bocas del toro

so...I had last week off of work because the children are on vacation. I decided to travel to Bocas Del Toro (islands off of Panama) with a friend from work, Brianna. We left Monday morning and rode a bus for about six hours to the border. There we got our passports stamped and made our way across an old bridge to a place where we would then catch a taxi to our next stop where we had to take a boat to the island. We were in the van with about 10 other people and after driving maybe ten minutes we came to a stop. Traffic was backed up and when we asked what was going on they said there was a protest being held. We were stopped for about two hours, but then everything seemed to clear up and we went right on through. By this time it was dark outside and Brianna and I had to find a boat to take us to our hostel Bocas Bound. The first boat we got on the driver ended up taking us to the wrong island. We paid him, he dropped us off, and then we realized this was not right. We were asking around for Bocas Bound and another boat driver said "ooh ooh come with me. its not on this island" so we went. At this time I was kind of scared. Two young american girls on a tiny boat with a guy in the dark not knowing where we were just sounds like the perfect start to a horror movie. But, we got lucky and he brought us to our final destination Bocas Bound on Red Frog Beach. We hung out there for the week (planned on leaving Friday). We went to the beach everyday and pretty much just relaxed. So Thursday rolls around and we are hanging out in the lounge at the hostel with some people trying to decide if we should stay until Saturday or just head back tomorrow when we hear the news...the bananas workers are protesting and the border is blocked there is no way back across the border. So we were stuck. The protestors had tipped over buses and trees and were burning them in the roads. Some people that had left the island trying to get back in to Costa Rica ended up back in Bocas saying there was no way across. It was a mess. People on the island were having to change there flights for a later day and everyone was asking everyone "have you figured out a way across". Basically the only way off the island was to fly, but all the flights were booked by the time Brianna and I realized that was what we were going to have to do. Luckily, we met enough people that were willing to pay to get a flight across and Nature Air scheduled an extra flight out Sunday morning. So after quite the adventure we made it home safely!