Living in Latin America

You’ve got 24 hours in Boquete, Panama. What are you going to do? 

In this guide, I’m going to go over all the essentials that you need if you’re spending 24 hours in Boquete, Panama.

Where is Boquete in Panama?

Now, Boquete is a little bit different than a lot of the coastal areas that I’ve covered.  It’s deep in the mountains, to give you an idea it’s 3,500 to 4,500ft above sea level. Everything is luscious in green, but because of that, it rains a lot. Well, we are in rainy season, but it does rain more in the mountains.

Knowing this, the temperature is a little bit chillier than anywhere else coastal.

In Panama, Average temperatures are 23 degrees Celsius during the day and it can get up to 26, 27 or 28 like it did yesterday. And in the evening it dips down to possibly around 18 degrees Celsius. So Fahrenheit, that’s 63, 64 up into maybe the 80s.

So if you had 24 hours in Boquete, Panama, what are you going to need?

I’m going to go through everything step by step-by-step.

Where to stay in Boquete

First you’re going to have to figure out where to stay. There is so many different options. Usually I stay at the Selina hostels. I’m at a Selina right now. This is definitely one of the nicer Selina’s. Beautiful river running through, Private cylinder sleeping quarters.  It’s a very nice chill vibe. A lot of the other Selina’s I’ve gone to that are like a heavy, heavy party. Not so much here really at all.

Boquete has really nice restaurants, lots of fitness. There’s also quite a few boutique hotels here. I haven’t seen a lot of those big luxury hotels here.

One is the Riverside Inn, it’s about three or four minutes outside side of town. They have six rooms. So very, very boutique and it’s located right on the river.

Now, fancier hotels. There’s an area called Valle Escondido. It’s a gated community and it’s based around a golf course in a valley, obviously “Valle” in Spanish. . In the community there is a luxury resort that is very, very high end.

It also has a lot of real estate options. Here is an example of the homes in Boquete HERE

Boquete Coffee

You’re iin Boquete and you wake up and you’re ready to go. So you’re probably going to want a coffee. Well, good thing we’re in Boquete. Boquete is known for coffee.

There’s so many different coffee plantations, coffee tours and seems like coffee shops.  I did a lot of searching because I like to wake up early, have a coffee and get started. I usually look for the little kind of hole in the wall, a hidden gem that really makes this guide stand out.

So I found Buckle Tip. It was a little hard to find. Tiny little spot and really, really good coffee.

Another is Alita Estate. Alita Estate is actually part of the Lamathus family, which is a prominent coffee family in Panama.

Fitness

Okay, so you’ve got a coffee in you. Now you’re going to go hit the gym. Not far from Selina, there’s a gym, but it’s not open on Sundays. It’s $5 for drop in, which is amazing. And it has everything that you’re going to need.

Moving on, you’ve hit the gym, you’re feeling great now you’re going to need food. Some of the food options were recommended to me by quite a few different real estate agents.

Boquete Restaurants

First I went for breakfast. I went to Sugar and Spice. They’re a bakery and amazing food, not too

expensive and just really, really good, wholesome food.

Now lunch. I happen to be here over the weekend, so I checked out Butcher and Retro Gusto. They’re only open for brunch on Saturdays and on Sundays.  They are easy o t find, as they are right next to each other and you can actually connect within the restaurant. They’ve got great dinner options as well as Retro Gusto is more of a like an Italian restaurant and the Butcher is obviously, you know, meats and things like that.

Now we get to dinner. So dinner happened to be probably the best food

I’ve had in Panama in a very long time. I would say probably the best food I’ve ever had in Panama. It is a place called the Rock. The drinks were incredible.I had a coffee negroni. I love negronis. It was superb.

I asked the local hostess, who happened to be the manager of a new facility that is opening up, spoke fluent English, even had an English menu. It sure didn’t feel like I was in Panama anymore.

I started off by doing lighter options. So I did. I did a soup, I did a salad, and then I finished it off with a chocolate bomb that was to die for. Then every single person that enjoys dinner with them gets to finish off by roasting marshmallows over their fire.

Nightlife

Now, if you’re looking for something afterwards, evening and late night, a lot of people here go to the Boquete Brewing Company. It’s open air, they’ve got a band playing I believe almost every night. And the beer prices are very, very reasonable. $4 to $5.50, or $6 bucks.

And it seems like everybody after that place closes moves across the street to a place called Taboo. It’s a late night drinking spot.

Someone told me that there’s over 100 restaurants in Boquete and there’s 23,000 people.

Here are some other notables for restaurants in Boquete.

For lunch, you could check out Dobo. It’s actually in Selina. Awesome pizza, reasonable prices. Perfect. Another place that you could check out for dinner just up the street is Tre Scallini. It is an Italian joint. I went there last night. Also, if you’re looking for something, fine dining for dinner. Panamonte was very, very highly recommended. 

Things to Do

Now you’re probably wondering what is there to do in Boquete? Well, Boquete is in a valley.

So that means that there’s a ton of waterfalls, a ton of hikes. There’s a volcano. It’s actually the highest volcano in all of Panama, called Volcan Baru. It is a roughly five hour hike up, four hours down. A lot of people do it super early morning and then super late at night. I even know people that camp out on the top just to watch the sunrise. It’s definitely on my list of things to do. I didn’t do it in this trip because you only have 24 hours.

In a 24 Hour period I chose to go to the Lost Waterfalls. I caught a cab to the Lost Waterfalls. The cab was $4. You pay $10 to get into the area. And it opens on Sundays at 9am Then I went to the Boquete Tree Trek and they have the hanging bridges and canopy. Canopy in Latin America is “ziplining”. This was $30 to get in.

For things to do as well as coffee, you have to check out Alita Estate. Alita Estate is from a Panamanian family. Very popular in Panama. Some of the top coffee, and it’s from Boquete Coffee tours range from $30 to $70.

If there’s any other questions you have about Boquete, let me know in the comment section below.