Our Return to Panama

We left Nicaragua Thursday morning and had a very nice bus ride to San Jose. Once we arrived in San Jose we tried to get tickets to David and found out that no transportation was running on Friday as it was Good Friday. The bus we took to San Jose was Tica bus and the price was twice as much as TraCopa so our friend Eduardo took us to the TraCopa bus station and we got tickets for Saturday morning at 7:30.
The Rojas' family once again took us into their home and showed incredible hospitality. Friday morning I went for an hour and a half walk with Yolanda and two of her friends from the congregation. San Jose was so dead due to the holiday. Everything was closed and there was hardly any traffic. It was a beautiful walk! When we returned to the house Yolanda made breakfast and then she took us to the Volcano Irazu. Eduardo had to leave to go to Limon at 12 so he could not come with us. The drive to the volcano was beautiful and it was freezing when we got to the top however we touched the ground in the crater of the volcano and it was warm. That was kind of weird! After we left we needed to get snacks for the bus ride and the only place open was Wal-Mart, so we went to Wal-Mart for the first time in over 6 months.
The next day we left in the early morning to get to the bus station by 7am. Yolanda woke up extra early and made us the best empanadas we have ever tasted! We had an uneventful bus ride until the border crossing at Paso Canoas. The people on our bus, many of them, did not have verification of $500 per person or else did not have tickets showing when they were exiting Panama and that is a requirement to crossover the border into Panama. So we had to wait an extra hour while they got it all figured out. It was over 100 degrees in Paso Canoas! We survived!
We got back to Boquete about 6pm and were so happy to be home! Even though it meant I had 7 loads of laundry, I was still glad to be home!

                                               Walking to the bus stop with Ted

                                              The children walking to the bus stop

                                  A volcano in Nicaragua; took the picture from the bus

                                        View driving up to Volcan Irazu in San Jose

Danielle in a crater in Volcan Irazu

Entrance to Volcan Irazu

Beautiful Creation

The Ground here was warm but the air was cold

With Yolanda on Volcan Irazu

We were literally walking through clouds

                                                On our way down the volcano

We went to Wal-Mart in Costa Rica

Palm Tree Farms on our way home