Panama - in search of Tom's perfect wave

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We safely made it over the Costa Rica – Panama border and have since racked up a few kilometres. First stop in Panama was Bocas del Torres which is on the Caribbean side and renowned for its surf. We stayed on the most remote island; Bastimentos, which seemed to be overrun by a million crazy but cute Arfo-Caribbean kids. Much to Tom’s disappointment we just missed out on a huge swell by one day and in order to get to one of the most consistent surfing beaches we had to trek across the jungle 30 mins each way in ankle, sometimes knee deep mud, safe to say the island was pretty remote. The beach was stunning though, surrounded by jungle and with clear water. We also enjoyed one of our favourite activities of chilling with our Kindles over breakfast at a hill top coffee plantation which also involved a jungle trek to get to in the mornings, we also got to see some nice sunsets while playing scrabble over dinner (Lucy currently has a two game lead after playing some strategically placed three letter words).

Next stop was Santa Catalina on Panama’s Pacific coast, another place renowned for its surfing. Luck wasn’t on Tom’s side here; the waves were pretty flat. We both still managed to get out and surf, Lucy at the kids beach and Tom on the big boy waves. The highlight of our time in Santa Catalina was the scuba diving where we saw dolphins, manta rays, reef sharks, turtles, sea snakes, moray eels and lots of other colourful fish. We also saw an 8m whale shark from the boat but by the time we got our gear on it had swam off but we still managed to catch a glimpse.

After a week of being in Santa Catalina we gave up waiting for this supposed swell coming and set off for Panama City. With no real plans for South America we searched around for the cheapest flights and figured it was best to head to Buenos Aires first and then work our way across and up through Chile and Peru. With a plan in hand we headed to Panama City for a couple of days to wait for our flight to Buenos Aires. Panama City was pretty average, nice skyline and the old town Casco Viejo was nice to wander around but the rest was pretty non-descript. No big deal though as it made us all the more excited for Buenos Aires!!! TBC….

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