A Zoologist Abroad: A Weekend in San Blas

6/5/12

We have not had the best of starts to our fieldwork and due to an unfortunate series of events its been a tough few weeks.

As it was also Tibo's last weekend in Panama and a good "cheer me up" for the rest of us we had a well deserved weekend off work and went to do a little exploring of Panama.

So extremely early on Saturday morning Solenn, Tibo, Roberto (Sol's flatmate) and I headed off to the Comarca de Kuna Yala.

This area of the country is home of the native Kuna people. They are a very traditional and indigenous group who live in the Archipielagos de San Blas. They are believed to have lived in this area of Panama for nearly 200 years. They are have a lot of respect for nature and rely on the rich sea food of the Caribbean (even their traditional currency is coconuts!)

If you want to image the Archipielagos close your eyes and envisage hundreds of palm cover islands floating peacefully in the beautiful Caribbean or alternatively look at this picture.

In theory you could spend the whole year simply sailing from one island to another as there are over 360 to choose from. We decided to stay on Robinson Island for the evening. In total 4 families live on this island and they have a number of tourists who can stay with them every day. The Kuna are not under control of the Panamanian government and instead the each island a number of chiefs.

We also went on a boat tour of some neighbouring islands and got to dome some snorkelling over the reefs that surround the islands.