Trinidad
Calgary, Alta
St. Maartin
Posted By Karen on May 4, 2012
We have arrived safely at the Shelter Bay Marina near Colon, Panama. Snowaway seems to be okay after the lightning strike except for the electronics… We will be checking the damage over the next few days. We do have good internet here so I will try to post some pistures shortly.
Posted By admin on May 3, 2012
We are in Panama now. We had a 53 hour sail from Santa Marta Colombia to Provenir in the San Blas Islands, Panama. We had a few nice stops in the San Blas Islands. Yesterday morning we were hit by lightning. We have lost many of our electronics and are now on our way to Shelter Bay, near Colon. We should be there tomorrow and we will update the web shortly.
Posted By Karen on April 24, 2012
We are just in the last stages of preparation to leave Colombia. Tomorrow, Wednesday April 25th, we will leave Santa Marta with the intent to sail for about 50 hours to Panama which is 300 miles away. I have cooked 2 meals and we have bought lots of fruit, vegetables and drinks. Richard has brought on ice for our cooler so we will cold drinks for the trip.
We will be cruising in the San Blas Islands for the next 2 to 3 weeks so we will not have access to internet. We expect to be at Shelter Bay Marina, where we will be leaving Snowaway for the hurricane season, by May 21. We will update the blog as soon as we reach Shelter Bay.
We will probably be back in Calgary by early June.
Posted By Karen on April 18, 2012
Today we walked over to see the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas. It is said to be the largest fort ever built by the Spaniards in any of their colonies. Construction was started in 1630 supposedly after Francis Drake had occupied Cartagena and demanded a significant ransom for its release. Over the next hundred or so years it was expanded to cover the entire hill. It was never taken despite several attempts by various nations over the years. There is a statue of Blas de Lezo at the foot of the fort. He fought off the English, lead by Edward Vernon in 1741. Lezo had already lost an arm, a leg and an eye in previous battles but managed to defend Cartagena with only one tenth the men that the English had.
We spent a some time going through the Palacio de la Inquisicion (Palace of the Inquisition). The Punishment Tribunal of the Holy Office started here in 1610. It is on the Parque de Bolivar, where another bonze statue of Simon Bolivar on his horse Palomo is at the center. 
It was at the Palace that the Catholic church held hearings, conducted torture and executed witches, heretics, and other undesirables. On independance in 1821, which was lead by Simon Bolivar, executions stopped here. About 800 people were executed at this site.
Posted By Karen on April 15, 2012
The Parque Nacional Natural Tayrona, about an hours drive east of Santa Marta, is 12,000 hectares of beaches and rainforest. It was the territory of the Tayrona Indians and there is a site called Pueblito that we wanted to hike to. We decided to splurge for a couple of nights and stay at the Ecohabs at Canaveral in the park. Most of the accommodations in the park are hammocks (some even come with mosquito nets) or tents but we thought we could use a nice room after 3 months on Snowaway. The taxi driver said he would take us to the hotel for 70,000 pesos but when we got to the park gate he just dropped us off there. It took us almost 40 minutes to pay our 35,000 peso per person fee to enter the park. But at least I got to see a family of monkeys pass overhead. 
Then we had to wait another 30 minutes until there were enough people to fill the van to take us to Canaveral. Our room wasn’t ready (we were early) so we left our bag at the front desk and walked the Canaveral beach. 
We had a nice lunch at the hotel restaurant and then walked to the small beach that the front desk said we could swim at. The waves seemed a bit rough so we walked up the hill and discovered our room. The view was amazing from our patio. The patio came complete with minibar, hammocks and cushions.
Our second day at the park was dedicated to hiking to Pueblito, the Tayrona townsite. We had been told that it would take 2 to 3 hours to get to Cabo San Juan de la Guia where we would then head inland for about an hour hike up the mountain. We left the hotel at 7:40 and made it to Cabo by 10:30. The sign at the start of the trail said it would take 1.5 hours to get to Pueblito and it took us that long. The trail was very rocky and there were several places that I didn’t think I would be able to cross. But we made it and enjoyed the site. 
Luckily the walk back was easier and quicker!
Posted By Karen on April 11, 2012
Our first day of exploring Santa Marta found us walking along the malecon with Evelyn and Jens of Segwun, stopping to look at the huge statues of the Tayrona Indians. There are several of these figures of the men and women. We are sure they are not lifesized!
Our next stop was the Museo del Oro (Gold Museum) located in the library on the Plaza de Bolivar. The museum is small but has some lovely pieces. 
Several were created using the wax wasting method. A figure is created out of bees wax,then covered with clay. Then the clay is heated so the wax comes out leaving a form inside. They then pour the melted gold into the form. These figures are from a 1000 years ago. It amazes me that someone thought up how to do this that long ago!
Our final stop for the day was Quinta de San Pedro Alejandrino. The locals just refer to it as Quinta as the full name is quite the mouth full. This is the hacienda where Simon Bolivar spent his final days, dying here in December 1830. 
Bolivar is a national hero as he lead the struggle for independance in 1819. In those days Venezuela and Panama were part of Colombia as well. There is an amazing monument called the Altar de la Patria built at the site on the 100 anniversary of Bolivar’s death. 
When one looks at the figure of Bolivar on the monument from the left side, you see a young man. When looking from the right side, you see an older man (he was only 47 when he died).
The hacienda (house) and the 22 hectare grounds are open for exploring. There are trees here over 500 years old but the highlight for us was the monument.
Posted By Karen on April 10, 2012
We have been busy the last few days checking into Colombia and getting the boat clean. After 10 days in Aruba we were all pretty dirty.
We have now cleaned her from top to bottom; Karen went up the mast to clean from the top! 
We are now ready to explore Colombia.
Posted By Karen on April 5, 2012
We are in Marina Santa Marta after 2 overnight sails and a night rest in Cabo de la Vela. Snowaway and crew are fine and resting after sailing one of the five worst passages in the world… We managed with little difficulty.
More will be posted shortly.
Posted By Karen on March 23, 2012
Our first day in Aruba we decided to walk into Oranjestad to look around. It only takes us about 10 minutes from where we leave the dinghy to reach the Renaisance Marina complex. When we reached the harbour we noticed a tallship near the cruise ship dock. We went over to see if we could get a tour of it. To our surprise the tallship belongs to the Colombian Navy and they were giving tours. The ship is a three masted barque and is used as a training ship. It was built in Spain in the 1960s. Our “guide” was training to be a diesel mechanic. The ship has nice trim and the boat was built to look old.
But the nav station has all the latest electronics. 
We were told that there are no winches to help raise the sails and it sometimes takes 3 men to handle them. Of course the Colombians are not known for their size!
Posted By Karen on March 22, 2012
We are anchored a quarter mile north of the runway and a mile south of the downtown casinos and glitz of Oranjestad.
We had a good downwind sail from Curacao averaging about 6 knots. As we neared Aruba we had some positive current with us and were often over 7 knots.
