Captain Wacky

So until a few years ago relatively few people caught boats from Panama to Colombia, but then The Lonely Planet said it was okay, and because we all just go where Lonely Planet tells us to, now there is a steady stream of backpackers seeking transit from Panama City hostels via the San Blas islands to Cartagena in Colombia and (apparently) the return route. And since Lonely Planet represents the backpackers bible and they don't tell you which operators to sail with or which hostels to book a trip from, it is something of a dice roll for the adventurous but ill informed tourist who follow their advice.

However, the tales of Captain Dennis and the 60 foot catamaran Mystic Wind already seem to be the stuff of legend. This is a boat trip where captain and first mate take on up to fifteen intrepid travellers on what they describe as being "THE party boat for hard drinking" on the Panama to Cartagena crossing. Of course what they have failed to mention is that captain and mate drink harder than most of the passengers (no small feat given the target market), and that they occasionally have gotten lost at sea and once or twice dropped passengers at the wrong location. On one occasion, the passengers apparently mutinied and threw all the alcohol overboard after the ship was blown out to sea after a storm and they ran out of fresh water.

Our fearless leader was German emigre Captain Andreas, who has been plying the Panama to Colombia route for more than two years, although says we were his penultimate human cargo. While looking slightly disheveled at first impression, Andreas seemed to adopt a professional attitude of a service culture mixed with a minimum number of rules necessary for the comfort of all passengers and safety on an ocean crossing. My impression was that he was very laid back, slightly quirky, but generally in good control of his boat and what takes place on it.

On the first evening, he even demonstrated a reasonable talent for cooking after turning out a very good conch stew (conch is a shell dwelling invertebrate that tastes a little like squid for those who aren't familiar with it).

On the first afternoon we went straight to the immigration island where the passports of our captain and eight adventurous backpackers were stamped to exit Panama. These consisted of Anglela and Christian, a couple from Switzerland on a twelve month gap year break, Adam a 29 year old English IT risk management consultant who went on holiday to Mexico in February 2007 and is now thinking of returning to London in a couple of months, Alicia, a Californian resident who took an extended Central American holiday after losing her drivers licence, Dara, a self confessed jaded ex-lawyer from Vancouver, and Sean and Bryan, university friends from California who decided to break from the surfing holiday crew they were travelling with for a few days of sailing. Oh, and me.

Andreas was quickly nicknamed "Captain Ron" (a character from a comedy movie of the same name played by Kirk Russell for those who don't recognise the reference) by Sean and Bryan, a name that was proved to be apt over the coming week. By the second morning his shorts had been discarded in preference for a pair of bum-hugging lycra swimming trunks that left rather too little to the imagination (see photo below ).

All went without major incident, although until the second night of the five day voyage when, after navigating a reef and dropping anchor well after sundown, Andreas left the cooking in charge of an enthusiastic passenger (yes, that would be me), and simply disappeared on the dinghy for three hours. He returned well after the meal quite seriously stoned saying that his friend Captain Dave was on another boat moored at the same island and he may have been offered a "quick toke" from Dave. We got to meet Captain Dave the following night, a fifty year old American who lived on his boat, and an interesting character.

After protests from several of my fellow passengers about the inequity of us saving pasta and sauce for Andreas but not being shown reciprocal consideration in return, Andreas disappeared below deck to look for his stash, but returned empty handed saying that he didn't know why it had all gone, but he guess he must have smoked it all at New Year.


Although I still can't help wondering whether that little plastic bag with the dried herbs that I added to the pasta sauce really was oregano...

Out of Office Message

Just a short note to let everyone know that I'm spending the next six days on a boat sailing from Palenque in Panama to Cartagena in Colombia via some snorkelling in San Blas. I won't have access to the Blog, email, or most likely mobile phone coverage for this whole period.

So there is nothing to worry about if you don't hear from me for a week. But feel free to email me with news in the meantime.

My email address is : david dot m dot beck@gmail.com

Cheers
David

My Panama Canal Assignment

I wanted to write something insightful about the Panama Canal. I really did. With interesting trivia like the highest toll ever paid was more than US$300,000 for a cruise ship and the lowest was US$0.36 for some clown who swam through. Unfortunately everything I tried to write ended up sounding like a third grade Society and Culture assignment. All that was missing was a big sheet of butchers paper and a set of textas.


So I won't tell you about the two failed attempts by private French companies to build the canal, or the 1903 acquisition of the project by the United States government, who improved on both the construction techniques and health of the workforce (most deaths were from malaria or yellow fever) but took sovereignty over the canal for the next 74 years. Or that escalating protests by Panamanians led to an agreement for the United States to hand back sovereignty over the canal to Panama on 31 December 1999.

Work has started on a third set of locks to accommodate larger ships which will cost US$5.2 billion and is due to open in 2014, the centenary of the canal opening. But that isn't very interesting or insightful, nor is the fact that the biggest five users of the canal are the United States, China, Japan, Chile and South Korea and approximately 45% of all transfers through the canal are shipping containers.

I will tell you that it takes about 8 or 9 hours each way to get through the canal, which is a shame, because it means there are few tourist boats actually offering visitors a ride on the canal and I had to be content viewing the canal in operation from the shore. And this means I can't offer any observations about travesing the canal, because I didn't.

In fact, about the only genuine insight I can offer after seeing the Canal in operation is that I have looked at a lot of toll roads and other forms of economic and social infrastructure over the last ten years, and this is definitely the coolest toll road I have seen.

The Psychedelic Buses of Panama City

Maybe it was because it was only 7am in Panama City. Maybe it was because I'd just got off an 18 hour bus ride from San Jose. Maybe it was because I'm just not that smart. But I sat there in my first local Panama City bus wondering for a good five minutes whether the purple, leather trim that adorned the entire front dashboard came standard when this American Blue Bird bus rolled off the assembly line in North Carolina.

Fortunately I needed no such deliberations to reach a conclusion about the gigantic purple feather boa (no, seriously) that circled the driver's rear view mirror and extended across the entire front of the bus. I was certain that it had only been installed once the bus reached Panama.

I have seen old American Blue Bird buses in every Central American country I've been to and the best days for most were definitely behind them. However the buses of Panama City have never looked better. The spray jobs on some of them are a combination of 1960's hippy designs merged with 1970's "Sin Bin" Panel Van artwork (think Conan the Barbarian style fantasy scenes), with 1980s graffiti text and comic book characters thrown in. Not to mention an excess of hood ornaments, like a bus with three pairs of rear view mirrors two rows tail lights and a set of three 'aerials' all on the bonnet.




Just about all of the local buses servicing the city centre have been made over in this style, and showing the pride behind the transport most also have been named. Typically these are girls names, although a few "boys" (with suitably macho paint jobs) work the streets too.




Of the Panama City neighbourhoods I walked through today, Casco Viejo was easily the most interesting. It used to was the old Panama City, and must have been quite beautiful, with French and Spanish architectural influences before being abandoned in the late 19th Century. The buildings have been left to fall down, and a good number seem to have done just that.

It is a case study in urban renewal as probably the worst neighbourhood in the city is being regenerated into a tourist district one building at a time. So at present you have five star hotels and fancy restaurants sandwiched between derelict buildings and metres from squatters slums. A significant presence of tourist police throughout the whole area are there to keep the peace.

Brought to you by Digital Communications

There are 10 types of people in this world, those
who understand binary and those who don't.

Sorry, thought I'd start with a little Geek humour, given that I am particularly happy today as have found a computer that lets me upload pictures relatively quickly. So I thought I'd indulge myself and write (briefly) about the communication technology that is bringing these posts to you.

My little collection of digital equipment includes a Blackbery which acts as telephone, music player, and word processor, and lets me type these blogs while on buses or in the evenings rather than waiting until I get to an Internet Cafe. It includes a Pentax Digital camera with removable memory cards and a portable USB card reader, which lets me copy data from aforementioned Blackberry and camera onto any every computer I have so far come across.

The other key piece of digital communications technology are of course the international telecommunications networks and the layman's portal to it, commonly known as the Internet. While this represents a great tool while on holidays and making mundane tasks quicker and easier, my observations as to the impact on the people in the developing world is that the results seem to be vastly greater.

I uploaded a post to this Blog from an Internet Cafe on Christmas Day in San Jose, which was full of locals at the time. The most common use of the computers was to make phone calls through Skype, followed by people reading newspapers or banking, with checking email a distant minority. The Cafe was in the less attractive end of town near the bus stations, and for 350 Colones per half hour (about 70-80c) my Christmas Day companions were provided with a multitude of services which were not just cheaper than the old way, but which they had never previously had access to.

The Economist recently wrote that the introduction of a mobile telephone system to a developing world country added about 0.5% to that country's GDP. Rather than simply being an easier way in touch, when introduced it becomes a portal to communications, commerce and (particularly) telephone banking.

So today's pictures are brought to you by lots of little ones and zeros which are changing the world [hopefully] for the better.


David



Aileen, this photo of the ducks is included especially for you. The haze in the photo is the steam coming off the heated pool, which might have been too hot for them to actually swim in.



An example of the traditional oxen drawn carts from Costa Rica. Your social status was indicated by the quality of the artwork on the sides of the carts, i.e. the nicer the paint job, the more wealthy the family. So I guess it was the Costa Ricans who invented Pimp My Ride. And speaking of 'pimp', he charged me a dollar for the photo.


Apparently this little guy is the only diving bird in the world who doesn't produce oil on his wings to keep him dry. So after each fishing 'trip' he needs to fan out his wings to dry off.


Close up of the same bird (in case you couldn't spot him in the original).


This is a Cayman, rather than a small crocodile. It was about 1m long and [I think] fully grown.

Iguana sunning itself on a tree root.


A couple of photos of hummingbirds from the Hummingbird Sanctuary. The birds aren't caged, although with a free and easy supply of food, they happily congregate around the sanctuary, despite all those pesky tourists with cameras.

Tricky little guys to catch on film, and these two were the best of about 40 shots.

Oliver North: My part in his downfall

On 5 October 1986, El Salvador soldiers successfully shot down a C-123 Fairchild Cargo plane causing the pilot and passenger (the latter a CIA agent) to parachute out of the plane safely but into the hands of of the San Salvador government. This sparked an international incident known as the Iran-Contra affair, which resulted in exposure of the sales of weapons at inflated prices to Iran with the profits being used to buy the freedom of American hostages in Lebanon and fund the Sandinista rebels in El Salvador.

Of the US$16 million raised from the arms sales, only $3.8 million went to the Sandinistas, however this was sufficient for them to buy (amongst other things) two C-123 cargo planes and construct a secret landing strip on an American-owned farm in northern Costa Rica. It was from this landing strip that the two cargo planes would deliver armaments and supplies to the Sandinistas.

At the subsequent inquiries into the activities of the CIA and NSA in generating and distributing these funds, it was Colonel Oliver North who was the star witness as the coordinator of the operation (and some argued the fall guy for his superiors). The entire episode was rather embarrassing to the Reagan administration as their official position had been neutrality in El Salvador and that they would not offer cash to terrorists in exchange for hostages in Lebanon or anywhere else.

The operation was immediately shut down and the second C-123 Fairchild was abandoned at San Jose international airport where it sat for more than 10 years. Then a hotel operator bought the plane for US$3000, had it cut into five pieces and shipped to Manuel Antonio... to be used as a cocktail bar!

If this sounds too bizare to be true here are the pictures (taken this morning).

So last night Siobhan and I sat drinking frozen margaritas and beers in a piece of Cold War memorabilia. Although I still can't help wondering just how much rum and tequilla you need to drink before you think "Hey, don't you think a cargo plane would make a great bar?"

Hope everyone is well and had a happy New Year!

Cheers
David

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

The following pictures were all taken in the Manuel Antonio National Park. It is on the Central Pacific Coast and is one of the best places to see the animals of Costa Rica. I'd like to claim credit for the better looking pictures, however most were taken by the tour guide (who was also a gun photographer) and took them by putting my camera up to the lens of his telescope.

Pretty well everything in the park seems capable of killing or maiming the unwary tourist. The trees send you [temporarily] blind, the leaves contain toxins, the hermit crabs bite, the monkeys have rabies, and even the sloths have parasites. Having said that, it was a stunning place with beautiful beaches.


These little couple are breeding pair of bats who have the nice distinction of being the sole monogamous species of 108 bat varieties in Costa Rica. They're nocturnal and eat mosquitos so are asleep under a tree branch.


Breed of falcon whose name I have forgotten. (Sorry.) It lives on a fish diet and have incredible eyesight for locating fish under the water and then catching them in its talons.


Sleeping three toed sloth. This is a female with a baby clutched to her chest, although you can't see the baby in the photo.

One of a large group of squirrel monkeys in the Manuel Antonio National Park. These little guys have turned to crime and steal food, bags, pretty well anything left unattended. Despite lots of big signs saying Do Not Feed The Monkeys, people still do. They are probably only one generation away from car jacking tourists.

This photo is a howler monkey. Looks like a bit like gorilla, but is much smaller. As the name suggests, they are extremely loud (and can be heard up to 30km away depending on the terrain) and use their voices to establish their territory.

Very tiny grasshopper who displays these bright colours as a way of advertising the poisons under his skin. The grasshopper gets these toxins from ingesting poisonous plant leaves.

These little crabs live their whole lives in the swamps but travel out to the ocean to mate and lay eggs. The crabs hatch and grow in the ocean and then return to the same streams as their parents once mature. They are quite brightly coloured (no camoflage) so the pincers have to protect them from potential predators.

One that did not need a telescopic sight was this three-toed sloth, which climbed from the ground out of the roots of one of the trees and back up into the canopy. They only come down to the ground about once a week for a bathroom visit, so I think we were incredibly lucky to get so close to him.

PS - I can think of only one person who would immediately recognise the title of this blog entry, so for anyone else who is interested Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, which tells the story of a nine year old child who is struggling to cope with the death of his father in the World Trade Center attacks on 9-11. He is a similar sort of protagonist to the narrator in The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, for anyone who has read that. Highly recommended.