What are the consequences of staying in Bocas so long? Well, it means you need to do a visa run. In typical Panamanian style the rules for how to renew your visa changed in the week we were set to do it. It used to be that you had to leave the country for 72 hours but apparently you can now just pop over the border for 15 minutes to do it.
However, James and I were definitely in need of a break from Bocas so we planned a 3 day excursion to Costa Rica. We travelled by land over the border, with Adamastor safely in bed at the marina, and visited Puerto Viejo de Talamanca. We rented bikes and cycled up to Playa Chiquita and Punta Uva, we strolled the streets, ate in restaurants and had siestas in our little rented room. We then hopped on a bus to Cahuita and rented a room right on the sea which was only a short stroll from the national park.
We got up at dawn (5:30am) on our final day to walk the park trail before other visitors disturbed the animals. The park trail is an amazing mix of jungle and beach with no guides or enclosures or anything like that. You can stroll the trail in your own time and all they ask for is a donation. So we spent the next 3 and a half hours walking through trees full of 3 kinds of monkeys, sloths, giant lizards, snakes, all manner of birds, butterflies and our friendly family of raccoons.
It was the perfect 3 day break to spur us on to leave Bocas and push on towards Portobello, Isla Linton and the San Blas.
