"Some guy named Oscar knows where the secret cave is."
That´s how it started. The quest. The adventure.
Jason, this guy I´ve bumped into in Punta Viejo and now Bocas said that there is a hidden cave on Bastimentos Island in the Bocas Del Toro. You have to hire a boat, that´ll take you across the bay, and then up a snake infested river lined with mangroves, drop you on a dock and there is a cave that you swim into that has a waterfall and a swimming hole underground.
Ummm... sign me up!
Thing is, no one´s heard of it. No one in Bocas town, where I`´m staying. Bastimentos is two islands over, and half of it is a national park of some sort. It has a small town, and apparently, a SECRET FRIGGIN CAVE!
So on my last day in Bocas Del Toro, I decide I´m going to find it or die trying... okay, I´m kidding about the die trying part. It would be a symbolic death.
The day dawned...wet. Very wet. Rainy wet. Lots of rain. Now, naturally this might deter a sane person from questing for a cave filled with an underground river, but they might have more than one more day to find it. I figured if worse came to worse, I would at least find the darn mysterious cave.
So I ran into Mandee, Crystal, Laura and Jason at breakfast on the moored boat restraunt and asked if they knew anything other than the fact that Oscar knows of it. Nope. I asked the folks running the restraunt... no idea what I was talking about it. Mandee said I shouldn´t ask people, it´ll give it away. I figured if no one knows, very few people are going to suddenly spread rumors of something they don´t believe exists in the first place.
So I went to good old Mondo Taitu and asked. Nope.
I suited up with swimsuit, water, waterproof headlamp and waterproof camera, sandals and some balance bars (gotta have the snacks!), and headed to Hostel Heike. The folks there had been helpful on day 1 getting oriented, so I figured it was a good next stop.
"Have you guys heard of the hidden cave on Bastimentos? Do You know Oliver?"
Nope. and Nope.
they were trying to figure out where I might go ask when a guy named Pete from england with lots of arm hair said... "I think i know a guy I could ask".
So he gets on his cell (yes they have them here, in fact, it seems everyone has them here), and calls Cristo over in Bastimentos town. After a minute or two he hangs up and says "Cristo says he can take you there".
SWEET!
I get the directions to find Cristo, write them on an already wet map of the area, and head out. But not before Pete gives me a tshirt he bought in Nicaragua for Cristo.
I head over to the water taxis. Now it´s realy raining hard. But they are glad to take me to Bastimentos town for 3 bucks. Me and a woman from San Francisco who is down here for some indeterminate amount of time for unclear reasons. The crossing is rough and wild, rain splashing on top of water splashing. My rain coat is pretty useless when it gets this wet, so I´m already soaked, but I´m planning on swimming in a cave, so I´m not to concerned.
I hop off at "the dock next to the Reef restraunt", and walk to the path that runs through town. No cars here. I walk along till I find "Hair by Cristo". He´s a barber. I go to his front door. Knock on the yellow door next to the pink walls with fish on them, and... he comes up from downstairs. He says its raining, and will usually be 25 bucks a person, but they would charge 50 for one person. Yikes.... but this is a quest, so pay I will.
He talks to his brother Alberto, and Alberto is to be my guide. Though he doesnt seem to excited to go out in the rain. But cash is cash. Chat with Cristo a bit about living in town his whole life, 32 years. Meet his 84 year old dad. And get our picture taken.
Then Alberto, complete with trashbag poncho, head to the boat. Its a rear stearing deal with a canopy, like all the water taxis around here. We get in, I help bail water out with cut up milk jugs. Alberto wisely grabs an old wooden oar from a junk pile by the dock, and weér off... the the gasolnaria. We get 4 gallons. It costs 18 bucks. that´s why they have to charge so much, since almost half goes to the gas cost. Yikes.
And we´re off. Rain pouring. Mist over the hills and jungle of the mountains. I´m taking too many pictures, but that´s what I do sometimes.
After 20 minutes or more of waves and splashing we reach a cove surrounded by Mangroves. It seems Alberto is lost a bit, searching for the way into the hidden river. After a couple minutes he finds the opening and we glide into a narrow channel with overhanging tree limbs and mangroves everywhere. They looked like they could walk out on spiderly legs, marching into the river and grab us (yep, I´ll put that in a movie someday). The river snaked for a good 20 to 30 minutes, getting smaller and smaller. We would scrape under tree limbs and they would drip and reach to grab the canopy... and eventually they did. We hit one that decided it would bend the front of the canopy back. Alberto saved the roof by jamming us into reverse, but the poles were bent. Yikes.
Eventually the channel was only a couple feet wider than the boat, which is about 6 feet wide, and maybe 18 to 20 feet long. Alberto decided we should take the canopy down, so we lifted out the supports and layed it down. Not an easy task and one of the poles broke because it had rusted through. Alberto sorta shrugged about it, but I could tell he was bummed. He´ll fix it he says. Hope it isn´t expensive.
A lone wooden canoe sat on a river bank.
The trees now reached to grab at us.
The rain still fell...
... and we reached a little wooden dock. Alberto did a 3 point turn in the boat. We moored up, and hopped out onto muddy land.
After about 5 minutes of squishing through the mud we reached a slightly elevated hut with a family living in it. Naturally they spoke only spanish, but here was to be my cave guide... Juan. He was a smiling fellow of about 5 foot. He led the way, along with his maybe 8 year old son Alberto (yep, same name as the boat captain). We squashed through more mud... a lot more mud. Saw a sloth. And reached the entrance to NI VIDA cave.
Aparantely it was discovered 8 years ago by an American who was traipsing through the jungle of the island exploring for days. No one has found the end of it. No one knows how deep it goes.
With two headlamps, and an energetic Nino in tow, we head into the cave...as the river flowed out of it.
And it was awesome! We move along, snapping a few pictures. Bats sweeping down from above. A couple missed my head by inches. They are white nectar bats that fly out to feed on the fruit nearby. Rare to have white bats apparently.
The cave split in two brances. We head left first, and the roar of the waterfall could be heard long before it was seen. Occasionally we had to swim in the river, other times it was knee deep. Little alberto would straddle the sides and cruise along with us just fine. The waterfall was powerful, if only 4 feet tall. And was more like Spouting Rock than a falls. But tehre was a 5 foot formation we could climb up and jump off of into the pool below. It was surreal to climb up there, leap off, and go completely under the pitchblack water. There was enough current to push me forward into the rocks. I naturally had to jump off 5 or 6 times.
Then we head back and goto the right (as the waterfall is the end of that passage). Juan would say ¨"Watch your head" a lot. First in spanish, then english. Even if it was my leg or my hand or knee that needed to be watched. Like me with spanish, i guess that´s the english phrase he knew. It was clear what to watch and am glad a number of times for him pointin things out that i nearly hit with my head.
Happy Hat´s younger brother was along for the ride, and saved my head once too. and got nice and muddy.
We reached a spot where Alberto stopped and waited, and Juan and Imoved forward.... to a passage with MAYBE 4 inches of headroom over the water.
Juan went first. You had to duck under the water and pop up in a tiny chamber, then slide under another low section, and so forth for about 6 feet or more and 4 or 5 chambers. Now, if you tilted your head right you could keep your eyes out of the water and see where you were going. But not on the last one... that one you had to go all the way under and slide through. Creepy! It took a few tries for me to control my mind so I could do it. I passed the hat and camera and light ahead, and then did it slowly and carefully. the rock walls sliding by right next to my temples. My feet not touching the ground, but having to press on the sides of the rock. The first chamber was big enough to get my head up in. The second too. The third Ihad to tilt to fit, and the final opening wasn´´t wide enough for my head at its widest part. So I felt below, made sure it was wider underwater and I could get through, and ducked down... and came back up. This is scary. I remember in Guatemala, a cave thing you had to slide through underwater and how terrifying it was to come up and hit rock instead of air. So I focused, knew I could hold my breath for 30 seconds or more, and then ducked under...
... and I´m writing this to you from heaven because I couldn´t get out...
... kidding! I made it through! Juan and I continued a bit further, through some more swimming channels and more places, and eventually stopped whre there was another low part. And we were both thinking of the fact that if the water even went up an inch or two from the rain outside we´d be fucked. So, following wise advice, we took a picture, and headed back to the low part to get out. It was easier to go out, as I´d done it before now. But still, took some concentration. It really is weird to have only a half inch of space between your mouth and the water, and rock pushing in from above.
I made it through, Juan handed his light through, and then SWAM the whole ducking part. It´s wider down below, and he swam through, coming up right next to me. Sweet.
We grabbed ALberto and headed out. Juan would hum some song as he went, and it sounded sorta like Indiana Jones. So I started humming that. Hoping that it would be known here in Panama as well, and that we would have an Indiana Jones theme hum along as we went. Turns out, given that they live in the jungle with no TV, I guess they´d never heard it. But that´s okay, because they get to LIVE IT every day as they lead people into the cave.
On the boat ride out I felt really good. It was great to have found the cave. To have seen it. To have gone alone, and not had any travel buddies. It made me realized that I´m ready to really go off on my own on this rip. Even though I said I have my "see legs" back on day one, I really didn´t. I´d been talking almost exclisively to other travelers, most of whom are American´s down here, and been able to rely on others Spanish abilities to make things happen. I´m excited to head to the mountains of Panama (where I just arrived today in Boquete, it´s rainy, cool, and awesome)... and other than running into the German guy, everyone else I´d been seeing has turned back to goto Costa Rica or stay in Bocas.
Things like this really make me happy. Traveling like that. Not knowing how it´ll turn out. Meeting people who live different lives from mine. It was wonderful. And scary. It´s scary to not have language to communicate with someone. To be in a situation where we had to rely on each other, but had to do it with instincts and not words. It´s scary to head off and have no idea where I´ll land. But it inevitably feels great to have done it.
This quote was painted on the wall of Mondo Taitu (along with the one written on the back of the toilet that said "Feed Me Your Poo. I´m Hungry"). But this quote fits a bit better:
"It´s only by going into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life. Where you stumble, there lies your treasure. That´s why the very cave you were afraid to enter turns out to be the source of what you were looking for."
So, will you enter the cave?
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