Boquete

As much as we love living on a chocolate farm in the jungle on an island in the Caribbean, we needed a break from it. So we went to the mountains. Three days in Boquete was all it took for me to finally agree with TK that it would be nicer to live in the mountains than in the tropics. We savored the cooler temperatures, the tall pines, the brisk air, the quaint houses surrounded by flowers and crystal clear streams.

Squirrel monkey

The spider monkey stole our camera case and reluctantly gave it back.

Now I look through my camera and find a lot of photos of animals, as usual, and not much else. We stayed at the strangest hostel I’ve ever been to – owned by a Bostonian woman who rescues animals to rehabilitate. We were the only guests and twice in two days we found the place completely locked up, forcing us to hop the fence and basically break in, which was “totally cool” with the owner. Monkeys, parrots, and one koati lived in large cages, goats and horses roamed out back, a large restaurant remained closed and unused, and then on the side, like an afterthought, sat the one-room hostel. We slept with boa constrictors slithering in cages outside our door and had to choose between a scalding hot shower with a shower head, or a freezing cold one without. Fortunately we both love monkeys. Monkeys are so humanlike, not just in their facial expressions and their use of their hands, but also in their moods and behavior. The spider monkey had some emotional issues resulting from past abuse, and she liked to wrap her tail around my arm with an affectionate death grip, and make furious clicking noises at TK if he touched me.

We rented a motorbike on our last morning in Boquete and drove up and down the rolling hills, stopping to check out waterfalls and farms and one exquisite restaurant. Then a bumpy bus ride back to Bocas to get back to work…