Paradise Found. Paradishe Losht.

As we approached the first island it was clear that we were approaching the tropical paradise that I expected from what I had briefly read in the guide book: crystal clear, turquoise water, peppered with islands of white coral sand, covered in coconut palms; the very archetype of island paradise. It really was very beautiful.

Turquoise waters

When we got slightly closer to the San Blas archipelago I noticed Fabian had his mobile out, sending text messages, so I tried mine: yes, full reception. I wondered why they would have bothered with mobile cells when the nearby islands all appeared to be uninhabited. Then I saw: harboured in the larger coves were several large yachts; this was a rich person's playground – of course they couldn't do without reception! Then I read my messages. My friend, John, had replied to the text I sent boasting of the gorgeous islands I would be visiting on my posh cruise and he had responded with something like: ''Island ghettos for the poor indigenous people forced from their mainland ancestral homes. Sounds lovely." I hadn't read much about the islands but this unsettled me, although the island we were heading to was clearly not a ghetto, in fact it was tiny and uninhabited.

Rich people's hangout

Fabian's boat

Fabian told us that this was Koala Island, a joke in reference to the fact his company is called Sailing Koala, which he apparently thought it would be easy for English speakers to remember. We stopped off at the island for a few hours to swim and relax on the beach. The snorkel gear Fabian had promised us never appeared, but Toby and Alex had their own, as well as a fantastic design of hammock, which ties at the sides and faces forwards, ideal for your typical desert island palm tree setup. Toby and Alex seemed to be having a great time, which just made me think how lovely it would be to have Joanne there. Maudlin, I walked around the island picking up a pretty shell on the way, which I decided I would take home for Joanne; if she can't be in the Caribbean, I would take the Caribbean to her.

Toby's cool side-tying forward-looking hammock

The couple

Shell

Next up was a populated island where some local Kuna people were going to cook our dinner. It took several hours to get there so on the way I read a bit more in the guide book, hoping to assuage the fears John's text message had planted. The book confirmed that these people were inhabitants of the mainland, Colombia, until they were displaced by the Conquistadores, which wasn't quite what I thought John had meant, but sad nonetheless; though I had thought that they had been displaced recently from John's text.

Sandro and Romano

El Capitan

Arriving at the next island, there were loads more large yachts moored around the island which, even from the shore, did not look like a pleasant place to live. We went ashore on Fabian's dinghy, were introduced to the family who would be cooking for us, and Fabian invited us to walk around the island. It was pretty depressing. Here, among all these island paradises, people were living in grim poverty. Almost the entire island had been covered in concrete, so the beautiful white sands were only visible in a few places next to the water. It was also clear that the only economy they had was what money they could extract from the wealthy yachting tourists: everywhere local crafts were being sold at far higher prices than I could afford, especially having blown so much money on the cruise, and we were told that if we took photos of anyone we would have to give US$1 to everyone in each photo. We saw plenty of what we would consider poverty on this trip, but there is something particularly upsetting about poverty when it exists right next to conspicuous wealth, like these yachts. It seems to make the difference between happy poor people and desperate poor people.

First view of an inhabited island

More rich people

Poor people

The one upside was that Fabian knew a lot of the locals and I believed him when he told us that he believed in spreading the money around. I think he probably paid them reasonably well for our dinner, and he told us that he changes which people he goes to so they all get their turn. Fabian had explained to us that each of the islands is legally a state in its own right with its own laws. In particular this meant that we had to buy and drink any beer we wanted immediately, before the alcohol curfew. Bizarrely the next island along had no closing time and alcohol could be bought, never mind consumed, 24 hours a day.

Pier

Towards the end of our meal we saw a side-effect of the different state's proximity. To much excitement on the beach next to our table, a large dugout boat with an outboard motor set off from the beach opposite. It was very overloaded and judging by the whooping on board, the occupants were also loaded. It started out at full speed and started taking water immediately. It sunk lower and lower during the 30 seconds or so after it set out until it had sunk too low to keep going and everyone had to splash out into the shallow water, laughing and falling about. They crowded around and started bailing the boat out, eventually managing to drag it ashore; however one of the people who had been on the boat was face-down in the water. Just when we were about to run over, the locals seemed to notice him and dragged him out. After a bit of squeezing his chest, him coughing up water, and lots of laughing all round they indicated he was alright. He was carried away and the rest of the people from the boat staggered off, most of them so drunk they could barely stand.

No more than 100m to booze

Back on Fabian's boat, where we were to sleep again, he told us that every so often a batch of cocaine, ditched in the sea when smugglers are evading the coast guard, washes up on the beaches of the islands and the islanders sell it on, meaning that they get a huge windfall so that they don't have to do any work for a while; instead they just get drunk constantly until the money runs out. It almost seemed Fabian didn't have a very high opinion of the islanders, but he did seem to care about them; I think he put it down to their lack of choices and saw it as sad rather than bad. I certainly found their situation sad.

written by

The Happy Couple on January 17, 2010 from San Blas Islands, Panama

from the travel blog: Michael's Lonely post-Honeymoon

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