Blogs from Panama City, Panamá, Panama, Central America Caribbean - page 15

My unplanned assault on Panama City ended up being an exclamation point of sorts at the end of a long journey. It was my intention to enter Panama and bed down somewhere a couple of hours from the border so that I could make a run for the canal the next day but I ended up calling an audible in a desperate bid to end this thing sooner rather than later. The day started out strangely. I picked up a couple who were hitchiking at the turnoff for Dominical as I was driving out. He was an expat from Hawaii who had come to Costa Rica 15 years ago to escape the high cost of living. She was his Costa Rican wife. They were going to Golfito which meant that I would be able to get ... read more

I woke up really early today. Someone walked down the stairs over our head with a roller suitcase & went bang bang bang down each step. It was around 5:30 am. Really thoughtful. I'm sure the entire hostel heard them. So, I'm up & typing & waiting for a more appropriate hour to go out & buy some coffee. At 7 I headed out & walked a bit. It's still a bit sketchy feeling at this time of day so I followed a couple of the police (there's tons of them in this area because the President's house is a few streets away, which you cannot walk within 3-4 blocks of) to a Fonda where I ordered a grande coffee that the guy served to me in a large styrofoam soup bowl. It made me laugh ... read more

I left the Lost and Found at about 8am as I expected a long day's travelling to get to Panama City. Originally, I had planned to stop half way to go and explore some slightly less travelled spots along the Pacific coast, but in the end, a combination of wanting to save some time and hoping to catch up with Ana and Luka, made me decide to do the trip in one go. The first bus ($2.5) was an hour's ride to David, where I could get the bus to Panama city. When I got to David's bus station, as I was looking for the Panama bound bus, I spotted Rob and his bike. He and Gerald were just arriving from a day in Boquete and and on their way to the capital. We opted for ... read more

I couldn’t do what I wanted to do in Panama, so I sulked and came home early. To be fair, this is only the second time in the last five years’ travelling that I haven’t managed to get to where I wanted to go because of logistical and security (rather than simple lack of time) reasons. The first was in Rwanda when, despite getting to the towns at the northern and southern ends of Lake Kivu, I failed to reach the town in the middle of the Lake’s eastern shore, despite trying from three different directions. The buses and the road conditions simply wouldn’t play ball. In Panama, my main aim had been to visit the site of Scotland’s short-lived and tragic attempt at an empire in the 1690s. While much of my school-taught Scottish history ... read more

The night before we arrived in Panama, we saw ships waiting to enter the Panama Canal. All night long! The next morning, the line was naturally very long. Luckly we didn't have to go into it but we stoped in Colon, Panama. A bus brought us to Panama City, which is the capital of Panama. We did a tour around the city. Panama is a city of contrasts: the old and the new. We saw the old inner city which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and also saw gleaming, modern sky scrapers. After having lunch we left Panama City for the famous Miraflores Locks of the Panama Canal. We also visited the Panama Canal Museum there and watched a couple of ships go through the Canal. Another cruise ship was about to go through the ... read more