Costa Rica we´re sure is beautiful and has loads of lovely flora and fauna and the rest.. It also costs an arm and a leg more than anywhere else in central America and it´s full of package touring fat americans. It being near Christmas (hence high season) and the imminent departure of our connection from Panama, we decided to drive through Costa Rica and pollute its atmosphere with coach fumes rather than patronise its beaches.

The bus driver got lost in the night, crossing over ricketty wooden bridges over swollen torrential rivers, mounting the kerb occasionally, and in true nicaraguan style, accelerating then braking sharply while on an empty road the whole way, so that sleep was entirely impossible.

As fans of uneventful border crossings, we were dismayed to spend 4 hours waiting in the dusty immigration car park for permission to cross from CR into Panama (they love to queue more than the English, even at 4am when the immigration office doesn´t open for another 2 hours, theres a queue 100 people long).

The trip from Omnetepe to Panama city took 32 hours and we arrived feeling fresh and elated, and as we got off the bus the tropical rain cleansed our skin and freshened us up ready for the final leg - finding a hotel at 8pm.

panama here we come!