On board of the Colombian Panga
Seen from above, in a sunny day of blue sky and calm sea, the small boat moving away from the shores of the Ballena island, with white sandy beaches and coconut palms, encircled by a transparent green sea that slowly transformed itself in the deep blue of the ocean, one could think that I was about to start a boat trip somewhere in a idyllic place of the Caribbean. but at 7.10 pm on board of a Colombian contraband boat with 3 strangers, in the darkness of the night and in an agitated sea, the scene was terrifying.
My only comfort was to known that I was going to Colombia and not coming from Colombia. That assured me that I was not on a drugs trafficking contraband boat. What it was, the load, I never found out, and didn't even dare to ask. Soon that was the smallest of my worries.
The merchandise was piled up well above the boat line and only with a gap in the middle, with about half meter long and all the width of the boat. It was in this "hole" that I threaded and travelled for 11 hours without moving.
Next to me was the young assistant whose face lines I would not be able to see properly before dawn. his job during the entire trip was to remove with a plastic container the sea water, that entered in the boat due to the agitating waves and also the rain water from the 2 storms we went through. If fact, I think that was the only reason of the existence of that gap.
Occasionally, and at the captain's command, the youngster would climb on top of the load, and with an agility that demonstrated habit, he kept his balance, and looked at the infinite of the ocean trying to sight some reference point. Some mountain in the coast, a light of any Colombian patrol, and in the final part of the trip, any indication of firm land, a clarity or a lighthouse.
At the back of the Panga ( boat in Colombian Spanish) were the other 2 crew. Each one seated in front of an engine, although they only use one, we travelled at good speed. In front of the pilot was a wooden box with a rudimentary navigation instrument, that he consulted regularly with his lantern.
The 3 man spoke little. The moments of silence were enormous. Some times half hour or more. and with me, they hardly spoke at all. I was not a desired passenger. I was there like if I was another piece of contraband. 50 dollars of profit, net. That was the only reason why they took me.
During the trip, I tried to make conversation with the guy next to me, offered a cigarette, talk about life in the sea, soccer, but the answers were always short and dry. On my right side, the black line of the mountains got lower and lower until it joined the infinite line of the ocean. The coast disappeared of sight and we travelled now in the open ocean. The sea was more agitated and the boat moved all over the place. The sky was cloudy but one could see some stars. There wasn't any moonlight, witch gave a somehow sinister feel to the night.
Everything happened so fast, that I didn't have time to prepare for the trip. My Gore-Tex was inside my luggage at the front of the boat and I didn't dare to go there and get it. So I spent all night soaked wet from the waves and the rain. But it wasn't cold.
The night was passing, long...interminable.
Minutes seemed like hours, and hours like an infinite time But the night didn't go by without its "entertainments". First it came the run away from the Colombian patrol that the captain starts the second engine and cuts through the waves at full speed. Latter came a sea storm, and then another, whose lightnings illuminated the vastness of the ocean. Some times they were so close that it felt like a camera flashes in front of my eyes. I remembered of "cape fear", of my mother, of the tranquility of the roads, and how much I had archived already on this trip.
-Ooh, how I wished I had gone through the Darien gap!
I wanted adventure, so here I have it, and on reinforced dose. When we sighted land was still dark, but it wasn't until dawn, that the boat run aground a few meters from the beach. A group of people were waiting for the boat. Some just curious, others to help with the unloading, and 3 of them, the purchasers, in old land rover jeeps.
I gave my bicycle and all my bags to some of the helpers and jumped on the water. I had set foot on south America soil. Never in the planing of this trip, I though it would be this way.
I load my bicycle and squeeze my t-shit to remove the extra water. I didn't feel like changing cloths. I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. " The road? where to?" I asked. A man indicates me the way pointing to the twirled marks on the dry mud of a pasture. I joggled my way through the farm land. I looked like if I have disembarked in Africa. Vast pastures with huge trees giving shade to the cattle and to the simple houses made of bamboo and coated with adobe.Its inhabitants were all black, descendants of the African slaves that populated not only the Colombian coast but also large parts of the central American coast and Caribbean.
Minutes latter, the jeeps fully loaded pass by at full speed.
According to the captains information, the first village was Moñitos, 6 km inland. The asphalt road passes there, he said, just before grabbing my 50 dollars.
14 km latter I entered Moñitos. For the asphalt was another 7 km. I was tired. I didn't have any water, Colombian money, or map. I just entered the country illegally and didn't have the foggiest idea of where I was.
In Moñitos I stop in the center of the village and got surrounded by a crowd of around 10 people. Some one fills up my water bottle from the tap. I then ask: "Cartagena...is it far? Uuuuh, lejissimo" (very very far) someone answer. A young man that insisted to talk to me in English, dawn me a map of the Atlantic coast, writing down all the towns until Cartagena with the mileage under each one. Under Cartagena he wrote 400 km.
I thanked everyone and left.
I still made 62 km that morning and reached lorica just after 1.30 pm. An armoured tank cruised the streets, and everyone stared at me and my loaded bicycle. For sure tourist are a rare sight around here, specially on tow wheels. I look for a restaurant and have an introduction to the Colombian food, "bandera paisa". I return to the hotel and at 4 pm I was asleep. didn't woke up till next morning.
I take a day off to reestablish energies and to soak myself on the atmosphere of the new country I just entered.
Now, that everything has passed, it didn't look like such a mad trip. I remember the unchanged posture of the crew members (except on the run from the patrol), as if it was just another trip on their routine as smugglers. But for me was everything so new and real, that it was probably the scariest boat trip of my life.
I felt like telling them how much I admired their bravery in their work and the daily risk they took. But I didn't say anything. After all, the "close to Cartagena" promised by the captain, ended up been 290 km.
I still cycled 3 more days until Cartagena with the fear of been stop by the police or military, because I didn't have a stamp on my passport. But the 2 times I was stop by the road check points (they seem to be very characteristic of the Colombian roads) the police were more interested in the Portuguese soccer league, my rusty machete (always creating a general laugh) or how many km I made per day.
Tomorrow veronica arrives in Cartagena for her 3 week cycling tour, and a new stage of this trip begins. I hope that will be a less "agitated" one.
Nuno Brilhante
In Cartagena, Colombia.
Monday, September 24, 2007
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Crossing to Colombia part II (Panama)
Day 4: Island of Carti to island of Playon Chico
on board the Purtugandi.
Today was a day spent on the horizontal. Calm sea, clear sky with a soft breeze and a strong sun. And me, lying on the top platform of this mercantile boat, with a 360 degrees view of the Caribbean sea.
We passed through dozen of small islands, many of them deserted, with fine sand and some coconuts. True fantasy islands. Other in contrast, overpopulated, covered with bamboo huts.
The Purtugandi stopped along the way on many of those islands to unload merchandise and passengers. Rice, beer, flour, canned products, gasoline, anything that the islanders could afford. Even the occasional fridge or TV set. The Purtugandi is, literally, a floating warehouse. Purchase by catalogue at sea. I say this because a great deal of the merchandise have been previously ordered to the captains of the many boats that ply the 37 inhabited islands of the archipelago of San Blas.
The products are bought in the "zona libre" of Colon, a tax free zone of mainly American and Chinese cheap junk. In some of the poorest islands where there is no electricity or potable water and whose only building that is not made of bamboo is the school built by the central government, the arrival of the Purtugandi is an entertainment attended by many.
Women and youth children gather around the pier as soon the boat is at sight. Man are at sea fishing on the cayocos (dugout canoes). Kuna women seem to take control of most of the islands business. They verify the merchandise, help with the unload, check the invoices, pay and make new orders. The younger ones load the heavy stuff like gasoline barrels or flour bags.
Each stop can take something between 10 minutes and a few hours.
At the end of the day the boat docks in Playon Chico for the night. Another Kuna island. This one close enough to the mainland to be connected with a bridge. On the main land there is a school, a Mormon church and a small aircraft landing strip. Daily flights connects Playon Chico with Panama city and some of the other islands. Essentially to load lobster and shellfish but also for passengers. Kuna who decided to live in the Latin world, and tourists for the nearby rustic resort. (Note that there aren't any Cancun style resorts around here. thanks God!)
A get off the boat and go for a stroll. I met a group of youngsters with whom I would spent the rest of night. They showed me around the island and spoke with enthusiasm about Kuna culture. Kuna are a proud people. They are the most organized aboriginal group in panama and the only one (so said my friends) with a legislative representative. They govern the juridical district of Kuna Yala with little interference from the central government.
The majority of them live in one of the 37 inhabited islands of the 365 islands that dot the coast between Provenir and the Colombian border. The lack of roads always kept them more isolated from the world then the other aboriginal groups, and the dugout canoes are the main means of transportation for the communities that exist in the islands and along the coast.
Each community has a Cacique, or chieftain, that chooses the representative for the central government and has decision power over the community - some times arbitrary. As one of the guys told me: "one day I was found in bed with a girl from another community and they fine me 5 balboas" (same as dollars). We ended up the rest of the evening in one of the guys house drinking shots of rum. It was (another) bamboo hut where some women embroidered Molas by hand, under a oil lamp`s light.
Molas are embroidered pieces of cloth that are part of their garments.
Day 5: Playon Chico to "paradise" island
on board the Purtugandi
We left the dock was well past 8 Am. It was going to be another day of deambulation through the lost paradises of the archipelago of San Blas.
With each island we visited, the more and more fascinated with those people I was. A world apart in Central America.
Today I changed boats. The Kuna boat where I was travelling was going to stop for 2 days in Istupo.
Here in this island that I don't know the name yet, there is another boat docked that goes tomorrow to Puerto Obaldia, near the Colombian border. It will be there in 2 or 3 days. They don't know yet. Both captain of the boats were in agreement. It was better and quicker for me to change boats. So I did.
My new boat had a very different atmosphere. The crew was only 4 black people (as opposed to the purtugandi that had 8 or 10). They were all from Colon and where here in the coconut business. They buy it from the Kuna and sell it to the Colombians. The atmosphere of the new boat is less likable but its compensated by the island where we spend the night. A little paradise.
Day 6: From "paradise" island to Ballena Island
on board the Colon
I wake up on my hammock mounted on the bilge. The racket of the engine woke me up. The sun was not up over the infinite line of the horizon, when the Colon left the dock and sailed in the dark and smooth waters of the bay. Those guys were early birds. It was going to be another long day at sea. Much longer then I ever imagined.
This new boat - in contrast with the Purtugandi - made very few stops. It sailed among the islands, some of them authentic paradisaical postcards. A fine sand mount, sprouting of the turquoise water with some coconut palms on it. Some of those islands were used by Colombian narcotic traffickers and smugglers, as I would witness far too close later on in the day.
One of the articles on the autonomous status of the juridical district of Kuna Yala, prohibits the Panamanian navy or the American DEA (drugs enforcement agency) to patrol its waters, turning the region in some sort of contraband "free-zone". Police post exist in some islands but they make little to stop the contraband.
We arrived in isla Ballena (that means wale island, so called by the shape of the island that resembles that animal), in early morning and anchored in the bay. The pier was too shallow to dock. A Colombian trawler leans against the boat and they initiate the long and arduous work of load transfer: Coconuts!
35.000 coconuts were passed and counted one by one from one boat to the other. A process supervised by both captains with a piece of cardboard and a pencil. It took the entire day. I tried to kill the time between some dips in the ocean, my hammock and my book.
The coconuts were sold to the Colombians for 11 cents each. the Kuna that harvested them received even less. coconuts of better quality then in Colombia (they have a thicker inner white) were taken to that country to do the most varied products. A arduous and little lucrative work that, according to the crew, was in decay. the Kuna Indians no longer want to harvest coconuts. They prefer to dedicate their time with the more lucrative lobster business or drugs trafficking.
During the day, several people came on board. They would came in cayocos or small boats to buy gasoline or other stuff, or just to chat away with the crew. One of those people said that he was a captain ( that I understood from the Colombian Trawler), and told me that he was going to Colombia next day, and would take me with him for 50 dollars.
I asked him where in Colombia, but his answer was very vague. "near Cartagena", he said. If what he said was true, that would save me a few days of travelling.. And although I found the fare expensive, it still would be cheaper then going via Puerto Obaldia.
I grab my bicycle and bags and paid the captain of the colon 5 dollars for the 24 hours I spent on board, and moved to the Colombian boat. just before sunset, the Colombian trawler overloaded with 35.000 coconuts plus a lot of other stuff, docked in the island for the night.
Someone offered me dinner (on the previous boats, food was also included. Usually the catch of the day with rice). In the pier where also other boats and trawler. Most of them of contraband. There wasn't many people around but the atmosphere felt quite busy, with people loading and unloading stuff from one boat to another.
A sailor indicates me to put my bicycle and my bags on the pier, that the boat to Colombia was about to leave.
I didn't understand anything anymore!
So we were not leaving tomorrow? And was not on the Colombian trawler full of coconuts? Shortly afterwards "my captain" appeared on board of a Small boat with no more then 2 meters width and 15 or 20 meters long , with two powerful engines and heavily loaded - I never found out of what!
"Pass me your stuff, get in. we going to leave!", he said. Leave to Colombia, during the night, in this....thing? through the open sea? I was petrified.
"Yes, we go. To Colombia. You want to go or not?", he asked me with a suddenly agitated voice, as if he was now in a hurry.
I didn't know what to do. I have to make a decision, and fast! I look at the other people that were watching the all scene in search for an answer. An affirmative look. Any indication that I was taking the right decision. But nothing. Some were laughing, others looked at me with indifferent eyes.
"You want to go to Colombia, right?", the "captain insisted, "lets go!"
He was right. I wanted to go to Colombia, and could not afford to spend a week in boats that stopped in every island along the way. I have to be in Cartagena before the 24th and didn't have many days left.
- We go!, I said.
I place my bicycle over the load already covered with a thick plastic cover, and managed, some how, to place the luggage under it. We leave the pier and the boat disappeared in the darkness of the night.
I just entered a Colombian contraband boat heading to an unknown place and would be entering the country illegally. The 11 hours that followed were an hallucinating trip that i will never forget.
The third and last part of the crossing will follow in the next few days.
Nuno brilhante
In Maria la Baja, Colombia
on board the Purtugandi.
Today was a day spent on the horizontal. Calm sea, clear sky with a soft breeze and a strong sun. And me, lying on the top platform of this mercantile boat, with a 360 degrees view of the Caribbean sea.
We passed through dozen of small islands, many of them deserted, with fine sand and some coconuts. True fantasy islands. Other in contrast, overpopulated, covered with bamboo huts.
The Purtugandi stopped along the way on many of those islands to unload merchandise and passengers. Rice, beer, flour, canned products, gasoline, anything that the islanders could afford. Even the occasional fridge or TV set. The Purtugandi is, literally, a floating warehouse. Purchase by catalogue at sea. I say this because a great deal of the merchandise have been previously ordered to the captains of the many boats that ply the 37 inhabited islands of the archipelago of San Blas.
The products are bought in the "zona libre" of Colon, a tax free zone of mainly American and Chinese cheap junk. In some of the poorest islands where there is no electricity or potable water and whose only building that is not made of bamboo is the school built by the central government, the arrival of the Purtugandi is an entertainment attended by many.
Women and youth children gather around the pier as soon the boat is at sight. Man are at sea fishing on the cayocos (dugout canoes). Kuna women seem to take control of most of the islands business. They verify the merchandise, help with the unload, check the invoices, pay and make new orders. The younger ones load the heavy stuff like gasoline barrels or flour bags.
Each stop can take something between 10 minutes and a few hours.
At the end of the day the boat docks in Playon Chico for the night. Another Kuna island. This one close enough to the mainland to be connected with a bridge. On the main land there is a school, a Mormon church and a small aircraft landing strip. Daily flights connects Playon Chico with Panama city and some of the other islands. Essentially to load lobster and shellfish but also for passengers. Kuna who decided to live in the Latin world, and tourists for the nearby rustic resort. (Note that there aren't any Cancun style resorts around here. thanks God!)
A get off the boat and go for a stroll. I met a group of youngsters with whom I would spent the rest of night. They showed me around the island and spoke with enthusiasm about Kuna culture. Kuna are a proud people. They are the most organized aboriginal group in panama and the only one (so said my friends) with a legislative representative. They govern the juridical district of Kuna Yala with little interference from the central government.
The majority of them live in one of the 37 inhabited islands of the 365 islands that dot the coast between Provenir and the Colombian border. The lack of roads always kept them more isolated from the world then the other aboriginal groups, and the dugout canoes are the main means of transportation for the communities that exist in the islands and along the coast.
Each community has a Cacique, or chieftain, that chooses the representative for the central government and has decision power over the community - some times arbitrary. As one of the guys told me: "one day I was found in bed with a girl from another community and they fine me 5 balboas" (same as dollars). We ended up the rest of the evening in one of the guys house drinking shots of rum. It was (another) bamboo hut where some women embroidered Molas by hand, under a oil lamp`s light.
Molas are embroidered pieces of cloth that are part of their garments.
Day 5: Playon Chico to "paradise" island
on board the Purtugandi
We left the dock was well past 8 Am. It was going to be another day of deambulation through the lost paradises of the archipelago of San Blas.
With each island we visited, the more and more fascinated with those people I was. A world apart in Central America.
Today I changed boats. The Kuna boat where I was travelling was going to stop for 2 days in Istupo.
Here in this island that I don't know the name yet, there is another boat docked that goes tomorrow to Puerto Obaldia, near the Colombian border. It will be there in 2 or 3 days. They don't know yet. Both captain of the boats were in agreement. It was better and quicker for me to change boats. So I did.
My new boat had a very different atmosphere. The crew was only 4 black people (as opposed to the purtugandi that had 8 or 10). They were all from Colon and where here in the coconut business. They buy it from the Kuna and sell it to the Colombians. The atmosphere of the new boat is less likable but its compensated by the island where we spend the night. A little paradise.
Day 6: From "paradise" island to Ballena Island
on board the Colon
I wake up on my hammock mounted on the bilge. The racket of the engine woke me up. The sun was not up over the infinite line of the horizon, when the Colon left the dock and sailed in the dark and smooth waters of the bay. Those guys were early birds. It was going to be another long day at sea. Much longer then I ever imagined.
This new boat - in contrast with the Purtugandi - made very few stops. It sailed among the islands, some of them authentic paradisaical postcards. A fine sand mount, sprouting of the turquoise water with some coconut palms on it. Some of those islands were used by Colombian narcotic traffickers and smugglers, as I would witness far too close later on in the day.
One of the articles on the autonomous status of the juridical district of Kuna Yala, prohibits the Panamanian navy or the American DEA (drugs enforcement agency) to patrol its waters, turning the region in some sort of contraband "free-zone". Police post exist in some islands but they make little to stop the contraband.
We arrived in isla Ballena (that means wale island, so called by the shape of the island that resembles that animal), in early morning and anchored in the bay. The pier was too shallow to dock. A Colombian trawler leans against the boat and they initiate the long and arduous work of load transfer: Coconuts!
35.000 coconuts were passed and counted one by one from one boat to the other. A process supervised by both captains with a piece of cardboard and a pencil. It took the entire day. I tried to kill the time between some dips in the ocean, my hammock and my book.
The coconuts were sold to the Colombians for 11 cents each. the Kuna that harvested them received even less. coconuts of better quality then in Colombia (they have a thicker inner white) were taken to that country to do the most varied products. A arduous and little lucrative work that, according to the crew, was in decay. the Kuna Indians no longer want to harvest coconuts. They prefer to dedicate their time with the more lucrative lobster business or drugs trafficking.
During the day, several people came on board. They would came in cayocos or small boats to buy gasoline or other stuff, or just to chat away with the crew. One of those people said that he was a captain ( that I understood from the Colombian Trawler), and told me that he was going to Colombia next day, and would take me with him for 50 dollars.
I asked him where in Colombia, but his answer was very vague. "near Cartagena", he said. If what he said was true, that would save me a few days of travelling.. And although I found the fare expensive, it still would be cheaper then going via Puerto Obaldia.
I grab my bicycle and bags and paid the captain of the colon 5 dollars for the 24 hours I spent on board, and moved to the Colombian boat. just before sunset, the Colombian trawler overloaded with 35.000 coconuts plus a lot of other stuff, docked in the island for the night.
Someone offered me dinner (on the previous boats, food was also included. Usually the catch of the day with rice). In the pier where also other boats and trawler. Most of them of contraband. There wasn't many people around but the atmosphere felt quite busy, with people loading and unloading stuff from one boat to another.
A sailor indicates me to put my bicycle and my bags on the pier, that the boat to Colombia was about to leave.
I didn't understand anything anymore!
So we were not leaving tomorrow? And was not on the Colombian trawler full of coconuts? Shortly afterwards "my captain" appeared on board of a Small boat with no more then 2 meters width and 15 or 20 meters long , with two powerful engines and heavily loaded - I never found out of what!
"Pass me your stuff, get in. we going to leave!", he said. Leave to Colombia, during the night, in this....thing? through the open sea? I was petrified.
"Yes, we go. To Colombia. You want to go or not?", he asked me with a suddenly agitated voice, as if he was now in a hurry.
I didn't know what to do. I have to make a decision, and fast! I look at the other people that were watching the all scene in search for an answer. An affirmative look. Any indication that I was taking the right decision. But nothing. Some were laughing, others looked at me with indifferent eyes.
"You want to go to Colombia, right?", the "captain insisted, "lets go!"
He was right. I wanted to go to Colombia, and could not afford to spend a week in boats that stopped in every island along the way. I have to be in Cartagena before the 24th and didn't have many days left.
- We go!, I said.
I place my bicycle over the load already covered with a thick plastic cover, and managed, some how, to place the luggage under it. We leave the pier and the boat disappeared in the darkness of the night.
I just entered a Colombian contraband boat heading to an unknown place and would be entering the country illegally. The 11 hours that followed were an hallucinating trip that i will never forget.
The third and last part of the crossing will follow in the next few days.
Nuno brilhante
In Maria la Baja, Colombia
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Crossing to colombia part I (Panama)
Day 1: Panama City to Chepo, 68 km.
Although I packed my bags the night before, I didn't managed to leave before 10.30 AM. I woke up with sunrise, but indetermination kept me glued to the bed. Last night in a way of farewell, I drank one balboa too many with Lard, Bart and Ronald. 3 dutch cyclist I met a few days before, around the peninsula de Azuero. we had travelled together until panama city. It was the end of their 6 week touring of central America.
In the bar was also a group of Portuguese fisherman. They were always there, waiting for a new job to came up and embark. The bar was also frequented by a Indian business man and a insane-looking black American who spent all the time talking to himself. He was looking for a job as a truck driver and claimed that the USA security services had placed a chip in his body and had tracked him down to Panama. Looking after all of us were the gorgeous Panamanian barmaids, Zoraida e Monica.
I already knew all of them.
The 5 days I spent preparing for the crossing, the bar of the Ideal hotel was the meeting point after any activity of the day. It was like if I searched in my new friends the answers to my doubts and uncertainties.
"So, Nuno, when are you going to the jungle?" Asked me the Portuguese every time they saw me.
-Tomorrow, I would reply.
The following day the same questions with the same answers.
Each day I would buy a new piece of equipment to give myself straight. It was like if I was preparing for a new cycling trip for the first time. I bought cartographic maps of the Darien region in the national geographic institute, that although were the best maps available in the country, did not show any trails beyond Yaviza - but they exist! I also bought a better compass then the one I had and 20 meters of rope. And other things that I though it would be necessary for the crossing.
I sharpened my rusty machete, that I found earlier in a deserted beach in northwest panama, and bought (for the first time in all my trips) malaria tablets.
Apparently the Darien region is one of the most malaria-infected areas of central America.
The dutches finished their trip here and gave me loads of packed food that they brought from Europe and didn't use. It was highly energetic and enough for almost a week. I had everything. All but a decision. Was it worth the risk of such journey?
I leave the hotel open to any option and decided to move on the way I did since the beginning of this trip 14 months ago: one day at the time.
I didn't want to admit it, but deep down I have made a decision. I have dreamt with the crossing of the Darien gap since the beginning of the planing of this journey on the pan American highway.
I betrayed my own plans and felt like a Coward. A Judas on two wheels.
I leave the "casco viejo", the old town, and followed the waterfront entering the "American" part of the city. A modern town of skyscrapers(many of them belonging to international banks, where money laundering takes place with little or no interference from the Panamanian government), shopping malls, Japanese and Italian restaurants, fashion shops, American schools. An almost perfect clone of a typical American city set in the tropics. The result of many decades of American
"occupation" during the time they were owners of the panama canal.
I continue towards the international airport and soon found myself again on the Pan-American highway that continues East until it reaches its final stop in the town of Yaviza, some 250 km away. The end of the roads in the northern part of the continent.
The road was flat and relatively monotonous crossing agriculture fields. The traffic was much lighter then on the west side of the city.
I arrive in Chepo mid-afternoon. Dark clouds were forming and a thunderstorm has just started. I should not go any further today. I found a place to stay for 5 balboas in a family-run guesthouse, just outside of the local hospital.
Chepo was only 60 km east of panama city but it seemed a world away from the chaotic capital. A small and sleepy town of about 5000 inhabitants, mainly black.
Throughout Latin America iron bar around windows and doors are a common feature, but in this small town it was "de rigour". The atmosphere was not the friendliest I have found in panama, but I just wanted to spend the night there.
Tomorrow I will leave the Pan American highway at el Llano and follow a gravel road directly north to the hamlet of Carti on the Caribbean coast. This is the only terrestrial link with the autonomous province of the Kuna Yala on the Atlantic coast, where I expect to found some transportation to puerto obaldia on the Colombian border.
The Kuna Yala tribe lives along the coast between Provenir and the Colombian border. With their own political leaders, laws and decision making, the Kuna are the indigenous group with the greatest autonomy in all of Latin America. They live in their ancestor land and still preserve their culture and traditions.
I have abandoned the idea of going to Yaviza, but the chosen route is not less uncertain.
DAY 2 From Chepo to somewhere in the rain forest (km 22 Llano-Carti road)
Before leaving Mi Ranchito guesthouse I went for breakfast at the Chinese restaurant (they seem to be everywhere in panama) just across the hospital. Chicken with fried rice and coffee. I continued to the town center to buy a few last groceries, raisins, cookies, cigarettes and 5 liters of water ( 7 in total with 2 that I already had) and then had a second breakfast, meat stew with rice and another coffee.
In panama there is not much difference between breakfast and lunch.
The owner of the pharmacy next door pulls in a conversation and tells me that in 2 years he lives there I was the second touring cyclist he sees (sure many others have passed through). The other one was a Japanese some time ago.
I leave Chepo and cycle east. The road was empty. The traffic was minimal, some local pick up trucks and the occasional bus. A man on the side of the road discretely takes me a photo with a dischargeble camera. I salute him, with a smile. It was 18 km of good and flat road to the turn off of el Llano.
I hit the gravel and started the countless ups and downs that continued all the way to the Caribbean coast 40 km to the north.
Soon the ups and downs became More accentuated with grades of 15% and 20%. The road didn't made any effort to avoid hills, climbing unnecessarily for a few hundred meters to descent almost immediately. The landscape alternated between forest and pasture land with the occasional hut on the top of a mount. The only traffic was some pick ups (5 or 6 all day) loaded with merchandises and Kuna Indians. They would stop next to me and offered a lift - for a price, of course. 10 Dollars. I refused. But it was good to know that if I could not go any further then Carti, I always could came back on a pick up. I would have done it. The road was becoming more and more difficult, and it seemed unnecessary to me, to do the same road twice at an average speed of 5 km/h.
The road climbed up to 500 meters and offered a panoramic view of the jungle with its
mist and the Caribbean sea to the north. The noises of the jungle were intense. I recognized one a few. One of them, the unmistakable sound of the howler monkey that resembles the roar of a feline. Howler monkeys are named and known for the loud, guttural howls that they routinely use at the beginning and end of the day. They are the loudest animal in the New World and the sounds can travel for 5 km through dense forest.
Good place to camp but I decide to move on.
2 km further I see an open mount on the side of the road and decided to climb it. the views were even more fantastic. I push the bike to the top with effort and set up camp. The rain that have been dropping softly during the day, intensified. I prepare one of the energetic food packs the dutches gave me. 1000 calories per portion. I put 2. I fell asleep with the sounds of the jungle around me and the constant lightning that illuminated the waters of the Atlantic in the distance.
The place was just perfect to camp. I had made only 42 km and it had been a very hard day, but I was happy. Perhaps I`ve took the option with less adventure, but the most sensible one for sure. But the most importantly, I was finally on my way to Colombia!
DAY 3 From the jungle to the island of Carti Suitupo, 13 km.
Yesterday I slept really badly. The constant lightning of the storm somewhere in the ocean had haunted (or illuminated) my tent all night. The sound of an animal in the jungle with a irritating and repetitive noise entered my hears like a untuned church bell, waking me up all the time.
I wake up with the first tones of light. The sky was dark and full of clouds. I prepare breakfast and a coffee and stare for a long while at the beautiful surroundings.
Apart from the gravel road down below, not a single vestige of human presence, a pasture, a hut or a house or a electrical pole on the gravel road. To the north, the Atlantic ocean and the over-populated islands of the Kuna Yala. At that distance they were no more then mere black dots on the vast ocean.
In all this peace and tranquility I hear the sound of an helicopter approaching. It comes closer and flies in circles around my camp. It flies low enough to perceive that it wasn't a military helicopter. There were foreigners inside. Rich tourist, I thought. They flew lower and I could See the pilot and the passengers making signal with their hands. At first I could not understand if they were trying to tell me that they were going to land or to fall. The movements were violent.
The mount where I was didn't have more then 100 square meters. They signal me to lie down on the dirt. They were going to land. The strong wind created by the helicopter`s wings rises my tent - with my equipment inside - into the air and falls into a small ravine spreading all my equipment all over the place.
"- I`m sorry, it was an emergency", said one of the passengers when they came out. They were 4 English crew working for Discovery channel, doing a "survivors show" in the middle of the Kuna Yala territory.
They didn't seemed too worried that my equipment was all over the place and after a short conversation, walked downhill in search of their working spot.
I put my coffee pot on the stove and prepare a coffee to the pilot.
"- Its exactly this that I needed", he says with a smile.
The pilot, an Austrian living and working in Panama, told me that "my" camping spot was the only spot where he could land in all that vast wilderness, and that in panama city they gave him the wrong coordinates and he spent far too long looking for that spot, 8 miles from here. He didn't have enough fuel to go back to panama.
I grab my machete and start to make my way through the vegetation in search of my stuff. It took me a good hour to collect everything. The poles of my tent broke, and even now, I don't really know what`s missing.
I load my "burra" and face the cruel climbs once again. I thought it would be an easier day. I was at the highest point of the road and from there it should be mostly downhill. How deceptive I was!
The road worsens and now the grades are so accentuated that I have to dismount on almost every climb. None of them with less the 15% or 20%, and some with probably 25% plus.
I make only 13 km to the river but it took me 4 hours. It was really hard, but from now on, I would travel on the horizontal!
Some Kuna Indians took me on a dugout canoe carved from one single enormous tree to the island of Carti Suitupo, through yet more river jungle, an indigenous village and a short hop to the island.
This 45 minute journey carried me to a different world. The world of the Kuna Yala. A fascinating group of indigenous people that still live in the land of their ancestors and still preserve a great deal of their traditions. I look for a place to sleep. A man takes me to the Porras family house, where I spent the night sleeping in a hammock, in the main room of the bamboo hut. The entire family moved to the kitchen to give some privacy. But privacy, in this part of the world has a different meaning. The island is so overpopulated that it hardly has any spare place for vegetation. The trails sometimes are so narrow that my loaded bike couldn't go trough.
I went for a walk around this island of about 800 meters long for 600 meters width. In this tiny space lived more the 2000 people. I bump into Juan again and he shows me the way to the docks. A Kuna merchant boat has just docked for the night and would leave in the morning for Istupo. Another island somewhere along the coast between here and Puerto obaldia, near the Colombian border, and my eventual next destination. The captain said they would leave around 8 Am.
I was in luck, Could move on already next day, and the 2 day journey would cost me only a mere 9 dollars. In Istupo I would have to arrange for another boat to
Obaldia, go through costumes, and then found another boat to Acandi, already in Colombia, and yet another boat from there to turbo, where the road begins again. That was the plan. A several days boat "hitch-hike", with probably several days of waiting in transit in some islands along the way.
I had 9 days to reach Cartagena before the arrival of my friend veronica that comes for 3 weeks touring in Colombia. It should be enough, I thought.
I return to my hosts house. The island was in complete darkness apart from the moon light and the many candles inside the houses. The generator that usually provides electricity, has been broken for a while. The atmosphere looked like if it was taken from a movie of the discovery of the Americas.
I lie down in the hammock and blow off the candle that the lady Porras left for me. I felt a sleep with the voices of a strange language coming from everywhere. the kitchen, the path, the neighbours house. The huts where built so close together that one could listen everybodys conversations. It was like if the island was part of one single gigantic family.
In the next few days it will follow the second part of the crossing.
Nuno Brilhante
In lorica, Colombia.
Although I packed my bags the night before, I didn't managed to leave before 10.30 AM. I woke up with sunrise, but indetermination kept me glued to the bed. Last night in a way of farewell, I drank one balboa too many with Lard, Bart and Ronald. 3 dutch cyclist I met a few days before, around the peninsula de Azuero. we had travelled together until panama city. It was the end of their 6 week touring of central America.
In the bar was also a group of Portuguese fisherman. They were always there, waiting for a new job to came up and embark. The bar was also frequented by a Indian business man and a insane-looking black American who spent all the time talking to himself. He was looking for a job as a truck driver and claimed that the USA security services had placed a chip in his body and had tracked him down to Panama. Looking after all of us were the gorgeous Panamanian barmaids, Zoraida e Monica.
I already knew all of them.
The 5 days I spent preparing for the crossing, the bar of the Ideal hotel was the meeting point after any activity of the day. It was like if I searched in my new friends the answers to my doubts and uncertainties.
"So, Nuno, when are you going to the jungle?" Asked me the Portuguese every time they saw me.
-Tomorrow, I would reply.
The following day the same questions with the same answers.
Each day I would buy a new piece of equipment to give myself straight. It was like if I was preparing for a new cycling trip for the first time. I bought cartographic maps of the Darien region in the national geographic institute, that although were the best maps available in the country, did not show any trails beyond Yaviza - but they exist! I also bought a better compass then the one I had and 20 meters of rope. And other things that I though it would be necessary for the crossing.
I sharpened my rusty machete, that I found earlier in a deserted beach in northwest panama, and bought (for the first time in all my trips) malaria tablets.
Apparently the Darien region is one of the most malaria-infected areas of central America.
The dutches finished their trip here and gave me loads of packed food that they brought from Europe and didn't use. It was highly energetic and enough for almost a week. I had everything. All but a decision. Was it worth the risk of such journey?
I leave the hotel open to any option and decided to move on the way I did since the beginning of this trip 14 months ago: one day at the time.
I didn't want to admit it, but deep down I have made a decision. I have dreamt with the crossing of the Darien gap since the beginning of the planing of this journey on the pan American highway.
I betrayed my own plans and felt like a Coward. A Judas on two wheels.
I leave the "casco viejo", the old town, and followed the waterfront entering the "American" part of the city. A modern town of skyscrapers(many of them belonging to international banks, where money laundering takes place with little or no interference from the Panamanian government), shopping malls, Japanese and Italian restaurants, fashion shops, American schools. An almost perfect clone of a typical American city set in the tropics. The result of many decades of American
"occupation" during the time they were owners of the panama canal.
I continue towards the international airport and soon found myself again on the Pan-American highway that continues East until it reaches its final stop in the town of Yaviza, some 250 km away. The end of the roads in the northern part of the continent.
The road was flat and relatively monotonous crossing agriculture fields. The traffic was much lighter then on the west side of the city.
I arrive in Chepo mid-afternoon. Dark clouds were forming and a thunderstorm has just started. I should not go any further today. I found a place to stay for 5 balboas in a family-run guesthouse, just outside of the local hospital.
Chepo was only 60 km east of panama city but it seemed a world away from the chaotic capital. A small and sleepy town of about 5000 inhabitants, mainly black.
Throughout Latin America iron bar around windows and doors are a common feature, but in this small town it was "de rigour". The atmosphere was not the friendliest I have found in panama, but I just wanted to spend the night there.
Tomorrow I will leave the Pan American highway at el Llano and follow a gravel road directly north to the hamlet of Carti on the Caribbean coast. This is the only terrestrial link with the autonomous province of the Kuna Yala on the Atlantic coast, where I expect to found some transportation to puerto obaldia on the Colombian border.
The Kuna Yala tribe lives along the coast between Provenir and the Colombian border. With their own political leaders, laws and decision making, the Kuna are the indigenous group with the greatest autonomy in all of Latin America. They live in their ancestor land and still preserve their culture and traditions.
I have abandoned the idea of going to Yaviza, but the chosen route is not less uncertain.
DAY 2 From Chepo to somewhere in the rain forest (km 22 Llano-Carti road)
Before leaving Mi Ranchito guesthouse I went for breakfast at the Chinese restaurant (they seem to be everywhere in panama) just across the hospital. Chicken with fried rice and coffee. I continued to the town center to buy a few last groceries, raisins, cookies, cigarettes and 5 liters of water ( 7 in total with 2 that I already had) and then had a second breakfast, meat stew with rice and another coffee.
In panama there is not much difference between breakfast and lunch.
The owner of the pharmacy next door pulls in a conversation and tells me that in 2 years he lives there I was the second touring cyclist he sees (sure many others have passed through). The other one was a Japanese some time ago.
I leave Chepo and cycle east. The road was empty. The traffic was minimal, some local pick up trucks and the occasional bus. A man on the side of the road discretely takes me a photo with a dischargeble camera. I salute him, with a smile. It was 18 km of good and flat road to the turn off of el Llano.
I hit the gravel and started the countless ups and downs that continued all the way to the Caribbean coast 40 km to the north.
Soon the ups and downs became More accentuated with grades of 15% and 20%. The road didn't made any effort to avoid hills, climbing unnecessarily for a few hundred meters to descent almost immediately. The landscape alternated between forest and pasture land with the occasional hut on the top of a mount. The only traffic was some pick ups (5 or 6 all day) loaded with merchandises and Kuna Indians. They would stop next to me and offered a lift - for a price, of course. 10 Dollars. I refused. But it was good to know that if I could not go any further then Carti, I always could came back on a pick up. I would have done it. The road was becoming more and more difficult, and it seemed unnecessary to me, to do the same road twice at an average speed of 5 km/h.
The road climbed up to 500 meters and offered a panoramic view of the jungle with its
mist and the Caribbean sea to the north. The noises of the jungle were intense. I recognized one a few. One of them, the unmistakable sound of the howler monkey that resembles the roar of a feline. Howler monkeys are named and known for the loud, guttural howls that they routinely use at the beginning and end of the day. They are the loudest animal in the New World and the sounds can travel for 5 km through dense forest.
Good place to camp but I decide to move on.
2 km further I see an open mount on the side of the road and decided to climb it. the views were even more fantastic. I push the bike to the top with effort and set up camp. The rain that have been dropping softly during the day, intensified. I prepare one of the energetic food packs the dutches gave me. 1000 calories per portion. I put 2. I fell asleep with the sounds of the jungle around me and the constant lightning that illuminated the waters of the Atlantic in the distance.
The place was just perfect to camp. I had made only 42 km and it had been a very hard day, but I was happy. Perhaps I`ve took the option with less adventure, but the most sensible one for sure. But the most importantly, I was finally on my way to Colombia!
DAY 3 From the jungle to the island of Carti Suitupo, 13 km.
Yesterday I slept really badly. The constant lightning of the storm somewhere in the ocean had haunted (or illuminated) my tent all night. The sound of an animal in the jungle with a irritating and repetitive noise entered my hears like a untuned church bell, waking me up all the time.
I wake up with the first tones of light. The sky was dark and full of clouds. I prepare breakfast and a coffee and stare for a long while at the beautiful surroundings.
Apart from the gravel road down below, not a single vestige of human presence, a pasture, a hut or a house or a electrical pole on the gravel road. To the north, the Atlantic ocean and the over-populated islands of the Kuna Yala. At that distance they were no more then mere black dots on the vast ocean.
In all this peace and tranquility I hear the sound of an helicopter approaching. It comes closer and flies in circles around my camp. It flies low enough to perceive that it wasn't a military helicopter. There were foreigners inside. Rich tourist, I thought. They flew lower and I could See the pilot and the passengers making signal with their hands. At first I could not understand if they were trying to tell me that they were going to land or to fall. The movements were violent.
The mount where I was didn't have more then 100 square meters. They signal me to lie down on the dirt. They were going to land. The strong wind created by the helicopter`s wings rises my tent - with my equipment inside - into the air and falls into a small ravine spreading all my equipment all over the place.
"- I`m sorry, it was an emergency", said one of the passengers when they came out. They were 4 English crew working for Discovery channel, doing a "survivors show" in the middle of the Kuna Yala territory.
They didn't seemed too worried that my equipment was all over the place and after a short conversation, walked downhill in search of their working spot.
I put my coffee pot on the stove and prepare a coffee to the pilot.
"- Its exactly this that I needed", he says with a smile.
The pilot, an Austrian living and working in Panama, told me that "my" camping spot was the only spot where he could land in all that vast wilderness, and that in panama city they gave him the wrong coordinates and he spent far too long looking for that spot, 8 miles from here. He didn't have enough fuel to go back to panama.
I grab my machete and start to make my way through the vegetation in search of my stuff. It took me a good hour to collect everything. The poles of my tent broke, and even now, I don't really know what`s missing.
I load my "burra" and face the cruel climbs once again. I thought it would be an easier day. I was at the highest point of the road and from there it should be mostly downhill. How deceptive I was!
The road worsens and now the grades are so accentuated that I have to dismount on almost every climb. None of them with less the 15% or 20%, and some with probably 25% plus.
I make only 13 km to the river but it took me 4 hours. It was really hard, but from now on, I would travel on the horizontal!
Some Kuna Indians took me on a dugout canoe carved from one single enormous tree to the island of Carti Suitupo, through yet more river jungle, an indigenous village and a short hop to the island.
This 45 minute journey carried me to a different world. The world of the Kuna Yala. A fascinating group of indigenous people that still live in the land of their ancestors and still preserve a great deal of their traditions. I look for a place to sleep. A man takes me to the Porras family house, where I spent the night sleeping in a hammock, in the main room of the bamboo hut. The entire family moved to the kitchen to give some privacy. But privacy, in this part of the world has a different meaning. The island is so overpopulated that it hardly has any spare place for vegetation. The trails sometimes are so narrow that my loaded bike couldn't go trough.
I went for a walk around this island of about 800 meters long for 600 meters width. In this tiny space lived more the 2000 people. I bump into Juan again and he shows me the way to the docks. A Kuna merchant boat has just docked for the night and would leave in the morning for Istupo. Another island somewhere along the coast between here and Puerto obaldia, near the Colombian border, and my eventual next destination. The captain said they would leave around 8 Am.
I was in luck, Could move on already next day, and the 2 day journey would cost me only a mere 9 dollars. In Istupo I would have to arrange for another boat to
Obaldia, go through costumes, and then found another boat to Acandi, already in Colombia, and yet another boat from there to turbo, where the road begins again. That was the plan. A several days boat "hitch-hike", with probably several days of waiting in transit in some islands along the way.
I had 9 days to reach Cartagena before the arrival of my friend veronica that comes for 3 weeks touring in Colombia. It should be enough, I thought.
I return to my hosts house. The island was in complete darkness apart from the moon light and the many candles inside the houses. The generator that usually provides electricity, has been broken for a while. The atmosphere looked like if it was taken from a movie of the discovery of the Americas.
I lie down in the hammock and blow off the candle that the lady Porras left for me. I felt a sleep with the voices of a strange language coming from everywhere. the kitchen, the path, the neighbours house. The huts where built so close together that one could listen everybodys conversations. It was like if the island was part of one single gigantic family.
In the next few days it will follow the second part of the crossing.
Nuno Brilhante
In lorica, Colombia.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Decisions needed! (Panama)
-
The blogs of my cycling journey through Costa Rica and Panama will came in a posterior phase of the trip. Its not for the lack of stories or good moments to write about, but because of the mental laziness that possessed me on the last few days and also for being in a moment of taking important decisions regarding my trip. I`ve been in panama city already for several days and still haven`t made up my mind about the next cycling stokes, and how I will cross into Colombia. There aren't regular maritime transport or roads linking the 2 countries. However there are a few options of crossing into Colombia.
Option A) The fastest and the most efficient way would be to fly to
Cartagena, but obviously it would be no fun.
Option B) The most touristic, would be to travel by sailing boat
through the islands of San Blas, in some sort of "mini-cruise" of 4 or 5 days, and that can be easily arranged in panama city.
Option C) would be to "hitch-hike" my way on cargo boats along the
Caribbean cost of the Comarca de Kula Yala, via San Blas, Puerto
albadia, and Turbo (Colombia). From turbo I would make my way to
Cartagena by bicycle
Option D) would be to do an identical crossing but on the pacific
side, via La Palma and God knows where on the Colombian side.
And option E) It would be the Darien gap crossing.
The Pan- American highway does not go all the way from Panama to
Colombia. It finishes somewhere in the middle of the jungle in a town called Yaviza, on the vast wilderness of the Darien region. It restarts again 80 km later already in Colombian territory. This gap of terrestrial transportation between north and south America is known as "Tampon del Darien", or Darien gap. Yaviza is, literally, the end of the road.
However a few adventurous travellers have made it over the years through the Darien gap on foot, by boat or even by bicycle.
On the next few blogs, will follow a daily account of my travels from panama city to Cartagena, whichever way that may be...
Nuno Brilhante
In Panama city.
The blogs of my cycling journey through Costa Rica and Panama will came in a posterior phase of the trip. Its not for the lack of stories or good moments to write about, but because of the mental laziness that possessed me on the last few days and also for being in a moment of taking important decisions regarding my trip. I`ve been in panama city already for several days and still haven`t made up my mind about the next cycling stokes, and how I will cross into Colombia. There aren't regular maritime transport or roads linking the 2 countries. However there are a few options of crossing into Colombia.
Option A) The fastest and the most efficient way would be to fly to
Cartagena, but obviously it would be no fun.
Option B) The most touristic, would be to travel by sailing boat
through the islands of San Blas, in some sort of "mini-cruise" of 4 or 5 days, and that can be easily arranged in panama city.
Option C) would be to "hitch-hike" my way on cargo boats along the
Caribbean cost of the Comarca de Kula Yala, via San Blas, Puerto
albadia, and Turbo (Colombia). From turbo I would make my way to
Cartagena by bicycle
Option D) would be to do an identical crossing but on the pacific
side, via La Palma and God knows where on the Colombian side.
And option E) It would be the Darien gap crossing.
The Pan- American highway does not go all the way from Panama to
Colombia. It finishes somewhere in the middle of the jungle in a town called Yaviza, on the vast wilderness of the Darien region. It restarts again 80 km later already in Colombian territory. This gap of terrestrial transportation between north and south America is known as "Tampon del Darien", or Darien gap. Yaviza is, literally, the end of the road.
However a few adventurous travellers have made it over the years through the Darien gap on foot, by boat or even by bicycle.
On the next few blogs, will follow a daily account of my travels from panama city to Cartagena, whichever way that may be...
Nuno Brilhante
In Panama city.
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
The road less travelled (Nicaragua)
Teresa’s arrival coincided with Jeff’s departure. We travelled together in 4 countries and it was difficult to see him leaving. We had different plans for the next weeks. There are still 10.000 km of pan-American road and we are both heading to Tierra del Fuego, probably our paths will cross again further south.
Teresa got tired of waiting for her donkey, lost somewhere between Lisbon, Newark and San Jose, and decided to meet me and buy a new bicycle in Granada. With her choice limited to the national brands: Rally USA, Linx or Toby Trek the choice wasn’t difficult. Teresa opted for a silver Linx “Desierto Azul”, which costed 1100 cordobas. Chains sets and gears changed to Shimano, back pannier rack, some handle bar extensions and the price rose to 1800 cordobas a mere 70 euros. We baptized it Tona, in honour to the National Beer and to the unique cycling experience it enabled.
Our first stage was to reach Omepete (80 km from Granada with a boat crossing from San Jorge), an island in the middle of the Lake Nicaragua, that my travel guide described as an “ecological jewel”. It is the biggest island in a lake; it is in a shape of “8” and has two volcanoes on each side. The volcano Maderas to the south and Concepcion in the north rose 1610 metres above the water in what resembled an almost perfect cone.
We left the Pan-American using a secondary road that ended by the lake to reappear 25 kms further south. The beach was the road. We followed the banks of the lake above the hardened sand, with the waves crushing on the wheels.
A punctual arrival to San Jorge port and we were on board of the ferry to the island contemplating the volcano in the distance and trying to spot sharks on the lake.
The Lake Nicaragua is the 10th biggest sweet water lake in the world, 117 km length and 58 km of width.
Its waters are inhabited by sharks that were imprisoned when the pacific bay was separated from the ocean by the raise of the earth’s surface, forming the lake, the sharks adapted slowly to the changes in the waters from sweet to salty.
The island deserved more than the night we spent there, however there are only two weekly boats to San Carlos island the frontier port in the south east coast of the lake and losing this boat would meant 3 days of wait for the next one.
The boat stopped twice in the eastern part of the lake. The first stop was in Morritos port (the beginning of our pedalling incognito) and the other in port Miguel. This part of Nicaragua wasn’t on the travel guide which is always a good sign.
It was already dark when the boat left, it was packed with tourists, locals and merchandise such as fish, bananas and other things that the locals were transporting and that seemed to be enough to cater for a nuclear winter. Our donkeys were left to the end after the loaders in bare muscled sweaty chests had loaded what resembled to me half of the banana production of the island with branches and leaves included.
The boat sled the dark waters to the rhythm of life in these part of the world, it moored swiftly in Puerto Morritos into the night. The night felt thick and heavy and only a few locals, us and our donkeys landed, to the incredulous looks of the tourists wondering what we were up to, after all Puerto Morritos wasn’t in the Lonely Planet guide why stop in that small village lost in the middle of the darkness of this unexplored (by tourism) part of Nicaragua? That was just what we planned to do.
When we queried the locals in Omepete about this part of the lake we got little or no information. Most of them never have been there, however it was only 5 hours away by boat.
- “the road is bad” – said one local, “very bad” – said another one, “it can be flooded at this time of the year”, why didn’t we take the boat like all the rest of the tourists?
I was worried with Teresa and her Tona. We’ve been travelling together only for two days and I didn’t know her enough, besides her bicycle was starting to present us with the first problems. I was wrong!
No other travel companion on this journey showed so much determination and adaptability for travelling in two wheels.
To our surprise the village was “full” of life at that time of night. The frenetic sound of frogs rose above challenging the music coming from a local bar with only 4 people seated around a table full of bottles of Tona. We were approached by two policemen that enquired about the reasons of our presence there then they registered in a loose piece of paper, using the light of my head torch, the details of our passports, we never found out why.
We stayed overnight in the “hospedaje” Jimenez. A smooth introduction to the lodging that awaited us – a small room where we stuck the donkeys that looked kind of clean, shared with the resident population of insects and cockroaches. The “Indian bath” was at the end of the corridor without light, in the centre of a dark compartment, a bucket with a small plastic recipient floating in the water – our head shower. We paid 3 euros for the facilities.
The sunrise revealed a humid day full of sun dispersing the morning fog and the inhospitable atmosphere of the previous night. We had breakfast with cereals that Teresa brought from Portugal (also sold here!) followed by a second breakfast – as it became the habit – eggs with Gallo Pinto (rice with beans) fresh cheese and coffee.
We tried to fix, with no success, Tona’s breaks in one of its morning moods. A boy with pliers in his hands was the solution. It reminded me of my journey in India on “board” of a Royal Enfield motorbike and its constant mechanical problems, and how any Indian with a hammer in their hand branded themselves as “mechanics”.
We were on the road again.
The first 15 km from Morrito weren’t very different from what I was already used in Nicaragua – but what were loose stone roads, became big loose stone roads near water lines, cutting the landscape without an effort to contour the hills, some had ascents of 15%, 20%.
After several stops to attend Tona’s moods: unscrewable screws, lost breaks, gears that don’t work we reached the main road that connects to all this vast eastern region of the country. Two loose stone roads and the other to South to San Carlos. The road was larger however it was also more degraded, after all the “bad road” and the “very bad road” actually existed.
Nicaragua is a very poor country, but in these areas poverty has different eyes it is in harmony with the land. Wooden huts with roofs made of hay populate the road sides; its residents share their space with cows, chickens, pigs and cats. There are also the fewer domestic animals such as parrots, monkeys or iguanas and the stray, starving and diseased dogs, unlucky for being born in these parts of the planet.
From the intimacy of a home we could see the curious, at times, incredulous looks. A “hola” in tone of a question. A break. A foot on the floor. A look with a smile. An exchange of ideas and some small talk. This is after all the great advantage of travelling by bike: to stop, to feel, to smell, to talk at any time. The feeling of “reflexion” is immediate!
In the afternoon we prepared ourselves for an uncertain night. We filled the bottles with water from someone’s well and bought some vegetables with the smell of earth in a “tienda” by the road. We arrived to El Tuli the sun had set on an uncertain dark horizon heavy with clouds. The tropical rains came late that day allowing us to cycle all day.
We didn’t need to camp. The owners of a little shop had built, in an organised way, 3 spare bedrooms in their backyard, sharing with all their animals. They had done it not thinking about the tourists’ but in all the Nicaraguans that visit the village on its festive dates. The house wasn’t very different from the ones we’ve seen through out the day, the main difference was that it was built in cement – solid.
Underneath a mango tree there was our bathroom, or rather a plastic bucket and a loo located across the garden and the pig sty, the bathroom was made up of a hole on the ground and a wooden platform. There were pieces of newspaper stuck on the wall by a rusty nail. It is a bathroom like so many around this area only different in very small detail: there was not one, but two holes on the wooden platform, one next to each other as if the owners thought that their guests would fancy going to the loo in pairs? Or perhaps to accommodate their guests and their extended family at the same time?
San Carlos is a warm and swampy port in the southeast coast of Lake Nicaragua next to San Juan River. From here boats depart to the Caribbean Coast trough San Juan river and also trough Los Chiles, in Costa Rica. There’s not much to see or do in San Carlos, but after 2 days in bumpy Nicaragua roads the city felt full of life and I even dare to say – modern.
An hour boat trip by Rio Frio and we were in Costa Rica. The bike computer had showed that afternoon a 20.000 km mark. This was the first time I entered south into a more wealthy country…
The differences were visible: tarmac roads in very good condition (if only a bit too narrow and without verges), supermarkets with imported goods, hotels without daily cuts of electricity and water, coffee shops with espresso machines! And green, lot’s of green! So much green that one feels intoxicated. Welcome to the world capital of Eco-Tourism.
Eco-tourists (mainly Americans) love Costa Rica. Probably it is one of the safest countries in the whole Central America. The armed forces were abolished after the civil war of 1948 and the country has been avoiding the dictatorships and the rebel groups that has affected life in the neighbour countries. The “Ticos” were quick to understand the benefits of preserving their natural wealth, at the moment 27% of the surface of their country is protected area. This guarantees that a citizen from New York or Lisbon will see a monkey or a toucan in their natural habitat, and often without having to leave the balcony of their resort.
The problem is that for us vagabonds in two wheels Costa Rica is expensive! Much more expensive that its neighbour countries, according to my index in the Pan-American a coca-cola in “Tico” territory is three times more expensive than in “Nica” territory.
The first night spent in Costa Rica was in Los Chiles, and in the following day we started our cycling towards San Jose. In a few days my cousin Pedro Pedrosa was arriving in the capital. The plan was to head the 3 of us towards Panama, where I would have to make the hardest decision of this journey: Darien or not? But about this later.
On the way to San Jose, Teresa would put herself and her problematic donkey to the test, showed her determination in being successful doing the cruel “trepadas” of Costa Rica. I can’t imagine a more suitable name for those high hills with uninterrupted ascents of 12% and 15% and 20%. One of the hardest so far. Half the way through we stopped in the dream like lagoon of Hule. An oasis full of peace on a country full of mass tourism. One more day of “trepada”, then a deserved break and then downhill to San Jose.
I had left Nicaragua few days ago but I was already looking forward to return. Nicaragua is one of those countries hat leaves one wishing for more.
As another cycle-tourist that I met in the Pan-American described: "cumplicidade ininteligível que arde em saudade". Ruben Dario certainly wouldn't disagree
Nuno Brilhante Pedrosa
In Chitrè, Panamá.
Teresa got tired of waiting for her donkey, lost somewhere between Lisbon, Newark and San Jose, and decided to meet me and buy a new bicycle in Granada. With her choice limited to the national brands: Rally USA, Linx or Toby Trek the choice wasn’t difficult. Teresa opted for a silver Linx “Desierto Azul”, which costed 1100 cordobas. Chains sets and gears changed to Shimano, back pannier rack, some handle bar extensions and the price rose to 1800 cordobas a mere 70 euros. We baptized it Tona, in honour to the National Beer and to the unique cycling experience it enabled.
Our first stage was to reach Omepete (80 km from Granada with a boat crossing from San Jorge), an island in the middle of the Lake Nicaragua, that my travel guide described as an “ecological jewel”. It is the biggest island in a lake; it is in a shape of “8” and has two volcanoes on each side. The volcano Maderas to the south and Concepcion in the north rose 1610 metres above the water in what resembled an almost perfect cone.
We left the Pan-American using a secondary road that ended by the lake to reappear 25 kms further south. The beach was the road. We followed the banks of the lake above the hardened sand, with the waves crushing on the wheels.
A punctual arrival to San Jorge port and we were on board of the ferry to the island contemplating the volcano in the distance and trying to spot sharks on the lake.
The Lake Nicaragua is the 10th biggest sweet water lake in the world, 117 km length and 58 km of width.
Its waters are inhabited by sharks that were imprisoned when the pacific bay was separated from the ocean by the raise of the earth’s surface, forming the lake, the sharks adapted slowly to the changes in the waters from sweet to salty.
The island deserved more than the night we spent there, however there are only two weekly boats to San Carlos island the frontier port in the south east coast of the lake and losing this boat would meant 3 days of wait for the next one.
The boat stopped twice in the eastern part of the lake. The first stop was in Morritos port (the beginning of our pedalling incognito) and the other in port Miguel. This part of Nicaragua wasn’t on the travel guide which is always a good sign.
It was already dark when the boat left, it was packed with tourists, locals and merchandise such as fish, bananas and other things that the locals were transporting and that seemed to be enough to cater for a nuclear winter. Our donkeys were left to the end after the loaders in bare muscled sweaty chests had loaded what resembled to me half of the banana production of the island with branches and leaves included.
The boat sled the dark waters to the rhythm of life in these part of the world, it moored swiftly in Puerto Morritos into the night. The night felt thick and heavy and only a few locals, us and our donkeys landed, to the incredulous looks of the tourists wondering what we were up to, after all Puerto Morritos wasn’t in the Lonely Planet guide why stop in that small village lost in the middle of the darkness of this unexplored (by tourism) part of Nicaragua? That was just what we planned to do.
When we queried the locals in Omepete about this part of the lake we got little or no information. Most of them never have been there, however it was only 5 hours away by boat.
- “the road is bad” – said one local, “very bad” – said another one, “it can be flooded at this time of the year”, why didn’t we take the boat like all the rest of the tourists?
I was worried with Teresa and her Tona. We’ve been travelling together only for two days and I didn’t know her enough, besides her bicycle was starting to present us with the first problems. I was wrong!
No other travel companion on this journey showed so much determination and adaptability for travelling in two wheels.
To our surprise the village was “full” of life at that time of night. The frenetic sound of frogs rose above challenging the music coming from a local bar with only 4 people seated around a table full of bottles of Tona. We were approached by two policemen that enquired about the reasons of our presence there then they registered in a loose piece of paper, using the light of my head torch, the details of our passports, we never found out why.
We stayed overnight in the “hospedaje” Jimenez. A smooth introduction to the lodging that awaited us – a small room where we stuck the donkeys that looked kind of clean, shared with the resident population of insects and cockroaches. The “Indian bath” was at the end of the corridor without light, in the centre of a dark compartment, a bucket with a small plastic recipient floating in the water – our head shower. We paid 3 euros for the facilities.
The sunrise revealed a humid day full of sun dispersing the morning fog and the inhospitable atmosphere of the previous night. We had breakfast with cereals that Teresa brought from Portugal (also sold here!) followed by a second breakfast – as it became the habit – eggs with Gallo Pinto (rice with beans) fresh cheese and coffee.
We tried to fix, with no success, Tona’s breaks in one of its morning moods. A boy with pliers in his hands was the solution. It reminded me of my journey in India on “board” of a Royal Enfield motorbike and its constant mechanical problems, and how any Indian with a hammer in their hand branded themselves as “mechanics”.
We were on the road again.
The first 15 km from Morrito weren’t very different from what I was already used in Nicaragua – but what were loose stone roads, became big loose stone roads near water lines, cutting the landscape without an effort to contour the hills, some had ascents of 15%, 20%.
After several stops to attend Tona’s moods: unscrewable screws, lost breaks, gears that don’t work we reached the main road that connects to all this vast eastern region of the country. Two loose stone roads and the other to South to San Carlos. The road was larger however it was also more degraded, after all the “bad road” and the “very bad road” actually existed.
Nicaragua is a very poor country, but in these areas poverty has different eyes it is in harmony with the land. Wooden huts with roofs made of hay populate the road sides; its residents share their space with cows, chickens, pigs and cats. There are also the fewer domestic animals such as parrots, monkeys or iguanas and the stray, starving and diseased dogs, unlucky for being born in these parts of the planet.
From the intimacy of a home we could see the curious, at times, incredulous looks. A “hola” in tone of a question. A break. A foot on the floor. A look with a smile. An exchange of ideas and some small talk. This is after all the great advantage of travelling by bike: to stop, to feel, to smell, to talk at any time. The feeling of “reflexion” is immediate!
In the afternoon we prepared ourselves for an uncertain night. We filled the bottles with water from someone’s well and bought some vegetables with the smell of earth in a “tienda” by the road. We arrived to El Tuli the sun had set on an uncertain dark horizon heavy with clouds. The tropical rains came late that day allowing us to cycle all day.
We didn’t need to camp. The owners of a little shop had built, in an organised way, 3 spare bedrooms in their backyard, sharing with all their animals. They had done it not thinking about the tourists’ but in all the Nicaraguans that visit the village on its festive dates. The house wasn’t very different from the ones we’ve seen through out the day, the main difference was that it was built in cement – solid.
Underneath a mango tree there was our bathroom, or rather a plastic bucket and a loo located across the garden and the pig sty, the bathroom was made up of a hole on the ground and a wooden platform. There were pieces of newspaper stuck on the wall by a rusty nail. It is a bathroom like so many around this area only different in very small detail: there was not one, but two holes on the wooden platform, one next to each other as if the owners thought that their guests would fancy going to the loo in pairs? Or perhaps to accommodate their guests and their extended family at the same time?
San Carlos is a warm and swampy port in the southeast coast of Lake Nicaragua next to San Juan River. From here boats depart to the Caribbean Coast trough San Juan river and also trough Los Chiles, in Costa Rica. There’s not much to see or do in San Carlos, but after 2 days in bumpy Nicaragua roads the city felt full of life and I even dare to say – modern.
An hour boat trip by Rio Frio and we were in Costa Rica. The bike computer had showed that afternoon a 20.000 km mark. This was the first time I entered south into a more wealthy country…
The differences were visible: tarmac roads in very good condition (if only a bit too narrow and without verges), supermarkets with imported goods, hotels without daily cuts of electricity and water, coffee shops with espresso machines! And green, lot’s of green! So much green that one feels intoxicated. Welcome to the world capital of Eco-Tourism.
Eco-tourists (mainly Americans) love Costa Rica. Probably it is one of the safest countries in the whole Central America. The armed forces were abolished after the civil war of 1948 and the country has been avoiding the dictatorships and the rebel groups that has affected life in the neighbour countries. The “Ticos” were quick to understand the benefits of preserving their natural wealth, at the moment 27% of the surface of their country is protected area. This guarantees that a citizen from New York or Lisbon will see a monkey or a toucan in their natural habitat, and often without having to leave the balcony of their resort.
The problem is that for us vagabonds in two wheels Costa Rica is expensive! Much more expensive that its neighbour countries, according to my index in the Pan-American a coca-cola in “Tico” territory is three times more expensive than in “Nica” territory.
The first night spent in Costa Rica was in Los Chiles, and in the following day we started our cycling towards San Jose. In a few days my cousin Pedro Pedrosa was arriving in the capital. The plan was to head the 3 of us towards Panama, where I would have to make the hardest decision of this journey: Darien or not? But about this later.
On the way to San Jose, Teresa would put herself and her problematic donkey to the test, showed her determination in being successful doing the cruel “trepadas” of Costa Rica. I can’t imagine a more suitable name for those high hills with uninterrupted ascents of 12% and 15% and 20%. One of the hardest so far. Half the way through we stopped in the dream like lagoon of Hule. An oasis full of peace on a country full of mass tourism. One more day of “trepada”, then a deserved break and then downhill to San Jose.
I had left Nicaragua few days ago but I was already looking forward to return. Nicaragua is one of those countries hat leaves one wishing for more.
As another cycle-tourist that I met in the Pan-American described: "cumplicidade ininteligível que arde em saudade". Ruben Dario certainly wouldn't disagree
Nuno Brilhante Pedrosa
In Chitrè, Panamá.
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