The Coco Bandero Cays are a set of small islands about 5-6 miles north of the mainland. These islands, as well as those west of it like the Holandes Cays, are true marine paradise. They are uninhabited and set amidst coral reefs. Therefore, the water is a very clear teal blue and snorkeling is very nice. We saw many of the coral reef fish that inhabit this area of the Caribbean, including large trigger fish which, unfortunately, end on many of the cruisers or Kunas' dinner tables as they are tasty.

On our first night we were alarmed by fires that were set in one of the small islands near our anchorage. We saw someone running around, almost with ritual movements, and lighting up the fires which lasted for a few hours. We hailed the sailors in the anchorage on the VHF radio and learned that Kunas as well as many cruisers set their trash of fire. Though this is preferable to seeing mountains of trash on the beautiful beaches of these islands, it does pose a fire hazard as well as air pollution. Knowing where and when fires are set by Kunas is an important piece of information for sailors as they would not visit islands where they know trash is burned and the anchorage is downwind of it.

Our days in Coco Bandero were quiet with one unusual event. Sigrid, our Danish friend who was just around the end our anchorage, noticed that a man she had seen 1 year ago in the Canary islands posing nearly naked in front of his camera was on the beach of an island near her doing it again! That was very bizarre. Daniel was asking all sorts of questions about this and we could only conjecture. Sigrid managed to take some pictures from her boat and we include a couple in the Coco Bandero Album in the gallery of pictures.