Quetzals

Our lodge
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Costa Rica finished with a bang, and by bang I mean that Diego, who knows and is loved by everyone took us to his friends house for a party whose guest list was as diverse as its potluck offerings.  We met an elder woman from NorCal embracing life by selling her restaurant and traveling the world by crewing a yatch, Argentine surfers escaping the cold southern hemisphere water, American ex-pats...all around a wonderful night that made leaving our confortable niche in Costa Rica just a little harder.

Worth and a river
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But Panama was waiting, so the next day we loaded back on the bus bound for San Jose and then a very long one across the border to David, Panama.

a resplendent rodent

The buses--our groaning, tired chariots south--deserve a little explication.  First, lets talk about getting on them.  A bustling crowd carrying babies, machetes, groceries, chickens crowds around the waiting bus, everyone trying to ease thier way on to ensure that they get a seat rather than be regailed to standing in the asile clutching babies, machetes, chicken, etc. All except Worth.  Worth apparently had superior lessons it politeness as a child.  I get on the bus, find us a seat, stick my head out the window and he is still standing at the entrance of the bus letting everyone--young men, women, children, wrestling school boys, chickens--stream past.  While I urge him to just get on the bus, he insists that everyone in the line are women and children, whom he surely cannot cut in front of.  All around a rather comical scene,  but maybe you have to be there...

Looking down on Boquete
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Anyways, once you get on the bus and it finally gets its motor running, packed with what it seems is the absolute maximum capacity, you start rolling down the road, the wind starts blowing through the windows, you think you`re really moving, really going somewhere, then the bus groans to a stop.  Five more people, climb on, contorting and squeezing themselves into absurdly small spots.  They pile a mother and her four children into one seat. They pull mini-fold-down seats off the main seats so that another body can squeeze in.  And then you start moving again, the wind starts blowing, and then, well, you stop...Surely an excellent way to transport many people short distances, but when you intend to go a little father...continents, lets say...it`s a bit more cramped and slightly less efficent than one would hope.

Learning Spanish
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But getting across a country for 20 USD is what enables this whole thing, so, for that, we love our buses.

So after many hours of such buses we arrived in David, took another bus to Cerra Punta in the Chiriqui Highlands in Northern Panama.  Cerra Punta is a small moutain village tucked in the steep cloud forests around Volcan Baru.  It is were 90 percent of the vegetables for Panama are grown, on patched-worked fields up absurdly steep slopes.  In front of every house is a sign advertising the sale of plants.  I can`t believe that business is very good since the market is unbelievably over-endowed with plants.  The only downside to Cerra Punta is that walking around you can not only watch as the farmers spray on coats of pestides, but you can literally smell the chemicals, especially walking by streams. Worth proposes we stop eating all together so as not to promote environmental degredation.

Happy horse in Cerra Punta
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We decided, that for now at least, we`ll continue eating until a better solutuion is proposed.  In Cerra Punta, we stayed in an amazing lodge, spent an extra day there enjoying the fresh jams sold on the sides of the road, and the local speciality of strawberries and cream, and loving being in weather cold enough to wear pants.  It was as good as it sounds.

The next day we traversed the side of the volcano to reach the town of Boquete on the other side.  The trail is apparently one of the best places in the world to spot the Queztal, a bird, which is apparently fantastically resplendent.  Though we didn´t see a queztal--perhaps becuase Worth was convinced that it was a resplendent rodent for the first day--we did see wild orchids, amazing views and meet Crazy Tom, self professed yoga teacher, masseuse, and organic gardener, traveling around in a jerry-rigged truck carrying the necessary gear for most human activities.

The Queztal Trail
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Boquete is also, absolutely beautiful, nestled at the base of the dormant volcano, it is the coffee capital of Panama. Also boasting, 30 cent beer and 3 dollar bottles of wine and delicous payapa batidos (smooties).  Its attractiveness has made it a retirment hot-spot for Americans.  Newpaper ads for new townhomes and communities proclaims that your life, in fact starts here. In Boquete, Panama.  Who knew.

I´m not sure I quite buy that my life hadn`t been knocked into go-mode before Boquete, but I will admit that it is a very nice place to find oneself...for now.

More water
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Con mucho amour,

Cassidy