Day 7: San Blas Islands, Panama

Today we got up to have breakfast. It was not as crazy this morning because we can not leave the boat until 11am. Today we reached Panama.

The San Blas archipelago is made up of 365 islands ranging in size from tiny ones with a few coconut palms to islands on which hundreds of Cuna Indians live. The cuna are the most sophisticated and politically organized of the country’s three major groups. They run the San Blas Territory virtually on their own terms, with internal autonomy and, uniquely among Panama’s Indians, send their representatives to the National Assembly. They have their own language, but Spanish is widely spoken. The women wear gold nose rings, earrings and costumes with unique designs based on local themes, geometric patterns, stylized flora and fauna, and pictorial representations of current events or political propaganda. Many tribesmen work on the mainland, but still live on the islands. If you’re going to take some photographs of the Cuna Indians, have plenty of small change as there is a price for the Cuna to pose. They also have an unique handicraft, which are decorative hand sewn appliques called Molas. You will also notice these fearless natives around the ship, for their main form of transportation is hand carved canoes. Whatever you choose to do today, enjoy your time with the Cuna Indians. It will be unlike anything you’ve ever experienced.

Since we had some time before disembarking, I had a massage after breakfast. It was a good massage, but I get tired of spa’s trying to sell you hundreds of dollars of overpriced lotions and chemicals. Just once, I would like to go to the spa and not feel that type of pressure. If anyone from HAL is reading this, take note. While I was getting my massage, Angie went to go work out at the gym. When we got back to the cabin  we got ready to disembark to the island of San Blas.

The islands

Huts on the island

San Blas Island huts

This is a very small island occupied by native Cuna Indians. We boarded the tender and headed over to the island. I was amazed at how low the islands are. It looks like if the ocean were to rise a foot it would flood the entire island.

San Blas Island

The island appears to be a very poor, but the wealth of the families are worn in the form of gold jewlery and beads, not in their homes or other posessions. This could be a side effect of where they live. Why put any wealth into property that could disappear in a hurricane or flood. We walked around the island which was  lined by huts and narrow dirt streets. You can see that the islands have both telephones and electricity, but you would not think so unless you looked up or inside the huts.

The narrow streets

As we walked down the streets we saw lots and lots of hand crafted fabric. They were very colorful and intricate.

Quilting patterns

More patterns

A local home

The humidity and temperature were quite high today and walking around was difficult. The streets were also packed with people so it was hard to get a decent breeze. As we continued to walk around we found the main square where the school was. This was the first place we saw older children. In the square, Angie found some jewlery and I found some very cool painted feathers. I found one with a dolphin on them.

Steve trying to stay cool.

Angie trying to stay cool in line for the boat.

We got in line for the tenders and returned back to the boat. The line was very long and took almost an hour before we got back on the tender. As we rode back to the ship a sailboat came around the stern of the ship. I was able to snap this photo. It really shows how big the cruise ships are.

Our ship is bigger than yours.

Once back at the ship we had lunch and attended the afternoon tea service. After tea, we went to the crows nest to listen to the trivial contest and read. We got dressed for dinner and hung out at the bar waiting for dinner to start. The evenings entertainment was “An Evening with Musical Virtuoso Salima Wazir” but we decided to skip it this evening.

After dinner, we relaxed and went to bed early because I wanted to get up bright and early in the morning as we are scheduled to enter the canal tomorrow.

Day 6: Santa Marta, Columbia

After leaving Aruba, our ship set a westerly course along the northern coast of South America towards Santa Marta.

Colombians like to call their country Locomibia, or the “mad country.”, a nickname that alludes not only to their self-destructive streak but also their penchant for revelry. This exuberance is among Colombian’s’ greatest charms, as though they are compensating for their country’s poor reputation abroad by being some of the warmest and friendliest hosts anywhere! Perhaps this warmth owes itself to their diverse roots – more than any other country in the Andes, the mixture of the European with the African and indigenous is more complete. The result is a rich culture and a nation of proud citizens anxious to show their country off. There’s certainly plenty to show off! In an area roughly the size of France, Colombia – the only country in South America to border both the Pacific and the Caribbean – offers every eco-system imaginable, from the Amazon Rain-forest near Leticia to the snow-capped mountains of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. For now, though, tourism is barely even an industry. Only about 750,000 foreigners arrived to Colombia in 2002, most of them for business or to visit family. Perhaps that’s why experienced travelers refer to the country as Latin America’s best kept secret!

We got up early and ate breakfast. The ship was still sailing into port when we got up. It was clear that we were in a working port not accustomed to cruise ships. We saw lots of coal processing bins along with stacks and stacks of Ammonia Nitrate. Today we are taking a shore excursion that would take us to one of the country’s national parks. We disembark to the buses that took us to the Toyrona National Park. Our guide Ryhan was a student in international business and communication. He had just returned a few days earlier from a four week school trip to the USA.

When we left the port, we noticed the mounds of coal and ammonia nitrate sitting at the port. I sure hope it’s being used as fertilizer. As we drove out of the port, we noticed a lot of scooters and motorcycles. Many of the bikes carried two passengers. It was also interesting that they used them as taxi’s. In some cases we would see a bike with two passengers on them carrying packages. As we exited the port you get a good impression of how poor a country this is. Along the road we saw areas of shacks  were people lived. they were basically three walls of plywood against a rack background with another piece of wood as a roof. There were hundreds of these rooms that lines the roads and railroad tracks on the way out of the port.

After a couple hours on the bus, we reached Toyrona National Park.

Toyrona National Park Map

This is a park that is tucked away into the rain forest. A short walk through the trees we saw lots of neat sites. We saw quite a few termite mounds up in the trees. Along the path we saw thousands of fire ants all in a line carrying leaves from the forest to their homes.

Steve in the forest

fire ants carrying leaves

As we walked through the forest we could hear the roar of the surf. Just before we reached the beach there was a side trail that went up the side of the hill to a rock outcrop. The view from here was pretty amazing, you could see all the way down the beach and see the surf crashing on the rocks. The sky was a bit overcast, so you couldn’t see too far out to sea.

A rock with a view

The view from a short climb up the rocks

We spent some time at the top of the rocks and then walked our way back down the steps. Once we reached the bottom again, we walked out on the beach. The beach was gorgeous, we took some pictures of the surf. Just on the other side of the beach was a small lagoon.

The Lagoon

The beach

We walked along the beach to the resort where we rested and had some drinks. The view along the beach was wonderful. This is definitely a place to come to enjoy the peacefulness of the rain forest and the ocean.

Angie walking along the beach

We had a group of about 20 people walking along the beach. It was hard for some of the people to keep up. I am sure they didn’t expect this much walking on this trip. It was only rated as “two hikers”, meaning moderate walking. I would consider this a “three hiker” tour. It was a lovely day, so it was not a problem taking our time as we strolled along the beach.

huts in the trees. This is part of the resort.

The surf

The sign between the beach and the resort.

Along the way I noticed sand crabs running along the beach. One of them stopped just in front of me, so I took a picture of it. It was amazing how it blended into the sand. I would not have seen it there unless I had noticed it moving.

Sand Crab

After we reached the resort, we rested and cooled off with a cold refreshment. We rested for about forty minutes at their outdoor pavilion where the guests of the resort eat. Along the path from the beach to the pavilion we noticed a huge bed with a canopy. I assume this is for relaxing out by the beach, rather than the cheap rooms 😉

It was a short walk back to the buses. On the ride back to the ship we saw a lot more motorcycle taxis carrying a lot of passengers. When we arrived back to the ship we grabbed lunch and took a nap, both of us were very tired after all the walking we did. After a short nap, I headed up to the crows nest with the Kindle to do some reading. I was watching the port and noticed they had these really interesting ways to unload the coal trucks.

Watching the trucks, I noticed they backed into a flat bed area. the entire truck was lifted up to about 75 degrees and all the coal slide out the back of the truck onto the conveyors. The port had four working lifts all running at the same time. It was quite a surreal site to see these semi-trucks lifted in this way. I spent a few hours reading and watching the port operations. After the ship had re-loaded all it’s passengers we went back to the cabin to watch the ship sail out of port. There were a lot of dock workers that had not seen a cruise ship before and they were waving and cheering us as we sailed by.

We got ready for dinner and tonight’s show. The show was a comedian Rick Starr. His comedy was really good, and I think I have seen him someplace before. We turned in early since we were both still tired from all the walking we did.

Day 5: Oranjestad, Aruba

Today we are in Aruba. Aruba’s first inhabitants were the Caquetios Indians from the Arawak tribe. Fragments of the earliest known Indian settlements date back to about 1000 A.D., as do ancient painted symbols still visible on limestone caves found at Fontein, Ayo, and elsewhere. Pottery remnants from this period can still be seen at the Museum of Archaeology. Some centuries later, the first European landed on Aruban shores. Spanish explorer Alonso De Ojeda is thought to have arrived about 1499. The Spanish promply exported the Indians to Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, where they were put to work in the copper mines. In 1636, near the culmination of teh Eighty Years’ War between Spain and Holland, the Dutch took possesion of Aruba and remained in control of it for nearly two centuries. In 1805, during the Napoleonic Wars, the English briefly took control of the island but it was returned t Dutch control in 1816. Although Aruba continues to exist within the kingdom of the Netherlands, it operates as an independent region under the crown. Aruba has a melange of people from the South American and European continents, and also from the far east and other islands in the Caribbean. These different settlers have added a unique flavor to the lives of the inhabitants of the island.

We got up early and showered. (Why are we always up early on vacation?) The ship was late getting into Aruba so we had some extra time to get ready and eat breakfast. The Lido was totally packed, so I decided to just come back to the room and rest for a few more minutes while we waited to disembark. We headed down to wait for our tour. We decided to take “The Colors of Aruba” tour. After we disembarked we boarded our bus. I did remember to turn on the GPS, so I hope that Geo-Tagging will work properly when I get home. We headed out on the bus and we drove by some of the fancy hotels on the island, and a brief stop at the original windmill on the island. After that we then drove out to the California lighthouse. This was named after the ship The SS California that sank here off the coast.

The Light House

Steve at the light house

After stopping at the lighthouse, we road to the Casibari Rock formation. We waited in line to walk up. It was not a very high climb, but it was a one way path for those going up and coming down and some of these people should not have tried to go up.

Entrance to The Rock

The Rock

angie on The Rock

After the visiting the Casibari Rock formation, we drive down to the beach. The swells were as tall as the rock shelf of the shore/cliff line. Watching the water break just below and then crest over the wall spraying foam and salt onto everyone was pretty amazing. Both Angie and I were covered in salt spray when we returned to the bus.

natural bridge

After visiting the beach, we then visited an ostrich and emu farm. We saw quite a number of them. Their expressions and mannerisms were quite amazing. I got some really great close ups using Bert’s 70-300mm lens. I really like this lens, but someone had an 18-250mm that I really liked and it was smaller and and lighter. I am now torn as to which one to get. We walked through the farm and got to watch some of the visitors feed them.

Aruba Ostrich farm.

Feeding the Ostriches

It was amazing to see these animals. They are quite large and looking at their feet, you can understand how they are able to kill a lion with a single kick. As we walked around the grounds we saw all sorts of different color Ostriches. The most spectacular ones are the the all black ones.

Angie posing with an ostrich

After the ostrich farm, we rode the bus back to the ship. We got off the bus at the gate to the terminal and wandered around the downtown area of Aruba and visited Wilhelmina park. On the pathways we saw a ton of iguanas. All different colors and levels of cautiousness. Some would walk away the minute they saw us while others would just site there as we passed inches away from them.

We walked through the shopping mall area and picked up an Christmas ornament and then we re-boarded the ship. We returned to the cabin and offloaded our excursion stuff. Mostly just the backpack and my camera. Then we headed up to the Lido for food. After we ate lunch we wandered up to the crows nest and hung out as they played team trivia. I only got 12 out of 20 questions right 🙁 Who knew that a pregnant goldfish was called a TWIT? I wonder if Leo Laport knows this?

We headed back to the cabin so I could pick up the kindle. I decided to do some reading up on deck. I started reading “Kitty goes to Washington“. Angie joined up with me after showering and getting dressed for dinner. After a little while, the noise level was pretty high in the crows nest so we decided to go to one of the other bars that was closer to nights entertainment.

The entertainment this evening was Joel Mason, a piano player who does an Elton John tribute. The performance was excellent. We really enjoyed the show and would recommend it to anyone. We headed to dinner and turned in early for the night.

Day 4: At Sea

We got up just before 8am. It was a restless night, somewhere in the cabin was a squeak/click that was keeping me up. It took me a few hours to go to sleep. It was not really annoying, but just there enough to not be rhythmic.

We dressed and headed to the dining room for breakfast. Angie had apple pancakes and I had Eggs Benedict. After breakfast, I went to listen to the shore excursion overview presentation. It was not all that informative though. The only thing I took away from it was they REALLY want you to know that you have to be on the ship 30 minutes prior to departure. The presentation was mostly a repeat of what was in the shore excursion brochure. I got the feeling that a lot of people do not read the literature and want someone else to tell them what they need to know.

While I was listening to the shore excursion presentation, Angie went to the Emerald Seminar. This presentation was running late, so we skipped the shopping and port talk scheduled next and headed to the behind the scenes kitchen tour. It’s always amazing to see how large the kitchen is and how they prepare food for 1900 people every night.

Behind the scenes in the kitchen

some bunny left this around.

Napkin Designs

that's a lot of pasta

behinds the scenes in the kitchen

behind the scenes in the kitchen

After the tour, I went to play bingo (no winners here. but we did get a 30% deal on spa treatments). I caught the tail end of the explorations speaker. This was a presentation by David Worrall who was from England. He presented information and photos from the ports we are heading to. It gave people a visual idea of what to expect when we get to each port. Angie went to the gym to work out.  After the gym and shower, we decided to head up to the Lido deck for lunch. We wandered by the shore excursion deck to book some of our trips. Most of the good ones we wanted to do were sold out. So we ended up on the wait list for a few of the ports.

We saw that they served High Dutch Tea today. We sat at a table with another couple from San Diego. What a small world. After tea, I went to play bingo and Angie went to the world class cocktails presentation. After the game, we rested up for dinner. Tonight was our first formal night.

The pre-Dinner show was a musical show called Stage & Screen. The cast sang songs from popular movies and musicals. After the show we headed to dinner. Before the show, the Captain gave a toast with his senior crew.

After dinner we wandered around the deck and took some pictures of ourselves.

A flying fish lands on deck after dinner.

While walking on the deck we noticed a fish had landed on deck. Yes, it was a flying fish 😉

Our first formal night

angie with drink before dinner.

The formal photographers were still around to take more  pictures. We went up to the crows nest bar and had an after dinner drink and listed to a guitar player sing 50’s songs. Afterwared we decided to head back  to the cabin for bed.