It was the best of days. It was the worst of days.

It started poorly.  The wind had been gusting throughout the night, at times making us question whether we were about to fly into the air like Dorothy.  Then in the morning as Jason opened the door a wind gust caught it and ripped it off it’s hinges, breaking parts of the door off in the process.  Being in the jungle, spare doors aren’t easy to come by so a rudimentary repair was attempted, but did not appear to be successful.  Fortunately there had been a no show the night before and we were able to move rooms.  However feeling slightly grumpy and out of sorts we hightailed it out of there to head to the river canyon.  We had decided the night before not to take valuables, and therefore planned to leave the camera bag at the hostel.  If we’d been thinking right and not so preoccupied with flying doors we would have proceeded in our normal swimming excursion process of only taking a small amount of money for the bus, and that’s it.  We didn’t.  We took Jason’s wallet with credit cards and my phone.

The canyon itself was lovely, the river having calved a way through the rock, leaving vertical sides around 5-6m high.  There were a lot of people about so we chose a shady spot near where we planned to enter the river, allowing us to keep an eye on our bag.  We braved the first jump, and the water was the perfect temperature, refreshing without being cold.  Then we saw a group of guys hanging around the highest point in the canyon, and diving in from there.  After finding our way to the top and jumping in a couple of times, we watched one of the guys climb up the vertical side of the canyon. It wasn’t long before Ivan was teaching us the routes up the side and encouraging us.  At one point Jason was clinging on desperately with all 4 limbs whilst Ivan somehow had hold of the rocks with just his feet, leaning his body horizontally so he could use both hands to show Jason where to grip.  It was amazing, one of those travel experiences you can’t plan.  It was a perfect day, probably the best of the trip so far.  

Then I went to check the time, only to find my phone was gone.  The best day, became the worst day.  We berated ourselves for letting our normal vigilance slip, for not thinking better about what to take with us.  Luckily Jason’s wallet was still there.  The thief must have seen me take a photo and then put the phone away, because it was in a hidden pocket inside the backpack and nothing else had been touched.

Our new friends called the police for us, and when they arrived explained what had happened as the officer didn’t speak English.  We were then escorted by the policeman on his motorbike to the nearest town where he took us to an internet cafe so that we could try and locate the phone using find my phone.  He explained the issue, and we were given free use of the computers.  It was offline unsurprisingly, so instead we set it to erase the contents of the phone.  We then went to the police station and were escorted to another building so that we could get a written statement for insurance.  I’m not sure that we’ll be covered, but without the report there’s no possibility.  We’ve still lost the photos, and perhaps worse the functionality of the phone.  It has been invaluable as a keeper of accommodation bookings, Spanish translations, maps that not only show the area, but show where we are within the area and, of course, music.

As strange as it is, today has been the best day of the trip, and the worst day of the trip.  We're trying hard to not let the worst overshadow the best.