We enjoyed San Jose, and walked around the city centre looking at the beautiful crafts and ate good cheap pizza. For the first time we saw paintings done on bird feathers, which seems to be everywhere for sale in Costa Rica. They really are pretty, but quite expensive, as it must be a fine art to paint it. Eventually, after 3 days in San Jose we got the long awaited visa for Panama, just in time, as we discovered items stolen from the bike in the hostel’s ‘secure’ locked garage on the third morning.. We were furious and confronted the hostel staff, as it seems that they never locked the gate that night. They just shoved up their shoulders and basically said that it is not their responsibility or problem. So we decided to leave the hostel and city immediately. We drove up the Irazu Volcano, a huge volcanic mountain where the roads leads up to the crater. We spent the night in cold weather at almost 3000m above sea level. The next morning it was cloudy and raining, and we could not see the crater, and drove all the way to the Panamanian border on the Caribbean Coast, in hopes to get out of Costa Rica.

 All day we drove in the rain and could not take any pictures of this beautiful part of the country. We arrived late afternoon, and were turned away by the border officials. They were just plain unfriendly, and not willing to let us through, due to some visa confusion on their side. We were told to come back the next day, with a ‘tip’ and then they ‘might’ be able to ‘fix’ the ‘problem’. The town was a dump, and everything was deep in the mud, and we did not want to spend a night there, so decided to rather drive to another border. It took us all night long to get to the main border on the Pan American highway. Most of the driving was in heavy rain, with poor visibility, but the concentration required kept us awake. At about 2 in the morning as we came over a clear and cloudless summit we could see the Southern Cross right in front of us. It was about 4-5 years ago when we saw it the last time, and it had a special meaning to us, almost like a home coming, we are almost back in the Southern Hemisphere. We arrived at the border by sunrise, and had to stand in a long queue full of bus tourists.

 There we met Martin, an American on his V-Strom. He told us that everything in the country (Panama) was closed for the week of Carnival, and freight companies will not be able to fly our bike to Colombia. That evening in David I checked the internet for an alternative way to Colombia, and came across the Stahlratte, a German boat that transports passengers and motorcycles between Panama and Colombia. It was quite a bit cheaper than flying, and we booked our place on this boat, a decision we will never regret, as it was a trip of a lifetime, but more about that later. For those who do not know, there are no roads between the two countries, it is thick jungle and is called the Darien Gap. Panama is in many ways American, the roads, the towns and even the money. We enjoyed our few days in Panama and briefly saw the biggest engineering marvel in the world, the Panama Canal.

In Panama City we stayed with a friend of Charmaine’s cousin, Jacx and Nigel, who have been living there for two years. Through Horizons Unlimited’s HUBB we met up with James, who was also booked on the Stahlratte voyage to Colombia. James is an American riding a 250 Honda down to Argentina. We met each other on the outskirts of town at 7 in the morning to ride out together to Carti. The road to Carti is notorious for being very rough, and I was not looking forward in doing it. Just before the turnoff from the main road, we ate our last meal in Panama and set off on the slippery (wet) muddy road. It was slow going and with extremely steep inclines over the mountains. The GS handled it very well, as there is no lack of power in the 1150cc motor, but traction was another thing with the smooth rear tire on the slippery mud. There was one river crossing that was not too bad, although a bit deep. The GS’s cylinder heads was under water for a short section, but she made it through without any problems. I’m starting to really like my GS again, as the problems it had in the USA is now in the distant past.

We arrived at the end of the road, and loaded the bikes into a wooden canoe, a scary thought by itself. It was clear that the local Kuna Indians have done this before, as they loaded the heavy bike into the rocking canoe like pros. It was a 5 to 10 min ride through the open water to get to the anchorage point of the Stahlratte. Ludwig (The captain) and his crew used a crane to load both bikes safely on the deck, and covered the bikes nicely. Again, it was clear that they have loaded and transported 100’s of bikes in the past. One of the crew members, Rolli from  Austria, looks and sound just like Arnold Swatzenegar. He also was on a major world tour with his BMW R100GS, and somehow ended up on the Stahlratte as part of the crew for the last two years. He told us all sorts of interesting stories about his travels in South America. The rest of the 16 passengers arrived the next day, and then we set sails to one of the uninhabited San Blass islands, where we anchored and spent the evening and had a BBQ on the beach. The next day we sailed to another group of Islands for the next night, and what a beautiful spot this was! It was a group of islands that is so close that you can swim across from one to the next. Bright clear turquoise water, white sand beach with bright green coconut trees was our background picture that evening. Our fellow passengers were a very nice group of people, mostly young backpackers from different European countries. The next morning we set sails again for our longest stretch of water across the depths of the Caribbean Sea. The swells were big and the boat was rocking a lot. Everybody except the crew was sick and laid flat on our backs for at least the first 10 hours. Half of us sort of recovered and could face some food later on while the rest only ate the next morning when we were close to land again. The captain and his crew were a jolly bunch and help made the journey very enjoyable. As we came into Cartagena, I started to worry again about the off loading process. Like with the loading, we transferred the bikes from the sail boat to a small rubberduck, motored about two minutes across the water to the dock and man handled the big GS off the rubberduck and up onto the wooden jetty. It was a huge relief for me when we were all loaded up and drove into town to the Hostel. South America is our 5^th continent and is the one we’ve been looking forward the most.