So it turns out that the late-night AC/DC I was enjoying before bed was merely a precursor to an excruciating evening of BLARING music and drunken stupidity. A group of morons decided to wake me and the rest of the planet up at around 2AM and could not be silenced until nearly six in the morning. A whole lot of us were furious but multiple trips to reception and screaming down the halls did absolutely nothing to dissuade the aforementioned morons from acting like...morons. The kid at reception tried to get them to be quiet a couple of times but was very timid and afraid of them. Apparently he's new and was too scared to call the police or even his boss. I was absolutely livid and at about 3AM started hunting online for another place to stay; by 7AM my bags were packed and I was ready to go. The problem was that I'd already paid for three nights there and I wasn't sure if I could get my money back for the other two nights. My hours of brooding/staring at the dark ceiling were spent agonizing over which adjectives would most effectively destroy anyone's desire to ever stay at Mamallena again, as I planned to write a scathing review and post it anywhere and everywhere I could. I really can't go all that far now because that morning I asked for a refund of the two nights and the manager voluntarily gave me ALL of my money back, along with a genuine apology. Hmph. That review was going to be pretty epic and now it will never see the light of a desk lamp. But I picked up $38 for pain and suffering! Apparently the noise wasn't quite as bad for Kim and Joe (I think their room was further down the hall) so they're staying put. We, on the other hand, found an amazing little house-turned-hotel that's super quiet, has a flatscreen TV in the room, and is the same price. Score! After dropping our bags at our fresh digs we happily trotted back to Mamallena, noses in the air, to start our guided tour of the Quetzal Trail. We drove over an hour to the northern part of Baru Volcano National Park and hiked several miles through the jungle. We were hoping to see a lot of wildlife but we (or at least I) were sorely disappointed. Everybody was happy with the beautiful hike on its own, but I had my heart set on seeing a sloth or a Quetzal (we were on the QUETZAL TRAIL, after all). Unfortunately we saw absolutely nothing, nada, zilch. Ugh. I'm telling myself to stop complaining now but it's oh so hard, especially because Colombia's trails were simultaneously prettier and cheaper :) Everybody else had a great time, the weather was perfect, and our guide was excellent; we even got some service time in when he recognized Joe's JW.org pin. It was at the end of the 5 hour hike that we entered the Twilight Zone. In a shockingly successful effort to be the very first person in our group of six to finish the hike, Brittany (MY Brittany) was not only at the front of the pack but actually RAN UPHILL for the win. Anyone that knows Brittany and her aversion to demanding physical activity will agree that entrance to the Twilight Zone is the only logical and possible explanation for such an event. My legs were trembling a little towards the end, and we were all pretty worn out on the bus ride home. We recharged a little bit with an amazing dessert of strawberries covered in a special cream called "natilla", and then got dinner at a tex-mex restaurant I'd been wanting to try (I highly recommend dessert before dinner; it's a magical experience). It was just the four of us there and a kind older lady took care of us like we were her kids. The food was amazing (hit Antojitos if you're ever in Boquete) and we meandered back to bed, fat and happy. We've seen no actual rain here, just a cool and persistent mist that leaves a vivid double rainbow semi-permanently plastered in the sky behind the city. I was expecting to be in lush green mountains but in reality we are on a large plain completely surrounded by dark brown mountains with cloud forest further off. It's an unsettling beauty, the kind that makes you stop and question what you're seeing. Far away but clearly and sharply, thick white clouds reach high into the sky as they come over the mountains, as if they're hitting some kind of invisible wall. I wrote a little and watched Maverick on TV (eat your heart out Kim and Joe) and went to sleep in my nice quiet room in preparation for our Island tour today. I wasn't too sure what to expect: I only knew that we were going on a tour of an island in the Chiriqui Gulf Marine Sanctuary. I booked through a company called Boquete Outdoor Adventures, and I think it's safe to say they're one of the best tour operators on Earth. From the time we left at 7AM to our exhausted yet triumphant return at 5PM they had every detail figured out and taken care of. We had to drive for almost two hours to the Pacific coast and then get on a boat for another half hour to reach the island (super frustrated I can't remember its name). We were in a small group of 9, our tour leaders were super-friendly ex-pats from the states, and what may have been the coolest dog to ever live graced us with his presence. All the indicators of a good time were there and it was virtually guaranteed when every cloud melted away to reveal a crystal clear sky accompanied by a cool island breeze. I really can't imagine a place more idyllic than where we spent our day, and I read a lot of travel magazines. I spent hours vegging out in a hammock, we had beers and cocktails brought to us whenever we wished, we snorkeled over beautiful reefs and shared a big stretch of sand with no more than 25 people at any one time. I'm shaking my head in disbelief at how great today was; it just doesn't get any better than that! Brittany and I made a somewhat daring swim around some big rocks to visit a second beach that couldn't be reached any other way. There were no footprints at all so I think we were the only ones that visited it the entire day. 500 romantic points to Jonathan! The beaches swarmed with hermit crabs and I think I sent a few of them to the moon; they would crawl onto my foot and I'd kick into the air in surprise. At least two are orbiting the Earth as we speak... Sun-kissed and weary we begrudgingly got back on the boat late this afternoon, endured the bus ride with drooping eyelids, and cleaned up before dinner at the el cheapo place. Brittany and I got out of there for less than $7 and I think Kim and Joe did even better than that. Killer deal for heaping plates of stick-to-your-ribs deliciousness. We used the food budget savings to justify more strawberries with natilla and a round of ice cream. It's vacation, right? Tomorrow will be a pretty big day: we are visiting a coffee plantation in the afternoon and then boarding a couple of different buses to negotiate the 10+ hour journey from this side of the country to the other. It'll be worth it when I see the canal. I have some REALLY great pictures from these tours but I'll have to wait until I get home to upload them :( P.S. I finished the book Alice in Wonderland today. It's terrible, don't read it. For the first time ever I am forced to say, "see the cartoon, it's way better".