Christmas in Curaçao, New Year in Aruba.
Wednesday 11 th January, Banedup Island, Holland Keys, Comarca de Guna Yala, Panama. Having been in the Dutch Caribbean since arriving in Statia last May (Statia-Sint Maarten-Curaçao-Aruba) Gráinne has finally escaped to Panama only to find herself anchored at the Holland Keys! Even though we're still technically in the Caribbean we have clearly arrived in Central America. After months of busy civilisation we're in a quiet anchorage among barely inhabited islands (a handful of local families, or maybe just one big family, who are running a couple of extremely low-key tourist businesses) with only the sound of the surf breaking on the reef and a couple of unusual bird-calls to break the peaceful silence. The Comarca de Guna Yala is an autonomously governed region of Panama belonging to the Guna Indian people who maintain an insular and fairly traditional lifestyle despite their forays into the world of tourism. But more of that later, first let's continue the updating.