The Rosarios, Columbia

It seems strange and a little scary to leave the dock after a long time tied up in one place! We were more than ready however and excited about the coming trip. First we needed to fill up with fuel at Club de Pesca nearby and this took hours! The process is slow here and we took on 250 gallons of diesel. Unknown to us the boat was settling into the mud as this happened and it took five men and all our power in reverse to get off the dock when we finished!

In addition their credit card machine wasn't working so Scott had to go to a bank and withdraw $700 in cash.
Still we were off again sailing through beautiful Cartagena harbor, by the city walls and church domes. It was a beautiful day and a lovely easy sail to the Rosario islands, some 20 miles away. .
We were there in the late afternoon and settled happily back on the anchor to watch the sunset next to Roy & Sue on "Vindomar". We've decided to "buddy boat" for awhile down the Columbian coast. This is our third time to team up with another boat since we left the eastern Caribbean and we feel very lucky.
The Rosarios are a tourist destination from Cartagena but very low key - mostly day trips with only a few small hotels. The local people are fisherman mostly and live very simply. We bought nine lobsters from one and had a feast!
One distinction however is a world class aviary! Hundreds of birds from all over the world have been collected here and cared for by a team of locals. Here are photos of a toucan and some beautiful flamingos. We spent only two nights and then headed southwest to the San Bernardo islands around 35 miles away. Navigation is very dependent on watching the color of the water and signs of coral heads and reefs so we time our arrival if possible with the sun overhead or behind us. We have electronic and paper charts but many of them were surveyed hundreds of years ago! They are often a little to more off target. Sometimes we finish anchoring to find our computer shows us in the middle of the island. Eyeball navigation is easier than it sounds and we've had lots of practice.