So Sunday 27 March comes sooner than expected. The time is passing quickly now and when I get back from Panama, there will be less than 3 weeks before I start heading home.
Holly drives me to the airport in Quepos for my quick flight to San Jose. This time, for the first time, I am flying Nature Air as they are the carrier to Panama. They also fly out of the second international airport in San Jose called Tobias Bolanos. The other is Juan Santamaria. This trip is the one I booked to fulfil my visa requirements for Costa Rica. Travellers from Australia and many other places get 90 days on entry to the country but you are (apparently) required to have a ticket out of the country booked. As my return flight was outside this period I had to book a flight to somewhere, so on 3 Jan ...yes the night before I left....I did a quick search on the web and picked Bocas del Toro in Panama. Bocas del Toro means mouth/gulf of the bull.
I actually no longer required this trip as I had been to Ecuador but it was a non-refundable ticket. My friend Chris from Jaco had been there a few weeks ago and quite liked it so I thought I might as well go. I booked a hotel that was recommended by Chris called Hotel Olas where he had stayed. In Bocas del Toro you pay for everything in cash and there are only a couple of places that take credit cards. Also at the place I was staying you paid for your room each night even if you were booked in for a week like I was.
The flight over was another trip in a little plane which I love. The planes seat about 12 but there was only 6 of us on the flight. The row of single seats were folded up and used to store one of the guys surfboards which made it feel like a real holiday flight. There was another young couple on the plane and she was really nervous about the flight and was asking me if I had done it before. I tried to convey lots of confidence in her but not sure she was convinced. She seemed to endure it okay though and took lots of photos before after and during, perhaps to keep herself preoccupied.
On the flight I met a guy called Bill, who lives in Jaco (about an hour north of Manuel Antonio) and is a stockbrocker from Denver. He has lived there for 7 years. He was singing the praises of Bocas to us on the flight. He loves it there and was going down to buy a business. I was a little disturbed though when he told me the only thing wrong with the place is how many mosquitoes there are. EEK! As I seem to be a target normally, the thought of being in a place where it is actually a problem sounds like it might be a major issue for me!
As we got closer the view of the coastline and the turquoise coloured water dispelled any thoughts of mosquitoes! The airport here was hysterical, quite a short runway that had the local sportsground located at the end of it. There was a baseball match being played when we landed with quite a few people filling the stands. The landing went without a hitch for both the group on the plane and the baseballers.....! Bags are searched before we are allowed to collect them. They were also searched in our presence before they put them on the plane at the other end. Not sure how we would have the chance to do anything illegal with them in that time, but hey....I guess it keeps people in a job. Customs is one man sitting in an office and we wait outside his door in line to be called in and approved to enter the country.
We all head our separate ways and there does not seem to be a taxi in sight. Luckily I travel light. I run into Bill again on my way to my hotel and he offers to show me the way. Not really knowing where I was going, I decide it is a good offer. As we walk along Im not completely convinced he knows where we are going but I follow along anyway. Finally we arrive at Hotel Olas and I check in. He decides to book a room there as he hasn’t been able to contact his friend that 
lives there. We meet back in the bar, which was built out over the water at the back of the hotel. I offer to buy him a beer for his trouble. One beer led to another and so the afternoon went. The perfect thing to do in a hot climate, right! I was a little concerned that he could drink two beers to my one but I guessed he had been doing it longer...! As Im not that good drinking without eating I decide I need to eat. So we head for the “best pizza place in town” but it wasn’t open as it was only 5.30pm (more about that place later). We ended up at Hotel El Limbo and had a beautiful dinner ...and of course more beers for Bill, although I had moved on to white wine. We met some people who were spending some time off their yacht which they had been sailing around for several years, about 12 from memory. They were now looking to get off the boat and set up house...she wanted to have a garden. They were quite the characters and it was good to chat to them. After dinner we headed back to the hotel and said goodnight. Bill announced that it had been a good first date...news to me..that it was a date that is, it had been a nice evening. 
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