Hola y Bienvenidos, de Santa Marta, Colombia
13 November 2017 | Santa Marta, Colombia
Cheryl/ Ahh air conditioning at last
Hola y Bienvenidos
We arrived in Santa Marta about two weeks ago. Our passage was mostly uneventful and that’s a good thing! Our winds died sometime during the 2nd day and since we aren’t purist, we cranked up our iron jib and motor sailed. We did lose a belt on our alternator as we were approaching Cinto, the first of the five bays to the north of Santa Marta. This is the second time in our travels where Ed had to go below and replace the belt while underway. He’s got it down to a science. We were greeted with so many dolphins as we approached the bay. It was spectacular since we haven’t seen this many dolphins since we left the US Gulf Coast. We arrived into Cinto after the sun had set but we had just enough light to go in and anchor. This is something we do not like to do but we saw a powerboat go in just ahead of us and also saw other boats anchored inside so we felt reasonably safe going into this bay. It was awesome to be anchored so close to mountains. The air was cool and comfortable, like fall weather, so different from Bonaire and Curacao, which was hot, hot, and hot. After a peaceful night's rest, we slowly made our way to Santa Marta on Sunday, Oct 29th, visiting some of the other bays along the way.
We are docked at the marina in Santa Marta. This is a happening marina with lots of local powerboats and fishing boats that are in and out of the marina often. My first impression of the neighborhood left me wondering if it was a safe place. There are armed police and military personnel on the street around the marina and one of the English speaking workers in the marina office was vocal saying “we are safe here”. Why did she say that? Should we worry? Of course we will worry, I mean it’s us, Ed and Cheryl. That’s what we do. Anyway, we have ventured all around the streets of Santa Marta and feel quite safe here although we haven’t been out late at night nor will we.
We are enjoying sunset and happy hours here at the marina. Beer is cheap and good. They have a nice area to enjoy talking with other boaters and watching sunset, drinking cerveza.
We along with 2 other couples, took a bus to Cartagena and spent 3 days and nights exploring the walled city of Cartagena. We stayed in a nice boutique hotel that had a rooftop pool (more like a large Jacuzzi with cold water only) where we had happy hour watching the parrots fly by. Every evening, flocks of parrots would fly around us for about an hour. I think I enjoyed this as much as I did the sightseeing in the walled city. We also visited the Cartagena marina area, just because… It is in a very busy port area and dirty. I wouldn’t want to bring our boat here.
We took pictures of our sightseeing which you can find in the gallery.
While Ed is extending his list of boat projects to work on, I am planning where we can go and what we can see and do!
Stay tuned, Machu Picchu is beckoning us to come before it gets too rainy. Looking forward to that adventure!