San Andrés - A dream island in the middle of the Caribbean Sea.

After our exhausting jungle adventure, we decided to head towards the Caribbean coast as quickly as possible. Since our friend Marcus is currently on vacation in Colombia and is currently on the Caribbean island of San Andrés, we decided to book a flight to the island to accompany him on his journey. The flight went from Leticia to Bogota directly to San Andrés. The island is located 800km from the Colombian mainland and 150km from the coast of Nicaragua. A dream island like something out of a fairy tale. The first impression from the plane confirmed this impression. The water turquoise blue, the beaches almost white. Upon arrival at the airport, we took a taxi to the hostel. The taxi driver had an impressive collection of dinosaurs on the dashboard and seemed to have African roots based on his clothing style. He was super cool and safely took us to the hostel. Upon arrival at the hostel, there was a lot of activity and the reception seemed to struggle with the rush. After about half an hour of back and forth, we finally got our rooms. We thought that next time we will book the rooms online to avoid this chaos. After that, Marius contacted Marcus. We agreed on a meeting point and then went to the beach together to end the evening with a beer or two. The beach lived up to its promise. It was white and incredibly fine. I have never seen finer sand in my life. The couple of beers turned into a few more and before we knew it, we were in one of the clubs in the city. The music was good and invited us to dance. We partied until the lights came on and when we were kicked out, we went to the beach with a few other vacationers/backpackers and sat in a cozy circle, talking until dawn. A great first evening that properly honored the reunion with Marcus. The next day, we slept in until 8 or 9 am. Marius and Marcus planned to go on a diving trip, so we decided to visit a German diving school in the town. After the formalities at the school were sorted out and the diving appointment was scheduled for the next morning, we survived a midday rain shower and went to have lunch at a nearby fish restaurant. We ate delicious fish and decided to rent an off-road golf cart until the next day to explore the island. Unfortunately, I (Max) started to feel unwell during lunch (too much heat and dehydration) and I decided to rest for the rest of the afternoon. The other two explored the island and checked out the area. It seemed that there were some really cool parts of the island. Marius' input: With the beach buggy, we first went to a less crowded beach near the city. After a short relaxation by the fantastic water, we continued to Westview and a very relaxed reggae bar with a view of a warship and sunset before driving back. The vehicle was really fun! In the evening, we met up again and took a leisurely stroll along the beach promenade before going to bed relatively early to be fit for the next day. The new day started early at 7:30 am. We had breakfast and I drove the two of them to the diving school. After dropping them off, I drove back to the hostel, grabbed my swimwear, and set off to explore the island myself. The two weren't lying, there were some beautiful white sandy beaches with turquoise blue sea, beautiful rock formations merging with the island, shipwrecks in the middle of the sea, half of them still protruding from the water, a navy ship in a bay, and a reggae bar at the westernmost point of the island. Around noon, I drove back to the town to extend the rental period of the golf cart for another day. Marcus and Mari were so enthusiastic about it that they wanted to drive it for another day. After extending the rental, I spent an hour on the town beach before meeting up with the guys at 2 pm. That's when I found out that they couldn't go diving due to the hurricane causing havoc in the Caribbean. Instead, they had a morning at the beach with Coco-Loco (rum in a coconut). Must have been cool too. (Maggi: Vacation is when you're slightly tipsy at noon ;)) In the afternoon, we took the off-road golf cart again and drove together to the westernmost point of the island. There we went to a kind of "natural swimming pool". Actually, we just went into the sea, but you had to pay an entrance fee for it. But there was a beautiful reef with lots of different colorful fish, and we decided to go snorkeling. After we ran out of breath and had seen enough of the many fish, we went to the nearby reggae bar and decided to have our sunset beers there. After nightfall, we made our way back through the somewhat chaotic road layout past the airport towards the hostel. Upon arrival, to our surprise, we met a girl named Alex from Bamberg. It's a small world sometimes. As hospitable Franconians, always willing to celebrate togetherness, we all went to a restaurant with live music and had dinner together. The sun made us tired, so we went to bed relatively early that evening. A new day dawned and it was also the last day for Marcus on the island. His flight was at 7 pm. We decided to take the day easy and chose to spend a relaxing day at the beach. In the morning, we returned the golf cart and headed towards the beach. One last sunbath, a dip in the sea, a Coco-Loco on the beach, and it was time to say goodbye. We went back to the hostel together, where we said goodbye to Marcus. Fortunately, the farewell was not so tragic as we would see each other again in Cartagena the next day. We still had another night on the island before our flight back to the mainland in the afternoon. We spent the evening relaxed before the next day came, packing our backpacks and flying on. The next day started for us early in the morning at 8 am. Checkout was at 11 am. To wake up, we had a cozy breakfast and then started packing our backpacks. Our goal was ambitious. The maximum weight of the backpack was 20 kilograms and the carry-on baggage was declared to be 5 kilograms according to the regulations. Since our backpacks usually weighed around 23 kg, we had to repack. After a lot of back and forth, tying shoes and ponchos to the smaller backpack, and stuffing said backpack to the fullest, we decided that we must have reached the 20-kilogram limit. Checked out, quickly grabbed a sub at Subway, withdrew money, and then took a taxi to the airport. At the airport, we briefly sweated about the weight at check-in, but we were still within the tolerance limit! Phew, that was close! The flight was slightly turbulent due to the hurricane, but nothing serious. After a good 2 hours of flying, we reached Cartagena, a city on the Caribbean coast of Colombia, and at the same time, our next adventure. Until then, Marius and Max