I flew back to Panama, spent a week with Yami and returned to Cartagena. I then tried to go south to Medellin, but the buses were a little bit of a problem due to the FARC in the region, so I decided to take another route, via boat from Colombia back to Panama. The trips are organised regularly, and sailed whenever there were enough people on-board. I called the Captain of one boat, arranged my ticket, and as luck would have it, we sailed the next day (Thurs 22nd June).

The Darién Gap is a stretch of land joining Panama and Colombia. Covered in dense rain forest, it is a widely unexplored, inhospitable area of land, home to various indigenous Indian groups, as well as some unfriendly characters, namely three Colombian rebel groups, the right-wing United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC) and both left-wing National Liberation Army (ELN) and Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The Panamerican highway, which stretches about 16,000 miles from Alaska to Argentina, would run continuously if it were not for a 62 mile stretch through the Darién Gap that has never been constructed. Various attempts have been made to link the road through the gap, however due to environmental and political reasons, this has never been accomplished. It is said there are mud roads, which are passable at some times of the year, but for the most they are only accessible by 4×4. The lack of decent road, and the presence of the rebel groups makes all overland passage both extremely difficult and dangerous, and is not recommended, and for that reason there are various sailboats offering passage from Panama to Colombia, thus bypassing the Darién Gap.

The boat I sailed on, the Stahlratte (German for “Steelrat”) is an old fishing vessel, made in Holland and first registered in 1903. In celebration of her 100 year anniversary, the ship’s owners decided it would be fitting to circumnavigate the globe, taking on board random crew members along the way. The financing of the boat is somewhat unplanned, and due to that, the ship was ferrying passengers back and forth from Panama to Colombia and vice versa (with a stop off in Panama’s San Blas islands to break up the journey), in order to pay the passage through the Panama Canal.

The group assembled early in the morning ready to load up and sail out, however it took a while to get everything organised, provisions bought, passports and immigration arranged etc, so we didn’t actually leave the Cartagena marina until late morning. That afternoon and the following day was all at sea, which although it is the Caribbean Sea, was surprisingly choppy, so choppy in fact that one of the girls on the boat started feeling ill about an hour from the port, and for the next 36 hours lay curled up in the fetal position, occasionally letting out a murmur or wail, moving only to drag herself to the side of boat, lean over and throw up!

After the initial euphoria of being on a sail boat wore off, and the gradual – sometimes violent – rocking motion of the ship took became monotonous, I passed time watching the open seas, reading, playing cards or soaking up some sunshine on deck, whilst below deck I took advantage of the classic offerings in the library, a lot of guidebooks, and a host of old (and some newer) movies. Add to this the seemingly constant food preparation or clean up, and the time passed fairly quickly. On board everyone was expected to take on some cooking/cleaning responsibility for at least one meal, so I got mine out the way early on, meaning I could sit back and relax for the remainder of my time on board. At one point on the Friday, out boat attracted a group of curious dolphin, who swam along with us for a good time, jumping out of the water and generally playing around.

We sailed (using a mixture of wind and motor power) from Thursday afternoon through the night, all Friday day and night, arriving and mooring amongst the San Blas islands just as it got light on the Saturday morning.

The San Blas islands are an Archipelago consisting of about 400 tiny islands, or cays, on average the size of a football pitch, covered in palm trees and ringed with white sand. Basically, paradise. On some islands the local indigenous people (the Kuna), have built their villages, whilst others remain untouched and undeveloped. We moored in a position within swimming distance of 3 or 4 uninhabited cays, each covered with palm trees. There was nothing for it but to jump into the warm Caribbean Sea and swim across to explore my own little island in the sun.

I spent the most of two and a bit days we were moored up exploring and looking around the islands, snorkelling and generally basking in the glory of the paradise that is San Blas. I can honestly not say enough good things about those two and a bit days. A complete break from civilisation, and a holiday from a holiday! Over the course of the time we were there I swam, sunbathed, explored, ate, drank, and enjoyed it all.

We left our mooring point on the Monday afternoon and sailed to a traditional Kuna village, where we went ashore and had a quick look around. The Kuna people are about 40,000 strong and are self-governing, separate from the Panamanian government. They gained this autonomy in the 1950′s, making their own laws and running their economy ever since. The three main industries are fishing, trading coconuts and tourism.

One of the most noticeable things about the Kuna is the traditional dress of the women, who are adorned head to toe in brightly coloured hand woven molas, their arms and lower legs are covered in beads, their heads are covered with scarves and some have nose rings and painted faces. The women sell these molas, which are very cheap considering the skill involved and time taken to make.

We arrived in the Kuna village in mid-afternoon, and wandered around the straw huts, taking in the way of life and being offered the various molas on sale, before heading back to the dock and onto the boat for a final night aboard.

The Tuesday was an adventure in itself, being taken to the off loading point, shipped across to the shore in speedboat, before boarding a 4×4 to the city. The 4×4 journey took us through the rain forest, across rivers, through waist deep mud and away from the Caribbean towards the Pacific and finally into the sprawl that is Panama City, where I checked into Zuly’s hostel and had a Cerveza Balboa with some of the folks from the boat, before heading off to Penonome to stay with Yami the following day.

Some more photos from the 5 day trip:

sailing away from South America

last views of S.A

dolphins

looking at the dolphins

first glimpse of San Blas

sunrise over San Blas

sailboat heaven

stahlratte

all seems shipshape

stahlratte

more sailboat heaven

waking up

the day revealed all

island hopping

moi

reef

lunch

me – posing

local sales people came by plying their wares

yee ha

the quintessentail desktop shot

midday on the stahlratte

posing – again

beers

beers pt 2

chess

sale made they shipped out

ashore

paradise!

my island

its mine – I lay claim to it!

stahlratte

stahlratte

moi

moi and my island

kuna school

another village shot

the houses

and the streets

all made from palm

once back on the mainland it was a 4×4 trip

through the jungle, on the washed out roads

and crossing a few rivers

definately 4×4 territory

no asphalt

view over the Panamanian rainforest

and back down to the Caribbean Sea

Rainforest

As far as the eye can see

Where the blog left off, I had just arrived in Cartagena. I arrived on the Thursday evening and I had a flight to Panama booked for the following Sunday. For whatever reason I decided to hang around the city for the weekend, and then I kind of got stuck, and didn’t move anywhere until I took the flight to Panama, 10 days later!

I stayed in the Getsemaní district just outside the old city, in a hotel that for about £2 a night was clean and had a ceiling fan. The downside was the partitioning walls were plyboard! That and the area was a haven for druggies, prostitutes and the destitute.

No matter, it was cheap! I spent the week wandering around the city, visiting the various museums etc,. Cartagena de Indias, founded in 1533 by a Spanish commander, Pedro de Heredia, sits on the mouth of Cartagena Bay.

Originally founded as a port where Europeans landed with their merchandise, and in reverse gold and silver were transported back to Spain, the city grew rapidly during the 1500’s. Cartagena is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, due to the walled city and its contents, and the huge fort that sits overlooking the bay.

As I mentioned before I stayed in Getsemaní, about 3 minutes walk to the old walled city and its colonial architecture. The old city is very reminiscent of Oaxaca, and in particular Guanajuato in Mexico, with its narrow streets and colonial style buildings.

The entrance to the city is via the Clock Gate, or Puerta Del Reloj, which then leads out onto the La Plaza de los Coches, which at night fills up with people drinking café or the local brew – Cerveza Aguilla, and watching the world go by. Inevitably there is a festival or music playing somewhere, usually some kind of live steel drum band. Mingled with the music is the clip-clop sound of horses hooves on the paved roads. The horse-drawn carts pass, one after another throughout the evening, trying to attract tourists to take a trip around the city.

I spent most days/evenings either wandering, or sitting in one of the plazas drinking café (or Cerveza Aguilla!). There are a lot of plazas! A lot of the buildings are painted and it seems in whichever colour is on special in the hardware store at the time. This makes Cartagena a very bright place and gives it a lot of its charm. Some of the streets are continuously busy, and others are all but deserted.

As in Taganga, the variety of fruits on offer is superb, and on virtually every corner there is a stall selling some variety of tropical produce, such as papaya, mango, melon and huge avocado pears. There is also a great range of fresh juices on offer in the various ‘loncherias’.

One of the main attractions in Cartagena is El Castillo de San Felipe (The Castle of Saint Filipe). This is a Spanish fort that stands guard over both the city and harbour. This is one of the strongest fortresses ever built by the Spanish in the Americas. Built to guard Cartagena and the Spanish gold from English pirates and war ships, it took over 150 years to complete. It is laden with tunnels leading to and from various places within the walls.

As testament to its strength, in 1741, Cartagena managed to repel an attack by the English Commander, Edward Vernon, who together with 25,000 men and 186 ships, laid the city to siege for three months. His ships cannons were unable to reach the Castillo, which sat high out of range. However the cannons of the Castillo were a little more powerful, and bombarded the English ships whenever they entered the harbour. By the time he gave up the attempted invasion, Vernon had lost over 70 ships and 10,000 men.

Built to protect the city from pirates in times of war, now in peace time some buildings and open spaces have been adapted to suit the modern consumer climate, and modern modes of transport. Incorporated into the city walls, Las Bóvedas are dungeons initially built for military purposes and now house boutiques and tourist shops.

It seems the residents of Cartagena are proud of their flag, as it hangs from a multitude of buildings, from the fort, to the theatre to what seem like private residences.

I took a boat trip out of the city, passing by some of the smaller forts in the mouth of the harbour, and some more modern naval craft. This trip visited a nearby beach, Playa Blanca, which is where the two Dutch guys I had met in Pasto had spent some time the week before I arrived in the city. During their time on the beach, one of them had done some snorkelling and had acquired a very nasty eye infection. A parasite of some kind had managed to bury itself into his cornea and was slowly eating through it. Apparently it was incurable and he was in serious danger losing his sight. He eventually had to return to Holland for a cornea transplant. I never saw him again so I don’t know how everything turned out, but I wish him the best. Also while I was in Cartagena, the football world cup kicked off. I saw England play their first two group games, but I can’t remember who against or what were the scores.

Below are some photos of me in the Castillo de San Felipe. It was a hot day!

Check out was 11am. Come 10.45 we rolled out of bed and quickly tried to pack our things up and leave. I decided that I wanted to go to Cartagena and hang around there for the 10 days until my flight to Panama, so it would be goodbye to the Swedes until much later in the year when we had planned to meet up in England to take in some lash action.

We all went to the bus station together where it was a quick goodbye and I jumped aboard a bus to make a two-hour trip to Barranquilla (birthplace of Shakira) where I would need to change buses to reach Cartagena.

The journey itself was uneventful, but my arrival in Barranquilla was a bit of a shambles. As we pulled up to the outskirts of the city there was an unofficial bus station, and the driver of my bus said I could change here for a bus to Cartagena, rather than going all the way into the centre of the city.

Good idea I thought, then my bowels surprised me I was left a little short. Having no public facilities nearby I went off in search of somewhere to drop the load. I soon realised this wasn’t that good an idea. I had all my stuff with me, I was blatantly not from around there, I was in a pretty dodgy area, I was attracting strange looks, and it was pissing down with rain.

Obvious robbery target, I decided I could wait for the toilet, went back to the makeshift bus station and jumped on the first available bus to Cartagena (it so happened there was one there just about to leave) and got the hell out of that place.

The two hours on the bus weren’t the most comfortable, being soaking wet and in need the toilet but overall I reckon its better to be on a bus whist wet, still have all of your possessions, and be in need of the toilet than be on a bus whilst wet, have a few less possessions and have crapped yourself when someone pulled a gun on you and robbed you!

That was my thinking anyway.

I arrived in Cartagena and discovered that the bus terminal is actually about and hour outside the town centre. Therefore I spend another hour on a city bus, reaching the town centre and finding a backpackers hotel. The first one I tried was full but the second one was decent enough with a double bed, fan and clean sheets for 10,000 Pesos a night (£1=4,500 Pesos).

I checked in (used the toilet!) and went out to the balcony to have a look at the street outside. The first person I saw there was a Dutch guy who I had been drinking with in Pasto when we were stuck there a few weeks before. I hadn’t really got on with them when we were in Pasto as I found them to be a little annoying by constantly trying to out-do everyone. I knew what to expect from them on this occasion and I didn’t pay too much attention when they started doing it again.

One of them had been exceptionally unlucky however and was in a pretty bad way. He had been staying at a nearby beach – Playa Blanca – a place similar to Tayrona National Park, and had been snorkelling with contact lenses. Somehow one of the lenses had scratched his cornea and caused a small cut. He had left it a day or so before his return to Cartagena, however in this time his eye had gotten infected and was clouded and he had no vision in the eye.

He had been to the doctor who had prescribed some medication and carried out some tests, but nothing seemed to be working. By the time I arrived he had been wearing an eye patch for a few days, complaining of bad headaches and dizziness. This obviously wasn’t a great predicament for the lad and he was pretty down at the time.

I spent the evening having a chat with the two of them and generally not doing much, before having a much-needed early night for the first time in a while.

Aaron & I woke up early as planned, packed our things up and checked out of our hostel. Our plan was to head to the Pacific coast of Colombia for the week before heading back to Cali for the weekend to hit the town.

We left our bags in the hostel whilst we searched for an Internet place to email our families and let them know we’d most likely be out of contact for the best part of the week, in order that they wouldn’t worry. This is always something I would rather do, especially when I am in a place like Colombia which isn’t exactly renowned for it safety.

As I looked on the Internet and in particular the BBC I noticed a small headline in the Americas section saying ‘Bombing Spate In Colombian Port Town Injures 5’. Interested to know exactly whereabouts for future reference I opened it up and lo and behold it was in Buenaventura, the exact place we were about to head to.

Erring on the side of caution we decided that it probably wasn’t the wisest idea to be heading to a town that is in the middle of a spate of bombings, and decided that maybe a week on the beach wasn’t going to happen.

We went for a little breakfast to discuss our next move and sitting at one of the tables was a guy we had met in Pasto. We sat down and started talking about plans and the usual and he mentioned in passing that because of the upcoming elections that weekend, everything in the country was shutting for the weekend. Everything. Shops & banks wouldn’t be opening, buses wouldn’t be running and even bars were being forced to close. This was going to start on the Friday and last for the entire weekend until the elections on Sunday.

There were two stories going around as to why everything was closing. The first was that in the run up to the last elections there was a large bombing in a bar in the capital Bogota which killed lots of people, and it was in an attempt to curb the effect of any bombings that everything was closing down. The second story went that if the bars and shops didn’t close the Colombians would either go shopping instead of voting or just get too pissed and forget to vote! I prefer the second story but in reality it was probably the first that was true, especially considering the President has declared war on the terrorists and the paramilitary group FARC had come out and said they would be trying their best to oust the president from office.

So everything closing on the weekend had put another spanner in the works. Cali was a party town, and so there wasn’t really much to be hanging around for if we weren’t going to have a party at the weekend.

We returned to the hostel and decided to take a taxi to the bus station and make our minds up on the spur of the moment. The two options we were considering were Popayan and Medellin. Both towns were supposed to be pretty decent places in which to hang around. Popayan was 2 hours away, Medellin 9 hours. When we got to the bus station for some reason I went a little crazy and made the spur of the moment decision that we should in fact get on a bus for 22 hours to the Caribbean coast and stay there for the election week.

The thinking was that a small beach town wasn’t likely to be the target of FARC terrorists, and also that the laws concerning alcohol sales might not be enforced as highly! Thus we boarded a bus for Cartagena on the north coast, a journey that was purported to take 22 hours.

Settling in on a pretty comfortable bus we were pretty pleased with our choice but looking forward to 22 hours time. I was excited about taking my new Valium pills and getting a decent sleep for the first time on a night bus. Up until it was time to take the Valium and drop off into the world of slumber, I tried to get through some more of Atlas Shrugged. That book was proving to be a real challenge. The story is interesting and it is very well written, but it isn’t a book that you can just pick up and put down at will, it takes a fair amount of concentration to read it.

I read most of the time, only being disturbed when a group of Army soldiers – all aged about 14 – stopped the bus, and made every male on board get off whilst they searched us at gunpoint.

Anyway, the time to take the pills came around, so take them I did. That’s where it got interesting. Not 10 minutes after I had taken them, we pulled up in a traffic jam. Bear in mind this is about midnight, on a road where you wouldn’t expect traffic. The bus didn’t move for about an hour, and everyone on the bus was getting more and more tense.

Aaron & I were the only two tourists on the bus, the rest were locals. Normally the locals never get tense. Which meant something was wrong. This didn’t worry me too much as the Valium was by now in full force and I was pretty drowsy. Then I looked out of the window of the bus and there were flashing lights in the distance, like flashes of gunfire lighting up the midnight sky. These went on for about another hour, lighting up the sky intermittently. All the time Aaron and I were getting a little more nervous, having heard the stories of travellers being kidnapped and taken off into the jungle.

There wasn’t really much we could do, sat in the middle of nowhere in the dead of night, apart from wait it out and hope that whoever was holding up the traffic wasn’t in the market for two English lads!

After two hours, we got a knock on the door of the bus, and a guy covered head to foot in camouflage, with a scarf/bandana across his face, holding an AK47 came on board. We’d been searched before and made to show our Passports, so I was expecting the same again, but this guy wasn’t the police or army, he had no badges or ID, so we concluded he must have been something to with the FARC.

Whether or not we were right in our conclusions I have no idea, but for the next hour while we were sitting there we were not really sure what to think, and so when we were finally given clearance to carry on with our journey the relief came over us and we sat back and fell into a deep, Valium-induced, comfortable-in-the-knowledge-that-we-had-survived-our-first-FARC-experience sleep.

Waking up for my first full day in Colombia was a decent feeling as Colombia was probably one of the countries I had most looked forward to visiting since starting to think about travelling in this part of the world.

We all went out for some fried breakfast goodness, before trying to find out the deal with the strike and when it was likely to be cleared. It wasn’t all that straightforward a task as everyone kept giving us different answers.

One person would say that it would be cleared the following day, others said about 2 more days; others even said it would be two more weeks!!!

Not wanting to be stuck in Pasto for two weeks we considered the option of taking a flight further north to Cali, Bogota or even Cartagena. We talked to the travel agents and eventually Aaron and I reserved flights to Cali, whilst the Swedes and Jon reserved flights to Cartagena.

We were told we needed to pay that afternoon so had little time to make our minds up. Did we wait for the strike to clear possibly risking some added time in Pasto or book the flight and hope the strike didn’t clear?

We played safe and booked the flights. Jon and the Swedes would fly to Cartagena on Saturday, Aaron and I would also fly on Saturday – but to Cali.

With the formalities sorted there was nothing left to worry about, so we could enjoy the town of Pasto and its surroundings. The main square wasn’t overly special but it was nice to sit and have a fruit juice or coffee, so that’s what we did. I also managed to polish off some of my book.

Thursday was pretty much the same, we wandered around and even took a taxi to the nearby village of , but it was really shite. The only thing of note that happened was me being threatened by an angry German Shepherd dog, before I literally shouted at it and told it to “fuck off”. It was obviously a multilingual dog – a German Shepherd that understood English in Spanish speaking Colombia.

Thursday night was alright for drinking, and that’s what we did. We headed to some bar on the outskirts of town and proceeded to polish off a decent amount of rum. We were certainly having a good night, and the people that were in the bar were too. It was just a shame that there weren’t all that many of them!

Friday was also a day of relaxation. I spent the late afternoon watching Da Vinci Code in the oldest cinema I have ever been in. In all honestly it is a pretty ordinary film, in a pretty ordinary cinema. The most exciting bit was the people handing out Anti Da Vinci Code flyers outside the cinema.

The evening was another night out. Only Aaron and I wanted to drink so we got a bottle of rum and drnk that in the hostel before heading out.

We took a taxi to a place recommended by the taxi driver. There were plenty of people there, but it was very much for couples. There were single girls there, but there seemed to be a pattern amongst them. They had all bought bottles of the local tipple Aguadiente – a Sambuca type drink – and proceeded to drink it in neat shot form. By the time we arrived these girls (about 15 of them – all in small groups of 2 or 3), were sat slumped in their chairs heads lolling, sleeping off the effects. It was quite a sight.

After finishing half a bottle ourselves the club closed and we were told there was nothing left open so it was back to the hostel to sleep it off and wait for our flight the next day.