72 Hours in Panama's Stunning San Blas Islands - 8-15-2012

From August 15th until the morning of August 18th, I was on a sailing charter that cruised through the San Blas Islands of Panama. I can tell you without exaggeration that the San Blas Islands are among the most beautiful places on Earth, and certainly one of the most beautiful places I have seen myself. A previous post talks all about why you should visit these gorgeous islands. This post tells the story of Day 1 of my sailing charter.


The San Blas Islands, Day 1:

Carti, Panama

The first day of our charter, our 4x4 taxi picked me and several other travelers up from Hostal Mamallena in Panama City at 5:30PM for the four hour ride from Panama City to Carti. Only three of us, though would be doing the boat charter. Ingmar was a 24 year old Austrian guy who looked a bit like Harry Potter, if Harry Potter was 6'4" and built like a mountain. Ilonka was a 32 year old Dutch woman who turned out to be a former model and currently owns her own interior design firm back home. And of course there was me, the former economist turned backpacker. The scenery outside of Panama City is beautiful, by the way -- winding roads and dense jungle for hours. Around 9:00AM, our taxi dropped us off at a dirt parking lot a wooden dock and two water taxis. This, apparently is Carti. We waited 20 minutes for the water taxi to arrive, but it gave the three of us plenty of time to talk and begin getting to know each other.

The Da Capo

The 30 minute taxi ride from Carti to Captain Mats and the Da Capo was smooth and was very pretty. Light blue sky above, dark blue water below and dark green jungle in the distance reminded me I was along way from Los Angeles. We greeted Captain Mats, a sixty-something Swede from Stockholm as he helped us onto his boat. Once aboard, Captain Mats showed us around his 36 foot sloop, the Da Capo, and collected the $300 from each of us for our three night cruise.

Captain Mats is a former investigative journalist and media consultant. He worked for decades for the largest newspaper in Sweden before he and his wife started their own media consulting firm. During the post-Internet bubble of 2001 to 2003, many of his clients merged or were acquired. The successor firms saw PR and media consulting as a cost center and so Captain Mats' business dried up. He and his wife sold their PR firm, split up somewhere along the line, and he dedicated himself to his lifelong hobby -- sailing. His adventures took him across the Atlantic multiple times, through the Caribbean and for the last several years, to the San Blas Islands.

Ingmar, Ilonka, your author making friends in San Blas

We start our trip when one of Captain Mats' Kuna friends rows out to the Da Capo in his canoe. He comes aboard and greets us with a friendly smile. In accented, but perfectly understandable English, he invites me, Ilonka and Ingmar to Nalu Nega, the island he and his family live on, for a tour. "Bring your cameras and leave your shoes," he advises with a laugh. Damn good advice for any tropical vacation, I'd say!

The Kuna are friendly folks, but aren't shy about asking for a dollar every time you take a picture with one. Thankfully, there were plenty of other great shots to capture, including charming wooden huts, clear water, and smiling children who were gracious enough to not ask for money. Our guide explains that about 20 families live on this island and that his uncle is chief. The island has a school, a sparely appointed hostel, a basketball court and a few small stores selling bottled water, bug spray, soap and other simple consumer goods. He gives us a tour of his hut as well, a huge structure with hammocks and clothes hung throughout. Large pieces of thin, multicolored, patterned cloth partition the large hut into "rooms." There's no running water or electricity, but I'm still impressed at the small luxuries the hut has. The large luxuries of free time, a warm climate and a stunningly picturesque locale that come with living on this island leave me more than a little jealous.




Your author and a coconut in San Blas. Damn it was yummy.

Also awesome was sipping coconut water from a freshly opened coconut, which Ingmar, Ilonka and I did leisurely under the shade of a palm tree after our tour of Nalu Nega was complete. After Captain Mats' friend rowed us back to the Da Capo, we sailed east about one hour to Isla Pero (Dog Island). Dog Island is a tiny island that took all of 15 minutes to walk around. People don't go there for the hiking, though. They go there for water so clear you could see forever, so blue you think you're in a painting and so warm you'd think you had died and gone to tropical heaven. As soon as the captain dropped anchor, Ingmar, Ilonka and I were in the bathwater warm sea. Ingmar explored a sunken wreck just off shore. I swam with Ilonka to the white sand beach.

Isla Pero (Dog Island), Panama

I'll never forget how beautiful that day was, with its crystal water, warm breeze, dark green palm trees tall against a sky impossibly blue and endless, and my amazement that places this gorgeous still existed in the world. Also striking was how I was exactly where I wanted to be, and had wanted to be for a long time. Seven months prior (and for many months before that), I was unhappy, working a job I didn't enjoy and wishing I could run away to tropical island paradise where I could bask in peace and beauty. And now...I was! That afternoon, I realized that I was a long way from my old life, and I couldn't have been happier about that. It's a wonderful feeling to experience a dream coming true. I remember thanking God and the universe for my life a lot on this Panama trip, but never as much as I did when I soaked in Isla Pero's calm and beauty.

Ingmar, your author and Ilonka. San Blas Islands.

For several hours on this idyllic mid-summer afternoon, I alternated talking with Ilonka, and swimming around the island's reefs with Ingmar...a pattern I'd repeat for the next two days. Ilonka and Ingmar were vastly different people, but I enjoyed both their company. Ilonka and I thought about the same things frequently: purpose, building something for the future, living a life that honored our values and dreams. Her's was a life of glamor, adventure, but struggle as well. Through everything, she worked hard desired to be successful as an entrepreneur and interior designer. Ilonka had a great life story and I could see how it forged her into a strong, assertive woman. She guarded her sentimental side with a certain coldness, but it was there if you looked...and if you earned her trust. She wore a ring on her left hand -- part reminder of a past love her heart clung to despite him treating her badly, and part hope that she would find a new love who would respect her. Looking back, I think meeting her on this trip and spending hours talking to her in San Blas, and then back in Panama City, was my trip's highlight. There wasn't anyone I met on this trip whose company I enjoyed more than Ilonka's. Ingmar was young, adventurous and active. I didn't have much to talk about him with, but he could always be counted on to go swimming, sea kayaking or photographing with. Part of me envied his youth and all the traveling he had done at only 24 years old. How could I so easily have traded my youth for over a decade of stress and late nights at the office?

Sunset in Cayes Limones, Panama

The afternoon passed all quickly. Too soon, the three of us swam back to the Da Capo and Captain Mats sailed us east again to our night anchorage at eastern Cayes Limones. We anchored between three islands that formed a loose triangle between them. Much of the sea between the islands was so shallow, you could walk from island to island and stay dry above your knees. Ingmar was eager to go sea kayaking. I had never kayaked at all and I wanted to try, so we went together. I sat in the front of the kayak and he sat behind me. Ingmar's muscles were twice the size of mine, and his never tired. Still, I kept up as best as I could. We kayaked between all three islands, admiring their white beaches and green jungles from the water. Small bright blue fish swam beside our kayak. Brighter orange starfish on the shallow sea floor almost glowed in the weakening sunlight. I could reach into the water to grab one and barely get my elbow wet, the water was so shallow here. Tired, but completely at peace, Ingmar and I rowed back to the Da Capo for dinner as afternoon faded to evening.

While Ingmar and I were out, Captain Mats' girlfriend, Dina, prepared a sumptuous, creamy lobster pasta for dinner.  The lobster was fresh. Kuna fisherman had caught it that day and sold it to us from their canoe not three hours prior to dinner. I do try to eat well when I travel, and this meal was still the best of my Panama trip. The company was excellent as well, and we all talked, ate and drank the rum I bought late into the night.

After everyone was asleep, I found myself still awake. It wasn't a tense wakefulness, though. It was a peaceful, serene wakefulness that wanted to enjoy the evening. That night, I don't recall how late, I climbed up to the deck and lay down. Above me were more stars than I had ever seen before. Tiny white lights twinkled in the sky from horizon to horizon. The brush stroke that was the Milky Way was nearly directly overhead. The air was warm and calm. Gentle waves rocked the boat and splashed lazily against the hull. There under the stars, in the warm air, a million miles from my old life, I slept through the night on the Da Capo's deck.

Why and How to Visit The San Blas Islands in Panama - 8-31-2012

From August 15th until the morning of August 18th, I was on a sailing charter that cruised through Panama's San Blas Islands. I can tell you without exaggeration that the San Blas Islands are among the most beautiful places on Earth, and certainly one of the most beautiful places I have seen myself. And with 380 individual islands, some only yards long and wide, you can check out a new island every day of the year with a bit left over.


This post covers the history of the San Blas Islands where to stay, and how to get here. Subsequent posts will cover my three day cruise through San Blas (which was awesome, thanks for asking).




Isla Pero (Dog Island)

History of the San Blas Islands and the Kuna Yala Comerica:

The San Blas Islands are part the Kuna Yala Comerica, which is a semi-autonomous region of Panama. The indigenous people, the Kuna Yala, have had contact with Europeans since the 1600s and are a fiercely independent people. In 1924, they violently rose up against the Panamanian government in response to adverse policies affecting the area. Shrewd diplomats, the Kuna Yala struck a deal with the American military. When Panamanian military elements moved to respond to the uprising, a Yankee gunboat was waiting for them. Backed by the Americans, and powered with their deep sense of sovereignty, the Kuna Yala negotiated their own constitution with the Panamanians, and autonomy within Panama. Subsequent constitutions have ceded more and more autonomy to the Kuna Yala. Today, the Kuna pay no Panamanian income taxes, have their own governance and police force and control all development within the Kuna Yala Comerica, including the San Blas Islands. Panama takes care of all international affairs and military defense of the Kuna Yala Comerica, and only interferes in Kuna law enforcement in the most serious circumstances such as murder.

Kuna Village

San Blas Today:

The Kuna have severely limited commercial and resort development in the San Blas Islands, making the area somewhat "rough" for typical Western tourists. Don't expect nice hotels, electricity, or even running water if you stay on an island with the Kuna. Do expect to bathe in rainwater from a bucket and use an outhouse sitting over the water on an isolated part of an island. The upside is that the islands are nearly completely unspoiled; you get NONE of the obnoxious, high density resorts and high rise hotels that dot Waikiki Beach in Hawaii, for instance. You also get the clearest, most pristine water you may see outside of Belize or the Maldives, and you get thick, verdant jungles on many islands.

Fresh fish

Island Accommodations:

Several Kuna families in San Blas host backpackers in Kuna "hostels." Like regular hostels, these hostels have dorm beds and private cabins. The dorms and cabins will be spare...don't expect mattresses or electricity. Do expect some bugs in the cabins, and again...expect to bathe from a bucket and use an outhouse for your toilet. Meals are included in your stay; expect simple rice dishes and seafood. If you get hungry, though, nearly all Kuna accommodations offer guests the opportunity to purchase fresh crab, lobster and fish pulled from the ocean that afternoon.

Unlike regular hostels, you have to book these Kuna hostels either through a hostel or hotel in Panama City, or through a travel company like Panama Travel Unlimited. Different hostels, hotels and travel companies have relationships with different Kuna. So check around to see which place offers nights at the Kuna island most suited to you. Expect to pay between $35 and $150 per person per night depending on the food offered, island you'll be staying on, tours included, and whether you booked a private room or dorm. One hostel I stayed at in Panama City, Mamallena Backpackers, has relations with several Kuna families and offers a range of budget options to stay with the Kuna. Mamallena's owners also own Panama Travel Unlimited, which offers more expensive options to stay with the Kuna.

Travelers I met stayed two or three nights with the Kuna, but you certainly have the option to stay longer. The people I met cited boredom and "island fever" by the third day as their reason for moving on from San Blas.




So relaxing...

Sailing Charters Through San Blas:

Not looking to shower from a bucket? Rather not commit to one island for several days? Book a boat charter! My friends and I used our hostel, Mamallena Backpackers to arrange transportation to and from Carti, which is where the water taxi picked us up to take us to our boat. We arranged our boat charter by contacting a captain directly, however (see below). Mamallena Backpackers in Panama City, and other hostels and hotels in Panama City, have relationships with tour companies and boat captains and can definitely assist you. The list at the end of this post offers several reputable sailing charter companies you can contact, including the one my friends and I used.

Expect to pay between $125 and $175 per person per night for a San Blas Islands boat charter.




Getting to the San Blas Islands:

My friends and I used our hostel in Panama City, Mamallena Backpackers to arrange transportation to and from Carti, which is where the water taxi picked us up to take us to our boat. We arranged our boat charter by contacting a captain directly, however (see below). Mamallena Backpackers and other hostels and hotels in Panama City will have relationships with tour companies and boat captains and can definitely assist you too.

Expect to pay about $60 round trip for the 4x4 taxi ride between Panama City and Carti. Also expect to be picked up from your hostel or hotel around 5AM. The trip should take three or four hours. Taxes to enter Kuna territory are $3 and are payable upon entrance to the Comerica. The water taxi from Carti to the islands or your boat should cost $10 to $15, depending on which island you're headed to.

If you want to contact a tour company or boat captain yourself, start with the following reputable operators. Please note that different captains will have different sized boats, so be sure to ask about boat size and how many people the boat can comfortably accomodate.

1) Panama Travel Unlimited -- http://panamatravelunlimited.com. This company is owned by the same folks who own Mamallena Backpackers in Panama City. The company has relationships with numerous captains, and even some Kuna if you'd like to stay on an island instead of on a boat.

2) Captain Mats of the boat Da Capo -- http://www.saildacapo.com. This is the boat my friends and I used. Captian Mats has a reputation for being well...moody. He treated my friends and I great, however, and fed us really well. I would recommend using him, if you're OK with sharing the boat with his girlfriend (a great cook!) and their six year old son (somewhat hyperactive).

3) Yacht Latina -- yachtlatina.com. As of August 2012, this company has been operating for about six months, but has a positive reputation. They have two boats.

4) Sailing One World -- www.sailingoneworld.com. The One World is a custom-built 64 foot brigantine schooner. She's got plenty of space and plenty of sail to take you where you need to go.

Costa Rica, A Review - Sunday 4-26-2009

Playa Samara, Costa Rica

You should go to Costa Rica.

The country is beautiful. I loved Costa Rica's gorgeous natural environments. The Monteverde and Santa Elena nature preserves house ancient hundred foot (and taller!) trees, which provide shelter to white-faced monkeys, howler monkeys, rainbow colored parrots and toucans, exotic tree-climbing mammals, and rare snakes. One day in Monteverde, I found waterfall and lagoon tucked away in the jungle, hidden down a kilometer-long walk past of vines, ferns and huge trees. I had the entire falls, lagoon and jungle all to myself. It felt like being in a picture in a travel magazine showing places too isolated and spectacular to really exist. The countryside is similarly beautiful, with acre after acre of green, undeveloped rain forest, ranch land, and farmland.

There is plenty of opportunity for water sports. My water sports included only swimming and sitting under palm trees, but that's just me. The surf on the Pacific Coast is reportedly some of the best in the world, especially at Montezuma, Santa Teresa and Mal Pais, but there is ample opportunity to surf at beaches on both coasts. In Playa Tamarindo and Playa Samara, numerous tour operators fishing, snorkeling, or marine-life viewing tours. I understand tour operators in beach communities all around the country offer the same. I also understand that the snorkeling near Playa Hermosa and Cahuita is amazing. In Playa Tamarindo and Monteverde and Santa Elena, I saw brochures for river rafting trips, too.

The country is cheap, especially compared to Western Europe and Australia. I never paid more than $35 per night for a private room with at least a double bed, including pillows, linens, and towels. This fee often included a private bathroom and breakfast. Meals were at least $8 each in Playa Tamarindo and Monteverde and Santa Elena, but those places are tourist traps. I could feed myself with hearty meals for $10-$12 per day in San Jose and Playa Samara. Playa Samara was particularly cheap, and the food was always tasty.

It is easy to go upscale in Costa Rica. Every town I stopped at had expensive, resort-type hotels. You do not have to spend under $40 per night for a private room at a hostel to enjoy Costa Rica. There are plenty of luxury options.

Costa Ricans are friendly. More than once on my trip, I must have looked terribly confused because a helpful local came up to me and asked me in perfect English if I needed help. In each case, I explained where I was trying to go and the local directed me to my destination or told me exactly where I was. The hotel staff, restaurant staff, and tour staff I dealt with were also universally helpful.

The backpackers are friendly, too. I met so many interesting, friendly, worldly, talkative, and generally cool people at the hostels I stayed at. For the record, I stayed at Costa Rica Backpackers & Guesthouse in San Jose (www.costaricabackpackers.com; phone: 2221 6191), Manakin Lodge in Monteverde (www.manakinlodge.com; phone: 2645 5058), Hostel Botella de Leche in Playa Tamarindo (www.labotelladeleche.com; phone: 2653 0189), Cabinas Marielos in Playa Tamarindo (phone and fax: 2653 0141), and Casa Brian in Playa Samara (casabrian@hotmail.com; phone: 2656 0315).

Playa Negra - Thursday 4-2-2009

In the morning, I eat breakfast and handle emails using the wireless router Nicolas had installed at Cabinas Marielos. He is taking it with him, so there will be no wireless if I return here since Nicolas is headed to his new life in San Jose tomorrow. In the afternoon, he and take his truck and three German women who check out today and who Nicolas befriended this morning take their rental car and we meet at Kike’s Place, a bar and soda attached to a small hotel at Playa Negra. Playa Negra is only about three kilometers north of Playa Tamarindo on foot. By car, it is much longer because we have to drive around Parque Las Baulas nature preserve. Nicolas and I reach the open air soda fifteen minutes after we set out. A few patrons are eating and drinking beer when we arrive. Nicolas greets the owner. Having been in Tamarindo for four months, Nicolas knows many people in the area. The women arrive and they have a friend with them, a Tico from Liberia who has traveled south from that city to meet them. All four will continue to Liberia after our afternoon together. I order a flavorful casados with chicken breast for about 3,500 colones and wash it down with a Cuba Libre, about 1,000 colones. Nicolas has the seafood rice, which he has raved about before. It is basically seafood paella. The three women, their Tico friend Saul, Nicolas and I trade stories over lunch. Two of the women have known each other for a dozen years – they used to work in a bank together. One became a teacher and met the third woman, also a teacher. One of the women studied Spanish in Liberia seven years ago and she knows the Tico. The women now live in Northern Germany, one in Osnabrook and the other two in Bremen.

Saul works in tourism and I talk to him about tour companies. Profit margins in Costa Rica are thin because there are so many operators, and because the operators have to contract with transportation companies to take the tourists to and from the tours. The transportation companies charge high prices for their services, further thinning the tour operators’ margins. This year is particularly bad because there are so few tourists. Saul says industry overcapacity is a real problem. Worse, some tour guides are cocaine addicts or alcoholics. This hurts their job performance and leads some to unethically ask for tips at the end of every tour. Both damage their employer's reputation. He tells me that some tour guides he admired and who made good money because of their knowledge fell victim to drug abuse and now beg for money on the street.

After lunch, we drive about one mile to a parking lot at Playa Negra. Sadly, I have forgotten my camera. The parking lot is next to a small luxury hotel. Eight people are on the sand beneath a line of palm trees enjoying the afternoon. Playa Negra is a long, wide beach. The waves are coming in strongly, but the beach is so wide that it looks like low tide. The parking lot ends where the sand begins, and you could still walk three hundred yards towards the ocean and be only knee deep in the warm, clear water. We walk on the beach away from distant Playa Tamarindo, which we see on the far side of the bay. Away from the luxury hotel, the beach is deserted. We pass a small condominium complex, or perhaps a second small hotel, but no one is on the balconies or on the sand. The tree line changes from palms to short, thick green trees with white branches reaching out over the sand. Further on, scrub brush replaces the trees. We continue walking on the Playa Negra away from Tamarindo and towards a huge, black, rocky outcropping that looks like a chunk of coal dropped onto the beach. Shallow tide pools break up black rock surrounding the outcropping. Tiny fish swim and small hermit crabs walk awkwardly in the warm pools. Waves crash loudly against the parts that jut into the ocean. Past the black outcropping, we follow the bend in the beach to the right. We all walk further, and then Saul turns back, and I go into the water. Nicolas and the girls keep walking. I wade in the surf for half an hour. Then we regroup and explore the tide pools. Some time later, we all walk back to the cars where Nicolas and I bid Saul and the German women goodbye and watch them drive off to Liberia.

Monteverde Waterfall - Saturday 3-28-2009

I eat pancakes for lunch (from last night's batter) with Rose from Maryland and Ann from Wisconsin. They are college students back in the States who are in Costa Rica for a semester doing social work. They work in soup kitchen. Ann also works a couple days a week at a local program similar to Headstart back home. Rose's soup kitchen operates out of a priest’s house in San Jose, serving people who are so hungry they dig in San Jose’s landfill for food. Both women love their work, and are in Monteverde for a weekend getaway.

After lunch, I walk east on the paved road that to the Monteverde Preserve. Retracing yesterday’s steps, I walk about one mile to the Monteverde Waterfall (opens at 8AM, closes irregularly, $8 per person, night tours available; from Manakin Lodge, walk east along the paved road towards the Monteverde Preserve until the paved road turns to gravel and then walk another half a mile down the gravel road; it will be on your right) just off the gravel road that leads to the Monteverde Preserve, but before the Monteverde’s town center. I walk down the dirt path to the information shack. A note advises me that the attendant is away and to pay when I leave. A yellow sign points towards the trail and says the waterfall is one kilometer away. The trail leads steeply down and I have to hang onto the climbing ropes several times to keep my footing. The ten minute walk to the river valley passes quickly. I follow the trail along a brook, and then past several shallow, wide pools. I continue until a rope originating from the opposite river bank and strung across the river blocks my path. I turn back and rest a while, soaking my feet in the cold water. Feeling adventurous, I go back to the roped off trail. Taking a closer look, I can see that the trail continues along the other bank and that this rope does not block my path. Rather it is a guide rope for me to hold as I cross the slippery rocks leading to the opposite bank. I grab hold of the rope and cross easily. I follow the trail and walk right up to the waterfall. One small pool and one larger, deeper pool separate me from the waterfall. I stop to take pictures, then drop my gear except for my camera and wade into the cool water. I climb on a rock and take several pictures of the waterfall and surrounding valley. The valley walls are nearly perfectly vertical. Strangler vines and tree roots descend the cliff walls. I notice that no direct sunlight reaches this hidden spot. I wade across the pool to a log and climb on it for a better shot of the waterfall. Satisfied, I cross back to shore, but then I try to jam my camera into the waterproof pocket of my swim trunks. The switch that toggles picture taking mode and picture reviewing mode breaks off. I search the leaves and muck for the switch in vain but come up empty. I put my camera down on shore and wade back out to the deeper pool. It’s peaceful here. Even the roar of the falls is calming. The water flows around me. I hang onto a log and test how deep the deeper pool is. The water is nearly up to my waist and I still I can’t touch the bottom. I’m cold. I hang on a few seconds in the cold water, then pull myself up onto the log. I linger a few more minutes to admire this beautiful waterfall and its pools. Finally, I gather my things and leave.