Panama City

Panama Day 8, Canopy Tower & The Panama City Fish Market

September 7, 2010
Thumbnail image for Panama Day 8, Canopy Tower & The Panama City Fish Market
July 17
Canopy Tower to Panama City
Mornings come early at the Canopy Tower. What’s that saying? The early bird gets the worm. Here, the early riser gets the bird.
…
Read the full article →

Panama Day 6-How To Make the Best Of A Bad Situation

August 13, 2010
Thumbnail image for Panama Day 6-How To Make the Best Of A Bad Situation
July 15
 
Isla Contadora to Panama City
 
Today our plan was to leave Isla Contadora on the 9:30 plane, pick up a rental car at Albrook airport, and drive to the Canopy Tower to be there in time for lunch and the afternoon bird watching walk. Tomorrow we’d check out at 9am, drive to the Caribbean coast and check out the ruins of the Spanish forts at Portobello, and then make our way back to Sierra Llorona Lodge for another afternoon of wildlife watching. Alas, none of this was to happen as planned.
 
It was dumping rain when we woke up. The fountain in the middle of the courtyard was overflowing and turning the breakfast area into a lake. By 8am we knew our plane would not be coming at 9:30. A giant storm was sitting directly over the Bay of Panama, purple on the radar map, and moving slowly toward Panama City.

Here’s how hard it was raining:

 

“Thank Heavens, For Little…Computers”

We waited to hear news. Nothing. We waited some more. Finally, around 11am, we decided to cut our losses and reconfigure as best we could.

Fortunately, we still had intermittent internet access, going in and out with the storm. I got on the netbook and did my best at vacation damage control.
  • Because the Canopy Tower was prepaid, I emailed them first, asking if we could push our arrival by a day as we were stuck. There was no point in arriving there late even if we could get off the island because we would miss our only chance for a nature walk if we did so. I heard back from them within a couple of hours and they said they had space available for the next day so we could move our reservation.
  • Next I

    • …

Read the full article →

Panama City-The Canal Locks, Casco Viejo, World Cup Madness

July 27, 2010
Thumbnail image for Panama City-The Canal Locks, Casco Viejo, World Cup Madness

July 11, 2010

Panama City, Panama

We woke to cloudy skies and a desire to get out for the day, but first, breakfast.
The Toscana Inn hotel includes breakfast with the rate in a room off the lobby and unfortunately this is probably the hotel’s weakest point. It’s not for lack of choice either, it’s just that none of it was particularly appetizing. The hot choices included an odd re-fried bean/meat/green olive concoction, limp bacon, scary pale things which looked like fingers but were probably sausages and overcooked hard boiled eggs. There was cold cereal and milk, fruit, and toast. Coffee and tea or $3 extra for a badly made cappuccino.

Our loose plan for the day was to check out the Miraflores Locks and then find some place to watch the World Cup Final game, possibly in a bar either near the hotel or in Casco Viejo.
First, a note about Panama City:
Panama City is a huge, sprawling, modern city filled with skyscrapers and varying states of construction. I didn’t realize this until I saw pictures when researching for the trip. This is no quaint, Central American small city with low slung buildings. It reminds me more of Bangkok in the spread of high rises than even Los Angeles where the tall buildings are clustered in “downtown.”
Unlike Bangkok, I didn’t see any big open markets and there’s no street food visible anywhere. Like Los Angeles, it seems that things are spread out all over, and there’s no good public transportation system like a subway. Yes, there are buses, but as a tourist and not a local I was hard pressed to find a bus map, let along figure out where they went and how to use them. That means that cabs are the way to go, and again, being from LA, jumping …
Read the full article →