The anticipation of the Archipelago de San Blas has in no way diminished the arrival! These islands, home to the Kuna tribe, and alternatively named Kuna Yala, have always been at the top of the list for the Caribbean. They are tiny sandy islets, dotted around a stretch of coast about 60 miles long, and inhabited by the charming Kuna Indians, who were driven out here from Panama, and now live a semi autonomous existence, with their own laws, taxes and way of life. Some of the women are still in traditional Kuna dress, brightly coloured, with a square embroidered 'mola' on the front of their dress. Their mode of transport is a dug out canoe or 'ulu', sometimes with a sail, only very rarely does someone have an outboard. The islands are too small for cars, and on only one have we found electricity, so the way of life is based on fishing, making 'molas' and I'm not sure what else they survive on. Their communications with the outside world are regular flights on tiny little aeroplanes to Panama and Colon, and their tourism is limited to yachts, there is no other means of transport between the islands except by 'ulu'! They provide us yachties with a great service, as they paddle or sail out to you in some far flung place, and sell you bread, fruit, and to our delight yesterday an enormous crab and a small lobster ($4). As well as selling the beautifully stitched 'molas', which I have succumbed to! Our first task on arrival here, after 5 days at sea from Bonaire, was to find a means of getting my brother Mike to Panama for his flight home a few days later. It all seemed too easy, as we gathered that you just turn up for the flight at 06.30, pay $35 and off you go! Problem number two however, was that we had almost no dollars, we'd used up virtually all we had paying the not inconsiderable customs and cruising permit fees. We did not resent this, as the money goes to the communities, and they need it! So our next task was to find the island with a bank on it! We only had some electronic charts, which were pretty inaccurate, and don't name most of the islands, but we looked at their map of Kuna Yala, and worked out roughly where we were heading for 20 miles away. Naganar, or Yandup, which we found without too much trouble. The only thing was that we had missed the bank for the day by the time we got there, but we managed to find a tiny lady who sold Mike a ticket for Panama, our very limited Spanish was working hard at this point! Naganar consists of two islands, joined by a splendid bridge, where the dominant feature of both islands are two churches! Unfortunately the technology of concrete has arrived, and amongst the traditional bamboo and palm thatched houses are plenty of concrete ones too. There is electricity, but only stand pipes for water. I couldn't work out what happens about drainage, but it didn't smell! This is one of the larger populated islands, and had a school, a few shops, if you could work out which they were, and of course the bank. Luckily for us, Mike had some traveller's cheques, as nothing else was acceptable. The people were charmingly accepting of us, no pestering or harassment. The roads are sand, and to our astonishment, we came across real grass in some patches! The rest of the Caribbean has a very coarse broad leaved grass, but this is fine and soft! We went off with Mike to find a sandy island somewhere for the rest of the day, and next morning had to get him to the airport at 06.30. The airport consists of a tiny island accessible only by boat, and one hut. We arrived in the half light of growing dawn, and gradually more and more people showed up. Eventually an aeroplane arrived, and people got off, Mike got on, and the daily dalliance with the outside world was finished! Magic, and all for $35 straight to Panama City. In a serendipitous way, getting off the aeroplane was a lone woman, laden with yachtie things, like a generator, so when we got talking we discovered that not only did she have what we needed, a pilot book to the San Blas, but she also needed a lift to her boat 4 miles away! We duly obliged, and ended up in Paradise, tiny sandy islands protected by a reef, several other boats, who we got to know, and as always provided useful advise and skills, (making LED lights for our nav lights) and general exchange of ideas. It made us realise what a rush we're in, as most of them just believe in taking their time, like arriving in the San Blas for 2 months and still there 2 years on! Sadly the San Blas had to end sooner than we'd wanted, as there was a bad weather forecast, and we thought we should get on to Panama. Our big regret was not having our dear friends Rob and Susan with us, and feeling we had to leave too soon.