It's only about 125 miles west of the canal and there's a town with a lot of restaurants, entertainment, long term cruisers and x-pats. You can gunk hole for months and when you get the itching to go to the San Blas or Cartagena you just go. If you get Pensionado status you don't have to play the visa game.

Shelter Bay is a nice marina but there's no where to go except for the pool as it's a half hour from anywhere. TThe marina has a bus to Colon but Colon is the pits. I think the big thing that soured me on Shelter Bay was when my 15 hp Yamaha was stolen while locked to the stern rail in the boat yard. They didn't care. It wasn't their problem. Chuck, the marina manager here at Bocas Marina is from San Clemente Ca and lives on his boat in the marina with his wife. This weekend he organized a cruise and raftup somewhere and about 10 boats took off on Friday afternoon for the weekend. They took great care of the boat while I was gone for 4 months and the new boatyard will be opening in a few months. It's a nice little community here.

We like Bocas as a home base. Only thing it doesn't have is a swimming pool. It's planned but so far it's a volleyball court.

The best part was that they took care of the boat very well while we were gone.