Cartagena and Rain Forest

Safiya
Harvey & Sue Death
Wed 15 Feb 2017 13:45

We've been in Santa Marta, Columbia for a week now. The City is not particularly touristy, a little shabby but full of character, where evr you go you hear salsa music playing. The tourist industry is just beginning to take off here with numbers increasing by 20% year on year since the end of the troubles about 7 years ago. We've had some fatastic meals out, great sea food and steak and really cheap!! There is very little English spoken and I really regret not trying harder with my Spanish lessons, we do a lot of gesticulating and Spanglish!!

Harvey and I had a couple of days break in the old walled city of Cartagena wich is about 100KM from here, but a 6 hour drive along very bumpy, busy roads. On the way we passed through shanty towns and the filth, squalor and poverty was quite shocking.There were armed guards on the side of the road protecting the traffic, and it served to remind us that Columbia is still very much a developing country.

Cartagena is a beautiful old City, its a World Heritage site and has been really well preserved. The narrow cobbled streets are overhung by the wooden balconies of the 400 year old houses which are covered in multi coloured borganvillea. We stayed in a lovley hotel just inside the City walls with a rooftop terrace where we had breakfast overlooking the old City. It was a real treat after being on the boat for 6 weeks to sleep in a bed that doesn't move and to enjoy a walk in shower!

Whilst in Santa Marta we also took a day trip to the Sierra Nevada mountains to trek to a waterfall and to visit a coffee plantation. It was nice to get out of the City and into the countryside. The hike was very demanding, we walked/slid down a very steep track for about 2 Km and then scrambled through the river and across boulders to get to the waterfalls. When we got there we were so hot and dusty, the water coming off the mountains was freezing but if was so refreshing to swim in. Then we had to scramble the 2Km track back up the mountain! It was very demanding and the rest of the group were all 20 something backpackers, but the old timers kept up with them!

There have been 5 other Oysters here in the Marina at the same time as us and it has been very sociable with drinks or dinner out all together most nights, and yesterday was Declans 25th birthday so we had drinks on Safiya and a meal out in our favourite restaurant to celebrate.

Later today we will set sail from Columbia en route for the San Blas Islands which are a vast archipelago on Panama's Caribbean coast, composed of over 340 islands. They are home to the Kuna Indians and despite being less than 100 miles from Panama they have retained their culture and live very primitively with no electricity, running water etc so they'll be no wifi for a couple of weeks!! We're looking forward to beng at anchor and doing some snorkeling/diving in the clear blue waters.

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