A title lined up for alliteration there. But no…Wow. Surprising that I would do that. That’s how surprised we were when it rained on our two day-trips in Bocas del Toro. Typical.
Snorkelling Trip
A day of searing heat proceeded this day-trip that we had planned and so we were excited for some snorkelling in the sunshine. Of course, the weather had a different plan and so instead it was cold and overcast. The day consisted of stops at multiple locations, the main one being Islas Zapatillas. I had read about the small group of islands beforehand and they had looked like paradise on Earth. Palm trees leaning lazily over perfect white sand, bright turquoise water and not a building in sight. As the boat got closer it was clear that the islands were indeed beautiful however, the sight was slightly marred by the fact that the sun wasn’t shining. The light drizzle and oppressively monotone grey sky seemed to wash out all the colours of paradise. That hadn’t happened in any of the photos on the internet. Reality does have a keen eye of when to kick you right in the nuts.
Nevertheless, we went for a snorkel and it was still crystal clear. There weren’t that many fish around but swore I saw a baby sunfish (although I’m no Ichthyologist so my word is basically garbage). After returning to the boat and the rest of the people who were just paddling right next to the rickety craft, we played football on the beach. Not with a football though. Instead it was with the only available round thing on this tiny island. No, not one of the heads of one of the constantly screeching tourists (although it did cross my mind). It was an empty, rock hard, dried up coconut. Playing with the local kid who helped lead the tour, we quickly found out that our fitness was a little low thanks to the beer drinking and lack of exercise, but we played on nevertheless. We stoically ignored the throbbing pain from our bruised and battered feet and threw all our moves at this kid. To try and bring back some sense of dignity after our shocking display of footballing talent, we had a race along the beach. And, despite all the odds stacking against me (just forget that I was taller and older), I did beat this 16/17 year old child. I am the pride of Britain.
After that we went to Dolphin Bay, to see (to my utter surprise) … Dolphins. Who would’ve guessed it? It was an amazing sight but definitely ruined by the number of companies cruising the waters. Their boats chased after the dolphins and surrounded them which felt cruel, also the fact that people in all the boats spent their whole time filming the experience or taking photos annoyed me slightly. They saw the whole experience through their phone instead of with their eyes which seemed like such a waste.
Sloth Island was the next stop on our rainy seafaring romp. Pretty certain about the animal we were going to see, thanks to the Primary school level naming practices of Panama, we started to get excited about seeing sloths. Problem with sloths is, as you may have guessed, they don’t like moving. At all. And thanks to their brown fur, they look exactly like a branch. We did see some of them that the guide had pointed out (after he used his whistle that is supposed to make them move), but maybe I just saw what I wanted to see. Maybe in reality, it’s all a scam and there’s no such thing as sloths. But I’m going to take a wild stab in the dark and trust the integrity of the man, the myth, the legend, David Attenborough. He saw sloths and he’s a national treasure, so they must be real. We love you David.
Finally, we stopped at Cayo Coral which was supposed to be the most amazing in terms of coral viewing. Instead there was a tiny patch of coral with lots of different colours but nothing particularly spectacular, I saw a few interesting jellyfish then got out.
Red Frog Beach
On another overcast day Pete, Brendan and I headed out for Red Frog Beach which I had read about before as a nice place to spend the day. We took a water taxi there which took around 15 minutes and Pete drove about half the way. As soon as we arrived it began raining, and in typical Central American fashion, it wasn’t drizzle. Taking shelter in the trees we came to the point where we had to pay, Brendan and I had enough money readily available but Pete was left rummaging around for $1 bills. Instead the man spied a condom in Pete’s bag of assorted clutter and it was then exchanged it for entry to the beach and island. Never had I seen a condom used as a form of payment before and it was nothing less than a beautiful moment.
Getting to the beach we were slightly disappointed, not because the beach wasn’t nice, it was probably because it was still raining. We still went for a swim in the slightly seaweedy water where I was nipped by a pesky crab and then we did a long jump competition on the beach. With my body proportions most accurately likened to a satyr my long legs propelled me to victory, not even Dutch Pete’s lankiness could surpass my springy appendages. Just call me Mr. Tumnus.
After getting a little bored we decided to go for a wander down one of the tracks we’d seen, all in our flip flops, which always seems to happen and it never ends well (see Montenegro and Trinidad). Aiming for nowhere in particular we ended up in this private housing complex on top of the hill, each house had a pool, they all had beautiful views over the sea and most seemed a bit empty. We were a little unclean by this point mostly due to our poor choice of footwear and so Pete decided that a shower would be nice. As if by magic there was an outdoor shower at the nearest house and so he went for a little rinse and got back to the road just before one of the patrol trucks came to maintain the security of the houses. They were probably making sure three young men weren’t breaking into these expensive houses or using their private outdoor showers…
After asking where we could go to see anything interesting we were pointed into the forest and we thought we’d try and find a way back from there instead of back down the same path. However, the slippery mud and my cheap flipflops weren’t working harmoniously and so it made for difficult walking. But, amongst the trees, we were rewarded with a random wooden staircase which after a lot of steps took us into the canopy and a zip wire. After a brief chill at the top, we headed back the way we had come trying our best to avoid the security patrol and maintain the structural integrity of our flip-flops.
Final thoughts
Yes, it rained all over our parade, but in the end, we didn’t care too much. Brendan didn’t drown on his first snorkelling excursion, I had happily ruined the self-confidence of a lovely 16 year old boy and we had had a lot of fun.
