A cousin of mine got wind that we were considering travelling to San Andres and went out of his way to caution me about their experience there, 5-6 years ago. The ironic part is, I'd heard about his mishap in the Caribbean several years ago, but by the time the story filtered down to me, I heard he was in the Bahamas! :roll: Turns out it was San Andres.
I'm a pretty level headed, neutral person, but this information concerns even me. I've edited the names, etc., but he and his wife both wrote me some details about their trip...
"Personally, **** and I would not recommend San Andres. Unless things have changed dramatically, it was a very dirty island. The water was not great at all. As a matter of fact, this is where **** was jet skiiing and hit coral, got a little cut on his foot that became badly infected with bacteria. Within 12 hours, his leg started to swell badly. Luckily, we were heading home that day and **** had to use a wheelchair to get off the plane. We came straight home, went right to the hospital and any longer, he would have run the risk of losing his leg. Got the antibiotics into him. Got to come home from hospital, had VON coming in and he also had to have antibiotics via IV. Not cute! He was off work for a week and on crutches, got referred to the Disease Centre in Hamilton months later and they declared it to be some kind of flesh eating disease due to badly contaminated water. The source entered this little cut. We stayed at the Decameron, which was suppose to be 4 star, not even close to the Decameron I had stayed at in Columbia a few years prior. The weather was great, not much for night life, alot of drug selling right in front of the motel which sat close to the road, had to cross the road for the beach. Needless to say, a getaway but not great island or trip. Keep in mind, things could have changed alot since we were there."
"I have some things to add. The island is miles wide, 20 long. We rented scooters and saw the complete island. For a fee you can go on a cave tour, it was a 10 foot hole in the ground. Not impressive. On a bus one day the driver stopped walked over to this fish and chip place, the bus had all the windows locked in the closed position so the gas fumes wouldn't be as bad. The bus was running an it was very,very hot that day. Ten min. later driver comes back and drives. When he's done eating, the box his food was in goes flying out his window. This explains to me all the garbage on the side of the road,including glass, car parts etc. We also saw a large garbage truck backed up to a cliff on the coast unloading the trash into the water. The residents told me a few years back the crime was so bad they got rid of the police, that's why it's military controlled now. Large green trucks continually driving around with 15 or 20 fully armed soldiers with machine guns and hand guns strapped to them in the back of these military vehicles. The place is talked about diving, but there are other places that are much better than that place. I would not even take a free trip there. Sorry to burst your bubble, but thought you'd want to know the truth. It is a Columbian Island."
Topic: Re: Yikes! Horror story out of San Andres (Read 3556 times)