The road to Boquete reeked of death.
Hours earlier, we stood under the baking sun of Sixaola at the Costa Rica – Panama border. What should have been a simple crossing dragged into a four hour long ordeal, as official after official mis-entered our information. Wrong license plate number, wrong passport numbers, misspelled names and wrong VIN. We might have let it slide, except for the impending Interpol inspection, needed to ship our car from Panama to Colombia. We had heard stories of the shipping companies being much stricter than local law enforcement, regarding data management.
So we stood on the sun-baked dirt of an unshaded parking lot, waiting for a form to be corrected. I went back to the car to get something and returned with bad news.
Jordan, I have some bad news.
The look on my face reinforced the seriousness of my statement.
Oh no, what happened?
Something died in the car.
What?
Something died. A gecko, maybe, or a mouse. I don’t know, but it’s dead and rotting fast in this heat. I looked for the body, but everything is too packed right now. I’ll have to look when we get to Boquete and I can unload things.
The drive that followed was long enough to make us want snacks but so foul smelling as to make us regret putting food in our mouths. This was a pity because the drive to Boquete was also beautiful. The road climbed into mountain passes and sometimes ran straight along narrow ridges. Deep green mountainsides carpeted in ferns materialized out of wet clouds. Sheets of rain battered us one moment and cleared abruptly the next to reveal narrow vistas of dense jungle falling into a furrowed coastline.
The going was slow and we arrived in Boquete with both stormclouds and dusk close at our heels. The first campsite we went to was unlocked and unattended, but appeared only half-finished and the ratty beds looked like prime candidates for bedbug hives.
Some searching and asking brought us to the very european-looking Pension Topas, run by an elderly German man. Night had fallen and with it fell rain by the bucketfull. We hurried to run what belongings we needed into our room. I made a valiant but doomed effort to find the occult corpse.
I can’t find it, I told Jordan. It’s too dark and raining too hard. I’ll strip the car tomorrow during any break in the weather.
Minutes later, Jordan came in from a trip to the car. She held a damp sock up to my nose.
Is this the smell?
I almost fainted. It is!
Is it worth even washing this?
No. Just get rid of it. Maybe burn it.
Grüß Gott!
Wandering Boquete’s streets, I can easily forget that I’m in Central America. The temperature was consistently cool, the rain that fell, while heavier than that of my native Southeast Alaska, had the same invigoratingly temperate feel to it and I had suddenly to rely on German as much as (or more than) Spanish.
Boquete, it turns out, is one of the top retirement destinations for North Americans and Europeans, particularly Germans and Swiss. Along this journey, we have become accustomed to the streets of any picturesque town along a tourist route being crowded with pale faces, but prior to Boquete, the non-native Spanish speakers weren’t the locals.
Is there any friction between the Panamanian population and the northern incomers, I asked one US-born restaurant owner.
Not really, he replied. This is one of the wealthiest areas in all Panama. Even the farmers in the hillsides are comparatively well-off. When everyone has enough money, no one feels like newcomers are taking anything and people tend to get along.
His easy comment spoke to a profound truth.
We wandered up the hill to Boquete’s small brewery and enjoyed delicious beer and the company of other travelers while a dark and heavy storm bore down upon us.
