Archive for May, 2004

Taganga, Colombia, 2004-05-31

I somehow imagined that it wasn’t a coincidence that all the people I’ve met who’ve been to Colombia say it’s great, and all the people who haven’t been say you’ve gotta be crazy to go there.

So far, for me it’s been scenic, warm (well… really hot, actually), cheap and the people have all been very friendly. Outside of Cartagena there’s very few tourists – only a handful of young backpackers in a few spots. Even in Cartagena, the most touristic of cities, there’s almost none of the fly-in-fly-out taxi-around with my-camera-around-my-neck types. Which is good, I hate seeing all those damned sunburnt American’s clogging everything up. One unfortunate aspect of Cartagena, however, is that the local unemployed think that all the tourists are of the type that they generally are not: walking wallets. I, for one, have already been liberated of my wallet; someone already beat them to it. They still try, buy this knickknack, tour to the islands, city guide, and so on and on. Worthy of special mention is that for every one that’s trying to sell you something miscellaneous, there’s one try to sell you cocaine, and come sundown there are lots of nice ladies who, well, you get the idea… (that’s legal here). It was still a very beautiful city with great people – as long as they aren’t ‘in the tourism industry.’

One guy came by the hostel on Saturday night. Some of the guys had met him earlier in the day and he had offered to guide us to see some of the locals’ hangouts. I followed them all to a very fun, loud, packed club way off the tourist radar in the ‘burbs. Our guide’s sleazy looks made me think he was in for getting a cut from the club for taking us. I guess I forgot that we were in Colombia. All he really wanted was to sell us coke. For very high prices, surprising as that may be. I opted out of buying any, surprising as that may be.

I’m finally out of Cartagena. I enjoyed my bus trip yesterday. I hadn’t yet seen anything outside the city and I want to have an idea of what it looked like out there. The countryside was very calm, green, rural, and not quite as poor as I expected. I had imagined myself being really scared on intercity bus trips, having to worry about paramilitaries and guerillas popping out at any moment to rob the bus and carry me off into the mountains and eat me alive. This bus ride, in fact, was a hell of a lot calmer than some trips on AC-Transit I can remember.

The countryside seems so tranquilo yet Cartagena was supposed to be one of the safest places to visit in Colombia. While I did not at any point feel personally threatened there, I can say it does seem more dangerous than anywhere else I’ve seen. During my stay there was a shootout 2 blocks down the street in which, reportedly, the robbed chased the robbers down a busy avenue shooting in the air. I did not witness that incident, but the one I did witness happened yesterday, just before I was going to the bus station. I headed down to the corner store for some sunscreen. They didn’t have any as I expected, but it was worth a shot. Something was captivating the attention of nearly everyone on the street. I asked the clerks at the store, and they told me that the story spreading down the street was that someone had tried to rob a lady, somehow it went wrong, he panicked, took a ten year girl hostage by machete. A teenaged boy ran by just then, smiled, patted me on the shoulder. He pointed at the epicenter of attention, a doorway of one of the many ancient colorful buildings. “¡Boom boom!” he said, making a little gun-shaped hand and running off. At that moment, trying to run into that doorway was a large, well-dressed man waving a gun around. A smaller, less-well-dressed woman was trying to talk him out of something stupid. It worked. He backed off, slipped the pistol into the back of his pants, and fluffed his baggy shirt until it disappeared underneath. Then he himself disappeared into the crowd.

I couldn’t help it, I starting looking at the backs of other guys’ shirts. You sure don’t seem something like that without wondering.

Three policemen with green vests, white helmets, and very, very large automatic weapons sprinted by and ran into the house. That, I thought, was my queue to exit. Exited I did, right here to Tanganga, a little fishing village with a beach. The village aspect is just an illusion created by steep barren hills surrounding the town, really it’s just a suburb of Santa Marta, the large city right on the other side of the hills and the jumping off point for my next stop: Parque Nacional Tayrona.

Cartagena, Colombia, 2004-05-28

The wet blue hills were marching in formation, off to fight a war somewhere else. We just went up and over them, splash splash, one by one. The only way to know how fast we were going without being able to see land was to look at the bubbles forming off the bow. The answer was not very. This trip has taught me a new respect for those people who would get into a sailboat knowing they could be in it for months at a time, and that might just be in order to fall off the edge of the world. Sailing is goddamn slow. Thank God for the internal combustion engine and all the wonderful things it has done for the world, like allow us to keep going when the wind gets bad.

This is how Ronaldo, our Brazillian Cuba Libre drinking captain should have advertised his boat:

Sail on the full-spa boat! Ammenities include: swimming pool (a bit salty), sun tanning salon (everywhere above deck), and hot hot sauna (everywhere below deck – especially when the engines on)! To be fair, despite the heat rash, sunburn (I tried, mom, I did, there`s just no winning at these lattitudes!) and extreme boredome (up and down up and down splash splash up and down up and down, splash splash) it was an experience I do not regret one bit. I had never before gone out so far as to not see land, and to do that in a little sailboat really helped get across that feeling of “you puny human, look how big and blue and powerful I am and there`s only a Cuba Libre drinking Brazillian, a Canadian trying to quit smoking, and a 30` fiberglass teardrop between you and me.” That is, really it is, a beautiful feeling. A sunset on the open ocean behind far off clouds lit up on the inside by lightning also fell into the beautiful category. As did the San Blas islands, the little archipelago on the way with it`s politically independent Kuna tribe. They were friendly and authentic, came by in a dug-out canoe wearing traditional dress and offered me all sorts of crap for sale: some beautiful cloths for way too much money, some lobsters pulled out by hand, and some avocados. I bought an avocado. I think it was the worst avacado I`ve ever eaten. They asked if we had any cigarettes. David, the other passenger, was trying to quit smoking by the remove yourself from all sources of cigarettes method. We deffinitely did not have any. The Kuna didn`t believe us.

I liked coming in to Cartagena harbor at night. I could see the glow on the horizon for hours before we got there, and approaching a new place at night by sea – especially after two days without seeing land – was an impressive introduction. In the morning we dingied to shore. I stepped on the shore. There was no music, no electric sensations shooting up my feet from my spine. I wondered why the solid earth was rocking back and forth. I sure was satisfied. South America! Whew. I made it all the way without flying once. I jumped a few times along the way probably. But no flying.

Colombia in my mind was a barren wasteland of war and shady drug-runners. Mind you I`ve only seen one city – what I`m told is by far its nicest city – but it seems like a pretty normal place, a lot more well off than I expected, actually. Things ARE different than Central America, but my impression so far makes it hard to imagine that this is a country that has been ravaged by civil war for decades. Well, on and off for centuries, really. A lot of the other travelers I`ve talked to here say it`s probably safer here than many other places, including Venezuela.

Best of all, I`ve been informed that cocaine only costs US$6.00 a gram. Think of all the money I could make importing that stuff. Until I have my business set up, you can get some good shit from this nice man. His family`s been in the business for generations.

Granada, Nicaragua, 2004-05-03

It`s only 9:00 am, and I already can`t help but think of how all those American agents must have suffered over all those years. It`s really hot here. Such a difficult climate to smuggle hot black artillery and to torch villages. Maybe when it`s for a good cause that makes everything bearable.

Leon and Granada are Nicaragua`s two old cities, the first traditionally liberal (poorer) and the second traditionally conservative (richer). If I would judge by all the polyglotic wall-scribble philosophy at this hostel, I`d say it isn`t too conservative here at all. Anyway, tired of so much fighting between the two towns, they built Managua as the new capital back in 1857, simply because it was between the two. Didn`t seem to work too well, though. I had to transfer in Managua yesterday, and to me it looked like a smaller dirtier poorer L.A. with a lot less Asians but still too many S.U.V.s.

I miss direct night busses. Yesterday was just a blur of one reincarnated schoolbus after another. I could have taken a direct first classer from Tegucigalpa to Managua but that would have been only one hour faster or so,and 3X more expensive. And it`s still a day bus. It could have been worth it were it a nighter, but if I`m spending all damned day busriding, I`ll save money and get some fresh wind and be spared terrible action movies the whole way.

Panama City, Panamá, 2004-05-22

Panamá has a higher per capita income than Costa Rica, but a trip halfway across it suggests to me that what wealth there may be is distributed a fair amount less. Panama City is incredibly Americanized (which sure does make sense), but in a way retains a certain charming tropical uniqueness that San José, equally Americanized, entirely lacked. The presence of half the world`s goods passing trough, along with a thriving off-shore banking idustry mean lots of consumerism and the money to support it. But, with plenty of things to see (including of course the canal itself), relatively safe streets, and relatively few tourists, I have found it to be a very friendly town to spend a few days in.

And I have a had to spend a few days in search of passage to Cartagena, Colombia. I originally didn`t want to fly at all, but I was really close to giving up. Until even this morning I was really thinking I would fly. There`s no regular boat service, and to get to Colombia from Panama without flying you just about three options: chartering a boat, paying your way on cargo ships, or walking across the Darién gap.

That gap would be the break in between North America`s and South America`s road networks. It`s also a narrow stip of hot swampy completely undeveloped jungle full of Colombian guerillas, paramilitaries following them, old-fashioned bandits, and drug smugglers. Panama is happy not to have the Panamerican highway go through; they don`t want Colombia`s wars, drugs, and diseases (foot and mouth disease, specifically).

If I wanted to go on cargo ships, I would have to hope all of the following: that they didn`t take two weeks stoppìng at every island, weren`t smuggling drugs up and guns down, and didn`t slit my thoat and toss me to the sharks halfway out in the open ocean.

Last of all, chartering a boat means finding one. That was what I wanted to do, but was so far terribly unable. All my leads were not working out. I was starting to see why so many people who say they want to take a boat just end up flying. Yesterday I headed out to the Caribbean and asked around in person. Everyone told me that my best luck would be island hopping on whatever I find. Discouraged, I returned to Panama City, ready to pop into the Avianca office across the street from my hostel as soon as it opened today and buying a seat on the 6pm flight. Taking a boat was going to be too dangerous, take too long, and cost as much as flying. Why should I be so stupid just because of a silly idea of not flying at all. Anyway, it wouldn`t be entirely illegite because I would be flying North, and the original original goal was to get as far South as possible without flying.

In the end, as with everything in life, the best way to make something happen is to stop waiting for it. David, another person at this hostel interested in making the trip by boat, said that as soon as I left the guy with the sailboat and an ad here finally did call back. So, he and I along with our Brazillian captain are heading out tomorrow morning, to arrive in Cartagena days of sailing and one day of islanding later. The owners of the hostel say they know him and that he`s been doing this for a while, so I feel safe with it. While it does mean I will have some 3 days less in Venezuela and Colombia, for the same price as the air ticket I have food and lodging for those lost days, and a very interesting trip. Best of all, my “peregrinatory integrity” (to use my mommy`s term for it) is still intact.

En La Panamericana, Panamá, 2004-05-18

What I thought would be my last day of hiking turned out just to be a morning of hiking. That was fine with me, I was quite ready to relax a little, especially after crossing that damned river 28 times.

Today I`m on my way to Panama City. I`ve been to a damn lot of border crossings lately, and this one today was the worst. I must have gone across the border back and forth 4 times. First the bus actually dropped me off on the Panamá side, and after some trouble figuring that out I had to walk back to get my exit stamp. After I headed back to Panamá, on the way changing my last 4,000 Colones into $8.00. A mediocre rate, but I didn`t care. Then I had to walk in a few circles to find the Panamanian immigration office conviniently located down a dirt sidestreet. I waited in line, got up, gave my passport, and was asked to present my onward or return ticket. Well, I didn`t happen to have one, so I had to go all the way back to Costa Rica and buy one. Ten minutes of waiting – the one employee at the bus company shuffled boxes that obviously were more time sensitive than a gringo – and he didn`t have change for a 20. That was a problem. The ticket was 3,750 Colones, or $US9.00. I had the aformentioned US$8.00 and a twenty. He wouldn`t take $8.00 and the 400 Colones a lady with pity offered me. If I pay in dollars, I have to pay it all in dollars. “Because I`m an asshole and I hate you” was his explanation. So, back to the money changer. Back to Bus company. Back to little dirt sidestreet. “Ahorita tiene que ir comprar tu tarjeta de turista…” in the building a few blocks away. Because it just does make sense to sell the turist cards in the building for searching cargo trucks and not at the immigration office. Finally back to immigration, and another charge for some paper stamp that didn`t even go in my passport and just disappeared and… whew… can I go now?

At least I got to sit shotty on the next busride.

Los Patos Ranger Station, Parque Nacional Corcovado, Costa Rica, 2004-05-16

In my rush and excitement to get to the river before high tide, I took off running in what was altogether despite what I could have easily figured out with a map the wrong direction. The wrong direction is a very hilly direction and my backpack was a very heavy backpack to be taking in the wrong direction. When I got to the end of the wrong direction and the staff at the hippy looking hotel told me I had to go all the way back down to find the right direction I was, well, really unhappy. Luckily I at least figured out that I could follow a river down to the right trail – which I now remembered was on the beach – and that saved me a little bit of backtracking. Also luckily I didn`t have to wait for the tide to subside to cross the next river because I arrived well after noon thanks to my genius little detour.

I did manage to get to Sirena before nightfall after about 7 hours of hiking on spectacularly pretty beaches. It does sound nice, but hiking on sand is quite difficult, trails are a lot easier I promise. Sirena was as beautiful as promised, set at one end of a grassy airstrip with the ocean at the other.

Last night, my second night at Sirena it sure did rain like crazy. During the night I was safe and dry, but I can`t make that claim about the 17km of trail today to get inland to Los Patos, many portions of which I would describe flatteringly as swampy and/or disparringly as small lakes. To be fair, so would I describe most of the forest. It was a little bit slow going at first, and then I saw a rather huge snake cross my path. With it`s head already under the roots of a tree there was still at least two meters left of its body. While it WAS moving rapidly away from me, it still scared the bujeezus outa me. A subsequent look on a laminated “Fauna of Costa Rica” sheet told me it was most like a Bushmaster or something like that. I figured that a snake so big didn`t need to be poisonous, but the sheet told me otherwise. At least it didn`t offer me any apples.

Mm… apples…

Canned tuna almost tastes like fresh apples if you close your eyes and squeeze your nose. Right?

Puerto Jimenez, Costa Rica, 2004-05-13

When choosing between a too heavy bag and even the slightest chance of getting hungry, the choice is obvious. Since I`ve got to carry all my food for my 4 day hike, it`ll be one of those heavy at the beginning light at the end hikes. Luckily for my sense of adventure, not only will my first day be heavy, but I`m going to practically have to run the first 10km of the 20km beach trail. OK, I don`t have to, but if I can`t make it to the first river by 10:00am, the tide will be too high and I`ll have to wait untill noon before I can cross again. From there I continue to La Sirena Ranger Station, which I`ve been told is is amazing and beautiful so I should camp there in my rented tent at least 2 nights. I`m excited for my adventure. I`ve read that this park is supposed to be “almost eden” although I don`t remember anything about sharks and crocodiles in Eden. Nonetheless, I`m ready to try and live up to my name and give it a go. And that`s kinda funny seeing as how when I went to make my reservation to camp, the officer who took that reservation specifically warned me not to touch the snakes…

Puerto Jimenez, Costa Rica, 2004-05-12

This trip has taken on an entirely new dimension. I now know when and where it will end. I have 1 day less than 1 month to be at the airport in Caracas, Venezuela.

I think I can make it.

`Course I can. I have to. Then I guess it doesn`t matter what I think.

San José, Costa Rica, 2004-05-11

I`ve only walked about a mile or so of this rich city and I`ve already counted six McDonald`s. If you squinted your eyes a little it could almost be a North American city. Except for maybe how early in the night everything gets closed and the streets get creepy. I think it was only about 10:00 when I walked back from the internet, and all the shops were closed except for a few dark bars. In front of one of which, when I passed, I was approached by a pretty young lady who demanded “mil Colones.” I`m not sure what she wanted it for, but considering the legality of certain things here and her mode of dress… still, 1,000 Colones is only about US$2.50. Maybe she just wanted it as a present, like the kid who pointed at the sign of the hostel I was seeking and then demanded “¡mil colones!”

“¿Para que?”

“¡Para mí! Yo soy gerencia. Me paga y vamos.”

Thanks, kid, I think I`d rather just ring the door bell.

La Fortuna, Costa Rica, 2004-05-08

The glossy brochures, of which there are many here, offer a tour at US$33 to take you up and down a river that sounds an awful lot like the one I took from San Carlos, Nicaragua, to Los Chiles, Costa Rica, for about US$6. Of course, I had quite a bit of waiting to do. 5 hours in San Carlos just to get my passport stamped. Another hour just to go 15km (that was the pretty river trip though – I saw some mighty fine crocses).

My impression of Costa Rica is that is it in relative terms extremely well-off. Average people drive new cars, there’s no one wearing random hand-me-down shirts from the Salvation Army. I haven’t seen one restaurant with a dirt floor. Best of all, the bus that pulled in to take me away from Los Chiles was not only not an ex-school bus, but it was a brand new A/C double-decker! The level of wealth and development reminds me quite a bit of southern Brazil, actually.

Still, no matter how hard you try, this is still Central America. It took about 2 hours for one mentally impaired immigration officer to process about 20 people ahead of me in line, while at one point 5-count-them-5 other employees sat around doing absolutely nothing. Later, to make up for the wowness of the first bus, my second bus was old and crowded, and got the famous flat tire in the middle of nowhere right as it started to rain.

In the bus’s defense, it does start to rain about every ten minutes here this time of year.