Day 205 : Horse Riding in Boquete

Boquete

Boquete is located in the mountainous region of Panama, and we were welcomed by cool weather upon arrival in Boquete around 11am. We were looking to do zip lining in the afternoon, but as it was full for the day, we booked ourselves in for a session early tomorrow morning.

One of the waterfalls

 So instead of waiting around, we decided to go horseback riding. 

The idea was good, but unfortunately the tour wasn`t. We were ¨picked up¨ at 3pm, and followed the guide in our car to a farm located about 30 minutes drive away.

When we got there, we were the only ones there, and the guide interacted with a guy at the farm, whom we later learnt to be the owner.


Throughout the time we were waiting for them to get the horses ready, we had a strange feeling that the guide was doing this for the first time, and we were right!


The owner of the farm showed us our horses and together with the guide came with us on our trek.  While on the trek, we hear the owner explaining to the guide on how to move the horses, the trek routes, the best way of opening the doors to the various lands on our trek etc.

The horses also slowly plodded along the way (almost as slow as a tortoise!), and no matter how hard we tried to nudge the horses to move, they refused to listen.

I subsequently found out that the horse I was on was named "Lazy Boy" - what an apt name!

Niklaus on his horse

On "Lazy Boy"

Getting a little frustrated, and also seeing the horses didn´t seem too excited about wanting to be on the trek, I decided to end both the horses and our torture half way through our trek, and told the guide and owner that we would like to turn back instead.

Rainbow in the distance

What was most appalling was that despite showing our disappointment, we still had to pay the full price.  What was worse was that the guide actually spoke bad about the people at the ziplining on a number of occasions - the same people who had recommended him to us initially.

I have to say that the view was actually really good and we even saw a rainbow over the valley.  A pity that we were unable to fully enjoy and soak in the scenery Boquete has to offer.