Cocktails in crumbling colonial mansions
Storyteller
Tue 12 Feb 2008 20:36
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Position 08.35N 79.02W
I began writing this at anchor off the island
of Contadora in the Gulf of Panama, famous for being the place where the Shah of
Iran lived during his exile. It's only about 30 miles off the coast of
Panama, and we're looking at some pretty glamorous houses on shore. We've
also send the best bird life in four years--flocks of pelicans skimming the
water, the adults teaching the fledglings how to fly. Instead of sailing
directly to Ecuador (off the coast of Colombia!) we are spending a couple of
days en route exploring the Las Perlas Archipelago, famous for its pirate
history and being the place where Elizabeth Taylor's huge pearl came from.
We've found Panama to be a fascinating place,
especially as we have been lucky enough to be here during Carnaval, he biggest
party of the year. John Hunt from Southern Princess, took some wonderful photos
the night we were there, so do take a look on the Southern Princess blog on
Mailasail or the World Cruising website. In a crowd of about 20,000 were amongst
a very small number of white faces, which could have been rather scary. Luckily
everyone was very polite and good natured.Sure parts are crime infested, but the
great thing is there are almost no tourists. Panama City has been described as
'Miami, but with more English" but we've found very little English, and my
limited Spanish has had a real work out. The history is fascinating, from
Henry Morgan to General Noriega, and as well as the canal, Panama is best known
for money laundering. Luckily my niece, Sophie brought us a copy of the Panama
Lonely Planet, so we were able to visit many great places and find the best food
and cocktails. Our favourite place was Casco Viejo, the old town, where we met
up with Vladamir, one of the tourist police who patrol the area on bicycles. As
it was nearly knock off time, He offered to take us back to the boat in his car,
which doubled as as taxi when he was off duty. He had pretty good English, so
Tony, Mike and I arranged for him to take us back to the Caribbean Coast to
visit Portobelo and Isla Grande. It was a wonderful trip, but we hadn't
bargained for the dreadful state of the roads. What we saw over there made us
sorry that we'd had to hurry down to make our Canal transit. You could happily
spend 3 months cruising the waters of the Caribbean and Pacific coasts of
Panama. Everything is so cheap here you can dine at a top quality restaurant for
remarkably little. And that includes the most delicious mojitos and excellent
Chilean wine.
We anchored last night off another idyllic island
where we found another Australian yacht--a couple doing a circumnavigation as
part of the Blue Water Rally. Because it's the right time of year we keep
bumping into the Blue Water folk.
Since we entered the Pacific the water has been
quite cloudy--full of krill. When you swim in it you come out smelling of fish.
The fishing is outstanding--we'd caught 3 tuna before 7 30 this morning. We had
Bill Granger's tuna confit and pasta last night, plus cherry pie, which we
shared with our friends on Southern Princess. Lunch today was the best sashimi
we've ever tasted. The fridge and freezer are now crammed with fish, but our
wine supplies are somewhat depleted. I counted 8 empty bottles this morning!
We're now back on our course to Ecuador which we
should reach on Saturday. There's very little wind, so it looks as though the
iron headsail aka the engine will have to be
employed.
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