Panama to Cartegena
In the morning we grab an Uber driver to take us to the Airport, again Uber is proving to be a great service. Today however we did have one glitch, the Uber driver was pulled over by traffic guards for being in the wrong lane. The Driver then proceeds to try and argue his way out of a fine. After fifteen minutes of this arguing I get out of the cab and tell the driver we need to get going,he takes the hint and finally pays the fine.
At the airport Peter and myself are split up while Peter jumps through hoops to clear us through immigration and customs to get us airside. Even though the helicopter has been sitting covered at the airport for the last five days, customs say that they want to inspect it again prior to our departure and request us to move it. Luckily we manage to convince them of there folly and avoid an expensive start and shut down.
Paperwork covered, helicopter prepped and convenient wall found we set of south to Cartegena, Colombia. On our departure we follow the canal to the Caribbean Sea avoiding wispy clouds along the way. As we coast out on the long sea journey the weather improves.
As we approach Cartegena the city quickly appears through the mist / sea haze and reminds me of the emerald city from the wizard of oz; of course it wasn't emerald but it was larger than I expected. As we approach to land we spot a kite very close to the airport, then Peter make a sudden and sharp bank to the right which startled me. Peter had spotted a second kite. That was a very near miss, but miss is a miss.
We had arranged handling in Cartegena and requested that we get a quick turnaround for our flight to Barrancamber Mejer. As usual with handlers things did not go as planned. This time they appeared to be using the wrong permit number when filing our flight plan and thus the flight plan was not being accepted by the system.
While we try to sort out the problem we talk with local pilots inorder to get the skinny on our route to Neiva. A nice gentleman named Jimmy informs us about a restricted area inside the valley, but tells us that there is enough room along the side to avoid any flight over the 14,000 ft mountains on either side. He also warns us of some bad weather on route to Barrancamber. We decide that with the delay due to permit issues and the ad weather that we will cancel our second flight of the day and make an early start tomorrow morning instead.
So Eddie books us into a "hotel". As with most hotels we have had this trip this is not a place that I will be returning to again. It was OK, but had no facilities and the corridors were warmer than a sauna. After our usual 45 min we head out to dinner at a meat restaurant and grab some breakfast yogurts at the local supermarket. At the supermarket we have to exchange some money with some locals since the supermarket would not take dollars or accept foreign credit cards.
Since we have a super early start in the morning we head of the bed early.
At the airport Peter and myself are split up while Peter jumps through hoops to clear us through immigration and customs to get us airside. Even though the helicopter has been sitting covered at the airport for the last five days, customs say that they want to inspect it again prior to our departure and request us to move it. Luckily we manage to convince them of there folly and avoid an expensive start and shut down.
Paperwork covered, helicopter prepped and convenient wall found we set of south to Cartegena, Colombia. On our departure we follow the canal to the Caribbean Sea avoiding wispy clouds along the way. As we coast out on the long sea journey the weather improves.
As we approach Cartegena the city quickly appears through the mist / sea haze and reminds me of the emerald city from the wizard of oz; of course it wasn't emerald but it was larger than I expected. As we approach to land we spot a kite very close to the airport, then Peter make a sudden and sharp bank to the right which startled me. Peter had spotted a second kite. That was a very near miss, but miss is a miss.
We had arranged handling in Cartegena and requested that we get a quick turnaround for our flight to Barrancamber Mejer. As usual with handlers things did not go as planned. This time they appeared to be using the wrong permit number when filing our flight plan and thus the flight plan was not being accepted by the system.
While we try to sort out the problem we talk with local pilots inorder to get the skinny on our route to Neiva. A nice gentleman named Jimmy informs us about a restricted area inside the valley, but tells us that there is enough room along the side to avoid any flight over the 14,000 ft mountains on either side. He also warns us of some bad weather on route to Barrancamber. We decide that with the delay due to permit issues and the ad weather that we will cancel our second flight of the day and make an early start tomorrow morning instead.
So Eddie books us into a "hotel". As with most hotels we have had this trip this is not a place that I will be returning to again. It was OK, but had no facilities and the corridors were warmer than a sauna. After our usual 45 min we head out to dinner at a meat restaurant and grab some breakfast yogurts at the local supermarket. At the supermarket we have to exchange some money with some locals since the supermarket would not take dollars or accept foreign credit cards.
Since we have a super early start in the morning we head of the bed early.
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