Blogs from Isla Colon, Bocas Del Toro, Panama, Central America Caribbean - page 18

I have traveled far and away..all over this globe yet never to Central America. Honestly, I don't think I would ever have made this trip but a good friend recently moved to Panama and I was intrigued as to why o why would he leave California for central america. I have to admit that I had a different image of what I would find than the quaint yet rustic island of Bocas Del Toro. The locals and imports ( there were canadians..americans...and many other countries represented) seemed to have a new outlook on life. I have never visited a place where it seems that time has almost stopped. Everyone and everything so relaxed and at a different pace than I am used to in Los Angeles. We ended up saying that we were on "Bocas" time.....There ... read more

just wanted to say a quick hello and update you on my whereabouts. i am now in boca del toro, panama. i arrived here yesterday after spending a few days in puerto viejo, costa rica. puerto viejo was amazing and very difficult to leave. my friend jim and i rented some bikes and rode to all of the beaches south of puerto viejo...if we went a little bit further, we could have rode our bikes into panama. it was tempting but the heat and sun were a bit of a deterrent. we arrived in boca del toro yesterday. the costa rica-panama border crossing, on the carribean coast, was pretty cool. to get from costa rica to panama you have to walk over an abandoned train bridge and the country border is in the middle of the ... read more

Although neither of our stomachs were feeling 100%, we decided to head out and take the boat tour. First stop was the dolphin bay where we watched dolphins follow our boat, playing and leaping out of the water. The next stop was snorkelling at Cayo Crawl - although the snorkelling was not the most amazing, it was refreshing to get in the water. We had lunch at a little restaurant out on stilts in the middle of nowhere. From there, we visited Red Frog beach, which is one of those postcard perfect Caribbean beaches - white sand, palm trees, clear water. We played in the surf and lounged on the beach. Our last stop-off was Hospital point, a snorkelling spot near the old hospital where they used to put people with malaria and yellow fever. It ... read more

We figured we had seen the main sights of Puerto Viejo, so we caught the bus down to Sixaola where we walked across the bridge to Panama. It was one of those fun, low tech border crossings - no finger prints or photos required, just lining up in a small immigration office to get stamp and a tourist card from the lady. After being helped out by a guy with one leg, we caught a ride through vast banana plantations to somewhere near Changuinola, where we took a boat out to town of Bocas del Toro on the island of Isla Colon. Quite a busy little town, with lots of buildings on the waterfront on stilts over the water.... read more

After our quick stop in El Valle, it was good to get on the road and really feel like this journey was underway. And getting to Boquete was no bad way to start. At over seven hours and including three different buses, I certainly smelt like a traveller by the time we arrived! Mind you, bus may not be the most comfortable way to travel but it´s certainly the best way to see the country. From the rolling hills of El Valle, we passed firstly through lush-looking agricultural country that could have been anywhere in northern Europe except for the odd incongruos palm and mango tree. About four hours into our second bus-ride, we entered the Chiriqui Highlands and the landscape began to change again as we climbed higher into the mountains. At David, we made ... read more