There was less down time while Rob, Susan, Immie and Miguel were on the boat with us, and the oppressive humidity and heat sap so much energy so that doing anything extra, even writing or downloading photos, is just too much. I can feel my energy being drained from my body even as I sit here in a light breeze with every pore oozing moisture, my cotton clothing adhering to my body with a sticky layer of sweat. Sweat pools below my keyboard where I rest my wrists on my laptop, and I have to stop typing to wipe it off. Yesterday evening, we turned the air conditioning on for a few hours since we needed to run the generator for the refrigerator, which is now fixed. It was heavenly. I pouted when Peter turned it off.
So, I will start back at the Islas del Rosario, where the six of us stayed for a few days. We spent the first couple of days on the south side of Isla Grande. On the Monday before last (Aug. 19), while most of us were snorkeling, swimming or reading, Peter and Rob amused themselves repairing (once again) the smaller of the two dinghy motors. Rob, Susan, Immie and Rob took the dinghy out for a spin afterwards and found a place for dinner on shore. Luckily, the restaurant had a water taxi, because the engine failed before they returned and they had to be towed back to
Mantra! Other than a half a dozen young backpackers staying at the eco-resort, we were the only customers there. The food was good, but the highlight of the evening out was the ride over to the restaurant; bioluminescent jellies flashed blazing blue light just below the surface as we skimmed past them.
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| Peter and Rob tinkering |
That night, there was a wonderful thunderstorm, which briefly made things cooler. The thunder and lightning were dramatic for a few hours but the lightning did not get close enough to be a concern.
On Tuesday, Aug. 20, after bailing out the dinghy and getting ready, we sailed around some of the islands in the archipelago to the north side of Isla Grande, which has more reefs, anchoring for a couple of days by ourselves in a lovely bay. The snorkeling was better there. One time, I hung out with a group of nine squid; they always are lined up and facing the same direction, moving as a unit, and I am fascinated by them. In the early morning, I spotted a green moray eel fully out of the crannies of the reef. I also swam above a lesser electric ray cruising over the sand and grass. On the reef, there are the usual colorful tropical fish, with larger ones further out from on the land. In more shallow water and near the mangroves, we swam within schools of inch-long glittering fish, thousands of them.
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| Immie |
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| Susan and Miguel |
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| Peter and Rob |
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| Immie enjoying the floating chair on the north side of Isla Grande |
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| Peter snorkeling |
Immie is irrepressible and managed get us involved in games and a diving/photo contest in the afternoon. The goal was not only to make the most spectacular dive or jump off the boat but to have it captured in the best photograph. It was a lot of fun, but there was no clear winner. (Competition was not really the point anyway.)
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| Susan taking the first leap |
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| Rob diving from the pilot house roof |
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| Miguel |
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| Peter |
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| Early morning rainbow over Isla Grande on Wednesday |
On our second day there (Wednesday, Aug. 21), using Google Maps, Rob found that there was a large pueblo on the interior of the island. We took the dinghy to shore and persuaded the staff at the Hotel Isla del Sol, which caters mostly to day trippers from Cartagena, to allow us to tie up, although we were told we could not use the facilities, but we could buy drinks. (You can never drink too much here.) After our refreshments, we asked if we could leave our dinghy and walk to the village which is invisible from the water, hidden by the mangroves.
Exiting the well-maintained hotel property, we entered directly into the village or Orika, where there are small stores and restaurants and houses, some nicer than others. The community appears to be mostly Afro-Caribbean. A man carrying a crate of crabs and lobsters stopped to talk with us, in Spanish, of course. Every place here, Immie and Miguel understand everything perfectly and fully engage, of course, and Susan and I follow along and can participate in conversations fairly well if necessary, and Peter and Rob wait for translations. The friendly man showed us to the main part of town.
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| Immie, Susan, Rob, Miguel and Peter walking through town |
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| Catch of the day |
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| Peter--yes, we were all sweating that much from strolling |
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| Immie, Miguel, our guide, Peter, Rob and Susan in Orika |
In the Plaza Principal, there is one brightly painted monument inhabited when we were there by live goats. Children ran around although it was still morning. Immie, talking with two little kids, learned that school runs from 6 to 11 a.m., before it becomes too hot.
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| Plaza Principal |
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| Goats in Plaza Principal |
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| An open-air restaurant on the main street |
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| Peter in the jungle |
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| Pigs helping with the trash |
We walked along the clean dirt streets all the way through town, passed a swamp, and finally found our destination, a backpackers retreat with an outdoor restaurant near the beach called Sol y Papaya. Like everything else on the island other than the resorts maintained for tourists, it was rustic, but the food was good.
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| Peter balancing at Sol y Papaya--right before a spectacular fall |
On Thurdsday Aug. 22, after a brief morning rain shower and a last snorkel, we pulled up anchor and had good wind for sailing all the way into Cartagena Bay. As we approached Club de Pesca (a private club catering to local wealthy boat owners but allowing transients when there is space), we all donned our clean white matching polo shirts that Rob and Susan's older daughter Rosie had embroidered for us with the boat's name and "Cartagena 2019." We may have looked more professional than we acted, but we handled the lines the best we could, going stern-first into a dock between two large mooring posts, one of which was solid concrete with no padding.
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| Immie steering in the bay |
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| The crew at work |
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| Rob, Susan, Immie, Miguel, Peter and Sherri |
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| Miguel and Immie |
After refreshing showers in clean, modern facilities at the club, everyone but me went to Getsemaní for dinner. For some reason, I was so exhausted that it was an effort to get myself from the showers to the boat. My legs felt like lead weights. I went to sleep right after they left and by the next morning my energy had returned.
That day (Aug. 23), Peter stayed on board to replace the alternator and engine belts, and the other five of us went to the National Aviary at Barú in a rental car. The car's GPS took us through the heart of the city, so everyone got a better sense of life away from the tourist areas. After more than an hour, we made it to the aviary. Everyone was delighted by the wide array of birds. Colombia has 1957 species of birds, with 81 of them being endemic to this country. I saw some that I hadn't seen on my last visit and also enjoyed seeing many of the same birds again. So here are more bird photos!
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| Blue and yellow macaws grubbing for food |
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| White-eyed parakeet |
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| Keel-billed toucan |
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| Blue-headed parrot |
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| Red-throated piping guan |
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| Great curassow, female rufus morph |
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| Sun parakeets |
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| Peacock and Northern Screamer |
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| Jabiru |
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| King vulture |
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| Roseate spoonbill |
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| Black crowned night heron |
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| Channel-billed toucan |
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| Yellow-throated toucan |
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| Double-striped thick-knee |
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| Andean condors |
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| Crested crane |
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| Crested caracara |
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| Muscovy duck |
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| Peahens, Orinoco goose and black-bellied whistling ducks |
For me, the highlight was early in the visit. The others had moved on from the first large enclosure, but I was patiently looking for birds in the trees. Suddenly, I felt something pinch my right shoulder. A blue-headed parrot had landed on me! Fascinated by my dangling earring, I think, it stayed perched by the side of my head. When I was finally ready to move on to the next area, I had to physically remove it from my body.
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| Blue-headed parrot on Sherri's shoulder |
The next day, Aug. 24, all six of us went (by taxi--it was so hot we couldn't face a 10-15 minute walk) to El Centro. Our first stop was the Naval Museum. The exhibits on the first floor are arranged chronologically, starting with the native people who lived in a village called Kalamarí on the land which is now the old city before the Spanish arrived. With signs mostly in Spanish, I took longer than the rest of the family to make my way through the exhibits of conquest and piracy and naval battles, because, as everyone knows, I cannot not read the signs. The second level is dedicated to history of the navy of the Republic of Colombia, with an amazing amount of detail. The most enjoyable part was going into the various parts of ships and a submarine that simulated being out at sea on duty.
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| Naval Museum submarine |
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| Naval Museum, bridge of a warship |
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| Naval Museum, battleship |
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| Immie and Susan on maneuvers |
After the Naval Museum, we had lunch at Cebiche, Seviche again because the ceviche is that good before exploring more of the old city. Immie started buying items to decorate her classroom (She teaches Spanish in England) at the Plaza de la Aduena. The church of Pedro Claver was open and being prepared for a wedding, so we were able to enter and appreciate the architecture.
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| Iglesia Pedro Claver |
Thunder was rumbling in the distance. Peter elected to return to the boat, and the rest of us chose to stay and shop. I separated from them in the stalls of the vendors outside the Naval Museum, wondering aimlessly through the lovely streets. The rain began, but it was not heavy and the drops were refreshing. I managed to stay relatively dry under balconies and made my way into Getsemaní. Almost everyone had retreated inside, so I was able to get a good look at the statues commemorating Pedro Romero and the Getsamaní Lancers, community members of African descent who were leaders in the revolutionary movement in the early 19th century. While sheltering under flower-festooned balconies, I also admired the colorful murals as well as door knockers. The tradition in Cartagena was to have the knocker on your door reflect your profession. Military members had lions; fishermen had fish. Some modern designs are more whimsical.
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| Plaza de Trinidad |
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| mural in Getsemaní |
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| mural in Getsamaní |
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| Door knocker in Getsemaní |
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| door knocker, Getsemaní |
The next day, Sunday, Aug. 25, we all visited the city's most massive fort, the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas. Built on the hill of San Lázaro overlooking approaches by land and by sea, it was constructed between 1536 and 1657 and expanded in 1763. The most important battle occurred in 1741 during the Battle of Cartagena des Indias (part of the Battle of Jenkin's Ear). Intent on capturing the city, British Admiral Edward Vernon brought 124 ships and nearly 25,000 military personnel, including 3600 North American colonial troops who arrived on an additional 40 ships, to Cartagena. The Spanish in Cartagena had about 6000 troops in total, led by the Governor General of Cartagena, Don Blas de Lezo, and the Viceroy of New Granada, Sebastián de Eslava. Initially, the British attacked and took outlying defensive works, including Fort San Luis and Fort San Lazara, and landed troops to fight from the ground. The Spanish colonial forces withdrew and concentrated their forces at San Felipe, where the British were soundly defeated, having already been weakened by previous losses in battle and tropical diseases. In all, over 18,000 British were dead or incapacitated, and only 300 of the North American troops survived. It was fascinating to explore the ramparts, tunnels and other parts of the fortress, and we enjoyed the informative video in the wonderfully air-conditioned room which was formerly the hospital.
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| Susan, Sherri, Peter, Rob, Immie and Miguel at San Felipe |
After San Felipe, we stopped for brunch in Getsamaní, in a restaurant run by Australians who are training and employing young Afro-Colombians who are disadvantaged. Then we wandered around some more, walking through the Parque del Centenario, where a guide led us to a place to view the sloths. They are well-camouflaged, and we hadn't spotted them on our own the last time we visited.
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| Sloth |
In El Centro, we shopped and just enjoyed walking along the streets and through the plazas.
Outside the church, we admired the bronze statue of Pedro Claver and a slave, with Peter noting how the metal had crystallized in some places during cooling. Somehow we had missed seeing it on our previous ambulations.
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| Statue of Pedro Claver and a slave |
From El Centro, we walked along the walls of the city by the sea and descended into the barrio of San Diego, where at the Plaza Fernandez de Madrid we came upon a street vendor making arepas in boiling hot oil. I enjoyed an arepa con huevos, a pocket of coarsely ground corn into which the raw egg is poured before being dropped into the pot. Delicious! The way to enjoy them is to consume them on the spot, adding salsa to each bite.
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| Immie on the wall of the old city |
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| Arepas huevos |
On Monday, Aug. 26, Immie and Miguel had to fly back to Madrid in the afternoon, but we still had time to make one more trip into the walled city before their departure for the airport. In the evening, Susan, Rob, Peter and I went back to the old city in search for a new place for dinner. While looking around, we came across a place I had read about, the KGB Bar, in Plaza Fernandez de Madrid. Bathed in glowing red light, the interior is filled with memorbalia from the USSR collectd by the owner, covering the walls and ceilings and placed throughout the rooms. Eventually, we chose El Balcon Restaurant overlooking Plaza San Diego. While we were having dinner, we could hear music and see dancing erupt spontaneously on the corners. After dinner, as we were walking along, a rooftop bar drew our attention. We went up for a drink (all of us chosing something non-alcoholic) and found ourselves among a crowd of people young enough to be our children.
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| KGB Bar |
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| Plaza San Diego in the evening |
Tuesday, Aug. 27, was the date of departure for Rob and Susan, but we had time to visit the Casa Museo Rafael Nuñez in the morning. The taxi driver took us to the wrong place, but we eventually found it just outside the walls of San Diego. Outside the walls, there were school children flying brightly colored kites, which seems to be a favorite past time here.
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| Kids flying kites outside the city walls |
The casa is a lovely, airy home turned museum where Rafael Nuñez lived with his second wife. He was president of Colombia four times. At his home here, he developed the ideas that would become the basis of the largest political reform in Colombia in the 19th century, the Constitution of 1886, which was the basis of government until 1991.
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| Home of Rafael Nuñez |
Back inside the walls, I left Rob and Susan on their own for last-minute shopping and went back to the boat, starting in on cleaning which I had neglected during their visit. By the end of the day, the inside of the boat was ship-shape again. The next day, I cleaned the cushions and other things on deck and made a couple of trips to provision. The nearby Carulla chain convenience store did not have everything I wanted, so I went to the larger store near Club Nautico. When I asked for a taxi to Club de Pesca when I finished checking out, the bag boy offered to walk the half-mile to the marina with the cart. The tip was much less expensive than a taxi, and he came right to our dock.
The refrigeration is soldered properly now. Peter has patched the small leak in the dinghy. He will always have more things to do, but I am ready to move on. We plan to leave on Sunday, stopping at a few islands in Colombia on our way to Panama. We are picking up a two-person kayak tomorrow morning from a nearby marine store, and we will be ready for more adventures.
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