Sailing from Panama to Colombia

When traveling south from Panama to Colombia, you must choose a method to get past the Darian Gap.

If you are driving and need to ship your vehicle, you simply need to send an email to Tea Kalmbach @ tea.kalmbach@gmail.com.  She is incredibly helpful, friendly & quick to respond.  She will also find a shipping partner for you to share a container with.  It will cost you around $1200 to share a container with another vehicle.

Per Wikipedia, "The Darién Gap is a break in the Pan-American Highway consisting of a large swath of undeveloped swampland and forest within Panama's Darién Province in Central America and the northern portion of Colombia's Chocó Department of South America.  It measures just over 160 km (99 mi) long and about 50 km (31 mi) wide."

Though people have successfully crossed through the gap by foot & vehicle, it's not something you just do.  If interested, here's a crazy story of 2 Range Rovers making it through this intense jungle in 1972:

http://www.range-rover-classic.com

Us more sane people must choose another method of travel:

1. Take a flight - unexpectedly expensive, other travelers I met paying in the ballpark of $330-$380 for one-way from Panama City to Cartagena or Bogota.

2. Take a speed boat or ride in a shipping container - one of the cheaper options I heard, more in the ballpark of $50- $100.  If you get dropped off right at the border, you will have to take another boat to make your way past the Darien Gap.  I never met anyone who actually did this but have spoken to travelers who tell me it's possible.

3. Take a speed boat with a stop in the San Blas Islands (4 days; 3 nights total).  The company is San Blas Adventures ( http://sanblasadventures.com) and you sleep on the islands in hammocks at night.  Please note with this option you are dropped right at the Panama/Colombia border and walk into Colombia.  You then say at a hostel the owner of the company runs on the Colombian side that night.  Price was $350 but you then have to take another boat and buses to get to Cartagena or the other main cities, which could run another $80-100 in costs plus a few days travel.

4. Take a ferry - I finally heard of a ferry actually running while I was in Panama City.  It's $250/person & takes 24 hours.  You can take bicycles, motorcycles & cars on this ferry as well.  All the info can be found at www.sanblasferry.com.

5. Take a chartered sailboat - A more expensive option with most charging $550 for 5 days/4 nights (food included) though a few were $500 or $530.  The plus to this option is that you get to spend a few days in the San Blas Islands of Panama and all food/accommodation is included.  (You can get it cheaper if you contact the captain of the boat directly!  See below!)

I went with option 5 because I wanted to experience sailing on the open sea and visit the incredible San Blas Islands (Kuna Yala).  Now, choosing this option opens brings up another big question - which boat?

I was given a binder of 30+ sailboats when I asked the owner of my hostel for a recommendation.  While hanging in Panama City, I heard stories of boats sinking, some captain getting drunk while sailing, some boats with great food, some with dorm-style beds, others with private rooms.  You ask everyone - but which is the BEST???  You can find a few reviews from past travelers, but there is no one stop shop website to make this decision.

By recommendation of my hostel (Villa Vento Surf Hostel), I ended up emailing a girl named Stef, owner of I Travel By Boat (Estefanía Gamarra, www.itravelbyboat.com
+507 6088-4815) in Panama City, Panama who provided me a calendar of all the boats leaving Panama that month:

Sailboat schedule from October & November 2013

The way it works for Stef as an "agent" is that she gets $50 of the $550 you pay (Some agents take $100 of the $550).  PLEASE NOTE YOU CAN SAVE MONEY BY EMAILING THE CAPTAIN DIRECTLY.  MY CAPTAIN SAID HE WOULD HAVE DONE IT FOR $450 IF I EMAILED HIM DIRECTLY (SEE BELOW FOR HIS CONTACT INFO)  I asked her what boats she recommended leaving in the next few days.  Here was her email response:

"Hey!  Swala on the 28th is a great catamaran.  French captain Bernard is super experienced and is a really really nice guy. He has endless stories of the many lives he's lived all over the world.  He departs from Portobelo and the trip costs $550. He'll take up to 10 guests. It costs $5 to get to Portobelo by bus.

On the 29th you have Corto sailboat, I also like it a lot because the captain is young (27) and super nice. He has his dog onboard and the ambiance is always cool and chill.  His boat is a monohull and he takes 8 guests. He charges $550 and departs from El Porvenir which costs $47 to get to.

These are my two best recommendations for departures before the 30th!!"

I went with Swala and had a phenomenal experience.  There were only 5 passengers so we each had our own bedroom, which is unheard of on these sailboats since most have 8-15 passengers.  You can contact the captain of my boat, Bernard, through his website:

http://panamasailingcharter.com

Or by searching "SWALA sailing" on Facebook.

For more information and pictures of the sailing trip, please visit the San Blas sailing on my blog, coming soon...