Blogs from Chiriquí, Panama, Central America Caribbean - page 21

¿Xopá? ¿Todo bien? Whenever you hear people greet each other with “xopá or que sopá” you know they are Panamanians. They like to say things the other way around and they have many unique words which I’ll be teaching you during my stay in Panama ;). “Que sopá” comes from “Que pasó”....it’s a way of saying hi, more like “what’s up or what’s going on”. After a long, busy and “expensive” week in The Netherlands I finally arrived in Panama last Saturday! In The Netherlands I managed to visit some friends and family and I was glad to see them all after more than a year. These visits took me to The Hague, Spijkenisse, Schiedam, Rotterdam, Tilburg, Winterswijk and Arnhem. The weather was generally not very good and it was “cold”!!! At that time I was ... read more

After two nights in Panama City we decided to swap the scorching, busy metropolis for the cool, lush mountains and forests of Boquete. We awoke early and got the 8.15 bus north to Panama´s second city David. After nearly missing the bus due to us queuing in the wrong area entirely we were hustled on as the bus was pulling off. Unfortunately the bus was quite busy and we would have to sit separately. I sat down beside a man who appeared to be asleep and throughout the 7 hour bus ride he did nothing other than breathe. Clare on the otherhand sat beside an elderly Panamanian man, probably in his sixties. The man´s resemblance to Morgan Freeman was scary, the only difference being that he spoke no English. As Clare sat down the elderly man, ... read more

We are now in Boquete, which is about 4 and a half hours away from Bocas Del Toro. We decided to make a pit stop on our way to Panama City. It was a very long day of travel. We left Bocas Del Toro at 12:30 pm and traveled by boat to Changuinola which took an hour and $7 per person. Then made a bus for David which took 4 and a half hours riding through mountains. That was $8 each. Sometimes we were in the clouds and I told Macayla that we could actually say that we had our heads in the clouds. Anyway, then we took another hour bus ride ($1.50 each) to Boquete. We got in around 7:30 pm. We had to visit at least 5 hostels before we found one with available ... read more

Day 208: Panamerican passage to the hills beyond Not wanting to be searching out new lodgings in the dark, I had to set off early this morning, and having got up before the pervy security guard had poked his nose round the door, I got a taxi to the bus terminal and caught the eight o'clock bus to David. Fairly uneventful, the journey was fairly restricted to the usually tarmacked roads of the Panamerican Highway. In between the films being shown on board, I did manage to get a bit of sleep and met a couple of English girls a few seats in front, and seven hours later, we arrived in David, a big and fairly unexciting city, and hour or two south of the Costa Rican border. From there, we caught a big yellow American ... read more

I’ve been spending the last 6 days now in Boquete, Pamana. Boquete is a small town, with gringo influence, in the mountains of Panama. There is the main street, with some restaurants, a few small souvenir-type shops, small supermarkets, and other assorted stores. There’s also the small hotels or hostels around town. Finally, for those people ready to buy their second home (or relocate to a whole new life) - which will often be older gringos - there are plenty of real estate agencies ready to get you into a new house. Finally, being in the mountains, there are great views and cooler temperatures than that of even David, a short 40 kilometers away. In fact, it is amazing the temperature difference. Here in Boquete, the temperature has not seemed to have gotten much above ... read more