Week 3

PHOTOS: Cassidy and our neighbor John at their property above Boquete picking oranges. The kids in their loft bedroom. A view of Volcan Baru (volcano) from John and Annes property.

We just finished week 3 of our stay in Boquete and language school. Things are going well here. It is really a very relaxing place to live. There arent a ton of activities for small kids except the public gardens and one very basic playground but fortunately there is nice space around our house to play outside a little. Dry season started last weekend but the weather hasnt heard the news yet. Still pours rain at night and some in the afternoons but mornings are usually nice. We are invited to a BBQ at friends of friends Sunday - American & Panamanian (Rick W's friend Kirt).
Our typical weekday is like this - awaken around 7 (roosters wake up at 5 but we all go back to sleep thankfully!). A quick breakfast and some cajoling to get the kids dressed and out the door and a call to our friendly taxista for a 5 minute ride downhill into town (too early for the half hour to hour walk depending on the size of the walker!). Class is from 8 to 12 with one 20 minute break during which we buy one of the only 3 donuts in Boquete for the kids to split! After class we usually have lunch at the little cafeteria close to the school where all our teachers eat. Lunch and drinks for all 4 of us - big, hot and delicious - is around $6 or $7 and is our big splurge for the day! If it is raining we usually take a taxi up to home and entertain ourselves there. If it is sunny we stay in town, go to the park or garden, do food shopping (usually every day) as it usually is in a foreign country we can occupy a good hour or more taking care of basic shopping tasks going one place for bread, one place for fruit and another for everything else. Ice cream cones are 30 cents and are a nice post shopping treat! Walking home with the kids takes an hour but there is lots to see on the way, beautiful gardens, colorful houses, dogs (!!) behind gates :), horses in back yards etc. In the afternoon the kids entertain themselves at home while we do homework and then we cook a basic dinner at home. Night falls dramatically at 6:15 every night so it is pretty easy to get the kids to sleep by 8!!
Two other cabanas out of the 4 by us are occupied by retired americans. Our kids are sort of their surrogate grandkids and they are very nice to us.
Next weekend we leave Boquete and head over Bocas on Sunday/ Monday where we stay until Dec. 26th and then head to Panama City to see the canal and rainforest.

Its December?!

Top is Cass in her new dress like the indigenous women and girls here where watching the independence day parade. It went on ALL Day! We only watched for 2 hrs but heard there were a total of 69 bands - lots of drumming!!

Above is Cassidy touching a Kinkajou at the animal rescue center we visited and toby looking at Macy, the Howler monkey in a diaper who was playing tag with them!

Left is a picture of the building our school is in.

We are tired after our first full week of school but happy. The town is great, weather is nice though today is the first day of dry season and we have had a fair amount of rain. But when it rains it usually only pours at night and mists during the day. Great temperture. We have met a few american kids here and had 2 play dates - one with a local girl who only spoke spanish and one with an american boy who was very wild (kicked out of school here already!) The kids like their school and we think their teacher is a saint but it is hard to get them to go in the morning. Dave went rock climbing (!!) yesterday witha guide and of course made friends with him and will go again for free. He was with 5 columbians so practiced lots of spanish. I hope to go climb the local volcano next weekend which the director of the school doesnt think is appropriate for women (!!!!). Tomorrow we are going bird watching (dave early, us a bit later to join him). Cant believe we are half way through our time in Boquete - I feel a lot of pressure to learn spanish faster and faster!!

PHOTOS

Finalmente!! Photos!!

I finally found another internet cafe that is configured to take our USB photo thingy! I have a horrid cold and no voice but otherwise we are well. Toby has decided he likes learning spanish which is a good thing since they started with full morning lessons today. Dave and another guy from Sweden have now joined our class previously of two and significantly ratcheted up the level. Vicky (from England) and I are struggling!! This weekend we did two cool excursions. We went Saturday to El Explorador - a totally wacky garden with found objects, piped classical music, play things, inspirational sayings and flowers. The kids loved it. Sunday we hired a cab to take us to the end of the road below Volcan Baru to the ranger station where the Quetzals trail started. You need 4wd to get there and then hike a very rough road for acouple km then join the trail. Beautiful cloud forest, towering trees, wild epiphites, wild green parrots, rushing rivers, mud, sun, sheepherders. We just finished reading Heidi and the first part of the hike was almost like Switzerland - sheep, herders huts, pine trees, flowers, then you drop ontot the otherside where it turns into cloud forest with thick trees and lush undergrowth. Mostly indigenous folks work up in the mountains (Ngobe Bugle). The kids did great with the hike which took almost 4 hours and involved getting Cassidy´s new red shoes totally mud coated (minor fit here). Unfortunately, the hike did me in and my cold set in for real. Here are some pictures from the hike and garden and our house.

from Toby; "We went to the Explorador, we saw funny things there . there was some sewing machines which had faces which were funny. We went to the mi jardin es su jardin, and there was cool bridges shaped like golden gate bridges but you couldnt drive on them you could only walk.there was wooden sculptures and a little salted sea village which had been recovered from water. and there was a tunnel covered with vines. this is back to cassidy

from Cassidy "I had fun at the Explorador. There was a little science cab. I had so much fun on the swings. we played billy goat gruff on the bridges.

First week

I have a few more minutes to post this time but still no picutures. Hopefully Monday! I am just finishing up my first week of classes, it feels frustratingly slow because I want to be able to communicate right away but my teacher says we are zipping along. We better be because Dave joins us next week and he is definitely more advanced than me! The kids like their teacher (who speaks no English which frustrates Toby sometimes). Cass will sing in class (Barney in spanish) but not talk much. We worry that 4 hrs a day will be too much for them next week but that is how long our class is - they will do lots of activities but we may have to find a way to make it only 3 hrs then one of video. They are struggling a bit to adjust, they like it here but get cranky very easily. Toby hasnt been eating much even though we are trying to replicate US food for now. He loves rice fortunately, he just seems to have lost his appetite. Cassidy does great and then has these fits that scare everyone!" Im sure it will just take some time for them to settle. Fortunatley our cabana is great and a very comfortable place to hang out. There is a great yard to run around in.

Boquete is a nice town, definitely cenral america but you randomly see gringos wandering the streets all the time. In the hills we were live it is mixed between luxury houses and shacks for coffee plantation workers. Just beyond our house is a big plantation and most of the workers seem to be natives - Ngobe people. It is one big cinderblock dorm with outdoor bathrooms and no windows. The kids smile and wave at us and I think how completely different their lives our from ours. Its hard for our kids to even fathom their life and they are practically across the street.
I am hiking up the Quetzal trail with my class today and hopefully with the kids this weekend.
Ciao!
Shannon

Arrived!

Here we are on our 2nd full day in Boquete. The travel from FL was uneventful but tiring - cassidy fell asleep on the taxi ride to our hotel in Alujela CR. I am on a short break from spanish class so wont write much and this keyboard stinks. Spent the night in CR then took the morning flight to David Panama - HOT!! Big bus shuttle took us to Boquete (Cass immediately fell asleep) arrived midday. The temp here is great - there is usually a cool breeze or light mist. It is encircled by mountains, fruit trees everywhere. We are living in a litle cabana with an upstairs sleeping loft (spiral staircase) and downstairs bedroom. Very light and clean with a nice small yard. It is a 30 min walk down into town or taxi or bus ride. I have taken 2 days of spanish and the kids start one hour a day today! Town is loud but nice, glad we are living up the hill though it will be a bit of a pain. Gardens everywhere that Cass loves. I will try to post photos soon. Kids are being great travelers despite all the upheaval. >love to all!

MAP

We will be staying in Boquete and Isla Colon in Bocas del Toro - all at the west end of Panama. Check it out on this map!

Headed South

Well this is it folks! Dave and the kids headed to Tampa FL yesterday for some extra time with Susannah, Brad, Allison and Timmer and grandpa Bill. I needed to put in one more week of work so Im going to miss out on Busch Gardens, the zoo, beach etc :(. Poor me!
I arrive in Florida Friday, we head to Miami Saturday and Sunday morning we're on a plane to San Jose Costa Rica. We spend one night there and then fly on Monday to David Panama. From there we head up to Boquete in the Chiriqui Highlands for 4 weeks of spanish school. We have rented a small apartment right in town and all four of us will take classes in the morning and then have the afternoons free to explore. There is an internet cafe downstairs from our school so I imagine we will be online several times a day. We will be anxious to hear from folks while we are traveling and the kids in particular would love emails from friends if parents are able to get there kids to dicate a few messages!
Dec 17th we head to the islands to meet up with Dave's dad for Christmas. We have rented a house on Bocas del Toro right on the beach and Toby has high hopes of learning to surf from his grandpa!! The day after Christmas we head to Costa Rica overland through Puerta Viejo and eventually end up in Monteverde for the month of January. We are renting a small house there and volunteering with the Cloud Forest School (http://www.cloudforestschool.org/ ), a bi-lingual preK-12 environmental education school. After Monteverde we stop through Florida again for 5 days before heading to Chile and Argentina on Feb 7th and finally return to the states June 2, spend a few more weeks in New England then drive back to Colorado by July 1. So that is the overview of our next whirlwind 7 months. Wish us luck!! We will miss you all!!

Contacting us: Email is going to be the best way to reach us the whole time. Mail to Panama supposedly takes forever so I wont bother giving you an address there. We can get mail c/o the Cloud Forest School in Monteverde and it should take only 10-15 days (dont send boxes, only envelope packages and letters). That address is: c/o Andrea Paltzer, Program Coordinator Centro de Educacion Creativa Apartado 23-5655 Monteverde, Puntarenas, COSTA RICA