BOCAS DEL TORO

PANAMA BEYOND THE CANAL 

Punta Caracol Acqua-Lodge 

Next month we will escape winter and visit a very popular tourist spot in Panama and it’s not the Panama Canal. 

With alluring mid-80s temperatures in February, stunning natural beauty with lush rainforests and white-sand beaches with turquoise water teeming with diverse marine life and a vibrant culture, the Bocas del Toro (mouths of the bull) archipelago will be a welcome and budget friendly destination. 

Popular with backpackers, surfers, scuba divers, and ecotourists this area, on the Caribbean side of Panama near the border with Costa Rica, will be a great excuse to get away from winter.

Besides, we had been to the Panama Canal once before. We had sailed from Costa Rica to Panama in 2020 with the small ship cruise line Variety Cruises. Our final stop on that trip was Panama City, and we toured the Miraflores Visitor Center to watch massive ships squeeze through the locks.

MIRAFLORES VISITOR CENTER

VARIETY CRUISES 

OVERWATER BUNGALOWS

With nine main islands and countless cays and islets, all accessible by boat or water taxis, Bocas del Toro is not only beautiful, but very affordable.

Though we have often admired overwater bungalows in brochures, the cost of a stay was always very prohibitive for us. In Bocas del Toro though this “dream” of staying in an overwater bungalow is a reality and there are several available at a very nominal price. We are staying at the Punta Caracol Acqua Lodge, at less than $250 per night. This is a fraction of similar stays say in the Maldives or French Polynesia, or even at a Sandals Resort that we like to visit. As a comparison point, overwater bungalows at the Sandals South Coast in Jamaica are roughly $1,600 per night, PER PERSON.

LISTING OF OVERWATER BUNGALOWS IN BOCAS

A BOOK AND A HAMMOCK

The bungalows of Punta Caracol Acqua-Lodge are set along a mile-long coral reef where we can swim or snorkel off our private deck or relax with a book in our hammock. We’ll enjoy sunsets and a restaurant whose menu changes daily.

It will be a rustic stay as there is an emphasis on sustainable renewable energy, but there is a free shuttle boat that leaves for town three times a day, in case we need to get in some partying or souvenir purchases. I suspect though, we will enjoy the quiet and the warm weather of Panama while back home they will be in the deepest throes of winter.

Once we are in town there are water taxis if we decide to go to one of the area floating bars, with fares anywhere from $2.00 to $5.00.

floating bar Bocas

Other activities available to us will be a boat tour of several islands in the archipelago to visit places like Starfish Beach or Red Frog Beach and at least one scuba dive excursion. Or, that hammock overlooking the water and frolicking dolphins may be all the activity we will require.

PUNTA CARACOL BOCAS DEL TORO PANAMA 

YOU CAN GET THERE FROM HERE

Bocas del Toro is on the extreme western edge of Panama, and it is an hour flight from Panama City with Panama Air. Oh, you can be cheap and take a 12-hour bus ride from the capital for less than $30. The round-trip flights are around $280, but with the inexpensive accommodation at Punta Caracol we could easily afford it.

We are staying in Panama City for 2 days before our flight out west, but we are taking a cooking class instead of touring the canal.

BOCAS DEL TORO TRAVEL GUIDE

BTW I’ve been working on my Spanish. I will make sure I use the word mucho while in Panama. It means “a lot” to the people.

Thanks for reading.

Love Janet and greg

© 2026 by Gregory Dunaj