Bovedas de Santa Clara Cartagena

... ocean to where our sailboat was waiting.

The Good:
The first few days, we spent in the San Blas Islands. This is a set of indigenously owned and operated islands on the Atlantic coast of Panama and they are BEAUTIFUL!!! Wow. White sand beaches, turquoise waters, palm trees, the works. Each island is tiny, and most just seem to have one family living on the island. Due to some problems with getting fuel ...

... Relax”, I say, “You always want to shop for jewellery. Here’s your chance.” Were not even in the door and a sales lady is all over Angie. She’s speaking English, but with the odd Spanish word and strong accent. I walk away....getting a glare that could kill....this is going to be funny. Angie looks at a ring. Nice ring (for $2400 US). “Too much money”, Angie says. Next display ...

... Isla de Rosario and Playa Blanca, on another boat ride from hell (this time due to the annoying guide/idiot with a microphone) where it took nearly three hours to get to the first island, discovering that it was pretty much just an aquarium, and just wanting to get ot Playa Blanca, to go for a swim, to eat some lunch, and to get the hell off the boat. Playa Blanca itself was stunning, with it's perfect white sand and clear blue water, pity about ...

... a bull in here.
S: Where? A bull?


Me: Ya, right by your feet. It is eating our food.
S: Um, what do we do?


Me: I don´t know. Should we get out of the hammocks and scare it? Maybe we should take a picture. (laughing quietly)
S: I want it to go away, but will it charge us if we get out? I don´t believe this. (laughing)


Me: I dunno. Lets just let it eat our food. Aw ****, it just ******.
Cartagena, Bolívar, Colombia ochavez79

We got up at the crack of dawn (well, not really, 6:30) and headed out in search of a snack before going diving. After some yogurt and cheese bread, we lugged our bags down to Dolphin Dive Shop they met us there with their two yellow labs and drove us to the marina, where they bought us some more breakfast and coffee while the boat was made ready. After a few minutes on the pier, we headed out to the Islas ...

... from the ceiling like electrical entrails. It's quite a classy place. However, for the price, I think I will stick it out for a few nights. (The people who work there are nice. It is clean and seems secure with sane people staying there. There is not a family of any sort of insect or rodent residing with me...that I know of...)

So, I showered, coffeed, and headed out to the center of Cartagena. My first sign of the city was the yellow and, therefore ...

We surived another bus journey and arrived In Cartagena for Easter and a whole week of chill-axing, wooo! Cartagena is a beautiful beachside town that was previously a Spanish fort. The old town is inside the old fortifications, big stone walls with lots of viewing holes and cannons, and we managed to find a hostel here. We spent a few afternoons walking around the fortifications, enjoying the old city ...

... were much safer than people will lead you to believe. People are for the most part very friendly and eager to help. The important exception here is some tourist related interactions, where there still seems to be a very third world, "scam the gringos any way we can" mentality. I, for one, really disliked this part of the country and it probably made the difference between a good and a great trip. That's not to say that with more local knowledge or some local friends, this ...

... cloud piercing mountains and stretches of desert. The only catch with all this diversity is that you need a lot of space to put it all in.


Well that was until Ecuador was invented. It's like God wanted all the features of a big country but needed them in a more portable format so he could show it off to his mates at work. And so iEcuador, or nano country came to be. All the features you want from continent compressed into a space only fractionally larger than a shopping ...

When landing in Cartagena, Colombia we couldnt figure out if the airport was near the ocean or the river. We were later disgusted to find out that was in fact the ocean!! It was so brown!!!! Anyway, we went for a walk down to the ¨beach¨where there was a wind storm. We could not believe people were swimming in this dirty water with sand flying everywhere. So we went back to the hostel to drink. We were staying in a dorm room with 4 Irish travllers. Two of ...