Cartagena to San Blas to Bocas

On our way out of Cartagena, we stopped at the Islas Rosarios for a few days to visit the little aquatic park there and celebrate our anniversary. The mini Sea World they have there was a lot of fun. Because it's small, you can get a lot closer to the fish and dolphins. You can see Pami on the far right. We continued down the Colombian coast, stopping at Punta Bernardo and briefly at Isla Fuerte before jumping off for Puerto Perme in San Blas. Pami caught a nice little shark on the way which is one of our favorites.







Perme is in the Eastern end of San Blas and sees much less traffic from cruising boats. As a result, it's much more traditional than the Western San Blas. There are no roads, electricity or cell phone towers and people live pretty much the way they have for hundreds of years. The Kuna women wear their traditional molas with gold nose rings and frequently a tattoo down the length of their nose.









A prized possession in this land without electricity is an old Singer treadle sewing machine. You see these all through the San Blas, still putting down the stitches and going strong.






While we were there, we took a hike through some Kuna farm land and up over a hill to the sea shore on the other side of the point. I got Pami to pose behind a spider web with a monster spider on it. I kept saying 'get closer, get closer' but this was as close as I could get her to it.

After Perme, we had a very leisurely trip up the coast, stopping at Puerto Ecoses, the site of a Scottish settlement in the 1800's and several other anchorages with traditional Kuna villages. It was a treat for me since I hadn't had the opportunity to explore this part of San Blas before. On our way to Cartagena last season, we had a once-in-a-season weather window and had to leave without seeing the Eastern part of the Kuna Nation.




We met Katie Wilson in Nargana for a short visit and had a fabulous time with her. We got in a lot of sailing, snorkeling and fishing during her visit. Seen here, Katie helps Pami fillet a Cero (a very tasty member of the mackerel family).



I hadn't spent much time with Katie since she was a kid and it was great to meet the new adult Katie. Still a kid at heart. Our only regret was that she had to leave too soon.








After Katie's visit, we joined some other gringos in helping a Kuna community haul an ulu out of the jungle and invited us to come along and watch and/or help.

An ulu is the Kuna word for a dugout canoe. They are carved from a single tree, as they have done for ages, and serve as the transportation infrastructure of the Kuna nation. Under paddle and sail, the Kuna travel great distance in fair weather and foul in their ulus. This particular ulu is about 30 feet in length and about 3 feet across. Since the Kuna have been crafting ulus in this manner for hundreds of years, there aren't a lot of 3 foot diameter trees near the water line anymore. The tree from which the ulu was made was between 2 and three miles inland, along a ridgeline path that had incredible grades.

Our trip began at 5 am while it was still quite dark. A group of cruiser dinghys was led up a local river by Bredio, one of the locals who does boat work. The river was alive with all sorts of jungle noises of critters we couldn't see in the dim morning light. We arrived at a spot on the river back where the trail started just as it was getting light enough to see. 2 other dinghys were already there. We headed up the trail with the other gringos following our Kuna guide, but were rapidly left behind by the more robust hikers.

The trail passed through many areas of cultivation. The Kuna do a great job of sustainable agriculture, clearing and cultivating small patches of the jungle while leaving the forest canopy largely intact (except for 3 foot diameter trees). We passed through areas planted in Plantains, Bananas, Avocados and Pineapple, all planted along the hillsides. One area that had recently been cleared for new crops made for great photos. Otherwise, it's hard to see the ulus for the trees :) We saw some awesome bugs too, some in the wild, some on us.

Just getting in to the carving site and out was almost as much as we could do, and in fact many gringos did just that. As we approached the carving site, we could hear a roaring sound in the distance. Some thought it was howler monkeys, but I've heard those and they are much deeper in pitch. This was more like the cheering at a local football game. As we started down the last grade, we were met by 70 Kuna, pulling the ulu up the hill with 2 long ropes, cheering and hollering the whole time. We estimated the canoe, carved from an awesomely dense hardwood and 3-4 inches thick, weighed about 4000 pounds, the weight of a good sized car, but no wheels. We joined in pulling and pushing whenever we could, though much of the time it was all we could do to hike along as fast as the Kuna were pulling the ulu. This trail is their daily commute to their farm plots and their level of fitness is absolutely amazing. They had left 2 quart and gallon jugs of water and what looked like kool aid along the path in a couple of spots. When they got to those places, they'd briefly pause, pour sacks of sugar into their water, and power it down. The easy-fix Kuna lunch. Up hill and down we went. On the steep uphill pitches, some of the gringos rigged pulleys and used one of Tisha Baby's old spinnaker halyards so that we could pull down the hill as well as up. The challenge was to set up the rigging before the Kuna got there. Only the steepest of grades would slow them down, particularly early in the day. One of our party, Kate, had her knees give out and the Kuna gave her a ride in the ulu. Quite a site, this petite little Scottish lady sitting in the ulu, snapping pictures with her camera as the Kuna hauled her through the jungle. In several places, the ulu would slide off the side of the path and down into the jungle bush, giving Kate quite a ride. With a bit of block and tackle and 70 Kuna power, the ulu would be brought back up onto the path. By the end of the trip, we were all absolutely beat. I put together a short movie from some of the other cruiser's videos...

The next evening, we were invited to the congreso, or the town hall, by the chief. They served us a traditional Kuna meal of rice with a few spaghetti noodles and a cup of kool aid. Afterwards, the chief addressed us and thanked us for our help, saying that they had estimated that it would take three days to get the ulu out of the hills, but with our help (mostly the block and tackle crew), they did it in less than a day. We gave him the names of our boats and he told us that we would always have the protection of the chief any time we returned. Pretty cool; I never shook hands with an Indian chief before.

A few weeks later, it was time to leave San Blas for Bocas del Toro where we're leaving the boat for a month to go back to the US for Aaron's wedding and a visit. This trip is usually accompanied by wind and current against you and good sized seas rolling in from behind, pretty unpleasant. We waited until the trade winds started to die soen due to disturbances north of our area and sailed as far as Linton with midld winds and big, rolly seas left over from the dying trades. In Linton, we picked up our friend Judy Rollinger who needed a ride to Bocas and headed around the corner to Portobello where we spent a few days enjoying the town and visiting with friends. Leaving the Portobello area, we managed to have good conditions for light air sailing the first few days as far as the Rio Chagres. The Chagres is the river that was dammed to create the lake that feeds the Panama Canal. It is maintained as a natural area which makes for great exploring in the dinghy. We waited in the Chagres for the winds to die out further and then had a delightful calm in which to motor the rest of the way in short hops. With the seas flat, we could anchor along the coast and explore the coast and travel up rivers where the surf is normally breaking. Our friend Judy Rollinger accompanied us and we spent over two weeks making a trip that is usually done is 36 hours. This coast was the last that Columbus explored on his fourth expedition and it was fun to retrace some of his footsteps (or oar strokes, or whatever he did). On our way past the bar at Belen, we caught a couple of Crevalle Jacks, one on each fishing line. Our fish book said that they were not the best to eat, so we threw them back. Shortly thereafter, Pami started having catch-and-release remorse. Some of the other fish in the book that are described as not too good are great (at least in these waters). In just a few minutes, we got another chance. We hooked another jack much bigger than the first two. We boated it and Pami cut out a sample and fried it up to taste. I didn't think it was very good tasting fish. In fact, after I thought about it a bit, it didn't taste like fish at all. It tasted like ground beef. Cows from the sea! We cut it up and made some great sausage from it. Here are a couple of recipes for the curious:

Italian Sausage ala Tisha Baby
2# ground pork or fish (Crevalle Jack)
1/2 cup shortening or oil (unless using fatty pork)
2 tsp Salt
1 tsp Pepper
1 tsp Fennel
4 cloves fresh crushed garlic
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper
1/2 cup grated Romano or Parmesian cheese
1/2 cup red wine
mix well - ta da!

Jimmy Dean Style Sausage
2# ground pork or fish (Crevalle Jack)
1/2 cup shortening or oil (unless using fatty pork)
2 tsp Salt
3 tsp Sage
2 tsp Pepper
3 tsp Parsley
1 tsp Thyme
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp crushed red pepper
mix well

Farther down the coast, we got a view of several beautiful natural arches and what can only be called Monkey Rock (Har, thar be treasure in the mouth of that monkey!). We finished our trip with snorkeling and sightseeing at Escudo de Veraguas and then a brief stop in Tobobe Creek. Tobobe is remote and seldom visited enough that the locals come out to visit in their dugouts and just stare at Tisha Baby. Everyone was very friendly, offering us a bunch of sugar bananas, little 'lunch sized' banannas that are wonderfully sweet. Judy passed out about thirty tooth brushes that she gets from her dentist in Houston and everyone felt they had a great deal.

Now we're at Red Frog Marina near Bocas and will be heading back to Boise and Olympia soon.