ASIA, HERE WE COME!

On the 23rd of January 2017 our dream became reality: we started our journey to the West with final destination: the ‘far East’.

After 5 years of traveling through Caribbean waters, it is time for us to explore new areas and to quench our thirst after more spiritual minded cultures.
For me it feels like a pilgrimage in which we slowly sail closer and closer into the direction where my Beloved Guru resides, Asia, India…. To be able to live closer to Him and visit Him on a more regular basis, makes my heart sing with joy!

 

 

 

CROSSING THE CARIBBEAN OCEAN FROM BEQUIA TO PANAMA

It is well known to us how Mother Ocean has her different faces. She can be as calm and patient as a loving mother or completely going mental as a wild fury.

When we left Bequia on the 23rd of January to set sail to Curacao, the weather could not be more welcoming. It was a lovely, calm sail of 4 days with nice fruit smoothies as breakfast, yoga and meditation on the deck and quiet nights with enough sleep. As a welcome, relaxing intermezzo we visited the beautiful islands of Aves, where we indeed saw great flocks of pelicans, and where we had a pleasant swim. Just like paradise!

Our sail from Curacao to the San Blas Islands, Panama, however was far from paradise like. I was too seasick to bother about delicious smoothies and happy if I managed to prepare some food anyway. The ocean builded up and the wind kept on singing louder and louder. In the last two days we had winds up to 42 knots and waves of 5-6 meters. No quiet sleep anymore especially when something broke in the autopilot and Deep had to steer till daylight through the tremendous waves. In the morning we switched to the second autopilot.
The area between Curacao and Panama is well known for its rough seas. It is one of the seven roughest oceans in the world. So we were not completely surprised, although the weather was far heavier as predicted. The good thing is that this was probably the roughest ride of our entire trip!

 

 

 

 

 

CURACAO, THE NETHERLANDS IN A TROPICAL SETTING

Trying to find our way to the right dinghy dock, I start asking a local in English where to go to. He stumbles over the English words and asks me:’Can you please talk Dutch?’
Wow, that is something new! Just talking in your own mothertongue and they even ask for it.
Curacao is a surprisingly diverse island with a cosy capital full of colorful buildings, very well developed industry in comparison to the other Caribbean islands and in the North the rough nature and countless ‘Boccas’: natural bays created by the ocean bumping into land and creating ‘mouths’ where the waves are crashing high up into spectacular forms..
The rich history of Curacao is not a happy one. Lots of slaves were brought here and the slave trade to other Carribean islands was big bussiness. There are still a lot of the plantation houses intact and well maintained. Although the sad story behind it, most mansions are a delight to look at. Beautiful architecture.

 

 

 

Next to sightseeing we visited a lot of supermarkets, marina shops etc to buy all we could for us, Juna and Yemaya. After Curacao it will be impossible to get certain items for about a year. Especially for our cat Juna and boat Yemaya.
It was a weird sensation to visit the Albert Heijn, a typical Dutch supermarket, where the set up of all the products is exactly the same as in the Albert Heijn of Malden, where most of my family lives. Even the temperature was the same because of the strong airco. For some time I was back in The Netherlands.

 

 

 

 

 

SAN BLAS ISLANDS, LAND OF THE KUNA YALA INDIANS

After our rough ride of 4 days, it was a great feeling to arrive into calmer waters again. With the first glimpse of land we were happy as little children. Suddenly we saw the high mountains of Panama dooming through the clouds and as we came closer dozens of little islands filled with palm trees caught our eyes. Land again!!!!
The San Blas region consists of more than 300 little islands. Some of them inhabited, but most of them just islands completely packed with palm trees. The waters are amazingly turquoize and the corals are so beautiful. The spotted eagle rays are everwhere here and are jumping out of the water just as if they want to say:’ Here we are.’ One morning we had two dolphins next to the boat, slowly swimming through the bay. The Kuna Indians are the sweetest people ever. In our opinion they are so much softer and relaxter than a lot of the locals we have encountered in the West Indies. It is a real treat to be able to stay here for some time.

The main land is covered with jungle and little rivers are coming down the mountains to merge with the ocean. We went there to do our enormous mount of salty laundry one day. But thanks to a nice tropical rainfall I didn’t have to carry the laundry to the river. Just sitting in the pouring rain, catching the water with our catching device gave me plenty of delicious sweet water to finally wash everything needed. A blessing from heaven! After that we went up to the river to see a bit of jungle. We didn’t see crocodiles, as we hoped for, but were surprised by so many different birds in all shape s and colors: kingfisher, woodpecker, giant bird of preys, vultures…

NEXT STOP: MAINLAND PANAMA, PREPARING FOR PANAMA CANAL TRANSIT

So our Carribean episode in our life is about to finish. We will enjoy paradise here for some more days before we will be heading for Puerto Linton. Than a lot of paperwork and arranging the panama canal transit will start. After that our Pacific adventure will begin!