San Andrés with Bucher

The trip materialized almost literally overnight. Bucher came home tired, Belize-happy (rhymes with stir-crazy), overworked, and with a heavy schedule ahead. He announced that Monday was a holiday (The Queen’s Birthday) and we were going somewhere. Look up schedules. Make reservations. Don’t care where.

We have wanted to go to San Andrés for a long time. It is a small island (7 x 3.5 miles) off the coast of Nicaragua, belonging to Colombia. It was part of the Miskito Coast, settled by the British and administered by them for many years, along with Belize. About half the people are the same Black Caribs [Garifuna] as in Belize with old English names; many of them seafaring families. Although the official language is Spanish, of course, most of the Blacks are bilingual and speak an English barely discernible from Belizean English.

 

The trip was easy. We left early morning, spent two hours in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, and were in San Andrés at noon. I had cabled El Isleño, the only hotel I could find listed, for reservations and the cable arrived the day after we did—full rate. Fortunately our choice was a good one. There are other hotels now, but none seemed as happily situated as El Isleño.

It is on the main street, which runs along a wide white beach lined with tall coconut palms. The hotel is set back somewhat in graciously planted grounds, and each room has a private balcony overlooking the sea. The beach is public, of course, but was not crowded, and it was immaculately clean. We saw one bit of litter and that appeared to be a tin a child had been playing with, which was washing at the edge of the waves.

 

We were there two nights. Had a very restful time—swam, walked miles up and down the beach, walked for hours back and forth through the town, and hired a taxi for a drive around the island. (Incidentally, it developed that our taxi driver had been a sailor on a ship that Bucher was Belize agent for a couple of years ago.)

Our favorite pastime was people-watching from our balcony. There are more motorcycles than cars—mostly small Yamahas. Many of them are family vehicles—a smiling young man, pretty wife perched behind, and between the two helmeted heads, a baby or small child peering serenely around.

 

There is a ridge down the center of the island around 300 feet high. Starting at sea level, that gives a pleasantly hilly aspect. The foliage was typically tropical—endless palms, breadfruit, papaya, and heavy bushes of various types.

Most of the shore was heavily eroded rock beaten by waves, with no beach. Only at the northeast end of the island is there a reef and a pretty beach and it is there that the town has developed. There are tiny native huts and houses here and there around the island, a tiny settlement at a cove on the southwest and another at the extreme south tip.

 

By accident we found we had arrived on election day. Fortunately, Colombia is among the most democratically stable countries in South America, so it was exciting and colorful and happy.

By six o’clock Sunday morning, the taxis and motorcycles were out, flying red or blue pennants to advertise their party loyalty or decked with the Colombian flag. The cycles had pennants, too, and the cyclists were dressed totally or partly in the bright red or blue of the principal parties. It appeared that almost every car on the island was being used as a jitney to ferry voters to the polls. We saw them frequently stopping to collect or return people on our drive around the island.

During our late-afternoon walk around town, we found sidewalks and streets mobbed with supporters near what probably were party headquarters. I was not sure it was any place for us to be promenading, but as we got closer, it was obvious that the gatherings were excited and happy with lots of laughing and clowning. The army—which had patrolled rather casually through day—had one street cordoned off where, apparently, votes from various polling places were being compiled. We learned the next day that the expected candidate, Liberal López had been elected—the “red” party (color, not politics; López, according to the Miami Herald, is expected to be fairly conservative, continuing reforms and promoting private rather than government investment.)

 

The food at El Isleño was selected from an extensive and interesting menu, was served with a flourish by well-trained, attentive waiters, and was almost completely tasteless. However, the same description fits our Fort George Hotel here so we were disappointed but not unduly distressed. Most things were closed election day so we could not try an interesting-looking restaurant that we had found on our walks, but we did find a pizzeria that had excellent Italian food. We have learned that, when in doubt in this part of the world, try the Italian places—usually they are superb.

 

Money is pouring into San Andrés, most of it private capital we understand, and the “new town” is a forest of newly finished or half-built concrete-block construction. The “new town” is shop after shop after shop, all carrying the same gleaming imported goods. The “old town” resembles a latinized Belize, partly shabby adobe-type construction and partly old frame two-story Colonial buildings with verandas across the front. The old town strings along the water front on both sides of the harbor. The new one branches out from the beach.

We felt that the Colombian government had been quite imaginative and pragmatic in the development of this little “forgotten” island. First, they made it a free port—but not all that free, according to our taxi driver, who said that there still is some duty on imported goods. There are a few gringo tourists and some of miscellaneous other nationalities, but the island’s main business is mainland Colombians. They swarm over to San Andrés, since it is Colombian territory, and load up on low-cost electrical appliances, TV sets, linens, French perfumes, imported clothes—spend their money in the shops, hotels, and government-operated casinos as tourists—and then can take their loot back home without paying the much higher duty that the same things would carry if bought there.

 

I learned one interesting and useful lesson. Bifocal-ed elderly types should order their priorities when strolling and should decide whether to look in the shop windows or to watch for potholes in the sidewalks. I ended up on my knees, apparently praying to a GE steam iron. Bucher and a gracious passing gentleman hauled me erect and propped me up until the stars disappeared and I decided that nothing was broken. The ankle was swollen and sore but I found that I could walk—carefully—as much as I liked.

 

Because of plane schedules, we had to overnight in Tegucigalpa on our return. We insisted on staying in centrally located Hotel Prado, which was the best hotel on our previous visits. We should know by now how quickly hotels die in this part of the world. Our favorites in Mérida, Guatemala, and Cayman were disappointments on repeat visits. However, we avoid the towering chrome-and-concrete monsters being erected on the edges of Central American cities.

Had our usual prowl through town, the market, the Cathedral (Colonial and with the magnificent, intricately golden nave wall). Our favorite restaurant (Italian, what else?) was closed Mondays so we had dinner in the hotel, which we remembered as being quite good.

We ordered shrimp cocktail and lobster thermidor and Bucher decided that a small bottle of wine would be in order. White wine? None. This was faintly ominous since the menu specifically described it in the thermidor. Rosé? Let’s see. Long wait. Oh, yes, rosé was available but not by the bottle. He would serve it and we would pay for just what we drank. Again, faintly ominous.

Came the shrimp. Lovely. Came the wine—somewhat muddy-appearing, in heavy glass tumblers that no self-respecting gas station would have given away in the Olden Days.

So we sipped. Can you imagine any one thing more calculated to take the glamour out of foreign travel than a bit of communion wine with dinner? This was well-watered red wine with the faintly vinegar-y taste that was first known with awe after confirmation forty years ego.

We laughed our way through dinner over the incongruity—and managed to avoid demanding the rest the bottle. As for the lobster thermidor—the lobster was nice and the “thermidor” elegant—if you happen to prefer your lobster in Fanny Farmer’s basic white sauce.

The next day we found our Italian restaurant open and obviously even better established than on previous visits. The plain tables with red-checked tablecloths are the same but the walls have been paneled and are hung with Honduran scenes painted by three or four different artists—all of them good, and the food is as beautifully prepared as we had remembered.

 

Bucher has devised what he thinks is a perfect system to cope with the threat of wifely shopping during travel. He doesn’t realize that the framework of his scheme is highly visible.

On our first exploring of a city, we stop and investigate any and all shops carrying native crafts. But of course one doesn’t want to buy anything before comparing prices and making sure that one has found the best selection.

On the next walk we turn corners suddenly or go out through arcades to streets we seem to have missed on the first walk. Then there’s the discussion over coffee, probably on the final morning. Yes, we really do want whatever-it-is. But how will we carry it? Where will we put it? How will we mail it? Are we talking about buying just for the sake of buying? And anyway, we’ll be back in a few weeks when all those questions will have evaporated.

And our final stroll through town again magically winds past shoe stores and hardwares, doctors’ offices, and shuttered residences. The next craft shop is the one at the airport—and everyone knows that that’s the worst place to do that sort of shopping.

On this particular trip we found nothing Colombian of interest in San Andrés (the one time we passed the only junky little shop). I was dead set on buying a Honduran lamp base, beautifully carved and (to me) very handsome. Bucher got me on the where-will-we-put-it. It is either too large or too small for any location I could think of. However, he only thinks I’ve given up on that one. All I have to do now is manufacture a place where that lamp is the only possible thing to use.