HAPPY NEW YEAR YOU ALL!!!! Hope you had as
much fun ringing the New Year in as we had. I have a feeling it’s going to be a
great 2013!
Let me catch you up on our Holiday Season:
On 12/12/12, we celebrated Heather’s
Birthday. What a fun date to have a BD. It was huge fun with yummy food, mostly
sushi (Heather and my favorite). One bottle of bubbly after another was opened
and I don’t think anybody was in pain when we left. What was the most memorable
just after it got dark the whole surrounding started blinking like the stars had
fallen out of the sky. Hundreds of lightning bugs arose from the grass and
started dancing around us. What a perfect way to end a fun party with a magical
light show like this. It was a great party and I think more than just one guest
had a hangover the next morning.
Unfortunately the phone rang early in the morning
we received very sad news of the passing of our dear friend Bill Jones. You may remember the fun times we had in Costa
Rica visiting him and his wife Jeannette. Bill was always Sid’s hero, he left
on his cruising dream before Sid was able to retire. Our deepest condolences go
out to his Jeannette. Bill was a great guy, we will miss him. http://turtle-express9.blogspot.com/
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| Bill and Jeanette |
On the 14th before the sun was up
we drove to Panama City, dropped the car off at Abby’s and took a Taxi to the
Bus Station. We had 20 minutes before the bus to David left. It’s a 7 hour
comfortable bus ride and we enjoyed watching 3 movies. The bus stopped a couple
of times but only in Santiago were we able to get off the bus for 20 minutes
and stretch our legs. A friendly almost toothless guy started talking to us, I
bought some souvenirs and it was already time to climb back onto the bus. I
started to recognize David on our arrival and knew we would get off the bus
soon. I called Scot to let him know that we were approaching. The bus stopped,
about 6 passengers got up and walked towards the front to get of the bus. We
were going to follow them, but they were told to return to their seats, so we
sat down as well. Must have not arrived at the bus station yet! The bus took
off and kept going and going and after about 5 minutes turned left into the
main road again. I mentioned to Sid that this was strange that they did a
detour through David. But then after another 5 or so minutes the bus did not
stop again and no bus station was in sight, now that made me really think. Just
good at that time the bus employee came by and I asked him about David. He
looked at me with a puzzled look, repeated David, walked to the front and
entered the cabin where the bus driver was sitting, the bus stopped and bus boy
motioned to us to exit the bus. When on the sidewalk the bus boy pointed at the
over pass and said you can catch a bus on the other side back into David! Just
good I know David a little otherwise we would have ended up at the Costa Rican
border. We both had a good chuckle and more so when we called Megan to let her
know that we are catching a bus back to David. She did not quite get what
happened and told Scot and Greg that we were thrown off the bus that caused
some fun confusion.
About ½ hour later we met the three at the
local Grocery Store and a further ½ hour later we arrived in Boquette and met
Scots wife Katie.
The two nights and three days we were there
were filled with sightseeing, eating and drinking and having fun. Megan wanted
to get some local Ruiz Coffee and when we walked into the store an almost
toothless guy approached Sid and said in Spanish: “I recognize this mustache
anywhere”! It was the same guy who talked to us at the bus station in Santiago.
He is the owner of Ruiz, small world.
What a stunning place Boquete is with an
incredible view over the volcanic mountains to the North and the Pacific Ocean
and islands to the South. No wonder there are so many Ex-Pats here, this is
definitely a place to retire. Although we heard that it rains a lot up here
(can’t be worse than Portobelo). The temperature was pleasant during the day
and coolish at night and the humidity was just perfect.
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| Scots House |
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| Cut in 1/2 coke bottles for planting seeds, great idea! |
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| Greg |
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| Megan |
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| Weird Rock formation |
The second afternoon Scot introduced us to
his friends who live in an incredible house on the mountain side way above
Boquete with a most spectacular view. They
know our cruising buddies Dotty and Larry well, he built their kitchen.
Unfortunately Dotty and Larry were visiting their kids for the Holidays and we
missed them in Boquete. Just means we have to come back.
The third day after thank yous and goodbye’s
we headed down the mountain and followed Scot’s directions to Pedosi, the
southern most part in Panama. It was a looooooong drive and nothing there until
you reach the village. A 30 minute drive we reached the beach Scot was referring
to. The beach was incredibly beautiful but not much was here, except for a very
expensive hotel. We met a jolly fellow, looking like Santa, who owns a hotel in Pedosi and decided
to spend the night there, found his place but he had only one room left.
Since
it was such a long drive we decided to head back to Santiago and spend the
night at the La Hacienda Hotel, where we enjoyed a wonderful Mexican lunch.
After a yet another wonderful meal we turned in for a restful night.
Early the next morning we were on our way to
Abby’s to pick up our car.
We did a quick stop in Coronado and drove up
the mountain to Altos del Maria, to find our buddies property. Wow what a
beautiful place, it puts Boquete in second place.
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| Stairway to heaven |
The boys drove straight home from there. Well……..
they had to do a little stop at Captain Jacks. The girls went shopping so not
to run out of any food for the week. They were with us at Summer Place, as it
is at least one hour one way to the nearest good grocery store. We did run out
of wine so a quick trip there was necessary after all.
Greg and Megan got us on a pretty tight BM schedule,
every morning at 9:00 a knock on the door, Sid would open and there was Greg
standing with two Bloody Mary’s in his hands. Life’s tough!!!
Unfortunately the weather wasn’t cooperating.
We had a lot of rain preventing us from doing several sightseeing trips. Megan
and Greg didn’t mind as they were able to relax. We did get a drive in to
Pelenque which is the most NE town in Panama where the road stops. We visited
the Green Turtle Marina and were surprised how beautiful the marina is,
although it’s so way out in the boonies it takes a 20 minute bumpy dirt road to
get to the main road and from there it’s almost an hour to our place. I guess
if working on the boat here you have to have all the necessary tools and paint
etc., already on board. And you have to get used to the surge. It is a pretty
area though and the beach is probably one of the best in Panama.
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| Viento Frio church |
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| Drive to Turtle Cay Marina |
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| One of the reasons the road is dangerous to Puerto Lindo |
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| The other reason is signs like this one! OOPS!!!! |
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| Dinghy ride to Isla Linton to see the monkeys |
On the 21st, last day of the
world, we celebrated Christmas at Cindy and Reeds with Greg, Megan, Jim and
Heather and us. I made a yummy Fondue Bourgignonne all enjoyed and the
champagne and wine was flowing until late into the night.
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| One of the dinners for Greg and Megan |
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| Grilled langostinos plus all this meat yum |
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| Fondue Bourgignonne |
A while back Francine from PMYC contacted me on Skype and asked how far we were away from the Canal. I wrote back depends on which side, 2hrs to Panama City and 1 ½ to Colon. On the 23rd Francine arrived on the Celebrity Cruiseship, we picked her and her friend Deanne up and had a champagne sightseeing drive back to Summer Place. It was such a great reunion for all of us and Francine fell in love with Dooger. We had pretty much all day to catch up before I had to drive the two back to the cruise ship in Colon. Francine said this was the highlight of her cruise, yaaahhhh.
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| Champagne welcome |
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| Stop in Portobelo |
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| Wonderful lunch at Captain Jacks |
Since our guest were flying out early on the
25th we were invited to spend a night with them at the beautiful
Riande Hotel close to the airport where we enjoyed a cocktails at the beautiful
pool bar, a cool swim, some cocktails on the patio and a quite Christmas
dinner. It was funny when we made the reservations for the hotel Megan wanted
to know if we needed reservations for the restaurant for the Christmas dinner,
so I called and asked. I told the operator that we were a party of four and
wanted to know if we needed reservation. She said let me connect you with
banquettes. A friendly person answered and I asked the question again, she put
me on hold, now that is odd a simple yes or no would have been sufficient, then
we got disconnected. A few minutes later I called again with the same question
if we needed a reservation for dinner for 4 on the 24th. “Let me
connect you with Banquette and before I could respond I was on hold again. When
the same friendly person answered again I repeated my question: “do we need reservations for 4 on the 24th
?” The responds was: reservation for 24 let me put you on hold…… disconnect. We
did have a good laugh about the party of 24 and just took our chances with
dinner. Did not need a reservation and we had a quite Christmas Eve dinner with
Megan and Greg. Thanks for a wonderful time and for our Riande stay, we enjoyed
it.
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| Evidence in Megan and Greg's apartment that they were here! |
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| Beautiful pool bar at the Riande |
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| Incredible lights in lobby |
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