OUR RETIRED ADVENTURE
qUEREMOS VIVIR AL SOL
KSha
Costa Rica is amazing! Beauty abounds.
Panama is "home" for now. Loving life!
South America is next! Columbia here we come.
Costa Rica is amazing! Beauty abounds.
Panama is "home" for now. Loving life!
South America is next! Columbia here we come.
I had to pry Sha out of Casa De Campo so we could leave Pedasi and take the 5 hour drive to David to turn in our rental...aka the clown car. Turned out to be a nice drive for the distance and we arrived in time to get lunch before we became carless. Here's a few sights along the way... It was hot in David, but fortunately we didn't have to wait very long outside the rental car place before our transport arrived to take us to Boquete. Joseph was our driver and spoke English, so Sha and I were asking him questions as we drove the 45 minutes up the mountain. He told us a lot about Boquete and we talked about the Flower festival that was starting and how the town was going to be packed with people throughout the 10 day festival. We arrived at Ladera Hotel mid afternoon and went to our 3rd floor room...and we were very unhappy! We were to have an apartment with a kitchen (we had brought food with us to stock the fridge), but were now sitting in a regular hotel room. Long story short; we were able to work with Wendy (our travel agent) and the local organizers of our trip to stay in Boquete for the night and then transfer to Bocas del Toro earlier than originally planned. This turned out to be a perfect solution for us beach bums. It's much cooler in the mountains! After a stressful afternoon we then were able to go out and see the festival and some of the town. Our walk through the narrow streets was full of people and ironically cars as well trying to get to who knew where. The festival grounds were beautiful... By the time we went to dinner, I was freezing! Can you imagine, I had on a jacket and it was zipped up all the way to my chin! We got up early to enjoy a nice breakfast and reorganized our bags to head for the lobby and our 9 AM transport down the mountain to the Caribbean side of Panama and the port town of Almirante. A beautiful morning moon greeted us before we left Boquete. Our new transport arrived right on time and Kevin was our driver...no, not me, nor the cool Kolb, just another cool Kev. Not long into our 3 1/2 hour trip, Kevin asked if we got car sick. We both replied no and then he explained we would be going up and down and rounding corners that he would be turning the other way before we finished going through the first corner...ok, glad he had a nice SUV for our trip. The trip was beautiful down and through the mountains; no one puked either! Here's a taste of the beautiful scenery we passed through. As we got closer to the Caribbean Sea we started seeing the homes of the indigenous Indians who populate the mountain side and the Bocas district. The Almirante dock town was small but crowded; and as we approached "our" dock, the congestion grew as a large number of small buses were dropping off many other tourist/travelers for transport to the Islands. We waited for about 20 minutes for our boat to come into the dock; during which time we chatted with 3 gals from France, the Netherlands and Sweden all traveling alone. We laughed as we traded "student" stories with the teacher from the Netherlands...kids are the same all over the world! When the boat came and we realized all of us in this area were going to be on this boat, we weren't sure how we all would fit with everyone's luggage. They managed to get all the bags onboard and we "squished" in with 5 people across each row of bench seats, totaling 30 of us onboard. The twin 300 HP engines on the back had me feeling confident we would be ok. Our boat ride was around 30 minutes to the big island, Isla Colon and was not too rough (sea was fairly calm between the multiple smaller islands along our path). We docked smoothly and then the hectic disembarkment and recollecting of your bags concluded and we went to locate our transport to Playa Tortuga Hotel and Beach Resort. Bocas del Toro Centro (center of town) has a crowded and hectic paced feel to it as we drove through the narrow streets passing small resorts, hotels and hostels, and restaurants. As our driver drove on we passed out of the center and things were more spread out; seeing houses and small rental places along the drive along the water. We were very happy as we arrived in our rescheduled new home for the next 10 days. Going to enjoy a beer and relax listening to the waves. Talk to you soon!
Pura Vida!
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Kevin & Sharon SeibelBeginning our next big adventure! Archives
December 2023
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