night we went to sleep with the uncanny, deep call of howler monkeys in the
jungle.
It's hot and humid and we've copped the rainy season with showers and
heavy downpours on and off all the time. We had cockpit covers made in St Martin
and are so glad we did, but we always new they'd be an improvement, not
perfection. With the mizzen mast coming down into the cockpit there is no way to
get a perfect seal, but at least we can sleep in the cockpit where it's cooler
and just zip everything closed when the rain comes.
Last night we had a huge thunderstorm with massive lightning and thunder
ripping overhead. It's interesting because sometimes you can hear the rain
approaching by the sound of the downpour on the jungle, often accompanied by the
protesting calls of the howler monkeys. Fortunately the rain tends to be in
short bursts because we'd die of the heat if we had to stay closed up all the time.
Portobelo was an important harbour and the Spanish used it as a hub to
consolidate all their plundered gold and silver etc before loading up fleets of
galleons to ship it back to Spain. From the mid 1500s for the next 150 years 45
fleets of galleons left from here, each with cargos worth 30 million pesos or more. To
give you an idea of how much that would have been worth, Henry Morgan with 450
of his pirates captured Portobelo and demanded 100,000 pesos NOT to kill the
entire population, so 100,000 would have been a vast amount.
This area was a magnet to pirates, and of course Francis Drake, the good guy.
It seems the Spanish felt it was ok to plunder gold and silver off the local
populations, but somehow wrong for anyone to take it off them! Of course the
Spanish had God on their side so it was ok, the Vatican told them so. Today the
Spanish have no gold, and the Vatican has... makes you think.
Knowing a bit of that history I figured there would be an active town and
harbour here. Coming in I called Portobelo Radio on 4 different call up
frequencies ... nothing! We motored in and found there is no harbour, not even a
quay, just a couple of dinghy docks. So we anchored near a bunch of other boats,
most very run down but a few obviously cruisers, and went ashore to clear
customs.
It didn't happen. She couldn't speak english and through a random passer by
told us to come back tomorrow because she was going home!
We took a walk around the town. It's so 3rd world that Sandy was in complete
shock. I felt like I was back in the Transkei. We found a Chinese 'supermarket'
and bought a sim card with instructions in Spanish, so we've got no idea how
long our $7.50 investment will last.
There are a number of old forts, ruins on each side of the bay and one on the
water right in the town. It even has the original old cannon in most of the
battlements, but just the barrels. The carriages would have rotted away
centuries ago. The tide is so small here, less than a foot, that most of the
cannon are just above water level and could have torn out the waterline of any
ship in the bay.
The fort walls were so low that I could picture an assault, soldiers charging
forward with a pistol in one hand and a milk crate in the other to scale the
walls.
The biggest building in the place is the church and it houses the famous
Black Christ. There are so many legends and myths about it the best I can do is
suggest you google it. It is quite impressive and every year there is a massive
pilgrimage to Portobelo. They have a 5 hour parade with 80 men carrying the black
Christ. You can walk around Portobelo in 20 minutes!
Apparently they march to music and literally take 3 steps forward and 2
steps back, with some kind of hop or jig action, and are exhausted at the end of
it. I guess that's how you have a 5 hour parade in Portobelo.
We found a sign up to Captain Jack's and made our way up the hill. It really
is the only place in town as far as we can see. It's basically a backpacker hostel
and has a big open communal area where you can get something to drink, chat,
have a burger, do laundry downstairs and has free wifi.
We spent a few hours there checking mail etc, and Jeff behind the bar got
Sandy's smartphone working with the sim card. So we can phone and have it working
as boat wifi too.
Before we left Chesapeake Bay a young guy, Trevor, came by the boat and we
had a bit of a chat. He and Gwen were planning to leave for the Caribbean last
November and it looked like we might be leaving together.
Imagine our surprise when we were pulling into a tiny dinghy dock behind a
couple, and to find it was Trevor and Gwen. They had left in November and gone
to the Bahamas and Jamaica, then they sailed here to the San Blas Islands and
just called into Portobelo a few days before we got here.
It's a small world.
Until next time...