What's Important?

A happy partner

 Good food

Heights

Blue sky

Dusk

An empty lane

Family

Friends

Wild water

Mystery

21 HOURS

(sorry for the delay in posting this cliffhanger, our internet was affected by high winds)

9 pm, Boquete: A post on the “Americans in Panama” forum caught my eye. A home to rent for 1-2 months – in Volcan.   How delightful!  Living on the slopes of an active volcano has always been on my "To Don't" list!

But on a lark, I responded anyway.

Next morning, 9 am, Boquete: Gusti and Christine, our Swiss friends, came by to see if we were up for a visit to Volcan, a 2 hour drive West of Boquete. The decision was quite easy: get out of Boquete for the day, go for a hike and spend time with our friends. And maybe we’d have a chance to look at that rental house.

Before leaving, I checked my email and sure enough, I got a preliminary response about the house.  I wrote a quick note back and we all piled into the car for a day of adventure in unknown lands. 

The drive to Volcan on the back roads set my imagination free: green but not jungly, rolling hills, not too hot, clean, and lots of fertile soil – of course.  We got to the town of Volcan and stopped for some espresso at a sweet little coffee shop. Then we piled in the car again and continued up the slope of the volcano. 

This area was settled many years ago by Swiss people. Swiss Chalets dot the landscape, produce stands are around every corner – talk about cute!! We arrived at a trail that skirts around the volcano through the jungle – not the trail that heads straight up to the summit – over 11,000 feet. 

It wasn’t a normal trail, but rather a rocky dirt road that passes through many acres of farmed land on the slopes before entering the jungle.  Potatoes, lettuce, broccoli, celery, onions: over 80% of Panama’s fruits and vegetables are grown in this area – on the slopes of Volcan Baru. 

We walked up the trail, and stopped for a rustic mid-day snack of wheat bread and queso fresco (fresh cheese).  Then upward again. 

When a pickup truck with two agricultural workers drove past us, Gusti thumbed for a ride.  They stopped and motioned us to jump in the back.  

Yeehaw!! As we inched up a terribly steep and bumpy road, we held onto the roll bar for dear life – laughing the whole time.  At the top of the ridge we all got out and began our stroll back to the car, snapping pictures of amazing flowers and plants all the way.

3:15 pm, Volcan Baru: Back at the car I checked my email – only to discover an email about the home for rent in Volcan.  Could we meet them at 4 pm? Well sure, why not? Just enough time to stop at a produce stand and drive back down to Volcan. 

This series of events was beginning to seem a bit amusing.

So yes, we checked out the home on the outskirts of Volcan. It was a clean very livable home in a nondescript residential area not too far out of town. Located in an ancient lava field actually, just one hour from the Costa Rican border; sandy, rocky, windy, with horses, chickens, and precarious dirt roads.  

Fully furnished, the place rents for less than $400/month including utilities.  The story is that the owner had to return to the U.S. for a few months and prefers not to leave the place unoccupied. 

The four of us had a fine dinner in Volcan with the friends of the owner, Lydia and her husband David. We asked all sorts of questions, and we set about trying to figure out if we had ANY attraction to the notion of chilling out in Volcan for a much needed rest.

6 pm, Volcan:  Before dinner was over, Jeff and I decided that we couldn’t think of any reason NOT to hang out in Volcan for 2 months.  Mainly, it would give us time to think about what we’re going to do next.

  

Just 21 hours after seeing the ad, we had seen the home and shook hands on the deal.  And 21 hours after that we had paid the first month’s rent, and with keys in hand, we had moved in to our new home in a town we knew nearly nothing about.

I’m so amused with this – especially after all the jokes I’ve made about people who elect to live precariously in active volcano zones.

Yet that’s exactly what we’re doing and quite glad about it. Both of us are thrilled to pause, relax, cook in our own kitchen, and sleep in the same bed for a while.

A well-earned repose in the struggles of travel. 

Thanks, God.

Our day in Volcan begins. Christine treats us to espresso.

The gals enjoy the hike.

Starr learns about growing chayote squash from an expert.

Lunch time is a welcome break.

The view down into the valley from the side of Baru.

Peace. Nicht krieg machen.

Which one is bigger?

The top of the mountain remains hidden in the clouds. Abundant lichens, moss and ferns.

This black & white captures how the jungle feels. Unreal and magical. 

Steeper than it looks. More fun too.

Our first orange and green house.

... and what to my wondering eyes should appear?

11,400 ft. Volcan Baru from our new home in Volcan.

Catching up onthe computer.

We don't have to share the kitchen with anyone!  Cooking a homemade meal on the propane stove.

A stormy, windy sunset over the Pacific tonight.



Now to uncover the mysteries of the little town of Volcan, Panama . . .

He wants Boquete. I want Santa Fe. Now what?

Boquete, Panama: 

Somewhat cute, cool, wet, flooded with foreigners and sweet restaurants, great bakeries, classy coffee shops, and lots of high end homes including various castles.

Boquete is Expat Central - totally the opposite of Santa Fe. Looking over our pictures, we focused on the outlying mountains and scenery, and spent very little time in the town. The hills surrounding the valley are full of gated communities, large estates, and coffee fincas.

Then, when Jeff said that we should look for places to rent in Boquete . . . the hair on my neck bristled.  "Oh really?!"

I thought Jeff was thinking, "How could we go wrong here?" 

I was thinking, if we wanted to live in Sierra Madre, California, why go to the trouble of going to Central America?!!



JEFF: My thought was to look at the price and condition of rental homes in Boquete before we returned to Santa Fe. Call it due diligence. I do like Santa Fe, but I was concerned about its isolation for a first-time rental  situation. Boquete is at the opposite extreme.

Funny thing happened.

We did something completely different, and we'll tell you about it in the next post.

Boquete is known for its "spring-like" climate - a rare thing in hot Central America.

Basalt columns make a great climbing wall.

The streams around Boquete are pure, fresh mountain water flowing straight out of the high, rainy jungle.

"Queen of the Night"  grows along many of the mountain roads, rivers, driveways, etc., etc.  (Queen of the Road)

An abandoned dream estate - decaying by a river in the jungle.

Back in the Bromeliad zone.  Bromelaids are beautiful - but too much of anything can kill, as this tree attests to.

These jungle mountains are part of the Amistad National Park, the only inter-national NP in the world, partly in Panama and partly in Costa Rica.

90% of Panama's veggies are grown on the slopes of Volcan Baru.  This is a view of the Boquete side of the slopes.

Every day the afternoon clouds roll in from the Pacific Ocean which is only 33 miles south of us, or from the Caribbean, just 20 miles to the north.  This is a skinny place, indeed!

Drum Roll Please

We were beginning to think our search for a home would never end - though perhaps we were wrong. Now it appears it will end.  In fact it may have already ended.

The winner may be Santa Fe, a charming (though undeveloped) mountain town in the Veraguas region of western Panama, pretty much halfway between the Caribbean coast and the Pacific Ocean.

So far we've been here a week during which time have experienced such warm relationships with our fellow travelers (you know who you are) and also with the local people. THIS feeling is what we have been seeking, and this is the place where it has happened.

Plus the climate is right for us, much better than the humid hot coastal areas and the dripping cloud forest jungles we have hiked.

Yep, several times we've hiked up into the jungle to see various waterfalls. We swam in the river. We had lunch with Chon and toured his organic farm and his wife's orchid collection.

We sat around the hostel in the evenings swapping stories with other travelers, other seekers. These are our people, and we have enjoyed their company immensely.

But now we're leaving this place, moving on to Boquete, only 100 km to the west, but a 4 hour drive on the roads. Boquete is a town that was discovered by North Americans about 10 years ago and reputedly seems like a little America. Not really our kind of place, but we need to see and feel it before we can come back to Santa Fe. We need to be sure before proceeding to set up camp in Santa Fe.

It feels so strange to think that our search may be over. I have never in my life thought that Panama is a place I might call home.

But I might do just that.

Stopping our travels makes me feel weird.

Santa Fe makes Starr feel really happy.

The local people here have not been trampled by tourism.

Veraguas region makes their own version of the Panama hat.

I really like this wild flower growing in Panama.

We hiked up to Bermejo Falls on a warm day (though ther're all warm so far).

Hey Toni, check this one out!  It's just growing alongside a river.

All the people we meet in the countryside are willing to stop and talk. 

OK here's what happened: Wasp lands on huge spider, stings him, and drags his limp, paralyzed victim all the way across the dirt road and into the bushes - as we watched.

Maria's orchids win prizes in local orchid competitions.

I call this the Morse Code plant. All dots and dashes.

Orchids can get very complicated indeed.

Epiphyllum?

Prettiest of the day  . . .but what is it?

Red and black is always in style.

What a wonderful farm lunch Maria gave us during the organic farm tour.

Gusti's magnetic smile - and he never stops telling stories.

Chon roasts and grinds some fresh beans for our coffee.

Sean will know it when he sees it.

Denton is still working toward Sourdough status after 30 years in Alaska. The jokes got pretty grizzly before it was over. 

A river dip for the men while on an outing.

Chon explains his farming theories.

Ribbons of frog eggs float in the river.