Bastimentos Town, Bocas del Toro

Map Bastimentos Town, Bocas del Toro

The town of Bastimentos has a population around 800 inhabitants, who live in 125 houses constructed with wood or cement with a zinc roof, plus a few of wood with a palm roof. The majority of the population here is afrocaribbean.

There are not streets in Bastimentos: the ways are wide cement paths. There are no roads, and therefore no cars. You need a boat to get around, and many of the residents of this community have at least one boat with an engine.

There is a health centre, an aqueduct, a primary school with 7 classrooms, 7 teachers and 145 students, and a police sub-station. The town is connected to the electricity and telephone services via underwater wires from Bocas town. There are public phones in the town.

Employment is in fishing, tourism, subsistence agriculture and employment in Bocas del Toro (away 10 minutes by boat).

In the past revenues came from leasing the turtle boats in an annual auction, and from the "Baker's Coconut Plantation Co.", in Cocoplum Point. A company engaged in planting coconut around 1924 or 1925, it started operating in Cocoplum Point (in Spanish, "Punta de Icaco"). The owners of this company came from the Cayman Islands. They employed about one hundred men and shipped the coconuts to the United States.

Bastimentos has seen a fair sprinkling West Indian families.They brought with them West Indies culture, ministers, their school teachers, tailors, barbers and farmers. All these contribute toward the progress and advancement of the island.

Bocas del Toro