Providencia, Columbia

Providencia (Old Providence-when English):

At noon yesterday, we arrived at the small island of Providencia, a small island of Columbia at the same latitude but far


off the coast of Nicaragua. It appears to be a beautiful island and we are looking forward to exploring. Our agent for clearing in to this country is Mr. Bush, well known for his services and a likable gentleman. In Colombia, "agents" seem to be required to handle the formalities of filling out a few pieces of paperwork. I've heard the charge here and in San Andres was $30. U.S. then it was upped to $50. Although, when we arrived, the cruisers in the harbor said it was now $60. Mr. Bush should arrived back from a flight yesterday to San Andres and started the check in procedure for us and




should be back this morning(Sat.) with our finalized paperwork from the Port Captain.

We left the Honduran Cayos Cochinos(often called, the Hobbies), at 6 a.m. on what looked like a favorable wind. Our passage took 30 hrs. exactly. Rough and confused seas at first, with 7-8’ swells, rain showers and some very unexpected squalls, upset our perfect premonitions of the crossing, by sail on a beam reach. By nightfall however, sailing close hauled in 20-30 knots of wind, we were 70-80 miles along and beyond the danger of the reef systems of Half Moon Cays(Media Luna) and it's






No MUSS, No FUSS!


"TIDE" cleans all!


NO! not THAT "TIDE",
the rising 'tide'...cleaned the smelly pig poop daily.

Nice family here apparently raises pigs for the local market.

slightly eastern brother, Arricife Alagardo. We then turned more south and headed directly here. No pirates, no more squalls, the seas subsided slowly. However, they HIT the boat hard on occasion and heading into them, when they HIT you ..... they send spray up and back at you! Lovely! To enjoy this, you have to think “water park and this is the expensive ride!” ;) Well, it was blowing like stink and the seas were not too friendly, so it was to be expected.


Not always so, but....by evening, life aboard was getting better. The engine was turned on and a sail dropped, to make our heading more comfortable during the night. Dorothy gets a bit nervous, so I steadied the boat for the evening. We're human and get worn down by the motion of the boat, sun, salt and lack of sleep and there was no need to push too hard tonight. Mileage can be made up in daylight, but I DO want to make it into Providencia early enough to clear in legally before the end of the day. You see, it’s Friday and IF the officials will work, there is Overtime pay to consider. If the officials do not work on the weekends and you are anxious to get off the boat, you might have to sit aboard till Monday morning.
Night watches are tough if done correctly(staying awake), and worse if something goes wrong, or one person gets overextended...but we did fine with only a couple of doze -offs.


First light, sails went back up and I got the boat gliding along at hull speed again on a broad reach. Sailing 15 more degrees off the wind was gentler.... Sailing with the waves and wind we sped nicely toward our destination and Providencia was a wonderful sight to behold in the distant morning haze 30 miles out on the horizon. It seemed as beautiful as any South Pacific
landfall could be, tall, rugged and welcoming. "Land Ho!"

We entered the harbor at noon, only 30 hours from point A to B. Good time and landing at high noon, gave perfect visibility to the tropical waters. The entrance to the N.E. harbor between Catalina Island and Providencia, was simple and straight forward, once the sea buoy was sighted. "Clearing in" was delayed as the local agent, Mr. Bush was off on business for the day, but we got everything in order by nightfall.

Anyway, we are here, but so far

Lunch at Divino Nino was tasty, except ............I do not recommend this place for reasons mentioned.
have not been able to figure out the direct upload of written material to our blog, to be patient. Will try today, to get a Colombian phone chip to install in our cell phone. We are anxious to contact the world we know.

Added: While on the island of Providencia, we enjoyed the friendliness of the population. While walking a bit out of the town, we sighted and heard a young man playing classical music on his guitar. He was sitting on his porch quietly picking his guitar in the coolness of shade during the siesta time. We gave him the thumbs up sign as we caught glances and he waved us over. While listening to his beautiful plucking of Beethoven he explained his early lessons and musical past. I later downloaded some classical music off my CD's to my hard drive and brought him the original discs for his enjoyment, as well as a set of guitar strings I had aboard. Yes, he was happy. He smiled with the joy and innocence of a young child at Christmas and it was good to see. Nice guy, trying to make a living as a taxi with his 115 c.c. motorbike. Joseph.





We also befriended Elvis, a local fisherman and others, Archibald, Howard, Francisco, and others. Through our Sailmail HF radio connection aboard, we were able to download and print out some weather information that helped Elvis decide how to spend his days...farming or fishing. Since the weather was not going to give him a break for almost a week, he decided to work on other projects and left the fishing alone.


Crucifix atop a Catholic church on the Eastern side of the island.


We walked over to the small island of Catalina where Capt. Morgan had his base and explored a bit. Another day, we opted to rent a scooter and tour the island. It takes only an hour to circle the whole thing, but we took our time and poked around. Lunch was had at Divinio Nino, a beach front eatery on the south coast. The setting was beautiful, the ambiance was just what we were looking for. The glitch was Delmar, the operator, chose to rip us off on lunch. His menu stated 34,000 pesos for a seafood special for 2. That's about $17 U.S. bucks. He explained what was on the platter and we said fine, and also ordered a bottled water. Before leaving, I handed him a 50,000 bill and got 3000 back. OF course I questioned the lack of correct change. He said well "for the beers". (there were only 3 customers in this place and there was no confusion, we did not have beers.) I said, we had one water. He then said, "well I put King Crab legs on and charged extra for that." (2 small crab legs were edible I guess, but not cracked for picking, so we left them untouched). There was no mention of extras upon ordering and it was clear by his look, that Delmar was just hitting up a tourist. No problem, the Divinio Nino eatery will get the coverage it deserves on this blog and other endeavors. Eat elsewhere!


Unless they young guys are pulling a prank, toting off someones horse, you should notice they are all smiling! This is common here. The people are truly easy going, relaxed and it was a joy to connect with them. How often in the States, do you see young folks just "smiling". It comes easy to them here and for that I give this place a thumbs up!



Cooking was often on wood fires. This shot was at Divino Nino's.

Rolands, another eatery and fun looking spot was neat looking and had a beautiful beach. Kind of like a Robinson Crusoe, or Gilligan's Island feel to the decor and the staff was a hoot :)





Roland's at Manchinell Bay, on the S.E. coast is a cool setting. A definite Rasta theme, mixed with Gilligan or Crusoe.


In town, the only town, "Isabela", the folk were laid back, helpful and virtually all had a quick smile. If you are accustomed to having access to everything....this is not the place, but if you can get by, then this is a relaxed atmosphere. No hurry, no problems. Note though, that while this island is of English ancestry, the Colombian school system here is teaching Spanish, not English. The locals speak both and more often than not, a dialect common on islands with a history of slavery....a slang mix of major languages. When spoken, you will not understand it, unless born here.






Sorely lacking though is something cruisers need.....Internet wifi. Everyday, the 2 Internet storefronts, one with 3 the other 4 computers, were full of users trying to get the slow connections to produce. They had enough customers to fill twice the number of computers they had, but ??? Hours spent waiting and hours spent fighting with poor connections. Most of our time, at least 70% of our time was spent trying to access information sending or retrieving. Same seemed to be true of the other cruisers. Maintaining banking, bills, family, weather, email, marina and other contacts took far too much time on the limited system available, but at least we could get it done. IF, the island would put up a wifi system on the dock area, I really think more cruisers would stay much longer. The internet thing was a true hassle.
.....Funny, at home in St. Pete, I leave a router set up in a windowfacing the lagoon so cruisers coming into our anchorage have a hotspot. Why cant a city that wants cruisers, do that too? ......

Someone could also offer a service to shuttle gasoline, diesel, water, ice, fresh fish etc. to your boat once a week or so since there was no docking available, but no one seemed enterprising in this way.
Well, that would be progress and the lack of it was much of the appeal of the island, so I guess it's a catch 22.
3 foodstores had plenty to keep you well fed and your thirst quenched. Hardware etc. was adaquate and lunches were similar at all 4 places in town that we tried. While tasty, if you want restaurant quality, go to San Andres or elsewhere.
Moved on now and the 8 hour run to San Andres, began with a 6:20 departure and was also tough. We both ended up with a touch of sea sickness soon after departure. At the southern end of the island when seas became confused. Dorothy went below to sleep and I ran the boat south. Wind started out at 16 kts. then ramped up to 20-25 for 90% of trip south. The seas, 10' and a few in 15'+ with often short period of as little as 5 seconds, creating vertical butt kickers. A frontal mess has been going through for the last 2 weeks or so and has driven the seas. The lack of wind in the morning was NOT followed by calmer weather as forecast, so.... I was glad to enter the shelter of the reef in San Andres... all things quieted down.