Panama Scouting - Day 19 - Boquete Notes
Hello from Boquete on a lovely Monday evening!
I am sending you a couple of photos from a tour we took, and then I have two short stories about my day.
The first photo is from rock formations all around the area - this is old-time volcano country, and the rock formed in sheets with pointed terminations; this photo is from the only location where a road passes a place that has both the long sheets of layered rock, and the layer/sheet termination points in a roadside turn-off where climbers come, and tours like ours stop to admire the local geology. There are other faces of this rock type - either the slabs or the termination points - throughout the area, and they are rated for climbers from 1 to 7 in difficulty; this one is rated a 1 as the simplest to access and attack! It is pretty amazing, and once you know it is here, the two types of formations are noticeable all over the mountainsides, even from a distance. Very cool stuff, and apparently an interesting and easy-grip climb for mountaineers.
Carvings: Below is an example of the many carvings we find all over the area - rocks and tree stumps get carved just because they are standing around naked. The photo is a carving in a yard near a historic church (tiny) we stopped at on the tour. In the plaza in town, there are carvings of a princess, a saint, and a Spanish explorer. A carving in a large rock of a quetzal bird and a tree is not even a block away. The fact that a stone is naked means it needs to be decorated with carvings, painted, or made into a fence. A tree stump is unusual - stumps and sticks seem to sprout again within weeks, and this is used in making fences by sticking branches into the ground and running barbed wire through the line, and next thing you know, you have a living fence! A stump that is not growing needs to be carved - is begging to be carved!
Croc-style house shoes: I think I told you that I found a dollar store in town and bought us some indoor shoes - I got each pair for $1.25. They are plastic, like Crocs, and they have a band that can rotate around to act as a heel brace for the shoe. Miguel's shoes are a classic black, and I got the correct size by downloading a size conversion chart before heading out. Women's plastic shoes were only available in cute colors, so I am sporting orchid purple around the hotel room. The hotel has wooden and tile floors, and I like to walk barefoot inside. My feet were always dirty, and I realized that carpeting at home is kindly absorbing all that dirt, whereas here, the bottoms of my feet pick it up. I was constantly washing my feet when I got anywhere near the bed, a significant seating area in our hotel. You might think, "that must not be a clean hotel," but not so; I have watched the women clean, and they clean well. Many streets are dirt roads, the wind is constant and blows stuff around, and the windows are always open (screened, but open). The world is a dirty place, and cleaning products leave sticky residues, and then Miguel and I walk into the rooms and add to the stuff that paints the bottoms of my feet. At home, the carpets must be hosting the dirt from the streets, the walk-throughs, and the daily activity, so I don't have to be as aware of it; these are now our indoor shoes, and I put them on when I enter the room and just wear them in the building (there are only nine rooms in this hotel, and a lobby and breakfast area). So, a great find for $1.25 a pair, and a great reminder that without dirt, the environment would be pretty darn sparse. Also, a good reminder of how quickly our spaces can be reclaimed by the environment!
Brazilian Italian Food in Panama: Tonight, we ate at a Brazilian restaurant I found on my walk this morning while Miguel was at the gym. This place amuses me because Brazilian food is terrific (we have visited Brazil twice), but this restaurant primarily exists to serve pizza. We had feijoada (black bean stew) and a grilled chicken dish, but almost every meal ordered while we were there or picked up by double-parking drivers was pizza. I thought you might chuckle from our trip to Panama to eat Italian at a Brazilian place! Italian places all around town serve pizza and pasta, but I think that the draw for Brazilian pizza is their grilled meats.
Tour In two Days: Miguel has put his name up for a hiking tour of the Pipeline Trail, known internationally as the best place in the world to see the Quetzal birds who come from Guatemala each year to mate here (and in Costa Rica) - promised the best quetzal viewing by National Geographic. The Resplendent Quetzal is a brilliant green bird with a tail about a yard long; the males have bright red tummies, their inner tail feathers include black and white coloring, and their heads are fuzzy with upstanding little hair-like green feathers. They are amazing cloud forest birds, and Miguel is going to work hard to see one - it is the national bird of Guatemala, and he has never seen one there. There are tours here for bird watching and specific tours to known Quetzal nesting areas, but that is no guarantee that one will be spotted - they are shy. There need to be at least three people for the tour to happen, so if we don't hear tomorrow, Miguel will be walking the streets trying to rouse another prospect for Wednesday (one woman is already in line to do the hike Tuesday or Wednesday).
Buenas noches to Day 19 from Panamanian Paradise!
Mary Bea y Miguel