The San Blas Islands, Panama
A new adventure for us all has started aboard the Sea Voyager, this time a ten-day trip through the natural and cultural wonders of Panama and Costa Rica. We picked up our guests in the town of Colon, at the Atlantic end of the most famous shortcut of the world, the Panama Canal. This is the feature that has made Panama famous, and relatively little people know that there is so much more to this northernmost nation of Central America, whose name literally means “abundance of fish”. Not only is the marine life abundant, but there is an abundance of culture, with seven strong indigenous groups, and of wildlife, with some of the most pristine rainforest in the world.
We started exploring this country by traveling overnight to an archipelago comprising close to 400 paradisiacal islands. These form part of a land ruled by its own ethnic group: Kunayala, home to the Kuna Indians and better known by its Spanish name: the San Blas district. About 32000 Kuna inhabit the archipelago, concentrated among 40 different islets, thus leaving plenty of uninhabited gems for us to enjoy as well. We anchored this morning off an islet housing a medium density population of Kuna, and after learning more about these people and their famous crafts, the molas, we set off the wander through the streets of this little town.
We then repositioned to the Holandes Cayes, where we snorkeled, SCUBA dived and kayaked through the turquoise waters and colourful reefs. The conditions for diving were so excellent that we took two dives in the afternoon and yet another at night, to explore the reef’s alter ego. It certainly had undergone a change, with many of the daytime denizens tucked away for the night, the corals alive and ravenous, and many other mysterious creatures that are active only during the dark hours. The most conspicuous of these were many species of echinoderms, the phylum including sea stars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers, all of which were actually moving around! The great highlight for me was coming across several unfurled giant basket stars, facing into the water flow direction to capture their planktonic food source.
A new adventure for us all has started aboard the Sea Voyager, this time a ten-day trip through the natural and cultural wonders of Panama and Costa Rica. We picked up our guests in the town of Colon, at the Atlantic end of the most famous shortcut of the world, the Panama Canal. This is the feature that has made Panama famous, and relatively little people know that there is so much more to this northernmost nation of Central America, whose name literally means “abundance of fish”. Not only is the marine life abundant, but there is an abundance of culture, with seven strong indigenous groups, and of wildlife, with some of the most pristine rainforest in the world.
We started exploring this country by traveling overnight to an archipelago comprising close to 400 paradisiacal islands. These form part of a land ruled by its own ethnic group: Kunayala, home to the Kuna Indians and better known by its Spanish name: the San Blas district. About 32000 Kuna inhabit the archipelago, concentrated among 40 different islets, thus leaving plenty of uninhabited gems for us to enjoy as well. We anchored this morning off an islet housing a medium density population of Kuna, and after learning more about these people and their famous crafts, the molas, we set off the wander through the streets of this little town.
We then repositioned to the Holandes Cayes, where we snorkeled, SCUBA dived and kayaked through the turquoise waters and colourful reefs. The conditions for diving were so excellent that we took two dives in the afternoon and yet another at night, to explore the reef’s alter ego. It certainly had undergone a change, with many of the daytime denizens tucked away for the night, the corals alive and ravenous, and many other mysterious creatures that are active only during the dark hours. The most conspicuous of these were many species of echinoderms, the phylum including sea stars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers, all of which were actually moving around! The great highlight for me was coming across several unfurled giant basket stars, facing into the water flow direction to capture their planktonic food source.
