd tin of bully beef on the yacht that we have been avoiding but will dig into if we have to. We are sick and tired of the never ending rain and wind, everything is wet and you cant get it dry, but we will survive. We are missing home like crazy especially at times like this.

Send us all your news so we have something to read while we are stuck on the yacht. Hope you are all well and happy.

Sorry about all the moaning, we are still fine and happy and have loads of stories to tell when we see you. Its Thanksgiving here this week, it was supposed to be turkey and pumpkin pie, we will see what the Americans can do to celebrate their holiday with us. Attached a picture of our friends in the Cantina at the yacht club, you will see we hanged the SA flag proudly in the prime spot!

Miss you stacks

Dyllan