Yellow Jack Dive.Hostal Isla Bastimentos

... Later as we are clearing customs we see a full size truck rig going across, no pedestrians when this happens.
We head into Panama, this part appears pretty poor with plenty of wooden shanties.The road is in really bad condition with occasionally rubble and huge potholes, this gets progressively worse as we move into the rain forest and mountains. Rain forest = rain and cloud ...

Isla Bastimentos is the second Island in the Bocas Del Toro Archipelago. A 15 minute boat ride for Isla Colon took us to the Islands only town Old Bank. With no transport on the Island there really is no need to extend from the sand path that stretches for two miles through the town. To one side the timber one storey buildings stretching up to the hills and to the other built on stilts above the water. Each waterside abode giving birth to ...

... got music thumping all the live long day and night, a lot of poverty and a lot of trash. BUT…in all of this, if you make your way “up in the hill” you find beauty, solitude and THAI!!!! So, that’s what we did, we walked about a third of a mile up. It started us walking through the neighborhood, then through a little park, then through the jungle. When we arrived we found these beautiful little bungalows, clustered ...

... change from Gregorio. The house (as most in this area) is completely off the grid. All power comes from solar or a gas generator..... hence the problems begin! We lost power last night at around 9:30 which was followed by a long beeping sound from the solar batteries that lasted the entire night. We were quite worried that we may lose the food that we brought as the fridge went without power for about 12 hours. This could have been handled better by ...

... trying to keep from being pulled out (the rips were strong) and just generally doing what you do on the beach. Again the stray dogs here, oh my goodness, the thinnest we had seen so far. Just heart breaking. And remember, we have Goose with us. Well the welcome from the other dogs was not so friendly. Another dog in competition for tourist food??? Goose handled it well and joined us in the surf. Well more like, he barked at as we played in the waves ...

... of some of the dogs. Some are skinny, some are more taken care of, it really is interesting to see the differences in them. This vacation has become one of relaxation. I am can't complain a bit as the area is so pristine, I don't feel I want to leave, even for a minute. Some people would be bored, no itinerary, same routine but we have not found one moment of bordem pass through our minds. We are planning on going to the Sloth Rescue Center in ...

... Plantation -Lunch (without any money) -Stranded, boat breakdown So it was quite the day. Oh, more details you aks? Alright. When we met Erwin, we told him the things we wanted to do for the day. One of which - the cacao plantation is a bit off the beaten path, and the only time the owner had available to give us a personalized tour was around 1:30 PM. So Erwin suggested ...

... bike ride to a town called manzanillo which was about 15 km away i think. we finally decided to leave puerto viejo and head to panama last wednesday and thats when the adventure really started!! puerto viejo is apparently about 30 minutes by bus from the panama border and we got up in rainy weather to go catch an 830 am bus. sooo we waited and waited and waited, heard that maybe the bus was in a fender bender or something, waited some more and then ...

... minutes to get on to the beach to look for Joey. He had already been swept out and was moving quickly. He was panicing and struggling to stay above water. Kevin was yelling and motioning to Joey that he should swim to the left, parallel to the shore, while I ran to get help. Surprisingly people were not reacting much to the situation. I tried to yell to where the surfers were, but they were too far out and could not hear me. By the time i ran back to Kevin we ...

... when they saw us, but if you move around slowly they dont feel at all threatened and just go around their own business, peeking at you from time to time, or even coming closer to have a better look. The coral around the area was magnificent and we are not sure how many different species of fish we saw, but sufficient to fill quite a few chinese restaurant fish tanks... After about 2 hours of snorkelling, and then a ...