Pirates of the Caribbean

One of the things we'd both been looking forward to for the whole trip was sailing from Colombia to Panama. It would have been easier and quicker to fly, but where's the fun in that? Neither of us had ever done anything even remotely like it before so we had no idea what to expect, but therein lies the fun. We'd read a lot about how important it is to find the right boat, and more importantly the right captain, as things can potentially go disastrously wrong. For us though, the other people on the boat were what could make or break the trip, but unfortunately we had no control over this. We had the name of one boat recommended by Paul, an Aussie we met in Ecuador, who'd made the trip a couple of months earlier. However, as luck would have it, things turned out much better for us.

Gronn and his mates had found a boat and there were a couple of spaces left, so they were happy to have us join them for the ride. We all met up again in Cartagena, and a couple of days before we were due to leave we met Loic,  one of the French captains, and talked to him about the boat and all the details. A few of the guys also went and checked out the boat - a 15m Atoll 6 called the Velero Amande, with 6 double cabins and 4 bathrooms - and gave it the all clear, so we were all set. We just had to buy a few supplies in the form of about 4 cases of beer, 4 litres of rum, 2 litres of aguardiente, 1.5 litres of vodka (all of this was just for the 2 of us of course) and a few snacks, then we were good to go.

The two Irish brothers in the group, Martin and Shane, arrived in Cartagena the day before we sailed so Loic wasn't able to get our passports stamped at customs before we left. He also hadn't been able to get the harbourmaster's permission for his boat to leave, so we were going to have to try and sneak out at night and get our passports stamped the next day at another place. We arrived at the port in small groups about 20mins apart, so as not to arouse the suspicion of the officials, and all made it safely onboard under the cover of night. We had a celebratory drink then stealthily set off to leave the harbour. Most sailing trips last about 5 days, but our captains, Loic and Frank, said they were relaxed about how long it took us and we could do whatever we wanted. Off to a great start then. The optimism soon started to wane though and nausea quickly set in, with Steph being the first to succumb. It became fairly obvious that not all of us had our sea legs. Not even close. That first night was pretty rough for a few of us, and Kurt and I and Steph and Alex chose to sleep in the sheltered sitting area as it had more fresh air than the cabins below deck. Loic and Frank were awesome, emptying our buckets and dishing out tissues and water all night long. We must have been a sorry sight. 

The crew

Chess and cards are a serious business

The next week was spent sailing a bit each day or night, anchoring at beautiful spots to swim in the crystal clear waters and snorkel over some amazing reefs, even a shipwreck off one of the San Blas islands. Loic and Frank also outdid themselves with the cooking, producing some awesome food for us, sometimes while sailing over pretty rough waters. We even had some fresh barracuda ceviche and beautifully cooked fillets, caught as we were sailing along one afternoon. And of course we were all hanging out for fresh lobster, which we bought off some of the locals from their canoe stocked with fish, lobster and the biggest crab I've ever seen. Steph and I still felt sick throughout most of the week, but I got to know that the minute we started sailing my safe place was lying down in the cabin. I think out of 9 of us, 4 made it the whole way without spewing. Not bad.

In total, we sailed about 550kms across the Caribbean Sea, and after an entire week we finally made it to Panama. Now we just had to get used to being back on land...