LEAVING A BOAT IN BAHIA DE CARAQUEZ, ECUADOR
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador, 30 November 08

There are only two places that you can leave your boat with any confidence in Ecuador: Puerto Lucia, Salinas, and Bahía de Caráquez.

Puerto Lucia has a full range of marina and haul-out/yard facilities. At a price, of course. I have not sailed there myself. The general feeling has been that they are not all that interested in cruisers since they serve basically the well-heeled yacht-owners in Guayaquil. Cruisers who have visited Puerto Lucia have occasionally also run into problems with Aduana about "importing a vehicle" (i.e., a boat) into Ecuador for longer than 90 days. Whether this was simply an attempt at extortion, there is in fact an import duty on 'vehicles' of 10% of the value.

The other possibility to leave your boat is Bahía de Caráquez, closer to the equator.

To deal with Customs first, Aduana in Manta (which is responsible for Bahía de Caráquez) does not apparently regard a vessel as a 'vehicle' and therefore there has been no harassing of cruisers who wish to leave their boats for longer periods in Bahía. A few times Aduana have sniffed around the Bahía, however, and are now involved in departure clearances for the first time (various government inspectors - health, agriculture, customs, what-have-you) have now to be brought out to Bahía from Manta by taxi so cruisers can clear out [expect approx. $60 in taxi costs, which can possibly be shared if there is more than one boat leaving]. Migración clearing is still done in Manta, two hours away, so you still have to travel there personally for that (it can be done cheaply by bus).

The bottom line is that you can leave your boat in Bahía for basically any amount of time. At least for the moment. Of course, where there is potentially money to be garnered, expect government officials to be almost as quick to get it figured it out as local businessmen. Who knows when Aduana’s attitude will change.

Leaving your boat in Bahía.

There are really no yacht-handling facilities in Bahía; i.e., no slips, no travel-lifts, no cranes, no hard-standings, not even a dock to tie up to (except a small float that could handle at most one yacht at the Bahía Yacht Club at $5-$10/day, the price being sort of ad hoc). We ourselves use a makeshift grid for bottom painting, but this is suitable only if you have the nerve for it, your draught does not exceed maximum 6 feet and you can get excellent tides. Marine craftsmen are in short supply here; there are in fact good mechanics, carpenters, machinists, welders, electricians, painters, etc, but no sail-makers or riggers and but few canvas-workers or upholsterers). We have been fortunate to be able to hire an excellent local mechanic who also handled our fuel-tank replacement (including putting us on to excellent welding and machining in town as well as other support craftsmen). There are a number of local men who will do basic cleanup or painting work on your boat; such help has been improving in quality and reliability over the last couple of years as they gain experience with cruisers. There are, in other words, good people around, but they are not all that used to working on yachts and are only slowly gaining the needed experience. The work rates, on the other hand, are very attractive, which can make up for a lot. Parts can be a problem here; it ometimes requires frequent trips to Manta or Puertoviejo, where you can get most things if not everything you will need. Importing from the U.S. or Europe can be quite expensive (Ecuador has no set-up for a “vessel in transit” so you pay high import duties.


To park your boat, you can rent a mooring buoy near town from Puerto Amistad (somewhat expensive at $270/month but the people are friendly and the facilities more than adequate with not-on-the-boat-wifi, laundry, delivered drinking water, propane and fuel also available). Much farther up river and out of town is Saiananda (somewhat cheaper at $170, also with wifi)) Or simply anchor off the town (the holding is excellent anywhere off the town; even the owner of Puerto Amistad has his yacht anchored off; no anchoring up at Saiananda, I have heard) and pay dinghy-docking fees (currently only at Puerto Amistad ($100/month) or Bahía Yacht Club ($60/month). The Bahía Yacht Club is friendly but very noisy at weekends and facilities (except the pool) are a bit tacky; taken together, that is likely why there are no boats there. They don’t have an agency either. A new causeway across the river is being built upriver a bit from the town. This will impact access to Saiananda starting perhaps within a few months since the clearance will be too low for normal sailboat masts. Rumours are that Saiananda will have a solution ready in time. Check with them. Although anchor holding is good everywhere, there is really no place near the town to land your dinghy on the beach.

Only Puerto Amistad and, I guess now, Saiananda can act as clearing-in or clearing-out agents with the Capitania de Puerto. an agent is mandatory. There have been cases reported in the recent past where Puerto Amistad has declined to be agents (or provide entry pilots) for anyone not staying at that marina, so you need to clarify this with them in advance. But, given the shifting nature of the river-mouth sandbars, you will likely want a pilot to enter and perhaps leave Bahia's estuary; Puerto Amistad can provide a pilot at $30 per one-way trip, somewhat cheaper if there are more boats assembled to enter/depart in convoy. I was required to sign a waiver of responsibility before I was guided in last April. If you are planning to stay somewhere other than Puerto Amistad, make sure someone will provide you a pilot if you want one.

Refuelling once you arrive can be a problem. Fuel is highly subsidised in Ecuador; diesel costs only $1.04/gallon at the pumps. But it is not available for foreign-flagged vessels at either that rate or any other. As far as I know, only Puerto Amistad can procure diesel for you at present ($1.50/gallon delivered to your boat). The Port Captain is insisting you have a receipt for some purchased fuel in order to issue you with departure documents; the only place to get this is from Puerto Amistad, although they can get any amount of fuel you need, I am told. You can purchase tiny amounts of gasoline yourself at (2) petrol stations for your outboard. Be sure to filter everything going into your tanks!

In addition to the phalanx of government inspectors that must inspect physically and approve your departure, the latest wrinkle in Paradise is that, whereas you once could easily get a 90-day tourist visa upon arrival and a 90-day visa extension just by asking, Migración will now only give you 90 days y nada mas. I was told this personally last week at Migración in Manta.

There are however a variety of various visa extensions available including a longer tourist visa (see Ecuador site on contact list below), but they are issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, Commercio e Integración). And, they are expensive: $200 per person (payable if approved) plus $30 application fee (payable when applying). The Ministerio has an office in Manta near the Malecón and the Terminal Terestre. You will likely also require an Ecuadorian to provide a personal (and notarised) guarantee and you have to prove you are financially solvent. The visa can be for 3-6 months but you must have at least 6 months left on your passport.

Clearly, this system is an indication that Ecuador does not expect tourists to stay longer than 90 days except in exceptional circumstances. The measures are probably aimed more at stemming the flow of migrants from Peru and Columbia than making life difficult for cruising tourists, but that is hard to keep in mind when you are running out of visa time.

That said, some cruisers, who have travelled out of the country to Peru or the U.S.A., have received new 90-day visas at the aeropuerto in Guayaquil or Quito upon return. Those returning from Peru or Colombia by bus have frequently been less fortunate and received only minimal extensions to allow them to get back to their boats. Very hit and miss.


Like the fuel restrictions (see below), I don't suppose any of this is actually aimed directly at cruisers. The government is trying to stamp out the smuggling of subsidised fuel to other countries. And, there are major border and border-crossing issues between Ecuador and its neighbours, Colombia and Peru. Some of the borders in the oil-rich Amazonian headwaters, for example, are still disputed, i.e., just waiting for trouble in the age of expensive petroleum. Large numbers of exiles enter Ecuador from civil war-torn Colombia, for example, and this has become a problem for Columbia's neighbours. Relations between the two countries have been severely strained since Columbia refused to stop spraying Agent Orange along the border. Colombia also actually attacked militarily into northern Ecuador earlier in the year, which inflamed public opinion. Ecuador hasn't like the USA or Israel yet resorted to building a wall along the border, but they are introducing various measures that, as it happens, also impact cruisers.

All that said, Bahía is an excellent place to leave your boat. The weather is always benign. Unlike other cities, the town is quite safe even at night. We have experinced no anti-Americanism or anti-gringoism in Ecuador at all and have heard of none; the people are reserved but friendly to gringos. Hell! Twenty percent of Bahía’s population now lives in Charlotte, NC, New York City or Madrid! The overall cost of living is low.

You can definitely leave your boat here without worry. Marina services are basic though sometimes comparatively expensive withal. There are boat-related tradesmen but at a still basic level. This is a fine place to wait out the hurricane season in Central America, a safe place to leave your boat and travel home or to Machu Pichu and an excellent spot to jump off for the Coconut Milk Run. The Galapagos are only one week's sailing due west.

But, since you can only get a normal tourist visa for 90 days, you will have to leave the country before the visa expires while leaving enough days to be able to get back in. This is undoubtedly going to be a pain in the arse for most cruisers.

When winding up to pitch something at its problems, Ecuador seems regularly to smack visiting cruisers with the back of its hand.

Contacts:
http://www.ecuador.org/visas.htm
www.puertoamistadecuador.com
www.saiananda.com
www.puertolucia.com.ec/cms/english
www.VilisarTimes.blogspot.com