Panama City. Some sort of bizarre cross between Dubai, Canary Wharf and Singapore, but with a schizophrenic Old Town thrown into the mix. Could be a wild card for a new F1 circuit. Lots of tower blocks everywhere as you drive in. Not many of the predominantly residential ones lit up at night. It's very hot here, in the thirties but with 75% humidity which tends to make it feel a tad hotter still. Not the conditions for a midday City walking tour. Having mastered the single line Metro as well as the buses we went walking in the Old Town ourselves. The schizophrenic nature is down to a very abrupt demarcation between an area that is immaculately restored and an area that is completely the opposite, that is itself further constrained by the glitzy tower blocks. It is a little more stark than the creep of gentrification.
We thought that as we were in Panama we had to go and see the Panama Canal despite it being a bit pricey. In fact, everything here is quite pricey. We hadn't realised that a new Panama Canal had been built and opened within the last ten years in order that new, bigger container ships could pass through. The new Canal runs parallel to the old one and can handle the current crop of container ships that can carry 13,000 containers, whilst the old Canal could only handle ships carrying half this many. The ships are manoeuvred in the lock by trains running either side of the canal.
We decided to go and see a nature reserve just outside of Panama City. An area where there was supposedly one of the highest number of different types of birds in the world. Hundreds. We hardly saw or heard one. And the cost to visiting the viewing platform was so extortionate we left straightaway and went back to Panama City for a coffee and cake.
After three days spent in Panama we had had enough of the big city and needed to be on the move. Everywhere seems so expensive for very little compared to what we have been paying, so we probably won't stay in Panama that long. This might be Central and Latin America but it is also little USA. The roadside signs are MacDonalds, Burger King, Papa Johns, Domino's, Starbucks and Cinnabon. The latter we tried as there was little else roadside and we needed a drink. Two lemonades and two cinnamon buns were just shy of 14$ - it's US$ here as currency.
Out of Panama City we stayed in a cute little town called Anton Valle which was built in the caldera of an extinct volcano. It was also at 600m altitude which made all the difference as far as being able to sleep without Aircon is concerned - just a fan to move the air around. Sleep was however broken by a significant dawn chorus. Being in a caldera mean that the roads in and out were actually quite challenging - even on the PanAmerica! What was noticeable was that the supermarkets in town were staffed by Chinese. They also sold lots of Chinese food stuffs - including steaming wontons at the checkout counter that you could buy in polystyrene beakers with plastic forks. They also sold those nodding Chinese cats and there was the equivalent of SeeWoo called Hong-Kong.
Next stop was a beach stop but as the accommodation had a lovely garden and a pool we never made it as far as the beach. It was only a stopover on the way to Boquete and as it was 35° at 0930 we think we really would have baked if we had stayed longer. We had thought that Anton Valle had noisy wildlife but Las Lajas was somethjng else altogether. Boquete was on the list of Panamanian 'must-see's. We know not why. Perhaps because at 1,000m altitude it was cool? Perhaps because of it being surrounded by coffee fincas? Perhaps because it was beneath Panama's highest volcano, Baru @3,500m? Whilst we were there you couldn't see the volcano because of the clouds. That was our excuse anyway and we didn't feel like leaving the hostel at 23.30 to see sunrise over the crater - unlike some younger guys from our hostel . More than likely Boquete is a weekend bolthole for people from Panama City who drive here somewhat quicker than what it took us. But it really isn't much. Not a decent cakeshop in town.
There is an indigenous population here, the Ngobe and they do look and dress differently. We believe that there were issues prior to Christmas where the indigenous population were at odds with the government over the sale of mining rights to a Canadian corporation. Panama was closed for a while.
Whilst in Boquete we visited a coffee finca. Just for a coffee, no tour involved. It was a very nice place indeed, it had a restaurant that dealt with wedding receptions and hotel rooms way above our budget. We left in the opposite direction to the way we had arrived and passed immediately through a very poor area where the Ngobe indigenous people lived. The juxtaposition was pretty extreme.
The following day we set off for the border. It was rainforest/jungle almost all the way accompanied by the rain. This area, to the northern Caribbean coast is the Ngobe-Bogle area and they are, we believe, responsible for governing it to a certain extent. It reminded us quite a bit of Laos with the timber houses on stilts in the jungle, except that in Laos there were a lot more domesticated animals about.
Our last stop in Panama was at Almirante and we stopped at a really nice place miles out of town on a ridge overlooking the Caribbean except that because of the clouds and mist we could not see much. But we saw loads of hummingbirds. Apparently we saw the Colibri type as they drink water and water had been put out for them in birdfeeders by the hotel.
We also had the visit of Mr Toad at night who was very large indeed. In the morning we could have breakfast with an abundance of birds around us from the tiny hummingbirds to the vultures circling above us, from what looked like swallows darting about to a pair of toucans who didn't look as though they should be able to fly with their gigantic beaks weighing them down.
The road to the border was very rainforest again but this time we didn't need our were gear. There was some sort of ongoing political demonstration which basically closed a bridge to traffic, except motorcycles - we were waved through by whoever it was that was demonstrating. The transition into Costa Rica further down the road was relatively painless and uneventful for once.
