The Boquete valley and the Caldera river basin have always been a natural attraction for the many indigenous peoples, local residents and foreign visitors who have been fortunate enough to travel or live in this area. But only in recent times has the work of professional guides and outfitters in Boquete become a major industry that now serves visitors from around the world.
This new “eco-tourism” has recently become an economic asset to the community and increasingly permits more travelers to experience the pristine and often rugged environment of the mountains and trails of Chiriqui in a safe and ecologically sound manner.
Before the early 1990’s only the most intrepid could venture forth into the wild lands of Chiriqui because there were no improvements to trails or facilities for use by tourists. Nevertheless, beginning in the mid-1980’s early Boqueteño adventurers such as Enrique Boutet and Gonzalo Miranda pioneered many of the tours and trails that are commonly used today.
They also taught and trained a new generation of travel guides, teaching them not only the locales and trails but also a love, respect and understanding of the natural world through which they would travel with their guests.waterfall02
With the ouster of Manuel Noriega and the election of the Endara administration in 1990, many improvements were begun to allow increased access and enjoyment of Boquete’s natural beauty. Although Parque Nacional Volcán Barú had been established in 1976, many improvements were needed, and more improvements to the world-famous Quetzal trail were also initiated. Roads were built and paved to serve Bajo Mono, Alto Quiel and other outlying areas, making access to the park and mountain trails more enjoyable. By the late 1990’s the word had gotten out that Boquete was the new national treasure of Panama, thus setting the stage for the current influx of tourists and expatriates we are still seeing today.
Below are listed some of the many tourism companies and individuals who provide safe, enjoyable and educational services to those visitors who desire a more intimate acquaintance with the magnificent natural heritage and environment that Boquete has to offer.
Hiking, Bird-watching, Hot Springs and Petroglyphs
Feliciano González, “Felicano’s Tours”. Hiking and driving tours of Volcan Baru, the Quetzal Trail, the Pianista Trail, Caldera Hot Springs and petroglyphs, custom tours of Boquete and Chiriqui province. Phone 632-8645 or 624-9940, email felicianogonzales255@hotmail.com, website www.geocities.com/boquete_tours.
Coffee Adventures, Hans and Terry Van der Vooren Coffee tours, cloud forest hikes, bird watching, Caldera Hot Springs, and Boquete tours. 720-3852
Luis Jaramillo, “Aventuras y Mas”. Hiking, driving and camping tours of Volcan Baru, The Quetzal Trail, Caldera Hot Springs and Pacific Coast beaches. Custom bus tours for larger groups to Panama City and the Panama Canal with advance notice. Phone 592-0971.
Richard Livingston, “Ocean to Ocean Ecological Expeditions”. Local driving tours of Boquete, Bajo Mono, Alto Quiel. Round-trip transportation to Parque Volcan Baru, Caldera Hot Springs and petroglyphs, La Barqueta Beach. Phone 636-9887..
Patsy Underhill, “Boquete Mountain Cruisers”. Open-air or covered driving tours of Boquete town and area, Caldera Hot Springs and petroglyphs, river beach swimming. Custom real estate tours available with advance arrangement. Phone 720-4697, 627-8829.
White Water Rafting
Kevin Mellinger, “Panama Rafters”. Half day and full day tours of various sections of the Chiriqui Viejo river on the Costa Rica border. Class II to Class IV. Other Panama rivers are available on request. Phone 720-2712 or 633-4313 or Email.
Héctor Sánchez, “Chiriqui River Rafting”. Half and full day tours of various sections of the Chiriqui Viejo river, Class II to Class IV. Experienced on all of Panama’s navigable rivers, custom tours available. Phone 720-1505, 618-0846 or Email.
Canopy Tours
Jorge Tovar, “Boquete Tree Trek”. Three kilometers of suspended cable and a 350meter drop in the upper Palo Alto valley, a 45 minute drive. Phone 720-1635 or email.
Horse Back Riding
Eduardo Caño, “Alquiler de Caballos”. Guided horseback tours of 2 to 5 hours. Leaves from Boquete with tours of Volcancito and Jaramillo. Phone 720-1750, 629-0184.
Other guides are available who offer a variety of services in the Boquete area. They may be found by advertisements posted on hotel and restaurant billboards, or by word-of-mouth.
source: The Boquete times
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Chiriqui, the westernmost province of Panama’s Pacific coast, offers visitors some of the republic’s most varied fare, ranging from swimming beaches to mountain climbing. For those interested in any of the following, Chiriqui is the place to find them: flower growing, trout fishing, medicinal springs, alpine farms, coffee, beer tasting, orange growing, cattle ranches, thoroughbred farms, hunting, bird watching, and white water rafting.
Visitors coming down the Pan American Highway receive Chiriqui as their Welcome Cocktail as soon as they cross the border at Paso Canoa. Alternatively, for car-renters and bus riders, the western welcome mat is spread over six or seven hours’ drive up the Panama American Highway, with abundant restaurants and sightseeing along the way.
David, third city of the republic, is the provincial capital of Chiriqui. Most sightseeing spectacles are within easy range of here, but a number of alluring mountain hotels can be found in the cooler climate of Boquete and Volcan. Boquete is the nation’s flower garden, prime supplier, for the capital city’s florists. Chill streams bounding down from el Volcan de Baru (11,450 feet) through Boquete, Cerro Punta, or Volcan contain a caveat for those who believe sea bass reigns unchallenged as Panama’s tastiest fish. Hot springs can also be found in the area of Boquete.
The variety of Chiriqui is what makes it greatest’the high farms look Swiss in their greenness. Las Lajas, about an hour’s drive from David, is the best known of Chiriqui’s beaches. The most vales of Boquete cradle Panama’s coffee growing industry. Chiriqui is also cattle country and the nation’s prime thoroughbred-raising area. Finally, the Guaymi Indians call Chiriqui’s central cordillera their home. For all these reasons, the area of Chiriqui has become a popular retirement destination for foreigners and Panamanians alike.
By Chris Kraul for the Los Angeles Times - boquete, PANAMA — New Zealand was too far, the south of France too cold and Colombia too unsafe for Casey and Susan Koehler. So the former Floridians settled quite happily on this mild and isolated coffee-growing town in western Panama for their retirement home. A former U.S. government official, Koehler had the bucks to spend his golden years anywhere in the world. That he and his wife chose this hilly, horsy town of 20,000 over their three other “finalist” destinations speaks volumes about Panama’s growing attraction to American retirees. (more)
Editor’s Comment: Notice the section of this article talking about the “white hat” vs. “black hat” developers buying up ROP land. With this article you can add the LA Times to the list of expanding media attention being drawn to this issue, along with the article that appeared in the Miami Herald last week and the speech given by US Ambassador William Eaton last Monday. The government of Panama needs to allocate additional resources to address this issue which is quickly growing in importance and gaining increased visibility. In short, I desperately need a headline that says “the government is doing something” and so far I don’t have it. I really wish they would give it to me (by doing something.)
Who’s Trying to Link The Two Issues? Panama getting it’s act together on land ownership and titling issues has (or should not have) absolutely anything to do with the Free Trade Agreement and “problem” of Pedro Miguel Gonzalez. The Free Trade Agreement will bring improved dispute resolution mechanisms for issues dealing with the cross border movement of materials and merchandise. There is nothing (not a word) about Rights of Possession land disputes in the Free Trade Agreement, and if the agreement passes congress then the reality on the ground in Panama will not change one iota. Any suggestion of a kind of quid pro quo is best categorized as wishful thinking.
(Article Continues)
“I’m a heart-attack survivor, so I like the laid-back thing. And knowing that every day I wake up, it’s going to be between 72 and 80 degrees,” said Koehler, 66. Two years ago, he and his wife plunked down $192,000 cash for a three-bedroom, 4,000-square foot house in the Los Molinos subdivision. The purchase price was a third of what they would have paid in Irvine, Encinitas, Calif., or Naples, Fla., where they used to live.
The Koehlers’ home is near a scenic canyon and waterfall, a typical boquete tableau. But they and 1,000 other foreigners who have retired or bought second homes here have been lured by more than tranquillity, the weather and beautiful scenery.
For expatriate retirees, Panama offers big discounts on plane fares and hotels, good healthcare and shopping. All foreign income — such as U.S. pension benefits or Social Security — is exempt from tax. And for Americans, financial matters are simplified because Panama uses the U.S. dollar as its currency. The atmosphere is friendly and more pro-American than many other Central American countries.
“The cost of living is much lower and the roads much better than places like Costa Rica,” said Shirley Bynum, a former Huntington Beach resident who moved here two years ago from Gracia, Costa Rica, after she was robbed. “And the tax system is more favorable.”
Bill Schroff, a former investment banker who advises U.S. investors and firms moving here, said Panama’s cost advantages over “Miami, San Diego or other nice-weather places that people want to retire to” are dramatic.
“Plus, Panamanians welcome us,” Schroff said. “It’s been an international banking and transportation hub for decades. They’re used to having gringos around, and they like us.”
Although Mexico and Costa Rica have been gaining popularity for several decades, Panama was “discovered” just a few years ago. Special retiree visas granted by the Panamanian government over the last 12 months exceed 1,300, triple the figure for all of 2004.
Schroff’s company, Panama Real Estate Holdings, specializes in the Panama City high-rise market, in which foreigners are snapping up condominiums in the dozens of projects going up in the capital’s frenzy of construction. Americans aren’t the only buyers: The expansion of the Panama Canal and the booming economy are drawing multinational companies from around the globe whose executives need housing.
Panamanian developer Jose Antonio Bern said the boom was being fed by several trends, including Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s socialism that has sent investors fleeing and the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks that have made travel to the United States more complicated for Latin Americans. “A lot of little things have gone our way,” Bern said.
But some clouds are on the horizon.
Rapid growth — there are 20 Orange County-style subdivisions under construction or in planning stages in the boquete area — has overloaded the streets with traffic and been a drain on the local water system. During the January-to-April dry season, boquete residents now go days without running water, a period during which they have to rely on cisterns or delivered water.Crime, once unheard of, has raised its ugly head: The area now averages two break-ins a month, Mayor Manolo Ruiz Castillo said. To cope, the town, about 200 miles west of Panama City, will soon inaugurate a new municipal police force, he said. Until now it has relied on the national police for protection.
Line Vreven, director of international affairs at AARP, the Washington-based advocacy group for the 39 million Americans ages 50 or older, noted that Panama recently reduced the length of tourist visas to 30 days from 60 days, making shopping for a house more complicated and pressure-packed for newcomers.
But perhaps the most disturbing development for investors and officials at the U.S. Embassy in Panama is that there is an increasing number of complaints about shady dealings by developers and land sellers who take advantage of Panama’s murky land-title rules to cheat foreigners.
Schroff said he knew of 150 cases of Panama City high-rise developers engaging in the unethical — if not illegal — practice of canceling preconstruction sales of condos to customers to take advantage of a rise in market prices by the time their projects reach completion.
“In some areas of Panama, land titling is not always clear, if it exists at all,” said one high-level embassy official in Panama City who asked not to be named. Title complaints have steadily risen over the last 18 months, he said.
Many disputes occur in transactions in which buyers do not receive clear title but “rights of possession,” a piece of paper that typically involves the buyer acquiring property to which the government never fully relinquished control. Often, scam artists appear after deals close to contest ownership and demand a bribe to go away, the official said.
Even the placidity of boquete has been broken by “range wars” between neighbors who can’t agree on property boundaries, said one transplanted retiree from Arizona.
Still, retirees with such horror stories are at this point in the minority, and officials here say they hope that the rule of law and dispute-resolution mechanisms will improve if the pending U.S.-Panama free trade agreement becomes law.
For most living here, the advantages of boquete’s climate, physical beauty and the proximity of scenic gems such as beaches, the rain forest and hot springs far outweigh the annoyances, including what one resident described as Panama’s “culture of waiting.”
“Panama may frustrate a Type A personality,” said Carolina Gonzalez, who has written about Latin America for AARP. “Transactions take time.”
Five-year resident Penny Barrett said that the traffic had become annoying, especially on weekends, and that some goods and services have doubled in price in two years because of demand caused by the influx of foreigners. Others, including the mayor, contend that the town’s mean temperature has risen in recent years because of the loss of 60,000 acres of coffee plantations to make way for development. He said a new master plan was in the works that would make future development more environmentally friendly.
But such frustrations seem far from the concerns of the 40 or 50 expats who attended a recent Tuesday gathering of foreign residents at the Panamonte Hotel, where the week’s topic of discussion was computers. It’s one of the many social groups centered on hobbies such as hiking and bird-watching.
Some of those attending were about to leave the Panamonte for an expedition to a nearby coffee plantation for lunch, others to caravan to the Pacific beach near the town of David, 30 miles away, for some whale watching.
One of my biggest concerns when we decided to pack up all our things and move to Boquete, Panama was “how will I keep busy?” I had been working full time, had a lot of friends and there was an abundance of things to do in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Boquete is a small town. I spoke only a little Spanish. I didn’t know anyone. Whatever would I do? If there is one thing I don’t tolerate well, it’s boredom.
We have been here almost four years, and just the other day I said to my husband: “I just want to stay home and do nothing tonight. I’m exhausted.” Clearly, I shouldn’t have been concerned about boredom if I was looking forward to a quiet evening of eating pizza and watching American Idol!
Let me give you a sample of things to do here, and you might decide you won’t even need a television:
Boquete has some great restaurants. There is a Panamanian cafeteria where you can buy more than you can possibly eat for under $3.00. Boquete also boasts Peruvian, Continental, French, North American, Mexican, Argentinian and Chinese restaurants. Coffee shops and bakeries offer prize winning coffees and light lunches. Musicians or small bands often entertain for tips, and many places have outdoor eating where you can catch a breeze and take in the scenery or the street scene.
While you are eating, pick up a copy of the Bajareque Times, a free monthly bilingual newspaper. It will give you a taste of the culture here. Over the last months there have been articles on coffee, a new dental clinic, a man’s work to protect the natural beauty of Boquete’s environment, a recipe for a typical Panamanian dish, and suggestions on good hiking trails, along with great photographs of local events and people. Check it out at www.bajarequetimes.com.
One recent article was a review of the first production by the Boquete Community Players. The Boquete Community Players is an amateur theater group dedicated to bringing classic theater to Chiriqui. People who like to act, direct, build sets, craft props, manage stage properties, create costumes, apply make up - or learn how to do any of these - will want to become involved.
I can’t sew a costume or build a set to save my life, so I got involved in acting. The Boquete Community Players put on the play The Night of January 16, written in the 1930’s by Ayn Rand. I auditioned for and was cast to play the part of a dowdy (and mouthy!) Swedish housekeeper. Typecasting?
Keith Cline, who played a detective, gives his view of BCP’s debut performance. “A friend told me I was perfect for the role of Inspector Sweeney. That did it. Flattery gets me every time. Thank God the role was small enough for me to learn without too much anxiety-and I was glad to get a part that had comic possibilities. Having spent much of my life learning that being myself is okay, I was finally free to pretend to be somebody else. What a great time! When’s the next show?”
Soon, Keith. The next production will be a musical set in a tropical paradise. Hmm, tropical paradise. Sounds familiar. And then maybe a comedy or a murder mystery. Possibilities abound.
If you are a hands on person who loves to learn new and creative things, Boquete offers a lot of choices. There is a chess club that meets on a regular basis. I’ve been part of a creative writing group and a book club. I also take acrylic art lessons from a Panamanian “profesoro” at a very reasonable rate. A community choral group, adults and children, performed Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus at Christmas and left the audience with tears in their eyes. There are salsa dance lessons and salsa aerobics. Talk about a fun way to get into shape! And much needed Spanish lessons, of course. Boquete boasts small groups of friendly people that give you the courage to try new things.
There are pristine and challenging golf courses. For the adventurous, there are internationally acclaimed white water rafting tours. Or go tree trekking — glide in a harness on a steel cable above the treetops of century-old forests, high above the blue rivers and waterfalls (unless, of course, you’re a afraid of heights like I am.) There are flower and coffee festivals. The orchids here will leave you marveling at how intricate, varied and delicate nature can be.
The Panamanian people are very outgoing, and boy! do they know how to celebrate! They host two Independence festivals each year in November (one from Colombia and the other from Spain), a Christmas parade and of course, Carnival. Panamanian women are among the most beautiful in the world, and for the parades they out do themselves by wearing pollera’s - long white traditional dresses that they proudly display by holding the ends of the dresses out like butterfly wings. (Some of these dresses-all made by hand-cost thousands of dollars). Tembleques, or beaded pearl head dresses are woven in their thick, black hair. Dark eyes, swaying rhythms-it is latin beauty at its best. School children from all over the country come for Independence Day to Boquete to march with military precision, play drums, liras (decorated xylophones), and proudly display the Panamanian and Chiriqui flags. Boys in sombreros and girls in cotton flowered dresses dip, weave, and curtsy with each other in tipico dancing. Bring a camera, and if you don’t have one, buy one. The parades of Boquete are not to be missed.
Do you like music? Boquete has hosted classical guitarists, saxophonists and jazz musicians. In March world famous Canadian flautist, Ron Korb gave a magical performance of Celtic, fusion, jazz and oriental music in the Catholic church downtown. And then, of course, there is Sammy and Sandra, a Panamanian brother and sister act that will have you shimmying to Latin salsa in no time at all.
In just the past few months alone, Valle Escondido-a master planned community with shops, luxurious spa, continental restaurant and a acoustically perfect performance amphitheatre-has offered several events. Golfers enjoyed perfect weather to attempt ‘hole in ones’ at three golf tournaments. The Former Miss Universe graced the Valle with her beauty, and the Cantina plied its customers with lots of green decorations and Guinness beer for St. Patrick’s Day. Folks had a great time eating barbecue and cole slaw while listening to The Roe Family Band-mom, pop and two brothers-perform toe-tapping, foot-stomping bluegrass in the chapel at Valle Escondido. Earlier in the year taste buds were tantalized with the First Annual Chiriqui Chili Cook-off-competition for next year’s is bound to be keen.
So, boredom here is no problem. The problem is making sure I have time and energy to go to all the classes, restaurants, concerts, dances, parades, festivals and other special events that Boquete has to offer. Life here is tranquil and exciting, relaxing and thrilling. From orchids to salsa, theater productions to parades, there is always something to do. Just bring your sense of adventure and your love of all things beautiful. You won’t be disappointed.
Source: Gate way to Panama
Why We Like Boquete For Investment:
1. Weather – Boquete’s highlands have mild, cool weather that many Europeans and Americans have found to their liking. The climate reminds one of Switzerland during warmer months.
2. Location – Boquete is near Panama’s border with Costa Rica and a quick drive or flight across the border. It is also the only area outside of Panama City with a flight (from David) to Bocas del Toro, so this is a one-two punch that is common with tourists and also an easy getaway for local residents in either direction.
Because of the proximity to Costa Rica and ease of travel between two popular tourism destinations, this location is poised for growth. Because many parts of Boquete are at high altitude, some parts of the highlands have incredible ocean views.
3. Environment – Many retirees and investors are flocking to Chiriqui. As a result, there’s a communal, fun feeling that only comes in these “town of transplants”. Retirees find there are many folks willing to take them under their wing and help them learn the ropes of life abroad.
4. Tourism — Boquete is to Panama what Monteverde and Arenal are to Costa Rica. Many tourists visiting Panama work their way to the Boquete area during their travels as a perfect cool weather complement to their beach time. The combination of tourism, foreign retirees and local investment make this region a safe bet for continued future growth.
