Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Panamania 2 – Surfin’ Santa Catalina

Santa Catalina Panama : 7 – 12 February 2011 :  Turbonegro – Apocolypse Dudes
Panama is a very nice place, and I still had a week to kill before sailing to Columbia. So I took a recommendation and headed to Santa Catalina on the Pacific coast.

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Turns out this place is a little bit of paradise waiting to be discovered. I settled into Rolo’s cabanas and talked about the bodacious surf with the local dudes. This place is a world class surf spot!!


Drunken adventures with Grenadian pirates

A few old travel buddies also rocked up to Rolo’s, and the seemingly sleepy fishing village turned into adventure central.

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My new friend squaaky. He likes to bite.
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Santa Catalina, not much to do except relax…
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I met some local fisherman on the first night and bought a tuna for 5usd, they gave me another one for free. Sweeet!!
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Ummm, how do you fillet a tuna?. Andy the Brit was no help whatsoever…
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In the morning, my German and Norweigan friends decided to go on a real fishing mission to the island in the background.
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You might say we were a bit naive, it is a long way without a motor.
 
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The island is stunning, there was no one there, except for us and 2 runaway boys.
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The boys thought they knew how and where to catch the big fish. They were wrong, we caught nothing, we even tried spear fishing with spears made from the trees on the island. fun fun fun!
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On our return, Douglas the friendly Grenadian pirate towed us back to the mainland. Turns out he and a few of his pirate friends own a huge catamaran in the harbour. To thank him for the tow, we took them out to No Worries Surf Cafe for a drink….
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And so after many rums later, he decided to have a party on his boat. What a sweet nigh…, i think….. On waking up in one of the cabins, I have vague memories of eating fish, talking revolution and watching the stars from the trampoline.
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View from out back of Rolo’s, you can just make out Douglas’s very nice catamaran.
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This little bugger was hanging about in someone's washing. This type won’t put you in hospital, but he will put you in bed for a few days of pain.


Surfin’ Santa Catalina

There are a number of different surf spots in Santa Catalina. There is “the point” which attracts huge barrelling left and rights over a flat rock base. These can be monster waves, 3 times a persons height, not for the feint hearted.

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There is also the beautiful Estero Beach, which has superb beach breaks for learning and improving. The waves also get big, often 4m high when we were there. I had the best time ever.

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Hanging out back for a nice set to roll in..
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Our friend had a water camera, sweet
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Norwegian Petter kicking arse.
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Nice place Santa Catalina. Property going cheap as well.

So I had a great time here. Lots of really nice people, there is no internet as well which makes for total relaxation, the shop didn’t even have milk! I had a small problem with sunburnt eyeballs, but that came right after a day with eye drops(shame could’ve got an eye patch).

Bgeeerk. Squaaky and me, me and squaaky, pluckin great.
Current Location : Taganga, Columbia

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