08/08/04- 16/08/04 Boquete

It rains here every day, and for most of the day is covered in cloud, but when you get a chance to see it the scenery is fantastic.

We have spent a week here and in the surrounding countryside and whilst we have been here we have been very active. One of the first days we were here we did and four hour walk around the mountains surrounding the town and down to the dam, the following day we took a bus to Volcan and explored the petroglyphs. We stayed the night that night in Volcan, seriously a one horse town. The only hotel we could find was hotel California and I was very nervous about checking in there. The following day we escaped before anyone could stop us and headed for Respingo from where we intended to take a nice leisurely 6 hour stroll along the side of the mountain and through the valley back to Boquete. However in my haste to get started I didn´t see the no entry sign on the path I suggested we take and ended up climbing to the very top of the mountain. It was hideous. We worked out later that we had climbed over a 1000 metres through really thick forest during the rainy season so the ground was crap. The only thing that kept us going was that we didn't want to have to go back the same way. We ended up doing just that as there wasn't a path down the other side. So we spent the night in Respingo at the refuge without any warm clothes. Thankfully the ranger gave us a sleeping bag and a nice cup of coffee and the next day we set out on the intended walk.

The following day I could not move, partly due to the excessive exercise and partly due to the litre of wine I drank to celebrate getting back with all my limbs still attached.

Today we are planning on taking it easy again, we have a fantastic hotel with a really pretty garden full of birds and with the river running at the bottom of it so it seems rude not to sit and enjoy the view.



People are really nice here- you go on a nice long walk and people stop their vehicles and ask if you want a lift.


Moses: This is me on top of the mountain/ volcano thing we accidentally climbed. Luckily we didn't follow a white flag we found on the peak which was in the same direction as the town of Bouquete (according to crap map and my compass) as I saw that that way was more or less sheer. Note trusty stick. In the background you can see the top of another mountain which is about 50m taller and is the highest mountain in Panama. It also has lots of communication masts on top and a service road from that but unfortunately we were seperated from getting a lift back down by an enormous valley. I think we would have realised our error earlier on if we could see what we were doing but it is really cloudy there but fortunately at the top you are way above the clouds so you know that you have really screwed up, going vertically up over a kilometre.

The ranger thought it was funny. A few days later in the town a Panamanian who I had never seen before asked if we managed to get back from the ranger's station without a problem- foolishness breeds minor celebrity, so it seems. Fiona strangled him there and then- that really did bring us notoriety. Run out of town after that- fair enough I thought.