On to paradise at last!!!

And so, the next day brought us finally to someplace beautiful--in fact, a place one might be tempted to call "paradise." We left early in the morning after a cheap but surprisingly tasty breakfast at a Panamanian fast-food type place. We found a boat driver who took us to the glorious island of Bastimentos, part of the Bocos del Toro archepeligo. As soon as the boat came near the island, we instantly knew we would like this place. It is much less toursity and much more a town of local people. The homes are built on the water on wooden stilts and there are no cars and no roads, only walking paths. There are a few small hotels, each with only a few rooms. Our wonderful boat driver, Javier, also showed us around the town when we arrived and walked us from one hotel to another.
One note about Bocos del Toro...most folks here are actually tri-lingual, as they also are in Puerto Viejo. Everyone on Bastimentos spoke a "patois" as their first language...similar to the language spoken in Jamaica. One man working at a restaurant there explained to us that the language is English spoken with the grammatical structure of West African languages. The people in Bastimentos also speak Spanish and English as well. It was amazing to see how people there would easily converse in all three, often within the same conversation. Also, being used to speaking Spanish, we would often speak Spanish to people in Bocos, and they would respond in English.
So, anyway, Javier showed us around and helped us find a hotel. We ended up in a hotel that was bit more expensive (15$ a night) ...but SO lovely we just couldn't pass it up. I will post a picture of it in the next entry. The picture here is of Bastimentos.