San Blas

We’d read that San Blas is beautiful but buggy (sand flies/no-see-ums and mosquitos) and we found all that to be true.  San Blas is in a malaria zone, so we’d started our malaria meds a few days earlier.  Nina’s a trooper and took her meds crushed up in some honey.  I tasted the same honey and it was miserably bitter!  Can’t believe the kid did it – and for 12 days (you have to take it for 2 days prior, the malaria zone stay, and 7 days after).

We stayed at the most expensive hotel in town, complete with air conditioning in the room, for a whopping $25 US/night.  After setting up at that place and parking our car in their semi-secure lot, we went to the town square where we ran into our French Canadian friend from the ferry!  Guess the plan to ditch the kid and run wouldn’t have paid off for long.  We told her about our pet-friendly, semi-secure parking accommodations and she decided to stay in the same place.

The town square boasted a trampoline where kids can jump for 20 minutes for 10 pesos.  Nina was in heaven…..until the bigger kids showed up anyway.

We ate dinner at the San Blas Social Club where Ted was allowed on the back patio and the owners were super cool.  Dmitri talked to one of them about getting rid of our expensive big dog crate that was presently cluttering the top of our Tonneau cover.  He arranged his friend who rescues dogs to take it for 1000 pesos, recouping 40% of our expense and putting the whole unpleasant dog crate experience behind us.

The little beach break turned out to be pretty fun, and we set up at one of the many dining establishments right on the beach to use as home base in the shade for the beach day.  Nina could dig in the sand and try to make friends with other kids, we could surf, Ted could lay under the table and catch scraps, and a friendly waiter brought us food and beverages.  We also procured a tiny body board for Nina with which she bonded immediately.