I still don't have my itinerary locked down, but I did quite a bit of reading and research over the weekend to narrow down the possibilities and that included searching for hotels. Actually, some of the places I looked at don't really fit the description of "hotel" as much as B&B or guest house. A number of the homier, less expensive places are family owned or just down right funky. Since I am not looking for luxury, a place to lay down that is clean and has at least tepid shower water will be good enough. I'll have my netbook with me so I'm not quite ready to settle for a backpacker's hostel (for security reasons), but one step above that is fine with me.
I'll start with Bocas del Toro. There are a lot of really cool and funky places on the island and at reasonable rates. Trip Advisor provided me with a list of lodging establishments to look at and after reading through a lot of reviews and taking a look at their web sites I narrowed my choices down to three: Hotel Olas, CalaLuna Hotel and Hotel Angela.
Hotel Olas is a colorful place (literally… the paint job is amazing) and is right on the water. The rooms all have AC and include internet access as well as breakfast. They keep their costs down by accepting cash only -- $40.00 per night for a standard room, $60.00 for ocean front. From what I can tell, Hotel Olas is close to everything in town.
My other pick that is on the ocean is Hotel Angela. With only thirteen rooms, Angela also offers free breakfast, a restaurant on site, AC in every room, internet and decent prices: $50.00 to $80.00 per night. Trip Advisor includes them in the list of establishments with internet but I didn't see it mentioned on their web site. I sent them an email and got a response within about 30 minutes (a good sign in itself) assuring me that wi-fi is available throughout the property.
My last choice is not on the water, but still in the heart of town and only a block or so away from the ocean. CalaLuna Hotel is an Italian owned property with a restaurant on site (they reportedly have excellent, authentic pizza), internet access and have rooms for as little as $45.00 per night. They also have a small bar and a ping pong table. One of the things about CalaLuna that may appeal to folks who don't sleep well with noise in the background is that the AC is a mini-split system instead of the through-the-wall units found in many inexpensive properties. The advantage of the mini-split system is that they are quieter and probably more reliable than wall units. Although, if they break down you can't just pop a new one in the wall -- they require an HVAC technician to fix them.
I am leaning towards Hotel Angela or Hotel Olas. Both are really cool properties and appear to be clean and well maintained. All of the properties offer to help with booking activities. When I owned my B&B in Key West, all of the boats and dive shops paid an incentive for booking them. I am not sure if that is the case here, but I know that most guest house owners took a lot of pride in booking the best activities in town and wouldn't let their guests go out on just any boat. After all, their recommendation reflects back on them and they want every guest to be a return guest.
One of the curious things I found in many lodging web sites throughout Panama is that they proudly proclaim that they have orthopedic mattresses. Apparently Panamanians place a high value on a good night's sleep!
A few of the other web sites I used to read up on Bocas del Toro as well are Panama Info, Extreme Panama and what touts itself as the "official" Bocas del Toro web site, bocas.com. Panama Info covers all of Panama and includes information on hotels, restaurants, activities and has regional descriptions of the country and much more. Two other websites that include information on Panama but are really geared towards future expats like myself are Escape from America Magazine and The Escape Artist.
Next up will be the information I found on lodging establishments on the Azuero Peninsula including Chitre, Las Tablas and Pedasi.
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