Final thoughts on Columbia
CARANGO AMEL 54 #035
PETER and VICKY FORBES
Sat 23 Jan 2016 21:05
| We were due to depart on the next leg to Santa Marta this morning but as with all the best laid plans the World ARC committee hadn’t reckoned with Columbian bureaucracy or intervention. The port Captain decreed that his port was shut to incoming and outgoing movements - after a tense standoff, including one rally yacht making a break for it for 5 miles and an armed intervention which caused this American yacht to return to the marina, we were officially delayed by a day. The weather was blamed but we are not so sure about that. There is some strong wind forecast but the forecasts around here, as we have discovered, are difficult. Anyway another day in Santa Marta, Colombia, was mandated - so we stayed. Probably safer as last night we broke our mooring dock in winds inside the Marina of 40 knots. We have fuelled up now and moved our mooring position.  Our broken mooring dock being repaired this morning after Carango destroyed it - we slept through the whole incident. After swimming of the beach next to the marina Vicky witnessed a huge effort by some local fishermen to capture a huge haul of fish. The net stretched about the size of a football pitch and after much effort by about 10 fishermen yielded on small sand eel which they threw back. Such is life in South America.  We went on a wonderfully exciting helicopter ride and saw the ‘Lost City’ of the American indians.Let us hope we get to sail off the the San Blas islands tomorrow. |