Isla Contadora is one of the many islands of the
archipelago of the Perlas Islands in Panama. Contadora was said to be used by
the Spanish conquistadors, hence the name, as a stop for taking inventory of
booty prior to returning to Spain. It’s mainly a tourist island now with small
hotels and BB’s while the workers live on the adjacent Saboga Island with a population of 253. Small Island, when you leave your house in your car or golf cart you can pretty much drive around the island in 5 mintues.
Las Perlas are also famous for the beautiful pearls that
were found here but that is all gone.
It’s the cutest island and so clean they pick up trash
every morning at 9. A few parrots can be heard early morning and before
sundown, deer roam the whole island and the nieques also called agouti are a
nuisance. Werner had asked us to bring a BB-gun as they eat his spinach. Sid’s
been having fun shooting them in the butt. No worries it does not injure them
just gives them a butt burn. They are amazing and still come in, outsmarting
Sid, now he gets more and more challenged and more frustrated with them. After
all they are steeling the mangoes. I am having a blast watching him chasing and
stocking them.
Werner practicing with his new toy
Funny, Giny hated to leave as she was going to miss the
mangoes, they are late this year. I don’t know what she did to them but they
could not wait for her to leave when they started dropping, I don’t even think
they were on the Ferry, Panama City bound yet LOL. Ever since they left Sid
picked up 2 to 3 dozen per day for over one months. Freezer is full and mangos
are coming out of our ears. Made a Mango Mousse, delish, Mango Pie, Mango
Chutney and lots of yummy Mango Margaritas yum (my favorite).
I was taking care of 3 beautiful cats, Elisabeth, Browny
and Kitty are the house cats. Kitty is shy and only Giny is allowed to pet
here, she wished me luck to be able to pet her at all, she bet that the
Agouti’s will sit in my lap before I can pet her. Second day in the house Kitty
was all mine. Browny is the independent one and is good in training us to open
and close the front and back door for him, rarely does he walk around the house
to get back in and what a schmoozer he is. But Elisabeth OMG his blue and
little cross-eyed eyes make you melt when he looks at you. Yes it’s a he not a
she. When Browny and Kitty arrived as kittens (they are all stray cats) he took
them in like he is the mother and earned his name. He is still their mama and
he loves to cuddle at any time of the day and can’t get enough. This morning he
pat my face with his paw and every time I took my hand away he would grab it,
like dogs do. Too cute. There is 2 more cats I have to feed. Some neighbors
down the road, had a medical emergency and are since over 3 years in the US to
get well and Giny feeds the poor lonely cats, now my job. To which I have to
add, the first time Giny took me there the cats were skittish and shy of me so I
stepped back so they were less threatened at the same time I backed up in a
thick golden orb spider web and screamed of the top of my lung, all I saw was
the cats 1 foot up in the air their legs spinning like a cartoon and gone they
were. Although Giny didn’t jump one foot high but I got her attention as well
while I am running around like nuts getting the web off of me, yikes. I hate
spiders, rather have snakes. Needless to say the cats in the week I fed them
with Giny didn’t want anything to do with me, now that I have been feeding them
while she is gone they can’t wait till I come to feed them.
A great hunter
Rare moment
Kitty with Mama Elisabeth.
Always together day and night except when he needs some cuddle time
But dose come and get his cuddle time in with me
He has the funniest poses
My love Browny, spends a lot of time following me
Slowly we melted into the CLOD
life (Cruiser’s Living On Dirt). Funny before Werner left, he and Sid watched
a cooking show on TV. So the second evening in the house alone Sid said he was
going to cook dinner, wow, I almost fell of the chair and OMG the dinner was
sooooooo yummy.
BBQ/smocked
Yummy, I think I want a TV on the boat!!!!
We also are getting to know Giny and Werner’s friends. Ilene and Adrienne. Both are in
the tourism business. Ilene asked me if I would be her snorkel buddy as she
mostly has to go alone. We had so much fun and I found several things for her
like turtles, white tip shark under a coral, a big clam the size of my hand
(man did it make a great appetizer for Sid and I, lots of meat in it), she
offered me to do snorkel trips for her for the Spanish speaking folks as her
Spanish is very poor.
Then she invited me to go along a whale watching tour to
help her translate and told me right off the bat that from now on when she has
Spanish speaking tourists she will let me do the whale watching tour. I had no
idea what to expect but I am still in ahhhh and ohhhh over what I experience
that day.
Bartholome island, with a beautiful beach but only at low tide, beach disappears at high tide
Contadora in background
If you look close you can see a whale wash
Blue footed boobies
2 whales
2 weeks into our house sitting Jim and Melania came for a
weekend.
It was funny day one at 4 we took them to the beautiful
beach and had just enough time to pose for a photo when it started to rain and
lightning bolts hit close by.
Rain coming
So we did another attempt for the beach the
following day, this time we were able to enjoy the water as well. There was a
minute shore break but was too rough for Melania with her bad knee so she
elegantly walked on all four out of the water onto the beach LOL.
We had a wonderful time with them but time went to fast
and before we knew it the weekend was over and they were back on the ferry
returning to Panama City. I think they enjoyed it as well.
South side of Contadora from runway
Playa Larga, the biggest beach on the island
Not safe to anchor especially in an Easterly
Souvenir store next to Icea Cream/Coffee Shop next to Dive/Fishing Shop
I have to add when we were in Contadora on our boat
before we knew we were house sitting so we made plans for them to come over stay
in a hotel and Melania wanted to know what the better way was to get here Ferry
or Plane. She is deadly afraid of Ferry rides so told her the ferry is
definitely more economical and did send her a photo of a plane that just flew
in. they are small plains so I sent her the following 2 photos.
After seeing photo 2 she wrote: OMG did the passengers
survive. I laughed so hard and wrote her back that it was not a crash but that
is where the runway is. They decided to come by Ferry LOL
A couple months later one passenger plane managed to run off the runway
Luckily the brand new truck was in the way to stop the plane to run off the road down to the beach
Originally the plan was for Jim, Melania and Ida with
sister to come, Anita joined the group, but it fell through. Anita made it 2
weeks after Melania’s visit, she came for a few days but ended up staying 11
days.
Before Anita arrived I told
Adrienne that she was a teacher at the Canal Zone and since Adrienne has been
here over 20 years she said, I bet we have a lot of friends in common. She came
to the airport to greet Anita. Of course I invited Adrienne for dinner and
these two girls had a blast and sure enough they know all the same
people. Small world.
The next afternoon we met Adrienne for a swim, cocktail, bubbly time on the beach.
Happens that one of Adrienne's
friend showed up on his fishing boat and so she came by the house at 6:30 we
needed to go with her to meet her friends for a sunset cruise on his boat. The
surprise was that Tim and his buddy both were ex-students of Anita.
Look at the grouper Tim caught, we got a huge chunk out of it
Great reunion
Ilene needed to check out the jungle trail on Saboga
Island for the cruise ship that are coming in December until March so we
combined a whale watching tour with a tour on Saboga island and jungle trail.
Saboga is quite a bit bigger than Contadora and has a
fairly big size village, 2 bars (lacking on Contadora), a church and several
stores but they didn’t look any better than on Contadora. The jungle walk,
well, from all the jungle walks we have under our belt from a 1 to 10, it’s
about a 1. Not much to see, definitely no jungle just a normal forest, but the
beach at trails end is amazing.
Saboga Island
Steep steps up to the village
We made it
Spectacular view over to Contadora
Interesting papaya tree, they usually only have 1 trunk
1 of the 2 bars where the ladies are standing
"jungle" trail
Alex our guide
Abandoned properties
Resort only open from November to April, French owned
Owners have 7 Salty German Shepherds
another beautiful Saboga Beach
Back at Executiva our swim beach
Whatever you do don’t want to get the flu, we did and we
both were sick for 2 weeks and a persistent cough lingered after week 4. I was
getting better but Sid was not. So took him to the small clinic here. La
Doctora did tell us it takes more than 4 weeks to get read of cough. She did
ask if he had a fever, he answered on and off but without a thermometer it’s
hard to tell. So she checked it for him but also listened to his lungs and said
that he needed to go on Antibiotics his lungs were full of mucus.
Nasty stuff I tell you and it does not help both being
sick. Seemed like everybody on the island got it and the maid Marta’s mom ended
in hospital in Panama City for 4 weeks with a bad pneumonia. Marta said the
hospitals in Panama City were full with flu patient. Just 3 days before we got
the flu they offered free flu shots here, we declined, probably a good thing as
it takes 2 weeks to work, could have made it worse.
I
suggest to Giny while in the States to get the flu shot, as everybody here is
sick. So they did, good thing, that’s when I found out it takes 2 weeks for the
shot to work, so they extended their stay for another 2 weeks.
In the mean time we have been on this incredible island
for over 3 months and still absolutely love it. The house is cozy and feels
like home. The view from the patio shows part of the ocean through the trees
and a couple times I got lucky to see whales swim close to the beach. I
thoroughly enjoyed watching 3 deer walk below the patio within 5 minutes of
each other. The first female saw me and took off but stopped further down so I
watched it eat. The second female saw me as well but didn’t shy away. The buck
OMG he was awesome I could here him talk to the females and never saw me until
he was in the field when he did he had big eyes.
One morning after leaving the bedroom this horrible odor
had taken over the house. First I thought it was the propane leaking but stove
was turned off. Sid made some coffee while I fed the cats and as I walked to
the TV room to watch news while I enjoy the coffee I asked Sid if he smells
what I smell. His smeller is not working at all so he said no but pointed at
the box on the inside of the patio door and said, did you put that there? I
spend all afternoon and evening catching up on the computer so never entered
the TV room. Sid said it had been there since after he got up after his nap in
afternoon. He is still recuperating from the flue. Okis, I opened the blue Clorox
box and instead of 2 clorox bottles there was a black garbage bag in it. First
of all when I opened box, dozens of flies escaped and the odor intensified
yuck. When I opened the bag I saw a fish eye popped out from its socket staring at
me. I brought the box right away outside to the far end of the patio where vulture
were already waiting, must have smelled it all night long. I pulled the fish
out and tossed it to the birds. All it was was a 3 foot carcass of a nice size
grouper head attached. Guess someone wanted me to make some fish stock. The living
room floor had a sticky blood puddle stinking to high heaven. It took a while
to get the smell out of the house but nothing boiling vinegar can’t do. Now the
question who brought me this present. Adrienne and Ilene both said OMG as it
wasn’t them. I had a hunch that it was Richard a local toothless, local. And
yes it was him.
Adrianne’s 2 brothers and sister in law came for a week and
the party started. First day one of her brother’s BD was celebrated on the
beach. Ilene had us all over for a bacon wrapped chicken leg BBQ, she had been graving for ever since she saw our photos. Since we had the flue it just never happened, so perfect timing.
Susane
Sid teaching Ilene
Plus wings and Terrie's wonderful potato pockets
5 days
later on the 6th of October we celebrated Adrienne’s BD. She organized a lancha that took us to Isla Chapira which
is the island south of us. We had a great time swimming in the crystal clear
water, snorkeling. One of her friends brought a jet ski that can do 80 miles an
hour. All the girls got a ride with him, that was sooooo much fun. The boys set
up a BBQ pit and all day something else was put on the grill, from fish to
sausages to fillet to pork ribs. It was fun.
Boys are working on the fire pit
Mogo Mogo Island on other side
The Birthday Girls
Her 2 brothers and sister in law, fun group
The party didn’t end there, Jessy the guy with the jet ski, him and his girlfriend are house sitting a mansion so we had Jacuzzi time by sunset overlooking the beautiful beach, Saboga island and I couldn’t believe we could see Taboga island and the Skyline of Panama City, it was that clear of a day.
another incredible house
Since Ginny and Werner
extended their US trip another 3 weeks I decided I needed to go to Panama City
for a shopping trip. I had provisioned for 2 months but we are starting to run
out of a lot of stuff, food, coffee, milk and toilet paper and paper towels.
Since I just wanted to spend one night in town I decided to take the 9 am
flight to Albrook that would give me plenty of time to do all the shopping and
return the next morning on the Ferry. Well, we both thought it was a good idea
at same time to check on the boat. So I made reservations for 2 nights and
rented a car to drive out to San Carlos.
It was a little breezy
when the plane took off, it was full too and as I was the first on the little
12 passenger plane I grabbed the last seat on the left, seat wasn’t as comfy
looking as the others but you had to squeeze by them plus my seat had lots of
leg room. Left the sun was on the right would have been very hot on the no
air-conditioned plane. I made a good choice, due to the high winds, the
approach to Panama City was perfect for my seat, but see for yourself.
The approach to the
Airport was rough and many fearful screams were heard on the plane, I loved it.
By the way with my
jubilado discount the flight cost me 59 bucks, not bad, Ferry is 39 one way.
Saboga
Casco Viejo and Panama Canal
Man made island like in Dubai
Punta Patilla
Paitilla and Balboa Avenue
Hard Rock Cafe the biggest building
You can see the Panama Canal
I headed straight to
Sixt where my car was waiting for me. They have been absolutely the best and as
a preferred customer I can keep the car the following day, no time. Perfect I
drove straight to San Carlos which is a 2 hour drive. What a beautiful and crystal
clear day this was, the scenery was incredible.
I had a full day of
shopping the following day and brought the car back by 3. Was going to go to
the Albrook Mall but was too exhausted so packed all the goodies up then headed
to the Vietnamese Restaurant next door and spoiled myself to a nice dinner and
went to bed.
Had to get up early for
the 7.30 Ferry back to Contadora.
Vietnamese Beef Soup, incredible flavor
Mustard greens with Mushroom, out of this world
Yes I know shopping is a tough business, I am sure Sid is very happy not having to go into town LOL.
Ming Xao, was good but had better
A Lufthansa Stewardess
sat next to me and was chatting excitedly with me that she was going to
Contadora. As we left she said she was hoping not to get seasick. Well she did.
I happened to have s ziplock in my bag and squeezed it into her hand as she was
fighting her stomach. I have never seen smile bigger than this on a seasick
person. She eventually used it and off the boat she thanked me a thousand time,
poor girls. It was a rough trip to Contadora.
We thoroughly enjoyed
our CLOD life on Isla Contadora and I think one of the reasons subconsciously
is. no matter where you go in Panama, the streets are littered, when
you drive behind a car or bus trash is being thrown out of the windows, even
dirty diapers, yes we know they are disposable but not through the car window.
The beaches are littered with plastic and Styrofoam, the roads are in bad
shape. Coming to Contadora is like going to Switzerland where you
never see trash on the ground. Every house and every corner you find a trash
can here in Contadora and every day the trash truck stops at every can and
empties it, there is no bad trash smell nor any road littered with just the
tiniest thing. The houses are beautiful like you walk through Bellaire and the
beaches are clean, thanks to Adrienne walking the beaches every morning picking
up trash. After 20 years traveling in third world countries this is the first
place it feels like being back in civilization. Contadora’s houses also belong
to the wealthiest of Panamanians and they do make sure it stays clean.
Ginny and Werner finally
came back and we had a fun 4 days with them before we returned to Paradise in
San Carlos.
It’s been way over a
months again on the boat with lots of projects and bustling to head back to
Isla Contadora. It was a fun time in the marina but you will have to wait for
this story in the next Blog.
Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We will see you the next year with our new post. Cheers!
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