Sailing San Blas: Why We Quit Our Jobs and You Should TOO

Ever see a postcard with a perfect white sand beach lined with coconut palms? We found the islands where they take those pictures. They are called San Blas and they are just as the postcards promise.

After a week in Panama City hanging out in cafes and eating good food, we prepared to cross into Colombia and conquer a new continent. Unfortunately, you can't take a bus from Panama to Colombia, because not only is the Darien Gap (a region spanning the border between the two countries) some of the densest jungle in the world, it's also controlled in some areas by Guerilla Narco-Militias which isn't nearly as cool as it sounds.

You can fly to Columbia, but that's just not our style; we chose to sail. Numerous captains make the trip between Portobelo, Panama and Cartagena, Colombia, and we chose to go with Fabian and his 40 foot Catamaran the "African Queen," a beautiful boat.

The trip was absolutely mindblowing. It's a 6 day journey that takes you through the San Blas Islands on the way to Colombia. San Blas is a group of over 360 small, picture perfect islands. Some islands are nothing more than a patch of white sand and a single palm tree. Most of the islands, however, are inhabited by the Kuna Indians, a traditional people group who successfully lobbied the Panamanian government to maintain their own control over their territory. Since San Blas is an autonomous region controlled independently by the Kuna, they have been able to maintain their traditional way of life and restrict outsiders from buying up the islands.

While the Kuna have avoided cruise ships and mass tourism, they generously share their islands with groups like ours. We spent 4 glorious days skipping around San Blas. We hung out on perfect white sand beaches, snorkeled, and swam in the crystal clear water. Rich did backflips off the front of our boat and Kendra soaked up the sun. We both turned a reddish-brown color that offset our typical pasty-ness.

We ate fresh fish almost every single day, and when we say fresh, we mean eating within an hour of them being pulled out of the water. The Kuna ride around in hollowed-out-tree-trunk canoes selling fish they just caught to sailors. We also ate our fill of ludicrously cheap and fresh lobster and octopus. Several times we had the opportunity to eat in the homes of Kuna families, which are little more than stick walls and thatch roofs covering sandy floors.

As part of our sailing voyage, we met a great group of people from all over the world. Our motley crew of passengers were from the US, England, Scotland, Germany and South Africa. Our Colombian Captain, Fabian, was an amazing sailor (ever sailed solo across the Atlantic? Fabian has!)and his wife was an outstanding cook. We were surprised at each meal how she was able to outdo the last. Even the last evening's dinner of ribs did not disappoint. How many people have eaten ribs out in the middle of the Caribbean?

After being completely spoiled by our time in San Blas, we spent the final 40 hours sailing to Cartagena, a beautiful sail at open sea where we enjoyed sunsets and groups of 20+ dolphin leading the boat. The largest obstacles to overcome during our six days included mild cases of sunburn, being slightly salty, being too full from our lobster lunch to eat our fish dinner, and running low on rum rations. Not a bad life.

The sailing trip was by far the highlight of our five months, not only for all we have written above, but also for one other reason.....