After 6 wonderful days in the Coco Bandero Cays, we pulled up the anchor at 2:30 p.m. Sunday, October 12, and headed toward Cartagena, Colombia, about 200 miles away. Our stay in the San Blas had been very enjoyable with many pleasant anchorages and surprisingly good weather for this time of year, having had only brief afternoon showers on most days. It would have been quite easy to linger longer in the San Blas, but this was the perfect time to head to Cartagena before the trade winds started to set in again in November. During our two-night passage to Cartagena we had lots of squalls and sloppy seas the first half and clear skies and calm seas the second half. As there was generally little wind, we sailed only 4 hours with the remainder of the time motoring or motorsailing depending upon the conditions.
We arrived at the sea buoy off the Boca Chica entrance to Cartagena Bay at 6 a.m., Tuesday, October 14, just behind a cruise ship entering the bay. The Colombian harbor patrol boat came out to meet us and to check us in with Port Control. Two hours later we anchored off Club Nautico, two miles from the center of town. We'll be in Cartagena for a month before pushing off for Florida around November 15. |
