Panama

Border to Panama

The north border crossing from Costa Rica to Panama at Sixaola is renowned for being pleasant and hassle free, and it certainly was. Travellers who chose the other crossing invariably had to bribe the border guards for not having return tickets out of the country. We ambled over a one lane railway bridge spanning a river and that was it. The rest of the day was a pleasant journey down a river to Bocas Del Toro, an archipelago off the Caribbean coast.

Waiting for the boat

For one of the most touristed places in Panama, Bocas isn't bad. The streets are clean, there is a pervasive rasta vibe and people are therefore far too chilled to hassle you. The coral reef is beautiful and the water is clean, with the exeption of the area around Hostel Tio Tom whose sanitary system emtpies directly into the sea.

Hostel Tio Tom: Don't swim here!

We were lucky enough to have a few days of sunshine in the wet season. By coincidence we bumped into the three New Zealanders who we climbed Volcan Tajamulco with in Guatemala, who were now trying to arrange a boat to Colombia.

Playa Wizard, where our bag was stolen

Our time in Bocas was spent snorkelling and playing on the beach. Unfortunately our backpack was stolen by a little boy while we were in the water. We knew this might happen and had placed it close to the water and were watching it closely for this reason. We had even paid for the surfboard rental beforehand so we were carrying less cash. Even so, he was quick and disappeared into the jungle, as did Roger for a good ten minutes chasing after him. We approached some locals wandering the beach who were apparently "security" and offered them large sums of money to get our bag back, just to make sure they weren't in on it. They weren't, and everyone was very sympathetic. The next day on a different island complete strangers were approaching us asking us if we had found our bag yet.

Bay of Dolphins

Mangroves

The mangroves around Bocas were remarkable in that they were immediately surrounded by pristine coral - I thought that usually it is too muddy for coral near mangroves. Unfortunately our close encounter with coral involved our boatman skimming over shallow water and probably damaging it, then picking living things out of the water to show tourists who, disturbingly, were not concerned.

Travelling back to the mainland we took on board an extra passenger. Our water taxi stopped next to a tiny dugout canoe in the middle of the shipping channel. A middle-aged, well dressed woman hopped on board and her family paddled the canoe back to shore.

View to Cerro Punta

From there we crossed the mountain range to the Pacific side of the country and ventured into the hills to a town called Boquete. Expats are buying land around here in droves but there's still lots of local culture. We took a horse ride through the hills around the town which was pleasant except for the traffic. There was a coffee factory to visit that roasts coffee voted the best in the world. We also walked the Sendero de Los Quetzales (Quetzal Trail) to a village over the hills. Being the rainy season we didn´t see any of the famed quetzals (click here for a pic) but it was a good rainforest walk.

Sendero los Quetzales

Orchids

Bamboo roots

Cloudforest

Lilies

On the way to Panama city we stopped at San Carlos:

Rio Mar Beach near San Carlos

Black Sand

We chose some good rainy days to bus down to Panama City. This is a thriving metropolis, more modern and affluent than any other central American city, except perhaps Mexico City. The canal was finished in 1914 by the US and has had a strong interest in regional security since. The canal workers were a mixed bunch and Panama is more multicultural than the rest of the region. The canal itself consists of a series of locks that raise ships to an artificial lake spanning the country´s narrowest point (50km) and they´re lowered again on the other coast.

Panama City

Bridge over the Canal

Canal locks

The city itself has an old town that still has some restoration work to go. Friendly locals advised us when we were about to enter the red light district and put us back on the tourist path.

We didn't notice any earthquake...