I’m have been reduced to writing from memory now, since I had been lazy and suffered technical difficulties on account of rain and laptops not playing nicely together. Unless I remember something really important, I’m going to write about multiple days in a single entry, starting with the remainder of my time in Puerto Viejo.
The first was all about recuperation. I woke up, and all of my roommates were gone. This was probably due to my actions the night before, as none of them left any contact info of any sort. I found my Canadian friends, and we grabbed some food and hung out. Our main goal of the day was to go to the bar with the really cold fridge and grab what I dubbed “the coldest beer in Costa Rica.” Little did we know that everything is closed on the first, and we had to settle for warm, super Mercado beer. It may sound bad, but they are perfect for shotgunning and that’s how many of them met their fate. I don’t really remember what happened for the rest of the night, but nothing eventful happened until the next morning.
We ate breakfast, with the usual shitty service. They had to harvest the beans to make my cup of coffee, but the food was awesome! We all got these rockin’ bacon and egg sandwiches, and were going to head down to Panama to see Bocas Del Toro. Kurt, who had done an entire gram of cocaine earlier that day rather than waste it, became even harder than fuck. It was when we left the restaurant that Nate realized he had forgotten his man-purse, and when we went back to look for it, it was gone. The people in the restaurant definitely stole it, and we filled out a police report. It took the guy fifteen minutes to write about ten sentences, and that’s when you realize why the drug problems and thefts persist. It was a long and boring process, and in the end he just stuck the copy in a drawer to rot. We ended up staying another night to see if anything turned up, and I told them that I was going to Panama regardless in the morning.
Nothing turned up, and I went to the bus stop to find John sitting there. I was stoked that I’d be traveling with him, as he’s a fun dude to hang out with, and we took the bus to the border together. Talk about crazy third world bullshit. You have to cross this long wooden and steel bridge that looks right out of 1874, which everything that crosses the border has to cross, and avoid falling in to one of the many holes in the bridge. You then have to go to a small office where they stamp your passport, spin your around three times, point you in the right direction and let you go. From there, you had to avoid people trying to shove you into their friend’s taxi, which would probably lead to some field where they mug you, and find your own taxi that takes you to a boat.
I think it is illegal for anyone to carry change in Panama. It took three taxi drivers to give me five bucks back, as none had any more than two dollars, and the boat booking place required me to get change so I wouldn’t have to pay twenty bucks instead of fifteen. It was worth it, though, as the boat ride was awesome.
We probably went about twenty miles in the boat, from river, to estuary, to ocean, and finally to the island. It had a big motor on it and just clipped through the water like it was a fish. We went about 30 the whole way, and it was a blast flying over the ocean waves when it got choppy. We finally arrived in Bocas Del Toro, and proceeded to make ourselves at home.
PANAMA!
Seamus
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