Chet and Karen's Adventures--South of the Border: Boquete

We woke up at 6:00 am. Our plan was to make it back to the mainland town of Almirante, catch a bus to David and then another bus to the small mountain town of Boquete. We ate breakfast and went to the dock on Bastimentos to catch a boat over to Isla Colon where the boats to the mainland depart from. Once on Isla Colon, we caught the first available boat, a jammed packed dingy headed to Almirante.

The dock at Old Bank on Isla Bastimentos

We disembarked the boat and were immediately approached by people offering to get us a taxi. We politely declined and went to find our own way. Meanwhile one tenacious fellow followed us to the cab and made sure he got his cut from the driver for 'rounding' us up.

We took the cab to the bus terminal and bought our tickets to David. The bus was a jammed packed express over the continental divide to the western side of Panama. Our driver drove the road like a madman. We flew down the road passing cars, trucks and buses in a rather frightening fashion. When we hit the uphill, we slowed to a crawl and the whole bus shook and vibrated with exertion. The vibrations created a deep and very loud buzzing sound. It felt like we were inside a subwoofer.

We drove up the mountains and finally passed through the clouds onto the other side into the sun and wind. Now we were going down hill. The load vibrations diminished and in their stead was the stench of burning brakes. Finally after 5 hours on the bus we arrived in the city of David. The David terminal was simple and logical: all the buses come to the same place. We got off one bus and onto the next, an old yellow school bus from the states. 45 minutes later and we arrived in Boquete after a long day of traveling.

View from our hostel.

Boquete (pronounced bo-ket-eh) is a small town up in the mountains, on the west side of the continental divide (elevation ~3900 ft). It is a beautiful place known for its coffee, flowers, and citrus. Every year in January, they hold a coffee and flower festival.

In the past decade Boquete has become a destination place for non-Panamanians to retire. Consequently, there are a lot of older gringos walking around and the town has seen a massive real estate boom. The locals joke that the name of the town is actually "se vende" (for sale) because there are so many se vende signs around. The evidence is everywhere. It is actually rather sad. Prices have sky-rocketed and the locals have a hard time affording to stay. However, many have also become millionaires overnight by selling their land while the price was right. Now gated communities and country clubs are replacing coffee farms and cloud forest and the gringos keep coming.

Coffee finca cleared for future country club.

Our first day we went for a walk around town. Boquete is known for its gardens so we figured we would go check them out. We walked a little ways out of town to Mi Jardin es su Jardin. The garden was beautiful! Tons of flowers, trees, ponds, and an artificial creek ran throughout. It was a very colorful spot. On the way back, we stopped at a local coffee shop for an iced coffee and Karen and I signed up for a coffee tour.