SOON AFTER KELVIN, Alessis and I slog over the last slide, we pause at the awning of a shuttered truck stop. Right then, three soldiers spring from their post, a sandbag bunker with a flimsy tin roof. They clomp down the street through a light drizzle, rifles pointed straight ahead. Other soldiers appear, stepping into view on a jungly ridgeline above the road. Am I hallucinating?

"What's going on?" I ask Kelvin.

"I dunno. There were shots fired," he says. "They're going to fight."

"You can't find out anything more?"

"No."

That's the way it goes in Colombia, a profoundly screwed-up country that's been that way since it became a country, in 1819. At first, it appeared just typically screwed, going through the usual South American saga of rich against poor, righties versus lefties. Then, in the early seventies, cocaine confused everything.

Seeing that a kilo of coke costing $1,500 to produce would sell for $50,000 in the United States, Colombian drug smugglers like Pablo Escobar—a fat wake-'n'-bake thug—got busy amassing fortunes. Escobar's Medellín cartel bribed government officials, hired guerrillas to protect remote labs, and intimidated civilians by summarily murdering suspected enemies. Meanwhile, the guerrillas—primarily the 18,000-strong FARC—followed their own business plan, one built around arms smuggling and ransom.

Little changed after Colombian police gunned down Escobar in Medellín in 1993. One year later, guerrillas occupied half the country and the Cali cartel was delivering 80 percent of the world's coke supply. And so it went until hard-liner Álvaro Uribe became president in 2002.

Rightists point out that, since then, cities and highways have gotten safer. But leftists spotlight the record-setting growth of cocaine production and say Uribe (who was reelected in May) has simply forced the violence into rural areas. However you break it down, the fact remains: Bad dudes with guns still roam the countryside, looking to show off their power in any way.

As for the bad dudes running around with guns on the road to El Mirador, 45 minutes pass after the hubbub starts. Then things settle down, and 30 of us pilgrims pack into two personnel transports, flatbed trucks with blue awnings that cast a melancholy tinge. Two armored vehicles pull out in front, and soldiers on motorcycles zip in behind. Our military convoy lurches off toward Buenaventura. The 20-mile ride ends 40 minutes later with me giving a big goodbye to Alessis. I say "Mucho gusto" and mean it. May all your shrimp be plump!

Stepping around puddles of shit and avoiding feral dogs in the outer slums of Buenaventura, Kelvin and I stumble upon a fenced-off shantytown/dock. Thirty-seven dollars later, we're riding a boat, embarking on a 25-hour ride north, a time frame that will give me ample opportunity to reflect on my stupidity.

The SS Pizarro, or good ship Bizarro, as I rename her, is a 75-foot-long, single-prop, steel-hulled powerboat generously painted with rust and offering lavish accommodations in any of six coffinlike bunk rooms. Ours is missing the door. Complimentary meals of rice, boiled potatoes, and line-caught fish (fried to leather) are served at a picnic table in the fly-swirled kitchen. Constipation is encouraged, as the toilet has neither seat, flush handle, nor toilet paper.

We chug due west at a ponderous five knots, and I fall asleep soon after the sun starts boiling the horizon.

At 4:30 p.m. the next day, we disembark in Bahía Solano, and because God is a master of irony, there are no buses, cabs, or Lamborghinis willing to take us the last ten miles to El Valle. It's Good Friday. We spend the night at an empty motel in the moon shadow of a steepled church, which itself is in the shadow of a colossal military watchtower.

The next morning, we opt for the Playa Alegre hotel shuttle: a dumpster-size, candy-apple-red, Russian-made Lada Niva known as "the 4x4 that'll get you there but won't get you back." It stalls at every chuckhole.

We emerge from the forest canopy one hour later, pass through El Valle, and sputter onto a black-sand beach at low tide, pink sand crabs scattering sideways as we approach. The exposed tidal flats mean we can drive all the way.

"Is that it?" I ask Kelvin, pointing to a colorful little smudge on a distant peninsula.

"That's it."