Voyage to "The Far Side"

... And a few days later I find that I have finally "made it" to Panama :)

But, make no mistake, it was most definitely another challenging experience!

It seems that no matter how I do this crossing (and Ive done it three times now), its a tough run....
First time I was on a big boat but we had really bad weather and just getting to the boat down a dirt road was probably the hardest off-road that Id ever done.
Next time, the access was easy, but the boat was small and crowded with a bunch of really challenging people. Again we had bad weather and the bike took quite a beating as well as my own patience!
And this time, it was the same boat but with only four people... But the boat was even more dilapidated than last time, and though there were few people, we also had lots of dreary rainy weather which made the boat seem even smaller.

But, the voyage its self was quite straight-forward with the same idyllic little palm covered islands ...

( all pictures courtesy of Greg George)






And dolphins swimming off the bow of the boat...







And wonderful sunsets etc.



Its true that we had more dreary rainy weather but there were no storms or traumatic events at all... very nice :)).... ( Though the captain said his voyage over to collect us did have a really nasty storm, and that in all his years of sailing , this was only the second time ever that he felt like grabbing the EPIRB and sending the signal to call for emergency rescue!!!)







Greg and the Skipper



Me ... Im still a skinny bugger :)



There were four of us on the boat and I guess Ill describe us each for the readers benefit, as I usually do :)

Captain and his Daughter

Greg



So, the captain was the same guy as last time. Hes a small, early sixties Italian guy who has been sailing for many years. He is a retired senior Quantum Physicist (as well as having achieved elite levels in photography and film making) and he definitely enjoys exercising his intellect on quite a diverse range of topics at every opportunity. Hes also classically "Latin" with a propensity to air his feiry temper and his equally boisterous affections on very "short notice" :)
But, hes also quite eccentric and would seem illogical to most "ordinary" people. He does not care at all for "empty"aesthetics... Only for functionalities, and it shows in his boat. Only the core functional equipment on the boat gets maintained, and after several years of abuse by the elements and dozens of trips with transient back-packer cruises across the Darriern Gap, that means that its pretty much only the functional stuff on the boat that still works, and pretty much every thing else is either broken completely or so run down and dilapidated that it would look like a slum to most tourists.... And indeed I would say that "A Sea-Worthy Rat Hole" is not an unfair description for the yacht as far as most people are concerned... Or, at least, the terms "ship shape, and Bristol fashion" would never be applied to this little boat!!



















But, the sad part as far as my trip was concerned, was that the boat is definitely deteriorating quite quickly (compared to six months ago) and I think that this actually reflects the man too. His intellect is still a shinning star, but hes becoming very disorganised, his strength is going, and he gets tired now too and it means he doesnt have the energy to keep the boat in good order any more... I dont like to think where it may lead, and I hope he is able to find a way to get some money other than these back-packer runs because it takes so much energy and is so unprofitable for him... Even though we paid him $1600 for the trip, and we made sure that he came because he wanted to (not just because we had asked him) and he would make a profit, I believe he ended up making no money at all because of extra costs for launches from Turbo, and immigration etc. that he had not planned on. (No fault of ours).

One of his biggest problems is that he regularly gets very critical web postings about himself and the boat from back-packers and this makes it increasingly difficult for him to get enough passengers. Its kinda obvious why this is happening (the lack of aesthetics, his elite intellect, and his quick temper) but after an entire lifetime of pursuing his intellectual passions in science and academia, and with no requirement to "be nice" to "ordinary" people, its just more than he can manage to change his personal style now!... And so the pattern of the past seems likely to be the pattern of the future...
But despite his complexities and idiosyncrasies he has a very generous heart and I really like him. I also really enjoyed discussing things with him in the evenings as we sailed across the Gap (the highlight of the trip for me)... :)


His daughter was also on the trip with us but I found her to be much more challenging and less rewarding to be around than her father. First up, she is Italian too and that meant for the cultural behaviours of Italy when father and daughter got together... Lots of exuberant hugging and kissing and shouting of "Amore!" etc for at least a minute or two each time :)... I got no problem with that at all, but it "went on" quite a bit... On first meeting, Whenever they successfully dropped the anchor, Or set a sail, Or a meal was cooked, Or even when they got up in the morning!... And actually, it more or less went on for the entire voyage!
And it also seemed that for most of the remaining daylight hours the two of them were in a close huddle and engaged in rapid and emotional "shouting" at each other in very loud "sing-song" Italian for hours at a time!



They were clearly behaving "normally" and carrying on the types of discussions that family members do when they meet after absences, but for me it was really loud and quite painful because there was no-where that I could go to get away from it.
Next issue for me was that she smoked cigarettes like they were candy... Popping another into her mouth virtually before the previous one was finished... Again this was normal for them but very annoying and uncomfortable for me because she only gave token effort to not having the smoke effect others.
Another "really challenging" aspect of her/their behaviour for me involved personal hygiene with her father... Several times a day she would "preen" him like a monkey... From chewing his finger nails to picking black-heads, scabs and dry skin and then eating whatever little bits and pieces here busy fingers had garnered from their efforts!... I kid you not!... And again, there is virtually nowhere to go to avoid this "show" on the little yacht. Poor Greg couldnt believe what they were doing, but it was obviously perfectly normal to them... I guess it takes all sorts, and it wasnt actually hurting others.
And, like her father, she was very bright too. But it felt to me like she took her fathers constant adoration as her only reference point and consequently thought she was "An Intellectual Giant"!... She positively oozed an air of arrogance and self confidence on every topic... But it seemed to me to be in a way that didnt seem to be backed up by practical ability etc.! But then again, she is after all only twenty years old, and I think its not unusual for bright people of that age to go through a phase like that... My motorbike friend Greg captured it well when he said " I hope she manages to get all her projects done in the next couple of years while she still knows everything!... After that its probably going to get more difficult for her".
Im sure she will "evolve" as she ages, but in the end, all I can say is that Im happily going to be somewhere else!

And then there was my motorbiking friend Greg who is a "bright fellow" in his own right. Hes 32 years old and from New Brunswick Canada. But it seems he just cant seem to settle down and figure out what he wants to do long-term... So he keeps re-skilling to different things... Among them hes been a Tree planter, Fire service smoke jumper, Ice Bridge Contractor, Oil rig roughneck, and most recently a Welding engineering technologist!
Id done the yacht crossing trip twice before and I also knew what sort of a character the yacht captain was, so I was more or less prepared for it all... But Greg didnt know what he was in for! I was very impressed with his ability to put up with both the cramped and messy conditions on the boat as well as the style of our conversations. I guess tolerance for others is something you learn out at oil rig camps! Wherever he learned it, I was happy that he was along on the trip and I was glad to have someone a little more "normal" (read that as "being from a similar cultural background to me") to talk with to break up the long hours.

And of course then there was me...
Well, what can I say, Id really rather let each of the others on the trip describe what they thought of me... But thats a bit flippant though because of course they cant do that on my blog! :)
I guess I started out being quite talkative but then got quiet after a couple of bouts of the intense intellectual conversations ... Which by the way had a rather strong flavour of each of the participants wanting to flex their intellectual muscles and manoeuvre the conversation into their area of expertise for both interest and egocentric purposes ... And that means all four of us!
I did enjoy the conversations, but I found Id quickly "had enough" of the egocentric aspects and then I decided to just let things go rather than play the default "bait and challenge" game. But I also really enjoy learning things through my own thinking and Ive become very good at just spending time by my self over the last few years of motorbiking, so I was happy to think quietly too. On the whole, I tried to engage each of the others in conversations that interested them from time to time, and I always try to be diplomatic and keep the peace when emotions flare form one thing or another (only a few times on this trip).

And that was it for the ship and its compliment!

So, the trip as a whole was successful and Im now safely back on the North American continent and able to ride my bike North at will. But what started out as a hoped for two week visit to Colombia turned into a month, and what I was initially told was going to be an easy six day crossing (including the wait in Cartegena) turned into eleven days of challenges!
I cant say I enjoyed the cramped sweaty conditions of the yacht for the five days but that was always going to be uncomfortable... I can say I did enjoy the opportunity to see a remote and beautiful area of the Colombian coast that I otherwise would not have seen, and I can also say that Ive done "the crossing" three different ways now and its always a challenging
experience and allows me to see and learn more about myself.


I can also say that even though this may have been "The Last Crossing" for me, I do hope that I get to meet that crazy yacht captain again somewhere down the way :)))

Set Sail

Well, after a few days of waiting and lots of internal turmoil, things seem to have sorted them selves out. Which is to say, that the captain and his yacht arrived at the designated place and he then contacted us.

That was about 30 hours ago, and since then we have been working on getting our selves and our bikes on-board. This was accomplished in a full day that involved getting bikes checked out of Colombia at Customs in Turbo, and then riding back along the road toward Cartegena about 40Km to a small town along the way (including a rather nasty bit of dirt road).

(all pictures courtesy of Greg George)

This is what a cheap meal looks like down here.



The captain and his daughter.

Then we man-handled the bikes and luggage from a beach into a 7m launch with a 200hp outboard (actually I didnt touch my bike at all, I rode it down to the water edge and then it was pounced on by a group of about 10 brawny brown locals who just picked it up and plonked it in the launch), loaded eleven people into the boat as well as about 400 litres of fuel and set out across the open waters of the Caribbean.



























Then it was about an hour and a half of fast cruising (with not too much bouncing around in the waves, Thank heavens!) to get to where the yacht was.


The launch captain didnt want his picture taken because hes not supposed to take people and cargo in the same boat load...slightly illegal.







Then it was another hour or so of winching the bikes up out of the launch and onto the yacht deck (Which was made quite entertaining by the dynamic mix of personalities involved... Yacht captain being very emotional and with explosively expressive emotions, Launch captain being surly, impatient and rough with the bike cargo, and Greg and I with being protective and maybe a bit paranoid with our trusty steads! ... At the end of it all though, the bikes were safe, captains were paid, and the damage to our stuff was not too bad. And another hour of lashing things down so that its all secure for when we sail... We´ll see how well we've done that when we head for open water tomorrow.













Then we had to get our selves checked out through immigration, so that meant a hike through the jungle for about an hour to the village in the next bay where the last immigration office is before entering Panama.



The village is called Carpulganna and I have to say it was a really nice little tourist town located on a particularly beautiful and relatively undeveloped and unpolluted coast. The thing I particularly liked about it was that there are absolutely no roads in the area so there are no cars or even motorbikes and quads.... That meant the place was beautifully quiet and dust free... Ahhh (Ive never seen any Latin American town like it!)
Then there was another launch ride back around to the yacht just as the day closed and the fading light of the sunset disappeared. We pulled into the dock just as a large open-top police launch powered with triple 350hp outboards headed out loaded with a full compliment of heavily armed marines with face paint... Drug patrol! (Its the Darrien gap dont ya know... Lotsa ¨bad hombres¨ in the area !)







And that was it for a busy but "experience rich" day... After which we had a bite to eat, a bit of red wine, and some conversation on the yacht ... Ahhhh

So, it seems Im finally on my way to Panama and it feels very good :)))


Ill post again when I get to the other side in a few days (probably 3 days time)

Salvation

... I bet your wondering what happened... ?

Well....


I couldnt do it!
... Neither could Greg... We both independently decided that we didnt want to change our commitment, and that we wanted to go with the original captain and just accept that it was going to be more hastle and more waiting.
... After all, we are on an "adventure tour"

So, today we rode all the way back down to Turbo where we will now wait (for an unknown length of time) till the captain shows up and we head off to Colombia...

But, we do have an advantage this time, in that we have the captains daughter with us (we gave here a free ride down to Turbo on the back of a bike because she needs to renew her visa and also wants to catch-up for a few days with her dad)... And we are pretty sure that he will therefore, eventually show up... Its just a matter of time :)))

... will report back when status changes.

Into Temptation

Current status on the "escape from Colombia" saga is that Im/We're in a bit of a dilemma...

Last I wrote, we had arranged for a captain of a yacht to specifically come and pick us up from Turbo. That was on the evening of the 4th of June (assuming he would leave on the morning of the 5th)
The plan was for him to sail to Sapsurro and then email us. Then we would ride down the next day, and load bikes/depart the day after.
But, that plan also involved it taking just two or two and a half days for him to get there...

... Its now the afternoon of the 8th of June and we have not heard from him... By my version of the schedule (which will undoubtedly be disputed by the captain if I were to ask him!!!), that makes him more than 24 hours late...


And the dilemma is that there is another boat that will leave directly from Cartegena on the 12th and will definitely leave and arrive "on time" (German captain). The trick is that this guy needs "commitment" by tomorrow (9th) if we want to sail with him instead.

So, the temptation is to "blow off" the guy who is out of touch and over schedule and go with the guy who is here and ready... But Id feel bad about that because the other guy is definitely on his way specifically for us... But Im also really annoyed at him for misleading us about the schedule... Deliberately as far as I can tell... Other captains can run their boats on punctual schedules so I dont see why this guy cant too...

And Im in this with Greg too, so its not an individual decision...
Weve had some initial discussions about our options and though things may yet change, it seems to be panning out like this...

If we have not received definitive communication from the captain "en route" by tonight (36 hours over due) then we will change our commitments to the other captain.
If we were to hear from him after that, it would still be way more hassle to go with the old plan at that point compared with the other captain... So I think we have a "decision point" defined.
If we do get confirmation by tonight then we will be riding back to Turbo tomorrow and proceeding with that plan. But I doubt this will happen (we shall see )

...But if I do have to change my commitment then I know it will have cost the other captain money to come get us and even though I feel justified in changing my commitment due to the size of the delay, I will still feel bad...
So, I think all I can do is leave him a token payment of $100 (Which of course is an extra $100 that I would certainly rather not spend) which should cover about a good amount of his costs for food/fuel. I cant put any similar expectation on the other rider Im with (Greg) - He will make his own choices about what is appropriate or not.


So, despite my best efforts, the plan keeps changing and people keep saying one thing and then doing something else...
And now it looks like Im getting sucked down into the same behaviour in response to their behaviours! But even though I really dislike that sort of thing, if I do it, it will be by my own choice, and I cant blame others for it...
I would be doing it because Im impatient and I have my own agenda ...And its a cheap escape to say "He made me do it".... No, my behaviour is my own responsibility... And Ill have to live with my choice!


So, apart from the ongoing saga, the real point of this post is the dilemma of this sort of situation where we can find our-selves "manoeuvred" by circumstances into behaving in ways that we dont normally, and really "dont want to"... It happens to us all from time to time, and the "chain of events" can lead us into some very "bad places" if we are not paying very careful attention....


... stay tuned for the outcome...

Hotel California

... "You can check out any time you like, But you can never leave!"...
(from the rock song by the Eagles)

Thats how Cartegena seems to me these days :)

Yesterday was another interesting one, And again the "escape plan" seems to be falling apart!
First off, we got a confirmation from the yacht captain we have been emailing, that he wants to come get us and take us to Panama... Awesome!

... But, there is a complication in that he does not have anyone who will come with him at the moment, and he needs a second experienced person to do it... problem indeed.
The captain had a friend/acquaintance that he was hoping would help, but that fell through... So, then the new plan was for his daughter (early 20s) who is living here in Cartegena to fly over there and sail back with him... OK, we are fine with that, since its out of his money, and not extra expense for us.
So, some internet research and some phone calls and we arrange to meet his daughter to get her a ticket. We figure out the options and the prices and the taxes... The daughter and the captain have a couple of chats by phone cos it costs more than hoped but they decide its OK... Greg and I have a few chats because there are several delays in the plan that we dont really want...It seems that it will take about four days longer than hoped and it is now little different to just sitting and waiting for one of the other boats but its a whole lot more effort...
Never the less, we all decide to "go for it" so we set about buying the flight ticket on-line...
... And the system wont take either Greg or my credit card details... (It expects all postal codes to be in US 5 digit format rather than Canadian digit/letter format!)
So, we are stuck again!!!

Everyone "takes a brake", and Greg and I have a bit of a chat and a chuckle as to our "ongoing predicament"!!
We decide that its more trouble than its worth to keep pushing at that plan, but there is still another possibility.

We phone up the captain again (hes over in Panama) and discuss the "Turbo" plan... Which is the same thing we tried to do with the original captain when the Cartegena side of things "went to pieces"... We propose meeting the captain further down the coast.
The plan has the benefit that
1) The captain can sail the route single handed (no flights or crew needed).
2) It will take less time by about three days.
3) We can confirm locations and times stage by stage
4) Greg and I already know where to stay and how to get there etc.
5) If it all "falls to pieces" again, we can still just catch another boat leaving from Cartegena on the 12th

The only down side is that we have to still organise our selves and motorbikes into a launch and out across the open sea for a few hours to get to the yacht! (but like I said last time, I think its possible)

So, Thats the new/old plan and in a couple of days we will be riding back to Turbo to try to escape the "evil clutches"of Colombia one more time!
Im not sure how, but Greg and I are still in good spirits and are beyond the stressing phase... Every time there is a new "complication" now, it just makes us laugh more :)))


















Stay tuned for more developments in the continuing saga of our ill fated return to North America!!

Captive in Cartegena

...Arrrrghhh

Im just festering away here in Cartegena with my friend Greg (the guy who got the Dengue fever).
It seems that pretty much all the yachts that can take motorbikes over to Panama are currently anchored on the other side... In Panama... And it also seems that we are at a very "low ebb" as far as tourists wanting to sail the San Blass islands are concerned.

We have sent emails off to various captains asking what their plans are, and the soonest any of them is likely to be departing here for Panama is the 12th of June!... Thats nearly a two week wait!
... And oh by the way, thats the same captain that I mentioned a while back that I really dont want to sail with. But, I think Im well past the stage of being "selective" about my options, and if Im still here at that time, Ill be glad to take passage with him :)

Weve become so desperate that we are actually engaged in trying to "coax" a different captain to come back to this side specifically to pick us up by offering to pay more than he usually charges... (Its the same captain that I sailed South with a few months ago, and hes normally cheaper than the others because his yacht is not quite as "pretty" as most others... but it works OK, and thtas enough for me) ...

And its looking like it may just work... But we wont know if hes coming till tomorrow morning, and even then it will be two or three more days till he gets here.

(all pictures by Greg George... since I still havent replaced my camera)


















So, in the mean time, I eek out an existence here filling my time in the hot sticky days by alternating the simplest of activities with meals and showers etc...
For example, todays big activities were to have a hair-cut, and to get some stickers made of national flags to decorate Gregs panniers (very exciting; yes?)
Tomorrows plan is to get some "business cards" made for Greg (to give to people when you meet them rather than always scribbling email and blog details on scraps of paper)... But, I think we may also decide to "splurge" and spend big bucks on some Salsa dance classes... Though Im rather hoping that the dance class provides female partners cos while I like him a lot, Greg is just not "my type" :)