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Published: October 19th 2009
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After another incredibly mediocre breakfast (translation : we taste some of it) we spend the morning walking around the town. Our goals, once more, are to call our daughter in Israel, and mail a postcard. You would think these to be realistic goals, and youd be wrong. We fail hopelessly on both fronts agreeing it must surely be easier in Cartagena, our next destination. Its a beautiful day and the water looks magnificent, but we can swim. Yesterday, while at Johnny Cay, Benjy, our son, suddenly started chafing and hurting from the sea water. It happened a year earlier in Honduras and we didn give it much further thought, but here we are 50 meters from the most incredible water you can imagine, and we
e walking around luggage and duty free stores. We went from paradise to misery in about 10 seconds. Its one of those things about traveling with kids. Things can change very quickly, so best be on your guard. You think youd get used to it, but no, its always a bit of a shock. I don mean the little things that happened when our kids were really young - your 4 year old throwing up all
over you on a plane (although that didn seem little at the time, in fact it was downright unpleasant) - but rather when your plans, made months in advance, just nosedive. This wasn part of my Colombia trip master plan, but well deal with it. We decide to go to our next hotel, the Cocoplum. As you may recall, Id decided wed spend 2 days in the town and 2 outside of town so that wed have a good mix of town distractions and perfect location. We
e not that excited by moving as we love the beach here, but apparently we
e off to the nicest beach on the island. The route there doesn suggest that in the slightest and we
e surprised when our taxi pulls off in the middle of nowhere but well reserve judgement for a few minutes. The staff is very friendly - our room is not ready but theyll let us use another (we would have loved that a few times in London and some other places) - so we go down to the beach. Its distressingly disappointing, even if it didn have the reputation. The sea is dirty and the small beach is
covered with seaweed. Im totally devastated - Im a perfectionist trip planner and have been so clever here, and it looks like a total failure. Mostly I feel for my eleven year old who is now ready to swim but doesn feel like it. For a few minutes we consider leaving, but just go to the beachside restaurant and have lunch instead. My wife and son try cheer me up - they know Im upset - and we decide to head back to town - all of ten minutes by taxi- to swim there in the afternoon. Its beautiful and we have a wonderful time. They say San Andres has seven colors of water and we
e swimming in at least three of them. Then, after a couple of hours it starts raining, hard. Within a couple of minutes its a tropical downpour and Im the only person in the water. My familys taken cover but my son runs back to tell me something about my sandals, very expensive orthopedic ones which along with my orthotics for my running shoes are the only pieces of luggage I ever care about (well I care if we buy some really good chocolate).
Hes worried theyll blow away so I charge out to huddle under some cover with half the island.
When the rain stops, we e soaked so we go look for towels. Instead we buy some cheap t-shirts which do a great job. They don appear too durable - in fact mine is now smaller than my sons because of laundry related injuries- but they e great for a couple of days.
We spend 2 more days in San Andres. The first of those we go back to Johnny Cay to make up for our first visit being cut short. We get the cheapest possible transport out, which happens to be on a boat full of workers setting up for the day. Its quite a ride, as we e packed tight between all the supplies being taken across for the day. After a wonderful morning,we return to our hotel just in time for a massive afternoon downpour. We huddle up and watch three hours of Friends, muting the sound every now and then when theres some inappropriate dialogue for our son.
Next day we spend at Cocoplum. The beach now actually lives up to its reputation. Its private, quiet,
and the waters perfect. Theres an old shipwreck about 100 meters out which you can virtually walk to on a sandbank. The water is shallow and very calm, and just great for kids. In fact the whole San Andres experience is one I would repeat tomorrow with kids.
Reluctantly we pack up and head for the airport. We e going to Cartagena, probably predestined to be the highlight of our trip, but leaving the Caribbean to go to a steaming hot city to start learning Spanish doesn feel as appealing as it once did. It also illustrates what Ive always felt about designing city/beach trips. Do the beach part last, because leaving to go to a city will be hard. A year before, we left the Caribbean, Honduran island of Roatan to go to Tikal where the heat exhausted and withered us and would have made far more sense in reverse order.
Avianca is very smooth in every capacity and we touch down at 8pm. We e staying in the city walls in the San Diego area and as we get close, we get our first glimpse that this is a wonderful city. There are outdoor cafes, restaurants and markets, with people everywhere, and the city just oozing life and energy. Our hotel is the very popular Tres Banderas where they greet us with a drink and cold towel. Weve only been outside for 5 minutes but are sweating profusely already. But our spirits are good, and we head out for dinner.We find an Italian place - our area is covered with restaurants, all pricey- get back to our hotel and get ready for the next adventure tomorrow.
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