10/03/2009, Nagarna, Kuna Yala
We have read about the San Blas Islands for more than ten years as we got ready to do this cruising business. The photos and stories were always enchanting; of a distant island chain set in the south west Caribbean where gentle, indigenous people live in harmony with their ancient ways.
Well, not exactly! It is true that the Kuna Yala (tribe from the mountains) live in closely knit palm villages throughout the chain of around four hundred coconut covered islands. They moved out of the mountains to escape the heat, humidity and mosquitoes. They used to subsist on fish and lobster caught from dug out canoes, which they supplemented with crops grown along the mainland coastline, and for the most part this is still the case. But, somewhere along the line their independent, self governing body has encouraged them to sell out to blatant commercialism. Their lobster supply is in serious trouble since they began large scale lobster fishing to fill the weekly airplanes sent in by "Red Lobster," a family style restaurant in the U.S. Their traditional dress has also become a commercial enterprise and the women are merciless in their pushiness to sell their embroidered "molas." It may sound cynical but half the time it feels as though the only reason they women still wear their traditional dress and gold nose ring is to request money after a photo has been agreed upon. Ouch!
The Kuna are stuck between a rock and a hard place. They say they want to preserve their traditions and ancient ways, but the 21st century is all around them, creating a pressure that must be crushing to both young and old alike. The couple of islands we have visited are not only surrounded by white coral sand beaches and coral reefs beyond, but also sadly, are ringed in piles of plastic waste washed up onto the shores from the ocean where the Kuna attempt to dump their 21st century trash in the ways of old. The alternative is burning the trash but their coconut husk fires are not in any way hot enough to dispose of modern plastic rubbish.
Each time we have anchored at a new island location hoping for solitude, we are hounded by Kuna after a buck for whatever they can carry in their sail and paddle powered canoes. There are always at least one or two small, very cute children wedged in between the molas, lobster, fish or bananas, and if you do not buy something, the guilt factor is employed, with a pointed demand for a present or sweets for the wretched children, whose teeth at that rate will all have fallen out before they are fifteen. It is seriously depressing.
Something most unsettling occurred the other day. After we had fought off another hard nosed sale, the old boot paddled back half an hour later and, out of her traditional, embroidered Kuna smock pulled a cell phone with charging wire attached. She boldly clambered up onto the deck and rudely demanded we recharge her cell battery for her. This gave her another chance to push her wares and then again no less, when she returned for the phone an hour later.
It has been a long while since our exciting transit through the Panama Canal and despite the existence of cell phones there is no computer or internet available in the islands, which is not a bad thing, but for an enforced blog break. I am glad to have finally visited the San Blas to see things for myself and will be infinitely glad when we can leave.
| Panama |
|
Comments [0]
10/02/2009, Isla Tigre, Kuna Yala
In our precisely timed and tightly scheduled lives using cars, buses, planes and trains we usually get where we plan to within a few minutes (or hours) of our expectations and are mightily disgruntled if it is otherwise. In fact we depend on it. The concept of turning around, backtracking and waiting a day or so or indeed not being able to reach our chosen destination at all has become alien to us, and so it has taken us a bit of adaptation to quietly accept that some goals need to be deferred or changed.
Our first encounter with the wisdom of this was early in Mexico when we were bemused by the equanimity with which "old salt" Lou Freeman accepted the 20 miles he had had to backtrack in the middle of the night to spend a few days in Bahia Chamela waiting for the Northerlies to ease. Remembering that acceptance of conditions as they are not as we would like them made it a little easier for us to make the decision to turn around and give up 25 hard earned miles on the way down the Costa Rican coast. So what that we arrived back at our previous day's anchorage a little after midnight, tired and frustrated that we had spent all day going nowhere. We realized we should accept it and take solace in the fact that neither body nor boat were any the worse for wear.
This month in the San Blas Islands we had planned to meander our way down the island chain and leave to Cartagena through a pass seventy miles to the east. On the 20 mile leg from Isla Tigre to Snug Harbor we ran into 35 knot head winds and building seas. With no possibility to crack off because the channels through the coral reefs are narrow and plagued by the consequences of my stupidity in electing to tow the dinghy, after two hours of pounding we gave up and headed right back where we had come from. Again frustrating and plans needed to be redrawn, but no real damage done.
So when all this is over and we are on to new adventures we will try to bring this freshly learned patience and adaptability to bear in a new environment. If we don't like the look of the road ahead, we'll turn around, go home and wait a day or so. It will get better.
| Panama |
|
10/02/2009, Central America
Back by popular demand here is the second instalment of creatures great and small seen in Central America.
| Panama |
|
09/16/2009, Chagres River
To relax after the canal transit we spent a few days in the beautiful Chagres River. It was this river that was dammed to provide the water that powers the canal system and long before that Drake used to get inland to play hell with the Spaniards. Good chap!
| Panama |
|
09/16/2009, Panama Canal, Panama
A smooth transit is now history
| Panama |
|
09/15/2009, Colon, Panama
So here we are again, a second goodbye to Sidewinder, but this time it cannot be reversed since we are now an ocean away as David and Suzi press on in the Pacific to Ecuador and the South Seas.
For ten months we have hopscotched and leap-frogged south from San Diego, our paths crossing, initially by accident but later by design. What started out as a mutual hand holding of greenhorn newbies in Baja developed into friendships we can cherish for all time. And this bears a little examination.
Whereas it is quite possible that on "dry land" Virginia and Suzi may well have found a friendship, perhaps through yoga or such like, I think David would be the first to agree that he and I would have been poles apart. Introduced at a party, as soon as he mentioned his quarter-back past, or his love of beach volley ball or for sure if he started to strut his alpha maleness, I would have said nice to meet you and see you later. No doubt he would have reacted likewise to me. But thrown together in the sometimes raw and intense crucible of learning to be cruisers we have seen things in each other we would never have appreciated shore-side and nurtured a friendship neither could have predicted that will last well beyond this farewell.
So godspeed to Sidewinder, we have reveled in your company and look forward to more Friday night tequila nights when our respective adventures are over and we reconnect down the line.
| Panama |
|
I have just had a telephone conversation with Richard and he asked me to tell you all that everything id fine with them but there are no internet connections in the St Blas Islands.They will shortly leave the Islands when weather is ok to sail to Columbia.
