“The universe is a collection of archipelagos - separate but connected.” Mommzen
BOCAS DEL TORO ISLANDS
A great place to chill out in the hot tropics with friendly natives and a very international population of backpackers, expats, ocean voyagers, SCUBA divers, and sun seekers.
Yep - that is the airport at the end of the city street. If you want - you can get off the plane and walk to your hotel!
Or you can take the ferry from the mainland - if you believe in such things as ferries.
The busy main street in Bocas Town.
And the busy beach at the edge of Bocas Town
When you fly into Isla Colon you actually land in Bocas Town. The eastern portion of the airstrip is used as a baseball field. Talk about playing games in the middle of the street - these ball players have their backs to arriving airplanes stopping just a few feet short of the diamond when they land! The ball players barely take notice of the arriving planes. Familiarity does breed contempt.
Everything in town is within walking distance of the airport. You can roll your luggage to any local hotel - or catch a cab to more distant locations on the island. Water taxis will take you to locations on all the other islands. The older buildings and residences are reminiscent of all the other old banana port cities in Central America. Two story wood structures with tin roofs.
There is an abundance of sailboats of every type throughout the archipelago. Obviously this is a popular destination and stop over for them. Mariners, like the many other types of visitors to these islands, are attracted by the S&S factor of the Bocas Del Toro Islands. S&S = "Safe and Small".
Panama in general and Bocas in particular is undergoing a building boom with the influx of foreigners and foreign money. They have great rates on the bank CDs! In Panama City the latest wave of immigrants are escaping Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. In Bocas there is an eclectic mix of expats from all over the world - many of them having spent time in Costa Rica first before deciding life was better and cheaper in Panama.
There are two temperatures here - hot and humid and cooler and humid (after a heavy rain). Wet clothing and towels will not dry unless laid out in the direct sunlight. If you dress for hot and wet - then your trip will be no sweat!
Unlike most places in Latin America, there are not armed guards posted at the doorways to commercial establishments. The exception would be the numerous Chinese mini-marts and supermarkets where a member of the family sits by the door like a human surveillance camera, usually grandma or one of the young daughters of the owner. I never saw any of the Chinese sitting by the door with a gun. Thieves would probably find it very humiliating if they were being chased down the street by an angry granny!
In fact it not unusual to walk into an unattended shop or pass by some personal belongings set down on the street or ground with no one nearby. Most of the people here seem to be very casual with their material goods considering the way they leave things lying around.
The scarcity of police, security guards, and burglar bars in the Bocas Del Toro Islands stand in testament to the relative safety of the region. There are far more young girl visitors then young boy visitors in the islands. I venture it has more to do with the girl's sense of safety then their sexual preference .
It is heartening to see that the residents are trying their best to put into place methods and practices that insure a healthy and clean environment for themselves and visitors, and ideas of conservation for the fauna and flora - above and below the water. This is evident in many ways, including the garbage boats that circulate around the islands picking up black garbage bags off the end of all the many small docks and piers. Of course the old garbage system is still in effect - the big black buzzards hanging out on the tops of lamp poles, or circling the skies looking to do their part in keeping the islands clean of offal and such.
Bocas, like Palau in Micronesia, is south of the tropical cyclone belt. This is evidenced by the old trees found on the shorelines and aged rickety structures built during the banana export days that are still standing.
Of course this place is still not "Paradise" found. What the islands may lack in the types of pollution we suffer in more developed and populated areas of the world they make up for with noise pollution from the numerous bars and the ubiquitous outboard motors. Gondolas with outboards to ferry the populace around the Venice of Panama.
And then there is an introduced underwater nuisance found in the islands in the form of the Pacific Lionfish. No one knows for certain how it has made the 12,000 mile journey from the Western Pacific to the Caribbean and Atlantic - but it is likely the fish caught a flight - to some marine tropical fish dealer on the East coast! Having collected and shipped marine tropical fish to the States from Micronesia in the past - I am quite familiar with this species. Familiar enough to have experienced their painful venomous spines, which does a good job defending them against most predators. There are now many eradication programs in the tropical areas of the Western Atlantic as most governments and biologists see the fish's fast growing numbers as a threat to native fish populations. So that fish you have on your plate in a Bocas restaurant may be a Lionfish. Enjoy! They are delicious, and you are doing the environment a favor too! What a way to go green - Gringo!
Everything is for sale in Panama. Businesses, homes, land. With the advent of the Internet there has been a globalization of the real estate business. ReMax and Century21, etc., jumped on the marketing of Panama 10 years ago and it has been downhill (or uphill - depending on how you look at it) ever since. Early buyers/sellers made a killing and now everyone is wondering; "What happened to the real estate market"? Value is still there if you look for it - or hang in for the long term. Of course everything is relative and the value of anything just depends on what someone else is willing to pay for it, from Beanie Babies to moon rocks.
A nice side trip on Isla Colon is to take the tour of the Smithsonian Institute facilities. If you are lucky you will get Marlon Brando Smith as your guide, a well informed and conscientious islander. While waiting for the tour to begin in the main office I looked at a wall poster featuring a variety of poison dart frogs found in the region. At first I thought there was some error in the names of some of the frogs as I am already familiar with the appearance of most dart species. The guide Marlon explained to me that lengthily isolation of separate gene pools of dart frogs of the same species on the many islands of the archipelago has resulted in the evolution of many color/pattern variations. So when you go from island to island you will find dart frogs that can be different in appearance and still be the same species. I had seen this variation in dart frogs from Surinam before - a result of frog populations isolated on mountain tops. "Islands" created by elevation in the tropical rain forests of South America. Nature’s evolutionary workshops.
Bocas Town has paved streets so there is no mucking around when it rains. Most people here are on foot in such a small place as this. But the yellow taxis keep busy even when it is not raining, with their distribution of all the goods arriving by boat or plane. On the other islands transportation seems to be restricted to boats. In a place like this it is easier to maintain waterways then highways.
Mosquitos do not seem to be too bad - but there are the sandflies to contend with. Those who have their homes built over the water have neither sand nor flies to deal with. So this is the ideal type of home here - over the water.
Saturday night. The youth are circulating in anticipation of another party night in paradise. On Saturdays there is a more obvious police presence on the main drag, but it is a reassuring one - it will be lively night and a safe one for all. Young and old crowd into the many party bars for the night time fun after a day of fun in and on the water.
And there it is - Bocas Del Toro is a small walk around safe and enjoyable place for the visitor.
Enjoy!
Click on the links in the side bar for more images of the Bocas Del Toro Islands
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