Leaving Bocas Del Toro, and Panama, meant grabbing a 45 minute speed boat to the mainland, where we could catch a bus to San Jose. The boat ride was unexpectedly beautiful. We passed through what seemed to be untouched jungle, only occasionally spotting a house or a person peaking out at us from the bushes. At one point, the boat seemed to be speeding ashore, only to turn into a hidden cove at the last minute that turned into a river.

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The Apple Falls Far From the Tree

Beth: I could just see your mother’s face if they asked her to pay $5 Lauren: My mother does not pitch fits at international border crossings… That would be me.

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For our second day in paradise, we decided to get a private boat to take us out snorkeling. Around 11am, we went to the boat dock to try to negotiate a place and a price. We were bombarded by touts, some telling us that one area was nice, others promising that the weather and tides were too bad to go to the same place.

Carlos, the guy who picked Kassie up from the airport the day before, spotted us. We trusted him, so we negotiated a $15/person private boat to take us out to a reef area that had a restaurant with a dock that we could lay out on. (more…)

Peruvian Cuisine

Beth: My stomach muscles are sore and I think they’re sore from trying to hold in all the food.

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Our bus ride to Bocas Del Toro was a 10 hour tour through the night that was scheduled to land us in Almirante at 6am where we would catch a 6:30am ferry to Bocas Del Toro. Unfortunately, we got there a bit early, all piling off the bus in the middle of nowhere at the very dark hour of 5am.

We stood in front of a closed store, while the locals grabbed taxis to somewhere. A taxi driver asked us if we wanted to go to the dock. (more…)

Beth: The night before we got to Panama, I started getting sick. Stomach-issues sick. Ever the hypochondriac, I was sure I was running a fever and would need to take CIPRO before it was all over with. Lauren and I also were wary of the warnings about the budget area of Panama (”don’t walk outside after dark”) so we decided to splurge for the night and get a nicer, air conditioned hotel room in Congrejo - the business district.

We checked in and went upstairs to our clean, king-sized bed with cable TV and Lauren watched old movies while I journeyed between the bed and the bathroom.

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