I had heard people talking about a Lost and Found hostel in the Jungle on the way to Boquete, so I decided to check it out. It’s actually been around for almost 10 years now, so all the bus drivers already know it and drop you off on the highway right in front of the trail going up in to the mountains. After about 15 minutes hiking, you get to this kind of eco-lodge in the jungle. It features a common area to eat and hang out with other guests. A fully stocked kitchen, where you can buy ingredients for cooking yourself and writing what you took on your bill. I stayed in the dorms of course and there were 8 others there when I arrived. I was too late for the treasure hunt hike but I did go on another hiking trail before sitting down with the others for some Yahtzee and tea. At around 1 pm the clouds start to come in and you really have a feeling of living in the clouds and then the rain starts at around 3 pm and continues till 7ish. This supplied the water used for the toilets.

We had dinner together and spent the night listening to music and exchanging stories. It was a very relaxed and friendly atmosphere, mainly because there wasn’t much you could do but just chill. It reminded me of another eco-lodge I used to go to in Egypt called Basata.

I started the next day early and went on the treasure hunt. This consists of a map of the trail and landmarks and the first clue. The solution to every clue leads to the next landmark, where you are supposed to find the next clue in a black plastic tube. I made it to the first clue and did manage to find the tube and answer the riddle. But finding a black tube among roots of a large tree in the middle of the jungle is not as easy as it sounds. So after 10 hopeless minutes, I skipped the looking for the second clue and just followed the trails to hit all the land marks. It was a nice and challenging hike to start the day with. Since I had started so early, I found myself back to the camp, showered and fed and ready to move on. So I checked out and headed down the mountain again to continue on to Boquete.

To get to Boquete, you have to go to a town called David first, then backtrack back north using the special Boquete buses, which are old yellow school buses.

Boquete became known a few years ago among expats after a magazine called it the best town to retire in. Mainly for it’s cool weather and relatively cheap living expenses. It’s supposed to be famous for flowers and strawberries as well but I didn’t really see any proof of that. I was here to get high aka climb a volcano!

Baru volcano, which is no longer active is the highest point in Panama. It’s also the easiest way of seeing two oceans at the same time; the caribbean and pacific oceans.

When I got to the hostel I saw that no one had signed up for the night hike at all. Having already been hiking that morning, I felt quite lazy as well and definitely didn’t want to go on my own. So I signed up for the hike on the condition that I would only go if there’s a group. It turns out that people had just been waiting for a leader (or hero) :-p

2 hours later we had 8 people on the list. I bought a few things for the hike and had an early dinner at this local cafeteria recommended by some people at the hostel (very tasty!!) and decided to try and sleep before the hike, which starts at 11:30 pm.

Two of the guys from the group had the same idea and coincidentally shared my dorm room. But that’s not all that we shared, we also shared an open window with the bar next door, where a live band was playing non-stop. We then shared a phone conversation between a girl in the dorm room and her ex-boyfriend, afterwards the fireworks started to celebrate a girl turning 15 somewhere in town. This was followed by an ambulance picking up a patient in the building next door and finally at around 11 pm, two trucks using their horns to clarify, who should go first. So we didn’t share much sleep but we definitely shared a lot of laughs at the whole situation.

After a few sleepless hours it was GO time. A micro bus took us to the bottom of the volcano and we started to follow the rocky path. It was perfect weather for the 5 hour hike up as long as you were moving. Once you stopped for a break, it got cold quickly and you needed to start adding layers to your outfit. The idea of the night hike is to catch the sunrise from the highest point in Panama (ca. 3500 m above sea level), which I’m glad to say we did. The group was quite interesting from different backgrounds and besides the two Scandinavian guys who over took us with machetes about half way up, there was no one else on the 14 km trail.

The view from the top was really impressive and feeling the warmth of the sun as it rises was wonderful and necessary, because it was very COLD up there! Unfortunately, quickly after the sunrise and seeing both oceans, the very tasty dinner I had had earlier had turned in to some very active and explosive diarrhea. So I was forced to rush back down and look for shelter :-/

The way down was actually quite difficult. I guess seeing how much you still need to go has a tiring effect on you. Going up in the dark, you only saw 3-4 meters ahead and didnt think of how much distance was left to go. So it felt like forever going down, although it actually took less time.

After getting lucky and finding a taxi at the bottom of the volcano, we arrived back to the hostel 12 hrs after we had left, tired, sleepy and covered in dirt but with a great feeling of achievement. The guys decided to cool down in the hot springs, while I opted for showering and finally sleeping. There are lots of things to see and do around Boquete, hot springs, waterfalls, coffee tours and another famous hiking trail. But after such a huge hiking day with a morning hike at the lost and found and the night hike on Baru volcano, I felt I needed to get back to the beach again and decided to join some people from the hostel and go to the surfer paradise, Santa Catalina.

After the bus drops you off on the highway, you just follow the trail up in to the clouds.

Some words of encouragement to help you hike up with your backpack!

The view from the top.

Spending some time in the clouds playing games with new friends.

The real treasure of the treasure hunt was the scenery.

Showering rules in the mountain.

The buses to Boquete are easy to recognize.

People here love their lottery. They buy tickets everywhere, including on the bus.

The view from the highest point in Panama.

The views on the way down are also spectacular.

For a little more money, you could probably get a car like this to take you up, but it would still take about 3 hours!