Total isolation
Trip Start
Sep 16, 2007
1
75
87
Trip End
Ongoing
Isla Violines,
Costa Rica
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
It's a pretty extreme place to live. Accessible only by small boat, which after 40 minutes travelling downriver from Sierpe then has to weave its way through a labyrinth of mangroves, the island is battered on on side by heavy waves and guarded on the other side by crocodiles and the most aggressive little bugs I've ever come across.
It is rainy season at the moment and the rains make for a pretty hostile living environment. NOTHING dries out in the hot, dark, damp area around the house. There is a prevailing smell of mildew and a depressing lack of sunlight under the forest canopy. But somehow it has a beauty to it. The concentration of life in the forest is incredible: there is no shortage of eerie sounds at night and spectacular plants, mammals, insects, reptiles and birds to play with. One of the highlights of my time there was witnessing two sloths mating. They were at it all day, no hurry or even passion involved. Just a bit of long, slow tantric rumpy-pumpy.
I guess Vladimir gets pretty lonely. He says he can go up to two or three weeks without seeing anyone so he works there, tending the fruit orchard, making jewellery which he takes to the pirate-like port of Sierpe to sell to tourists in the summer.
I helped him make his earrings and we headed up the coast to the town of Drake to sell them and so he could have some human contact. I was starting to get a little tired of listening to him talk about his favourite subject - sex with foreign girls - so I was looking forward to having some time with other people too. It was a good arrangement. He sold his jewellery in the evenings at the hotels, and during the day we took the boat out to remote beaches to surf.
We returned to the island after a few days away and I started to think about leaving. If getting there was hard, leaving was harder. Vladimir didn't seem to want me to leave and there were various excuses that appeared to hinder my exit, including problems with the weather, the outboard motor, etc. Eventually I was able to leave with some fishermen neighbours of his who were heading back to Sierpe to sell their fish.
The saddest news of these days was the death of my travelling companion: my little half-size Mexiguitar, which has accompanied me since I was in Baja California, nearly a year ago. The guitar got wet whe na wave came oer the bow of our little boat and the wood warped out of shape. I gave it to the ten-year-old son of a fisherman and h was happy to have something to make noise with.
