I’ve updated my blog with a few new sets of pictures. We hope you are all doing well and we are getting pretty good at being tour guides so book your trip and come on down!!!!
Well this is going to be one long blog because I don’t want to forget anything myself and I’m going to go a little bit backwards here and start with the recent visit we just had with Wayne’s dad (Gil) and step mother (Pat). In fact they are still in Panama. We shipped them out on the bus Friday for 3 days in the city. Yesterday they are toured the canal and we can’t wait to hear all about it. We have YET to do that ourselves. Pathetic. So hopefully you enjoy if you end up reading this whole damn thing otherwise we hope to hear from you or better yet, SEE YOU sometime. We are also wishing you all a quick end to winter.
Any way, how we managed to fill over 2 weeks with things to do here in little old Pedasi is beyond me but we did it and had a great time. The first 3 days were spent here in town. We toured the beaches, some of the new developments going in and of course our local cantina’s.
We spent 3 nights in Boquete. The 4 of us and the 2 dogs. Made for a cozy trip. In David (close to Boquete) we ate at TGIF’s!!! Pretty much our first American food chain since we got here (well ok, had a milkshake or 2 from McD’s). We stayed at Momentum B&B in Boquete where we’ve stayed before. Had a little snag in our reservation so we didn’t get our cabin the first night, but had 2 rooms in the B&B. Ken, the owner is a great guy and a little on the wild side. As you will see in the pictures, Ken has a disco ball in his living room, which is right outside the bedrooms. He used to be a DJ and still loves to dance. Go for it! We never did kick up our heels. Instead we chose to spend our afternoons sipping cocktails in the pool after our days of touring.
Our first full day there we drove all through the mountains. The views are incredible. We stopped at ‘mi jardin es tu jardin’, ‘my garden is your garden’. It’s a privately owned home that has opened it’s garden for people to tour. It’s amazing. Lots and lots of pictures were taken there. From there we stopped for a fresh cup of coffee looking out over the mountains.
Day 2 Pat and I did the Ruiz Coffee Tour. WORD OF WARNING…..If any of you drink Folgers or Nescafe, STOP!!!!!!! We learned about floaters. Yes, yes, I’m sure we are all familiar with the term floaters but in this case we are talking about coffee beans. Floaters are beans that have been eaten by bugs, or have rotted or mildewed. They float to the top, while the good beans sink. The floaters are scooped out and in their entirety are dried…bugs and all. Once dried….again, in their entirety….they are shipped off to be roasted, dyed, and whatever else they need to do to make them look like coffee flakes. I believe this is all done in the US. So anywhooooo, I’d stay away from the instant coffees.
We learned so much on our tour and I’m glad I took the time to go. Real estate in that area has become crazy and people are selling off their fields to become millionaires, which they never would become no matter how long they owned their fields. Hopefully some of the big families will stay, like the Ruiz family. For the most part, the beans are shipped off and roasted elsewhere. A small portion is roasted in Panama for distribution in the country only. We had our coffee tasting at this facility and wow, did it smell good.
We ended our stay in Boquete by having dinner at The Rock. A restaurant that had existed until it floated down the river during the last flooding. It’s been rebuilt and it was the best food I’ve eaten in the 8 months we’ve been here. The entire restaurant was windows and it looked out onto the huge rock walls that have been built around it. Hopefully now it won’t float away again. Pat and I had Bourbon spiced pasta with shrimp. OMG! The boys had filet. Excellent. We were so happy.
Back in Pedasi we booked Gil and Pat at Casa de Campo rather than where they started their stay. This hotel is awesome with an awesome pool and real COTTON SHEETS! All that you could hope for in a small hotel. We spent just about every afternoon/evening in the pool before heading to dinner. I even got permission to use their pool daily for one hour to do laps. HA, anyone who knows me knows I can’t do an hour of laps. Today I did 15 minutes. Whatever, it’s cool, it’s wet and it’s all mine!!!
We spent this last week exploring different areas around Pedasi, introducing them to some of our friends and relaxing by the pool. But the highlight had to be the rum factory in Pese. About 1 ½ hours from us. They produce Abuelo rum, Seco (the national drink of Panama), Jumbie (flavored rum) and a few others. When we arrived we were handed the new Seco drink in a can. We each got our own can. YAHOO! Ice cold. Similar to those Smirnoff drinks. Then we moved onto sampling the Abuelo; Unaged, 7 year old and 12 year old. The only thing we couldn’t sample was the 30 year old. We also sampled some of the flavors and ended up buying a coconut and a pineapple rum. Along with a 12 year old. On our way out we were handed 4 more cans ‘for the road’. Have I said how much I love it here!!!
Some interesting facts….the barrels that they age their rum in come from Jack Daniels in TN. They are used 1 year by JD first. Sugar cane is brought to the factory in both large and small amounts. We saw a bunch of steer driven carts coming in with their load of cane. It was very cool. Some farmers will burn the cane first because it makes for easier harvesting. When they do that though, they get less money. The factory crushes the juice out of the cane and uses the leaves to fuel the factory. 70% of the energy the factory uses is powered by sugar cane.
On our way back from the rum tour we hit the casino in Chitre. We had to check our firearms at the door. Wayne won $25 and I spent about that losing. Gil and Pat didn’t do much better.
Friday we brought them to Las Tablas to catch a bus back to the city. The bus waiting was an old run down thing but it was ready to go and it happened so fast. Our goodbyes were quick and sad. Of course as soon as their bus pulled out, a brand new one pulled in that would be leaving in 1 hour. Oh well. They got to the city safe and just a little dirtier than they hoped to be.
Ahhhh, it was just great having some familiar faces here and we explored areas we probably wouldn’t have bothered with otherwise. We are hoping by the time they come again, they said they would come again, that we’ll actually have a house for them to stay in. Although they might opt for the hotel since it was so nice.
Other stuff: Land deal is done. Dirt road somewhat put in, drainage pipe along the road is in. Permit to build our storage shed has been granted….we were able to go into the mayors office and actually communicate in SPANISH and get our building permit. We presented them with our drawing, in colored pencil (my idea). They laughed at my artistic ability! It was a day of celebration!!! Permit to build; $10. NICE. All 10 citrus trees that we planted at the beginning of dry season are alive and well. Fence posts are in. Fencing still needs to be put up. Gate is being made and should be done soon….although 6 weeks ago we were told it would be 2 weeks. It’s ok, it’s ok. We’ve met with 4 different architects so far. Might meet with one more who speaks only Spanish so that might be tough but he works in the mayors office. Good be a good thing, then again ya never know. We’ll get there…..when exactly is anyone’s guess. We are in no rush….THANKFULLY!
Wayne fished yesterday. Left at 8AM and wasn’t back until after midnight. The boat had to wait for the tide so there’d be enough water to get back in. We’ve got about 100 pounds of tuna sitting in the fridge right now. Not a bad thing. While he’s off cleaning the boat today, I’ll run around town giving tuna away.
The dogs are great but we might need to bring Melvin to AA. If it’s got booze in it, he’s on it! A tablespoon is all he needs. He’s ‘maturing’ now so after he’s a had few, well he gets to feeling randy and poor Fischer gets the brunt of it. I know, I should probably be a better mother but there just isn’t that much entertainment here. You don’t just throw this kind of fun out.
Fischer is off limits to the property until it’s fully fenced in. As some of you already heard, he’s a new breed of dog. A Schitzwoo (Woo being his nickname). Pictures are attached that pretty much tell the story. Not 30 seconds after a cow ‘did his business’ Fischer ran to it and rolled in it. Not just a little. This was a body roll. Legs in the air, smile on his silly face. I guess you can equate it to how Wayne would look rolling around in a large keg of beer, with tuna swimming in it! He couldn’t have been happier. Made for a great ride home in the truck.
We made another border crossing at the end of January. It was actually FUN this time. We used the bus system. It was so much less stressful and a lot more entertaining. There were several stops along the way, some obvious that they were terminals, other’s not so much. Really, we wait here for a bus? OK. Sure enough, here comes the bus. On our arrival at the border we were the only one’s in line to leave Panama and then the only ones in line to enter Costa Rica. And it was a Saturday. How we managed that, I have no idea. Leaving would have been no hassle either but we got caught up trying to get ourselves out of buying a bus ticket to Costa Rica. Yes, in order to ENTER back into Panama you have to buy a ticket TO Costa Rica. It’s proof to the government that you promise to leave Panama after your timeframe is up. HELLO! The ticket cost $15. If I were a drug dealer, I think I might be ok buying this damn ticket and then doing what ever the f I wanted to. Crazy!
Travel info. That none of you would be interested in reading. I just want for my records:
Going to CR (Saturday)
Caught the Chitre bus to Davisa at abot 8:15-8:30
Arrive Divisa 9:15
Caught Divisa bus to Santiago at 9:30
Arrive in Santiago around 10 for ½ hour stop
Leave Santiago around 10:30
Arrive David around 1:15
Leave David around 1:30 to Frontera
Arrive Frontera, can’t remember, maybe 3:00. NO LINES, NO WAITING
Leaving CR (Monday)
8:25 no lines at CR border
Small line at Panama
Well I’ve managed to bore myself at this point so if any of you are still reading, you are a good friend J)) or really, really bored.
