Dogs on the Roof and a Caribbean Island

Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2010—Banquete to Changuinola

It’s a long way from Banquete to the border area on the eastern side of Panama.  We had to first take a bus from Banquete to David and then change to a bus in David that would bring us here along a road that parallels the one from Banquete to David for the first hour.  As usual, all the buses were full with people occasionally standing.  We were glad in David that we were NOT going to Panama City; there was a line over a block long for people to buy tickets for buses to there.  Fortunately, we got the last 2 tickets on a bus leaving immediately to Changuinola.

The route took us up into the mountains and over the continental divide.  The scenery was fantastic.  Panama is a very pretty and mostly clean country.  As we came down on the east side, it began to look different from the west.  Many of the houses are built of wood and on stilts.  Often, they have elaborate geometric cutouts in the sides to allow the breeze to get through.  And many of them are painted in bright colors.  This is the Caribbean side of the country, and their culture is tied more to that of the people on the various islands of the Caribbean.  Many more people are black, and most of the other people have more native characteristics and fewer Spanish ones than the people in the west.

At a rest stop, we were surprised to see that two dogs were among the cargo being unloaded from the top of the bus.  They were in vegetable backs with draw strings that had been tied just enough for their heads to stick out, but not enough for them to get their legs/bodies out.  The bus conductor just held the bags by the drawstrings and lowered them to two guys who were waiting for them below.  Then they transferred the dogs in the bags to the back of a nearby pickup taxi to continue their trip.  

Approaching Changuinola, we got glimpses of the blue sea and the islands of Bocas del Toro, the surfing capital of Panama which we plan to visit tomorrow.  Today, we stayed on the bus all the way to Changuinola, a rather plain town that is the headquarters of the Chiquita Banana corporation and is surrounded by fields of banana palms.

Our hotel, the Semiramis, is basic, but fine.  At least it has air conditioning (since it is hot and humid again), hot water for a morning shower, and free wifi.  It’s much cheaper than where we have been staying, since it is in a non-tourist town.

After exploring town, we stopped at a restaurant and had white rice, pinto beans, and two meat empanadas in cornmeal crusts.  We were so tired that we returned to the room and went to bed by 21:00.

Thursday, Jan. 3, 2013—Day Trip to Boca del Toro

It was cloudy and raining some, but we still made our trip to Bocas del Toro.  We caught a local bus immediately for Almirante, then we caught a boat immediately from there.  We arrived in Bocas at 10:00.  It has a very Caribbean vibe to it—small, colorful wooden houses; many black people, a very casual atmosphere, etc.

Bocas is a small town.  It has about 4 streets that make up most of it.  We walked from the dock of our boat down part of the main street lined with colorful buildings housing restaurants, bakeries, souvenir shops, supermarkets, etc.  We stopped to watch the daily morning ferry unload.  Then we walked a couple of secondary streets.  We continued on a street leading out of town until we came to the first beach, but because it was cloudy and few people were out, we then turned around and returned to town.  

Most of the tourists in Bocas are young people there to party and surf.  It’s a typical backpacker crowd that parties until 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning and sleeps until 10:00 or 11:00.  Some of the restaurants had signs indicating that breakfast was served until 13:00 and that lunch began after that!  As we watched them slowly emerging into the streets from their hostels, it was obvious from their eyes that most had just awakened.

We ate breakfast ourselves—at 12:30!  It sounded better than the rest of the menu and seemed to be better priced.  Unfortunately, it was a restaurant where you order at the counter, and an 8-member Costa Rican family was lined up at the counter trying to decide what to have rather than standing back to make those decisions.  It took probably 15 minutes for them to finish their ordering while the line grew and grew with others who already knew what they wanted.

We spent part of the afternoon just sitting and watching people.  It was fun to see the locals, the tourists, the delivery trucks, etc.  After being there about 5 hours, however, we took the boat and bus back to Changuinola.

We found a great bakery that we had missed yesterday.  I had read about it, and we could smell it last night, but we didn’t find it then.  Today, we shared a small coconut pie and bought a pineapple upside down cake to have as dessert tonight and as breakfast tomorrow morning before heading for the border crossing to Costa Rica.