Traveling to Panama

[FI460]

Last fall my girlfriend and I purchased a trip to Central Panama at a fundraising banquet. We're scheduled for mid-July and are considering extending it. The plan is to spend the first 4-5 days in Boquete at the resort, but we're looking at adding a few days to travel to the Caribbean side. Also entertaining the idea of visiting the Pacific side of the country.

Right now she's interested in the area around Boca del Tora.
It sounds like there are some good snorkeling areas on the Caribbean side. We're generally interested in outdoor experiences and she is especially into experiencing the local culture outside of the major tourist areas.

Has anyone been? Any recommendations?

 

[rtraverdavis]

Haven’t been, but it’s my understanding that when visiting Panama it is an absolute requirement to have a boombox playing Van Halen’s “Panama” at max volume on a constant loop whenever you’re around locals. Pretty sure you get arrested if you don’t follow that rule.

 

[FI460]

Haven’t been, but it’s my understanding that when visiting Panama it is an absolute requirement to have a boombox playing Van Halen’s “Panama” at max volume on a constant loop whenever you’re around locals. Pretty sure you get arrested if you don’t follow that rule.

I was 100% expecting this response. I did not expect for you to deliver it so quickly though.

 

[cedahm]

We spent a week down there a few years ago.

2 nights in Panama City (which was great).
- Canal visit is a must. Such a marvel
- Boat trip ( based around seeing monkeys) in the ”lakes” was a hit with the wife and son, I enjoyed it too, especially the howler monkeys going off, but hot/humid on a boat isn’t my thing unless fishing is involved. (note: apparently there is some great peacock bass fishing in those lakes)
- wandering around the old city eating and gawking was great.

3 nights in Boquete. Was our favorite part of the trip (Mountain folks that we are, makes sense)

- drove random jungle mountain roads, did some minor hikes, etc. Really pretty country and highly suggest renting a capable vehicle as we had a blast just driving around the secondary roads.
- stopped in the outskirts of Volcan to see a woodworking shop and the owner made a few little things for my son and was a neat experience
- went to the brewery every night, solid beers and a fun place

2 nights in Bocas Del Mar on the pacific side.

- did an inshore trip one day and it rained so hard it was like fishing in the shower most of the day. and got into some decent snapper (plus my first moray on rod and reel which is a trip to see out of the water). Also ran into a cow/calf pair of whales just off shore that we followed for a while.
- lounged around the beach/pool
- we had considered going to the Caribbean side but the pacific side is a little less busy and was closer to David for our flight back to Panama City

1 night at the Westin in Playa Bonita which could be any resort hotel on any beach anywhere so not very memorable.

Happy to share more details via email. All 3 places we stayed at were excellent minus the westin which was fine (and available on points)

Assume you’re flying through PTY to David?

 

[Letthemgrow]

If you can arrange a few days of snorkeling in the San Blas islands I don't think you will regret it.
It was one of our best vacations.

 

[trb]

I spent 2+ years there in the Peace Corps. @cedahm had some good recommendations for you. 95% of my experience there was on the Pacific Coast, so I am not much help with Bocas del Toro, but happy to answer any questions you may have.

Of the more popular tourist destinations, Isla Coiba is pretty amazing. Former prison colony, now a a maritime reserve. Lots of generic day boat/snorkeling tours (swim with sharks, sea turtles, sea snakes, etc...), but there's also some crazy custom sea kayak and beach camping tours that can be arranged.

In general, Panama's ecotourism is pretty concentrated, and not nearly as developed as Costa Rica's. Boquete, Bocas del Toro, the Canal, San Blas, Coiba are the highlights. It's easy to get off the beaten path if you want to, but just be aware of the challenges of doing so, especially if you don't speak Spanish.

 

[FI460]

Well we did it. Much like my lackluster or nonexistent hunt recaps I haven't put the time into this that HT deserves. I figure I should wrap the thread up before my memory fades anymore and not just leave it here languishing in case someone else searches Panama.

The original plan was to travel in July. Spend a few days up north in Boquete on the auction trip we had purchased and then pop up to the Caribbean side for a few days. The wrinkle with that plan was that my passport was long expired, and I applied for a new one with something like 6 weeks until departure time. We were originally planning on going to Hawaii to a friends family property but that fell through, so Panama wasn't on my radar. We decided to go for it and run the risk that we would have to postpone the trip. That was a serious gamble considering the rescheduling policy wasn't very clear.

4 weeks of waiting on the passport application came and I hadn't received any updates. I called the help line the day I was in their emergency travel period and had an estimated wait time of 3+ hours. Never got through during business hours. Same story the next day. I shot off a few emails to the passport agency and my representatives. I had seen a forum post that that had worked from someone else. Finally on the 3rd day I got through. I talked to a lady who was very helpful, but she essentially told me the best she could give me was a weak maybe. We're at 11 days to departure and the processing status on the State Department website finally updates to something like "in progress". Two more days and I still haven't received shipping confirmation and we decide to pull the plug on July. We'll see what we can reschedule and eat what we have to.

Miraculously we were able to reschedule everything with just a small fee to re-book the resort stay. We also decided in this rescheduling to skip the Caribbean side and just spend the extra few days in Panama City. This would make our return trip considerably easier as we'd cut out 2 hours drive and a connecting flight.

2 or 3 days after I had emailed my congressman I got a call from his office. I explain my situation and she tells me that they'll do what they can. My new passport ends up arriving a day after our original departure date. Oh well, on to August. By then we're well prepared, except my girlfriend had left her raincoat in a friends car the week before...

We fly out of Medford, which is still super cool to me. When I was young we drove 5 hours to either Sacramento or the Bay Area for flights, so I never got the see the aerial view of home.



I love being able to pick the landmarks out. There is my parents canyon. That's so 'n so's house. That's Tom Martin Peak. Is that a fire? Huh, looks like it's a ways to the west.

 

[FI460]

It wasn't that far to the west. As we deplane I'm bombarded by text messages and voicemails. My mother has left me a frantic message so I call her back first. She had picked up my puppy to babysit for the trip and made it about 3 miles from her home when she was met by the USFS engines and a wall of fire. Traffic control wasn't even set up yet. My half crippled Dad was with the volunteers on structure protection at a friends house and mom didn't know what to do. I told her the best thing was to just go the 1.5 hours back to my house. She hated that but knew I was right.

I got one of those fancy air-miles cards this year so we decided to try out the free passes to the lounge for the first time. I got to sit in the plush chairs eating complimentary food and sipping free beer while neighbors posted things like this:





Quite the dichotomy. That pine tree on the right is on the corner of my childhood property. My grandmother was the postmaster of that little green post office for 27 years.

We land and a message gets through from Dad. He's fine, in the next community over sleeping in his engine. They were cut off when the fire jumped over top of them so nobody knows what's happening in our little community.

This fire would go on to burn within half a mile of my parents property, take 4 neighbors homes, and scorch nearly 7000 acres. About 6000 acres of that in the first week. Most of the people down there got lucky, again. But it seems inevitable at this point. I'll wrap the fire talk up here because this about Panama.

26 hours of travel from when we left home and we arrive in David, Panama. We had more layover time than flight time. From David we have an hour shuttle ride up to Boquete but in the rescheduling confusion the shuttle service wasn't updated, and our phones aren't working. Luckily the agent for the company we got the trip from was lightning fast at responding to email, so we only have to wait an additional hour at the airport.

We're just getting the lay of the land, but it looks pretty dang cool.

 

[LopeHunter]

Haven’t been, but it’s my understanding that when visiting Panama it is an absolute requirement to have a boombox playing Van Halen’s “Panama” at max volume on a constant loop whenever you’re around locals. Pretty sure you get arrested if you don’t follow that rule.

While wearing a Panama hat.

 

[cbat]

Keep it coming. My bride is wanting to there.

 

[FI460]

Day 1 we sleep in and hit the hotel gym. I think this is sort of the off season so the resort is quiet. There are only 3 other groups at the resort: A pair of Texas couples, 3 generations of a Massachusetts family, and a quite little family that never spoke a word to any of the rest of us. At lunch the Texans give us some pointers on excursions. The trip that we purchased was all inclusive with 2 excursions per day in a sort of catered touristy list. We decide on hanging bridges since it's nearby and we're still recovering from the travel.

I made some friends in the lobby waiting for the cab:



The bridges are pretty cool. Some mediocre waterfall views through a dense canopy. I have a thousand pictures still to be gone through on my digital camera, but I have a presentation on this at work in a few weeks so we're sticking mostly to cell phone images.



Another trail friend. In a huge shock to my girlfriend the German lady behind her was not excited about being offered a crab to hold.




I made the mistake of not elbowing our way in to get a picture with the Elephants ear on the trail. I figured there would be more and ended up with just a shot from the bridge. The leaves are about 4 foot in diameter and thiiiiccc.

 

[FI460]

Nobody else in the office today. Guess I should get back to this.

Day 2 we hiked a loop of 3 waterfalls in the morning. There is a small trail system in the watershed above town. It feeds down into a treatment center and I would guess this is what has kept the watershed from being developed into farmland. Notice the official Oregon uniform of keens and socks.



That afternoon we traveled south to a set of hot springs. Our guide explained to us on the drive that much of the area was privately owned by a hydroelectric company that folks were not fond of. Many of the locals are big kayakers and the dam operators will frequently dewater the river with no notice.

A kingfisher in the river as we crossed the bridge:


The property containing the hot springs was also private, owned by some rich foreigner. But there was a multi generational farm still operating there, and they charged a few dollars to access the pools. Hot water was flowing through the entire property, and the farmer had dug out 3 small pools with staggered temperatures. River rocks were stacked around the pools for some level of privacy. I didn't get a ton of pictures there as it was raining pretty good the entire time we were there. Worth the drive after a morning of hiking in the mud though. Seemed weird to me to see ducks swimming in water I knew to be 100 degrees.

 

[FI460]

Morning 3 was what they call the Pipeline hike. It's just on the other side of the creek from the waterfalls and follows the towns main waterline up the mountain. The guide is an amateur naturalist who shared some good knowledge.

The adventure rigs:

The prado was actually on Nissan axles with a new motor swapped in and a bigger turbo. The tuning wasn't right though so it wouldn't idle. Interesting rigs all over that occasionally necessitated letting god take the wheel...

It's been too long and I don't remember what this tree is. When cut the sap looks like blood.


We saw our only sloth here. Not much more than a big ball of fur.



Sceloporus sp. Similar to our blue belly/ fence lizard.


Glasswing butterfly


Funny morph of a sharp shinned hawk. He was eating a roadside chicken.


I don't remember what this is either, but the guide fed it to me. It was sort of spicy.


The favorite pet of every 5th grade class. I almost broke a hip avoiding stepping on this fellow.


Prionus sp. He looked very similar to the one I find back home. This individual did not appreciate being pet though.

 

[rtraverdavis]

Great photos. That glasswing is really neat.

 

[FI460]

Great photos. That glasswing is really neat.

They were very cool. We were told they're pretty rare and we ended up seeing about half a dozen of them in 2 different parts of the country.

Some of the photos are cell phone pics and some are with my Canon M50.

 

[FI460]

Photos of the resort


Cartwheel and selfie with the volcano


While sitting in the hot tub I chatted with a few of the other guests. One group was from Texas and had done some extensive traveling. They had just come up from Panama City, so their trip was mirroring ours, as we were headed there the next day.

I asked them what they did for work and one gentelman told me he oversees IT for NPS through the intermountain west. The father of one of my best buddies is an IT guy in Utah, so I asked if he knew him. Sure enough, they've worked together for 15 years.

They asked where we were staying in Panama City and we told them it was a little lodge just out of town. They were unfamiliar but said the hotel they stayed at was amazing. This story will be relevant in a few posts... (ominous and foreboding)

 

[FI460]

Last morning in Boquete: Coffee Plantation Tour!

Can't go anywhere without taking pictures of bugs, or lecturing people on what a true bug is (order hemiptera)
Neat little Panamanian leafhopper


Not a bug


The coffee industry in Panama is tiny compared to Costa Rica, but their revenue is substantial as they're one of the last producers of the most expensive coffee in the world, Geisha. The story was that it originated in Ethiopa and spread around the world. For a while Costa Rica had significant acreage planted in Geisha, but it's low yielding and temperamental so they they removed most of it. Boquete claims to grow the majority of the high dollar Geisha and it sells for hundreds of dollars per pound after export.

We tried it. It's not my style. It's very delicate, almost like you mixed lemongrass tea with an ounce of coffee. They say it's become very popular in predominately tea drinking countries for that soft flavor profile.

Normal coffee fruits


Selfie with normal coffee. You'll notice the trees are about the same height as our short selves here.


Geisha trees: Many times taller to produce less yield than the 5-6 foot trees. The clusters of fruit are also much less dense.


She's always giving my anxiety by petting street dogs



Not Geisha. This was something that was actually good.

And then we were off. We took the hour shuttle ride back to David. Again I was very glad to not be driving through that city.

 

[Phaseolus]

Entomology Geeks are cool. CSU 85