Patacones

Patacones for Lunch

Upon arrival we committed to a tour of some of the outlaying islands by boat for $20. This tour, buy powered speedboat, would take us to numerous spots around Bocas del Toro, including Dolphin Bay, Cayo Crawl, Red Frog Beach and Hospital Point. We could snorkel out at Cayo Crawl and Hospital Point.

We left at 9:30am, and the sun was already strong. It was about a 30 minute ride to Dolphin Bay. The bay is formed by a series of mangrove forests with small openings. This set up traps many fish in the bay and dolphins come to feast. We actually saw a family of three dolphins! Environmentalists actually scorn on these trips to Dolphin Bay because the local boat operators some times get very close to the dolphins, and the motors on the boats could injure them.

We then headed out to Cayo Crawl, where we snorkeled for a while. There were beautiful coral formations, but unfortunately, not many fish. We stopped to eat lunch at a local restaurant where Amar and I had our first taste of patacones, the Panamanian version of tostones. I sort of like the Puerto Rican ones more -- they have more flavor. They are salted and have toppings. The Panamanian patacones are extremely bland in comparison, most likely, as we noticed at Cafe Ohm, because Panamanians prefer lightly spiced food.

Red Frog Beach

Red Frog beach was nice, but smaller, more crowded and dirtier than expected. We also did not see a single red frog, and we walked up and down the trail to the beach multiple times carefully looking for one. The entrance fee is $2 per person. Unfortunately, some of the beaches in Bocas are going the way of Red Frog: crowded and lots of garbage. Not sure why people choose not to through away their rubbish in a trash can.

Me & Amar at Red Frog Beach

We were exhausted by the time we made it to Hospital Point, so we skipped the snorkeling and went back to the hotel to shower and get ready for the evening.