Advertisement
Published: June 27th 2010
Okay, so we didn’t really go island hopping, but we did go to two very different islands the next two days in a row and I think that should count for something…
On Tuesday, we again woke up fairly early and piled in cars to head to the small town of Portobelo on the coast about an hour north of Panama City. It is on the Caribbean Coast. Kendi and Miguel took a dive master with them from the city and when we got there we met up with their three remaining friends from Michigan. Kendi, Miguel and Jeff were scuba diving so they got what they needed while the rest of us rented snorkel gear.
Just as we were finally getting ready to head off it started to rain. We had become accustomed to the daily afternoon shower in the City, but this was morning and it was a serious downpour. All of the snorkelers piled on one boat and took off in through the rain to an island. The scuba people stayed to take another boat to their scuba spot.
As we headed for the island it continued to rain harder and harder and the poor
people in the front got pelted well and good, we were all mostly soaked by the time we got there. It was still pouring and there wasn’t shelter as we pulled up to a cove on the island. The island itself was beautiful, there was a fairly small beach surrounded by trees. Unfortunately, once you moved beyond the beach there was trash everywhere. Clearly a great many people had come to spend the day and party and left behind a great deal of garbage. As long as you stay on the stretch of beach and look out toward the ocean it was incredible.
There was pretty much no hope of keeping anything that wasn’t in a dry bag or plastic bag dry. So we piled our stuff on a fallen tree trunk under some other trees that were already thoroughly drenched and dripping through, put on our snorkel gear and headed into the water. It was actually very cool to be snorkeling in the pouring rain.
Allie and I headed out in the direction the boat driver suggested toward a little island just off the bigger island we were on. Unknowingly also heading toward the open ocean. We
snorkeled over the sand and then onward over some very cool and very distinct types of coral and some cute and colorful fish. The water was quite warm but the rain was a bit chilly pounding down on our backs. I have to say though, when you lifted you head out of the water to look ahead it was quite an incredible scene looking at both the edge of the bigger island and the little island covered in trees and the water as the rain hit it causing a sort of mist. Plus, as we left the island the howler monkeys in the trees near the beach were going crazy making quite a racket. It felt like something out of a movie.
We were very content heading toward our little island, watching below the ocean. I was just thinking it was about time to think about turning around and I looked up to see how close we were to things and there on the boat came the driver and Aunt Trudi and Nathan. I couldn’t figure out what they were doing, I thought maybe they were trying to tell us that people had decided to leave the island, but
as they got closer Aunt Trudi explained that they were coming to save us.
They had decided that we were too far out and Aunt Trudi had gotten worried so she’d sent Uncle Don to swim after us wearing one life vest and carrying two others for us. It’s not easy to swim like that so then she’d started worrying about him and the boat guy was worried about Meghan and John that had gone around the point of the bigger island. We headed toward Uncle Don to get our life vests. What a pain to put vests on in the water! It was quite an ordeal, but luckily we got them on and were saved. The vests made the swim back to the beach a bit long since we were going against the current and had the vests in the way, but we were definitely kept above the water.
Some time during the swim back it stopped raining. When we got back to the beach we hung around in the water for quite some time. The scuba people came in on their boat to visit while they had to be above water. It was warmer in the
water than out. Eventually we got out, gathered all our soaking wet belongings and headed back to land. By this point it had cleared up and it was sunny and beautiful.
We drove around the town of Portobelo, checked out the left over canons at the fort, watched the local boys play soccer in the mud wearing only their underwear (school uniforms piled along the fort wall), had dinner and then headed back to the city.
Wednesday morning was our earliest day yet. We had to leave the house at 6:15 to catch the one and only ferry across the canal to the Isla Barro Colorado. The boys couldn’t come so Miguel stayed home to babysit and the rest of us headed off.
Barro Colorado Island (BCI) was made into and island in 1914 when the Chagres River was dammed. It is now a biological reserve run by the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. It is basically for research, having been protected since 1923, but something like 10 visitors a day can ride the ferry across with a guide and visit the forest. Kendra had been working on getting us reservations and our group consisted of our family,
Fernando from Brazil and Angie our guide.
The ferry left at 7:15 on the dot from Gamboa and took about 45 minutes to get to BCI. Once there we went into one of the institute buildings, had breakfast and a little talk about the kinds of animals we might see. We taped our pants into our socks (a nice look for sure) to try and keep out chiggers and ticks and headed off into the forest.
Just outside the building we spotted our first interesting animals, a couple of poison dart frogs. We also saw birds and bugs right away. Not too far in, before we really even got out of the buildings, actually, on the researcher’s basketball court, we spotted a spider monkey. We had seen howler forms from the window at breakfast, but there are dozens of howler troops on the island and only one spider monkey troop so this was very exciting. We watched her for quite some time, it was almost like she was posing for us, sitting on branches nearby and climbing from one to another.
We continued along our hike, we watched agoutis, and lots of different ants, including the ever
present leaf cutters as well as bullet ants which are huge and apparently hurt like hell if they get you. Fernando wanted to get bit by one to see just how painful it is, but he guide wouldn’t let him. We also saw and heard a guan (a cool gray and red turkey like bird) amongst other things. There is so much research going on on the island that all along the paths there are markers, tags, and various different experiments. You are constantly passed by workers with all their gear in a hurry to get to their work spot.
We continued on our hike through the sticky heat with our taped up pant-saunas creating a lovely experience. Just as we hit the point where we could choose to go further to the big kapok tree or head back for lunch, it started to pour. Like really, really dump down on us. Everyone (except Kendi who is not bothered by rain) frantically tried to find coats or in my case a poncho to put on. By the time we got them out we were pretty much already soaked through. We figured that we might as well keep hiking in
the rain to see the tree. We were already wet, and it’s a tree just like in the book!
I was glad we went because the tree was way cool. And there were bats on it! We took lots of pictures with the Kapok tree, but Kendi and I made sure to get one together. I figure this is as close as we will come to the famed rainforest trip we spent all those hours planning. She’ll live in the rainforest and I’ll come every few years to visit. Everyone else pointed out that next time I’ll have to be sure to drive down in the crayola-stocked trailer. We’ll have to see…
After this we headed back to the buildings for lunch and some videos about the island. Then we went back out and up to the visitor center and gift shop to wait for the 3:40 ferry to take us back. As we left the gift shop we spotted some more spider monkeys.
This was by far the neatest part of the day. We watched tons of spider monkeys, even some mamas with babies on their backs swing around and jump across from tree to tree.
Right in front of us! We watched them forever! All the way down the path, back to the buildings. It was seriously like they were putting on an incredible show along just the path we needed to walk. They went from tree to tree and down eventually to a roof that they hopped on and ran back and forth across chasing each other. It was truly amazing and very lucky for us since Angie said she hadn’t even seen a spider monkey (from the one and only troop on the island) in about a year. We seriously lucked out!
Photos from everyone again. And there's a second page of them.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.066s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 10; qc: 28; dbt: 0.0416s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
