I woke up to Lucy the dog licking my face at 6am. She insisted on sleeping in the tent with us. We looked out and saw that not only had the rain held off all night but that the clouds had actually rolled out a bit and some blue sky was visible. The good weather comes just in time for us to leave. Feh.

Jeff whipped up a hell of a breakfast with coffee, French toast, scrambled eggs, sausage and fresh fruit. It trumped our planned meal of Coco Crispies and warm milk. When the collectivo did eventually come around and it was time for us to go, Jeff wouldn’t even take any money. If I ever make it back to Carate and have a bit more of a budget, I’d definitely want to stay at The Lookout Inn for a while.

Even after 18 hours of dry weather, the collectivo still struggled to pass some of the crossings. We did eventually make it back to town, and were able to dry out some of our gear in the hot sun before boarding the 2pm lancha for Golfito. In Golfito, we got on a bus bound for the border town of Paso Canoas.

We exited Costa Rica without a problem, but were given trouble on the Panamanian side. They wanted to see an exit ticket, which neither of us had. We tried our best to argue that this policy was not posted nor did any of the travelers we met who had been through Panama have this problem.

A French man who had overheard our broken Spanish ranting, came up beside us and offered some assistance. I’m not sure what he said to the immigrations officer, but it worked and we ended up with valid entry stamps. My faith in the French has been restored.

At the border, we caught a bus to David, which immediately reminded me of the US with it’s paved roads and street lights and strip malls. We checked into the Purple House hostel and walked down the road to the (ABSURDLY HUGE) supermarket to grab some grub.

Panama affords us the opportunity to go coast-to-coast fairly easily, so tomorrow we’ll likely head north to the Carribean coast and the islands of Bocas del Toro.