We woke up this morning to the sound of something we hadn’t heard in the past few days: silence. All our other mornings in Panama have begun with the steady drumbeat of rain falling on the roof, but not today - the weather was gorgeous. We packed our bags, grabbed a cup of coffee and headed to try and secure one of the remaining spots available on the Bocas Sailing catamaran. This turned out to be the first day they sailed in the last two weeks because the weather has been so rainy! Our sailing mates today included six interns from the US Consulate in Panama City, another couple that recently embarked on a six-month travel journey and an Italian woman traveling alone. The boat holds up to 21, but at only 11 it gave us plenty of room to spread out.
Our first stop was the Dolphin Cove, which, as the name would suggest, is where a bunch of dolphins hang out for tourists like us to look at. It took about two hours to slowly sail there, but we certainly weren’t complaining about the pace.
Taking in some sun and the beautiful views.
My very nautical bathing suit fit right in.
The entrance to The Cove.
We were fortunate to see a bunch of dolphins after only a few minutes. Sarah was very excited.
Only photo we got before the camera battery died - at least it's a pretty good one! (and good thing we also brought the GoPro!)
From here, we sailed for about an hour until we arrived at our first snorkel site - a coral reef. Our captain handed out the masks (who really needs safety instructions, anyway?) and we dove in to check it out. I wasn’t really sure what to expect - Panama isn’t exactly world-renowned for its reefs - but the sea life was pretty cool.
One of the many Starfish we saw.
Purple coral (or at least something that is purple).
While we were snorkeling, our captain prepared a “super sandwich” for everyone. Basically it was turkey, cheese, lettuce and tomato, but we’d all worked up quite an appetite in the water so anything would’ve qualified as “super.” While we ate, we cruised across Bocas to our second snorkeling site. The wind was strong, but not blowing in the direction we needed so it took a little longer to get there than our captain expected. Not to worry though, the views were great and a little siesta was just what everyone needed.
Not a bad place for a quick nap - looking up at the sails from my spot on deck.
Our second snorkeling site was really the highlight of the day. There wasn’t a nice reef to look at, but there were a ton of fish! Once I jumped in, our captain threw bread in the water right beside me to attract the fish…the video turned out pretty well but the in-person experience was amazing!
They knew it was feeding time - think the whole school came out.
Once we got tired of swimming around with the fish, we got back on board the boat and returned to Bocas Town. It was such a great day and we were so thankful that we got such nice weather for it!
Sailing home.