December 23rd, 2017
Today was a mixture of the beautiful and bizarre. It was recommended to us to hike from Sapzurro, Colombia to La Miel, Panama, a gorgeous, but arduous and hot experience. The round trip adventure involves over 1000 steep stairs, and at the top culminates in a view of Panama on one side, and Colombia on the other. It is truly breathtaking. A brief passport check (no stamp necessary) and you’re all set.
At first as we walked along the shore we were nervous there was no safe spot to cool down in the rough sea that splashed onto some very violent looking coral, but eventually we came to a pristine (but a bit crowded) beach. We made our way through the crowd toward an empty shaded spot at the end, and relaxed there. It turned out to be a bit too rough to enjoy swimming, and just before we decided to leave, we saw a guy about our age that had jumped in and looked like he was attempting to bathe. As he got out, he we noticed he looked malnourished. He walked toward us slowly, and I we were both apprehensive about the possibility he was going to beg. Instead he said hi in English, and asked if we had our phones on us. Still unsure I slowly said yes, but with no signal, and he asked if we would take a photo of him and email it to his friend. I thought it odd when he was unsmiling, and turned out that he had not said “to tell them I have been kidnapped” but to say “I HAVE been kidnapped”. My face fell and he quickly gave me the email, I asked what happened, and he said he has been held in Panama City prison for 3 months and somehow was brought to La Miel, and they were saying they were going to transport him to Puerto Obaldia. There was honest fear in his eyes and we watched him walk back toward his military escort, without a chance to ask anything more. He loaded onto a boat with many police, and that was it.
After a lot of scary discussion, we made the rough hike back to a place we could get service and I sent the girl several messages. I don’t know what else to do, without even a name or country of origin.
UPDATE
After sending the message, I was able to find the friend via her email address on Facebook. She was very confused and asked me to call her, which I was unable to do until the following morning when we reached Capurgana. Grant and I were sitting in a cafe waiting for our hosts to meet us, and we saw the kidnapped man pass by, clearly at ease. I was shocked, and didn’t immediately go after him. I told his friend this via Facebook messenger, and she dismissed me as a crazy person and blocked me. The guy walked by again and I confronted him, he claimed they had returned his passport and let him enter Colombia legally. He hugged me and asked if there was anything he could do for us, but I was still quite dumbfounded. We later met a couple who said they had also met him, and had heard a similar story, but he had either already been crazy or the months in Panamanian jail put some voices in his head. I’m just thankful he’s physically ok.