Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Cycling South America Style

September 2nd to 4th

At last we get to turn some wheels on South American soil!

We leave Cartegena under heavy skies, heavier rain and waterlogged roads. Diesel from the buses makes the road slick and their driving makes progress increasingly treacherous. In one place I am forced off the road and my tyres slide out from under me on a steep edge of Tarmac. I am only prevented from crashing into the road by bouncing off the side of the bus - much to the amusement of it's passengers. Welcome to driving South America style!

Things calm down a couple of miles out of town and thankfully the rains clear as well. It's just incredible how quickly standing water steams and boils back into the sky - the roads are clear again in an hour...


The countryside either side of the road however, is totally waterlogged. Being totally flat, the land cannot drain and fields are flooded throughout the rainy season....


It's an aquatic environment perfect for amphibians and pools of water sing a chorus of 'ribbits' and croaks. It's a musical ride. We stop frequently to try and spot frogs on the lilly pad that carpet the water's surface but they are shy and 'plop' into the water as we approach. The only ones we do see are on the road, confused and slowly baking in the 90+ degree temperatures. Sue turns animal rescue and carries them to safety in roadside pools....


Making sure to rinse hands afterwards as many species are poisonous. It's a crispy fate that awaits the ones not so lucky to be rescued....


The road flirts with the Caribbean Coast and for the first 30 miles or so we get brief glimpses of the sea and some welcome cooling breezes. After that it becomes straight, flat, a bit boring and very very hot. Along with the sound of frogs calling, the air buzzes with a million butterflies and giant dragonflies. Despite the watery world, it is a surprise to ride past huge cacti, the like of which we haven't seen since Mexico. It is a testament to the extreme environment here where the rains disappear for four months, the land turns to dust and the heat balloons; allowing these hardy, dry loving plants to gain a foothold. They also provide hunting perches to the dozens of varieties of hawks and falcons we see riding the air....


First day's ride in S.A. - first puncture. I just can't believe it - I rode six months here previously without a single one and when I get a second on the same day I start to hope the cycle gods have not rescinded my welcome here. Ominous signs!

Reading other people's accounts of riding in Colombia has lead us to believe that finding accommodation is as easy as it gets, so we are getting a bit concerned after 50 miles of seeing absolutely nothing. A little later a sign for a small town sends us off the main road to investigate and suddenly we find 10 in a row! For US$13 we get a private room right on a Caribbean beach complete with balcony and hammocks. The shower is a cold water bucket - but we'll take that deal any day. First South American sunset on the road...


Next day we head into 'Baranquila' - Colombia's third city after Bogota and Medellin. It's huge, sprawling and the traffic is frenetic. Heads down we ride... and pass this monster port and metropolis...


Next is a series of bridges that lead on to a narrow strip of reclaimed land across the Grand Bay of Santa Marta. This narrow earth bridge saves maybe 80 miles compared to circumnavigating the bay. It's hot and swampy, but people still live here amongst the mosquito swarms and sand flies. Their wood huts can be seen from the road, like tiny islands in a pea soup reached along rickety plank walkways....


It gets too hot to ride, but stopping for water paints a huge bulls eye on us and a trillion mosquitoes take aim. You can here the nagging 'Zzzzzzzzzzz' of them zeroing in on us and you get maybe 30 seconds grace before they start to drain blood. We ride fast and straight into the mirage....


At 'Pueblo Viejo' there is a toll booth - they are a common sight here every few miles and road travel can get expensive. The big wagons pay US$10 and it seems that is enough for a village to have sprung up providing a re-loading service. Thousands of card-board boxes are transported along this route for the banana plantations. I guess profit margins are next to nothing on such a low value cargo so wagons unload just before the toll booth. The roadside is littered with piles of flat-packed boxes and teams hurry to load them on makeshift carts, ferry them through the toll for free, then reload them onto another wagon - and all before the unpredictable rains come and turn them to mush. Wagons run as shuttles between toll booths and the village lives in awful conditions in a flooded land. Sanitation is non existent and the pools are edged in scum from the human detritus and rubbish. I see people literally tipping waste into the water outside their front doors and small children playing in amongst the mess. It's a sad and sorry scene and a stark contrast to the magnificence of Cartegena....


I am reluctant to take a picture of the worst of it - but believe me it is way worse than this and some of the worst poverty we have seen on tour. Deeply saddening!

Next day we ride into Santa Marta.

Cartegena and Baranquila were easy - just a quick dart on ring roads. We have to pass directly through Santa Marta and the driving style is best described as 'Aggressive' - with a capital 'A'. It's just odd! Colombians are just the most friendly, tranquilo people we have met, but in a vehicle they just morph into something new. It's all gone a bit 'Ben Hur' - a death race in chariots and no-one gives an inch. If you can capture a piece of road - you own it. To make things worse, there are earth banks across parts of the road where mud is washed from the fields and not cleared away. A couple of times we are forced into them by drivers who just won't budge. Motorbikes zip about like buzzing gnats and the road is bedeviled with deep pot holes. It's a crazy free for all and even the police devise tactics to beat the traffic light grand prix....


I take a motorcyclist's mirror directly in the elbow and the impact ricochets him into another bike, his mirror spinning away to be crushes under car tyres. No-one even reacts or complains - I guess it's too common an occurrence here and just nothing to bother about.... but my elbow sure does hurt....

It's a relief to be out of the melee and finally we climb away from this crazy town....


A brief up-and-over drops us down to 'Teganga' a small fishing village situated in a jewel of a bay....


Looks nice - maybe we'll stay a day or two....

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Cartegena

27th Aug to 1st Sept

It's a bit sad to leave Ludwig, Rolli and the rest of the Stahlratte crew behind as we take a short dinghy ride to shore with our bikes and kit. Riding into the old town of Cartegena, the very first Colombian to talk to us is a guy who jumps out in the road offering us drugs! Welcome to Colombia - good to see all the old stereotypes alive!

The town centre is carnage with narrow streets thronging with hoards, all weaving in and out of hand carts and yellow taxis that blare horns incessantly. We ride the wrong way up a couple of streets to a hotel where some of the others from the boat are staying; but it is full.

I'm sure I didn't buy any drugs off that guy, but I must be hallucinating when we see a guy dressed as a horse throwing high-kicks at a group of passing school children. They scream and squeal in delight running out into the traffic choked street.

We hole up just outside the old city walls in "Getsemeni" and head out to explore this mad place - our first sight together of South America. Cartegena is an old, colonial walled town that prospered as a major Spanish port in the 16th Century. Old silver money just drips off the beautiful building facades. Nowadays, some are showing signs of disrepair as the money dried up and left; this block is the thriving red light district where painted ladies stretch latex to bursting point as they pout and whisper enticements to the crumbling, hourly-rate rooms upstairs....


Heading on inside the walls that South American vibrancy hits you immediately. Plaza de los Coches is alive with dancers writhing to maniacal drumbeats. They dance the traditional steps of the "Kalimari" tribe who inhabited this coast before Spain came. They worshiped a serpent god and the dance is seductive, sexy and sinuous reflecting the demon spirit of the snake. It's too fast to capture....


The streets are similarly alive with vendors of all kinds pushing carts of fruit, deep fried foods or coffee and cakes. 'Minutos' are everywhere - guys sitting behind trestles with mobile phones for hire. For 100 Pesos ($0.05) you can buy minutes and they will place the call for you. In between calls they gamble on dice or the flip of a coin. The excitement is too much for one onlooker....


We meet up with all 20 fellow passengers from Stahlratte in their hostel's roof top bar and enjoy a couple of cold ones in sight of Fort San Filipe that once protected the city from English pirates....


Later we hit a reggae bar for some live music. We leave at around 1:30am but some of the others see the dawn in... Cartegena is a party town.

There are some excellent museums in town and we head to the Naval Museum next day which has a history of the Spanish conquest displacing the local tribes in this area. The main room has some fantastic models of the ongoing struggle to defend the city during the 16th to 18th centuries. The treasure hoards of Peruvian silver attracted increasingly more determined fleets from Britain and France (including Sir Francis Drake) who often carried out pirate raids rather than risk outright war closer to home. There are descriptions of the battles and a timeline for the building of ever more elaborate defensive walls and forts around Cartegena.

Inside the walls, Cartegena is definitely less seedy than Getsemeni and there are tons of upmarket eateries and boutique hotels around the open plazas....


They obviously cater to a different budget than ours so we head back to the cheap seats and find a bar doing an excellent curry. Oh I do miss a good curry! After that we head on to a Salsa bar and meet up with the crew and our Stahlratte ship mates again.

On the last Sunday of the month, most city attractions are free so we head en-masse up to San Filipe Fort to see the canons and imagine battling scurvy sea dogs come-a-plundering!


It's all a little hard to imagine with all that modern skyline in the background though. The Fort itself is impressive with tunnels running like an underground warren, but as a museum it is not. There is no information of any kind and it definitely pays to visit the Naval Museum first.

As it a free day we head to the gold museum next and learn how rare metals like iron and steel were here but that gold was commonplace. Rumour has it that pure nuggets could be found just lying in rivers waiting to be picked up! Consequently it was used for everything from beautiful jewelery and ornamental dress; right down to commonplace objects like weights and fish hooks....


You can imagine how the Spanish must have felt when they washed up on shore amongst all this wealth!

There is a film about the "Zenu" - an inland tribe that built vast canal networks over a 2000 square mile area to control river flooding around 2000 years ago. They slowed the advancing water and used the river and it's silt to irrigate and fertilise vast tracts of land. It is a feat that is beyond modern engineers and parts of Colombia's central valley suffer from uncontrolled flooding today!

Plaza Trinidad is a local's hangout and the boat crew head down for Sunday nights. There is a 5 piece band just jamming and they are really, really good. A stilt walking dancer joins them followed by a juggler with flaming torches. There are street carts laden with food and the local shop sells cold beer which you can carry out - it's a really chilled atmosphere.

A typical Sunday night out with friends....



50 kilometers outside Cartegena is "Volcan de Lodo el Totumo" so we take a tour bus with our group. The volcano doesn't look that impressive - just a 15 metre cone, but it is made from mud spewed up to the surface under pressure. The lukewarm mud is supposed to have therapeutic properties and it's a weird feeling slipping and sliding into this thick, oily bath....


You feel a bit like a cork bobbing uncontrollably high in the water and you just can't move. There are 'helpers' who push you into place where, if you are still, you hardly feel the mud at all and you get this weird sensation of floating in space. If you do try and move, you get a strange feeling of overbalancing as your body flails about and you start to roll forward.
Mud does not taste good!
Your skin does feel amazing afterwards though and you can get a massage for about $1.50. Next it's off to the lake to wash off and there are washer women who are more than happy to help. You have to be quick to stop them whipping off your shorts underwater and giving you a good rub down!

We return via a golden sandy beach where a fish lunch awaits us.

Cartegena is alleged to be the most beautiful of all Colombia's cities and I can well believe it. It's not just the buildings either, the people are warm and friendly as well. True, in some parts of Getsemeni after dark it can get a little edgy and there are whispering spivs on many of the street corners, all 'trust-me' smiles and shifty eyes. Mobile phone attached to ear, they promise they can get you anything..... ANYthink (nod, wink....).

But alongside the more 'adventurous' side of life, it's also a place where you could spend a couple of hundred dollars a night in a boutique hotel and dine in fine style in an expensive gourmet restaurant then stroll amongst the walls looking at the ocean and admiring the incredible architecture. It's a real mix!

You could spend days just wandering here. There are numerous old plazas, churches and municipal buildings, plus the street scenes are vibrant and chaotic and ever changing.

A couple of images around town...

A scene straight out of the 16th century....


Cafe culture....


With ever present street vendors and music....


Ancient defenses - modern hangout....


Classic lighting....


Modern art....



The question is.... does life imitate art or does art imitate life....


Sunday, September 19, 2010

The Steel Rat

August 24th to 28th

The road ends in Panama. Literally! There is no way to ride through the Darien Gap to Colombia in South America so we investigate options. There used to be a regular ferry service running between the two, but for reasons shrouded in mystery it no longer runs. This has lead to a thriving industry for privateers making the run on small boats ranging from oversize motor boats right up to large sail boats. Some have a nasty reputation - tales of drunken captains sleeping off hangovers through the voyage or worse still drug runners masquerading as tourist transport abound. If caught with drugs, all are assumed to be guilty and innocent fare paying tourists get to see the inside of Panamanian prisons along with the guilty crew. It pays to do research and unfortunately, this is not our strong suit!

Fortunately we do know other people who take the time to find out all the best information and so, we have heard of "The Stahlratte" which by sheer fluke is sailing just when we need it. It's one of the bigger vessels making the run and has an excellent reputation. It is also the boat taken by Anna and Ali and also Danny who I rode with in Bolivia so we relax and look forward to a safe passage.

It's a 4am start for a 5am pick up. The grumpiest man in the universe arrives at our hostel and his mood nose dives even further when he realises we have bikes. He had not been told. We had not been told that he has another five travelers to collect, plus all their gear. It's an extremely tight squeeze in a 4x4 pick up, along some immensely 3 dimensional roads.

We enter Kuna territory.

The Kuna are an indigenous tribe who are fiercely independent. They have remained separate from the rest of Panama maintaining their own lands, laws and culture. Passage is strictly controlled and passports must be shown and an entry fee paid to the official in a small hut at the roadside. To get to Stahlratte we take small Kuna piloted canoes through their river system and out to the open sea where we get our first glimpse of "Stahlratte" - The Steel Rat!


She's a 100 foot steel hulled, twin masted sail boat with an interesting history. Once a floating commune with a loose mission to sail round the world, once a sister ship to "Rainbow Warrior" and part of Greenpeace she is now captained by Ludwig a German who has been with her for 17 years. There are 20 passengers including us and the table is already set for a feast when we arrive!

We get the run down of the boat from Ludwig, a list of do's and don'ts, sign up for the roster to help out in the galley and the ship gets under way past tiny Kuna islands and their fishing canoes....


We are escorted through Kuna waters by a flotilla of bottle nosed dolphin - 'gay sharks' or 'pigs of the sea' according to Ludwig....


It's about a three hour trip under The Steel Rats chugging diesel engine to paradise.

We anchor up, pinch ourselves and gaze, open jawed at our new surroundings....


It's a bounty advert! Like stepping into one of those impossibly perfect holiday brochure pictures!


That island over there is our own personal little playground for the next day and a half! Just when you think life can't get any better, the bar full of ice cold cans floats out to meet us....


We snorkel amongst huge schools of iridescent fish and there are colourful parrot and angel fish. The coral is close to the surface and is a stark, vivid red. Someone spots a whale shark, we see an octopus maybe a metre long, all liquid limbs as it flees and hides in the dark places.

There are hundreds of these islands all dotted along the Caribbean Coast of Panama and it's easy to see why the Kuna seek to keep them private. Some are tiny - just golden mounds of sand, some have a single or maybe a pair of palm trees. Others are larger and have villages of densely packed palm thatched houses. There are schools and workshops where traditional clothes are weaved by hand. The villagers are really friendly, rowing out to our island to greet us and to invite us to visit their island village....


We see a canoe leave a neighboring island and I am amazed when they drop a line and instantly pull out a five pound fish! But that's nothing - for a minute later there is a struggle - one man in the water, one on the boat and suddenly they land what must be a 50 pound red snapper. Horns blare and a cheer goes up as the islanders celebrate their catch. We dispatch a dingy, negotiations take place and suddenly the fish is ours in exchange for $30 and a dozen cold beers. Ludwig sets about filleting the monster and it doesn't get any fresher than this....


The evening is spent on OUR island with a BBQ whilst the crew get to know each other....


Paradise Island by moonlight....


We spend the next day just hanging out with new friends - snorkeling, swinging on the boat's rope swing and swimming to other near-by islands. It's a pretty mixed bunch from Ireland, Sweden, The States, England, Switzerland and Canada; a couple travelling overland by car, three on motorbikes, us on bikes and the rest by bus. I had some reservations about being trapped on a small boat with a bunch of boring strangers, but everyone gets along amazingly well and it's a real laugh!


I'm on galley duty and learn how to crack open lobster. They are done in a delicious sweet papaya sauce, plus there is the fresh snapper! There are no complaints about the food!

Next morning we wake to the rhythmic sound of the engine and we are under way. It's sad to leave this gorgeous place behind, and it's a completely different atmosphere on the boat as we head out into the open seas. Crossings can be rough! The boat starts to rock and roll and we're glad to be on one of the biggest boats plying this route. It's much rougher on a smaller vessel and much more claustrophobic to boot. Sue takes a sickness tablet and disappears below deck for the rest of the day. I'm feeling fine until I try and use my laptop. 30 seconds later I'm feeding the fish over the side. I put the laptop away....

The crew prepare a stew, some eat... some just avoid the sight and smell of food at all costs. By all accounts it's a pretty calm crossing, but most of us landlubbers would disagree. The wind picks up a bit and the crew hoist the mainsail. It's a fine sight, but unfortunately the engine stays on as it's only a light breeze....


Going to sleep that night is a strange experience. The sound of the waves, the rhythmic swaying of the boat and the reassuring heart beat of the engine gently lull you down, down into deep slumber.

Interrupted when the engine suddenly stops!

It's 6am and people start to emerge from below decks into the sunlight. It slowly dawns on me that Central America is no more.... and that the coastline I am now looking at is South America! It's an odd way for us to cross a border; by ocean, and still thick with sleep it takes a moment for it all to sink in.

The harbour, the boats and then, beyond that - the skyline of the next leg of the tour! This is where we begin our adventure in South America - with the old city of Cartegena....


Thanks to Rachel Pook for the Kuna women and group photos and to Valerie for Stahratte's sails. Thanks to the rest of the crew for making it such a great voyage - good times!

Friday, September 17, 2010

The Panama Canal

August 18th


When in Panama you obviously have to visit “The Canal”, but first we head to The Canal Museum off Plaza de la Independencia to get some background info. We're a bit geeky like that.


It starts right back at the beginning showing the routes that sturdy mules overloaded with silver would have taken before the canal was even built. The 50 mile over land route took 4 day by fast horse – used for messages and important passengers, cargo took longer - 7 to 14 days which considering the heat, insects and dense jungle was tough going. In the 1850's the Americans built a railroad to help prospectors get from the East to the West coast of America during the gold rush. When it was opened it was the most expensive railway in the world: $25 for a first class ticket and $10 for second class, but many speculators happily paid given the vast wealth they thought was waiting for them in San Francisco. Ironically the railroad “paved” the way for a canal, showing both a viable route and also providing the logistics to bring in supplies and remove excavated earth.


Interestingly several routes were proposed for a canal; several in Panama and some through Nicaragua where a simpler route might have taken a canal through the San Juan River on to Lake Cocibolca where a small excavation to Lake Managua would have left just 15 miles to cut through to the Pacific. The final decision was largely political and some portions of Nicaragua were actually bought up to prevent a French Canal Company using that easier route.


The French engineer Ferdinand de Lesseps who had just completed the Suez Canal was contracted to construct the Panama Canal, a company was duly formed and a team of engineers recruited. After de Lesseps's success at Suez, obtaining funding was no problem. A map at the museum shows the size of the prize, displaying some of the trade routes that benefit from the canal, rather than taking the extra 8,000 mile voyage around South America....



The French started building in 1881 and it was a disaster, Following the Suez model they planned to build at sea level, arrogantly smashing their way through anything and everything in their path. Unlike Suez the rainy season in Panama is savage and heavy rainfall simply filled the excavations as quickly as the steam shovels could make them. Landfalls were a daily occurrence and 22 000 people died from accidents, yellow fever and malaria. De Lesseps hid the bulk of the problems from investors whilst continually returning to them for more money. Engineers begged him to reconsider building a lock system and finally walked off the project when he obstinately refused to consider anything other than the sea level canal.


Finally the project went bankrupt in 1889 causing stock markets to crash around the world. De Lesseps died not long after, a broken man.


Nothing else happened until the Americans bought the concession from the French in 1903, however Columbia objected (Panama was part of Columbia at the time) so Panama declared independence backed by US money and a couple of US battleships. A treaty was signed that gave Panama it's independence and the US sovereign rights over the canal and land 8km either side of it – effectively splitting Panama in two!


The Americans more sensibly decided to put in a series of locks rather than making the canal all one level so they didn't have to excavate so deeply. Also medical advances had now discovered how malaria and yellow fever were spread so they took 4,000 men off the project to improve sanitation and help wipe out the breeding zones of the mosquitos. They successfully eradicated Yellow Fever from the whole of Panama – a legacy that remains to this day!


Still 6 000 people died during the construction, 80% of whom were Afro-Caribbean as they were housed in worse conditions than the white labourers from Europe who in turn were housed in worse conditions than the American engineers! The canal was finally completed in 1914. The first boat to sail through was a lowly tug-boat on August 15th 1914.


OK, long winded introduction over....


Armed with a bit of history we take a mad dash through Panama City traffic on the bikes for the 10 miles or so to the “Miraflores Locks” passing the old railway station on route....



As luck would have it there is a giant “Pana-Max” size car carrier lumbering up the canal and we manage to overtake it before it gets to the locks. Pana-Max is a specification for the largest ship that can fit through the locks and has become an international standard for ship builders wanting to use the canal.


We head out on to the viewing gallery to get a sight of the massive lock gates holding back tons of fresh water used to raise ships 54 feet to the level of Gatun Lake. Two workers stand by these giant gates to provide scale across from the control building....



I won't bore you with any more details except that in a space of around 15 minutes this enormous ship is raised upwards and passes through the 66 feet high gates which open to lie flush against the canal edge. The ship powers forward, guided by eight “mules” that run on rails and keep the ship safe from collision using huge steel chains before being raised again in the second lock....



You can see just how much the ship rises by looking at the name “Wallenius Wilhelmsen” painted on the side. A massive crane “Titan” looks on as the ship passes. This mighty lifter floats on a pontoon and can be used to raise the lock gates in and out for maintenance....



We decide to race the Wilhelmsen up canal to the next set of locks at Pedro Miguel and on to the famous Gaillard Cut where engineers channelled this waterway through a massive slice in the hillside.


Pedro Miguel locks are less impressive and hard to see from the road so we carry on to “Centenario Bridge” built over the canal at Gaillard.



The bridge itself is impressive, but unfortunately there are “No Stopping” signs along it's length. I decide that they can't possibly apply to bikes so I can get some photos of the monumental effort involved to move a mountain at “The Gaillard Cut”. It is an awesome sight looking down on a man made canyon 1800 feet wide at the top and 155 feet deep. Huge excavators look like tiny dots on the valley floor....



I just manage to spot our boat the Wilhelmsen dawdling towards us as we return along the other side of the bridge when the police politely ask me to “shift it” and I am forced to leave the bridge....



The scale of the project is immense and we haven't even seen the largest of the three locks that lie 35 miles away on the Caribbean side, nor the giant Gatun Lake that was created by damming and flooding a 164 square mile area of land. At the time it was by far the largest man-made lake and it still provides all the water supply not just for the canal, but for drinking water and hydro power as well. It is just a stunning achievement when you consider Panama was effectively sliced in two and flooded to allow these mighty ships to pass across a country. It's even more impressive when you think it was all done with steam and muscle power.


In stark contrast we head further into the canal zone to the Summit Botanical Garden and Zoo. Summit was established to help introduce new tropical plants and animals to Panama, but also to help The US military to identify species they would encounter here in the field.


A beautiful King Vulture....



A Keel Billed Toucan.....



Whilst most of the animals look in good condition, their behaviour suggests their boredom, caged as they are in too small enclosures....


This magnificent (unnamed) cat is wildly aggressive, charging the confines of it's area and snarling at passers by....



We have seen plenty of spider monkeys at play in their natural habitat and they are an energetic and social animal. It's just too depressing to see this kind of graphic display of hopelessness so we leave and head back to the city....