Thursday 31 January 2019

Green Island, and Porvenir

Our favourite anchorage so far in the San Blas is Green Island, or
Kanlildup.

We managed to launch the drone when the wind dropped and in the first
picture you can see the mountains of Panama mainland in the background.
These mountains of San Blas are among the world's most undisturbed
tropical forests.
From our anchorage we saw turtles, dolphins, and brown pelicans diving
into the sea. It feels a great privilege to be sailing in these
beautiful waters amongst the tiny islands inhabited by a gentle people
whose way of life has changed little in recent decades.

Today we visited the island of Porvenir to clear customs - for
entrance into both the Guna Nation and Panama. Dealing with 18 boats
in one day was clearly a great deal more business than usual for
the customs officer, but he managed a smile for us as he stamped the
passports and handed them over. We have to make sure that we keep our
filing system in good order on Tintin, as each new port of call
requires us to provide evidence of clearance into and out of the
previous one.

We have another day to explore this wonderful archipelago, before we
sail on to Shelter Bay, situated opposite Colon at the northern end of
the Panama canal. There we will prepare Tintin for our canal transit a
few days later.