Blog

Initially when we (Bridget and Micaela) started to write this blog post, we wrote a nice little introduction about the cool mountain air of Boquete (tan fresco) and we were about to write a play by play of our mid-semester break adventures. Then we realized that we couldn’t even summarize one day in 300 words, let alone five, so we thought we would describe Boquete in numbers.

Distance traveled from Bocas to Boquete: 203 km
Elevation gained in travel from Bocas to Boquete: 1200 m
Nights spent in Boquete: 4
Power outages: 2
Dutch numbers learned during one of said power outages: 10
Combined cups of coffee consumed: 21+
Pounds of coffee roasted: 4
Flamingo statues spotted: 3
Life chats chatted: at least 5
Number of toilets broken: 1
Pictures taken: at least 300
Volcanoes hiked: 1 (Micaela), 0 (Bridget)
Massages received: 0 (Micaela), 1 (Bridget)
Elevation gained in hiking Volcán Barú: 1675 m
Expected trivia nights: 1
Actual trivia nights: 0
Expected dominoes games: 0
Actual dominoes games: 2

As students of science we are so often asked to make sense of numbers—to take sums and averages and graph trendlines and curves—yet trying to do that to these numbers would be meaningless. The experiences we have shared cannot be weighted or quantified, and there is something wonderful in that. Boquete was coffee, volcanoes, and crisp air, but it was also the small moments—the people we met, and the unanticipated experiences—that defined our time there.

Micaela in Boquete

View from the top of Volcan Baru

Coffee beans drying at Dos Jefe’s Coffee Farm

Bridget completes her coffee roast