Mugging, bathing and sightseeing in Panama City

As we want to truly discover the heart of Panama City, we thought today it was time to try to be mugged...Yes we believe it is important to evaluate the safety of a city to have a clear idea of it : we are serious investigators!
So as we were trying to find the bus station for the Miraflores Locks of the Panama Canal which are located 13km away from the Capital, we got into a dodgy looking district (which is actually in front of the Justice court..how ironic is that?). After walking 30 meters in this street, a woman made us sign and told us something in spanish that we later interpreted as "Go away stupid foreigners, it s a dangerous place here". We then turned back to go to the main street (still looking for this secret bus station) when a guy jumped on me (=Amelie) and tried to rip off my bag! What a disgrace! My handbag is a cute little hand made bag with a colourful chicken on it that I bought in Bocas del Toro just a few days ago. I managed to hold on to it and it seems this surprised the robber as I finally managed to save my bag. Weirdly, my first feeling was not fear but anger. I screamed a majestic "F..k you!" to the guy, at this moment I realised that this guy could actually be more dangerous than me and we ran off. We don t quite know what Peter was doing during this time:placing bets in his head on the outcome of the bag fight? Well after this 30 seconds rush of adrenaline, I was actually quite shocked...I have now recovered from this unfortunate incident so it is now time to talk about bit more about this cool city.

Next to Panama City, there are a few islands and we went to visit one of them: Isla Taboga. This island is the sunday get-away of the Panamian city inhabitants. The boat was full of local families: we don t see that many tourists here. The island is really pretty and after being in the past the home sweet home of some English pirates, it became at the beginning of the 20th century the quarantinee zone for canal workers. By the way, Paul Gauguin, the painter was there in the sanatorium so I was not the 1st French on this island.

In case you are wondering, we finally managed to get a bus (actually 2) to the Miraflores Lock.
The Canal of Panama has 3 sets of locks and those one are the one on the Pacific ocean's side. Next to them there is as well a visitor centers where we could learn more about the history and the technology of the Canal. A few interesting facts:
-this gigantic project was first started by a French company (same than the one of the Suez Canal) which failed mainly because of the Malaria and Yellow fever that killed more than 22000 workers.
- It was inaugurated in 19174 and was operated until 1999 by the USA
- In 2006, there was a referundum in Panama on the future of the Canal: the population agreeded masively in enlarging the Canal which allow more traffic and bigger ships to cross the 2 oceans.
- The smallest toll was paid in the 1920's by a swimmer for 0.36$ (80km)
- The largest toll was paid 3 weeks ago: 375 000$

From Bocas to Panama City

We left the island world of Bocas behind us, but before we met up with two guys from our turtle time to go out. We followed the recommendations for a local place, which turned out to be a jackpot. We arrived in a big harbour hall with almost no lights, maybe ten people scattered around the walls, a small bar and one customer sleeping at it. Unmistakeable signs of a good place. We ordered cuba libres (they produce rum in Panama too after all) and paid 0.75 USD each (0.50 EUR) now we were convinced that it was a good spot, but as we didn't want to start kissing each other violently, like the other ten people we thought we move on to a more busy place.
Next day we were going on a bike tour, which seemed like a really good idea until we realized, that the road is not shady at all and noon is a hot time, but we recovered on the water facing veranda of our hostel. The airport had a suprise as well. Local newspaper Bocas Breeze had a nice article on the mayor of Bocas, mentioning as one of the controversies, that he let a "Survivor type" reality show being shot in a natural reserve (he says that the contract was made with the previous mayor). So the next time you see stuff like that on TV don't forget that the next McDonalds is only a 10 min boatride away, and they could get to the next restaurant on foot.




We took the plane to Panama city, which was promising wonderful views of the country, but unfortunately it rained all the time and i didn't get my free nachos because of the shaky ride (Amelie, one row in front of me did but she only gave me 6 Nachos out of her bag which was not a fair sharing). When we arrived we decided that we are not going to fall into the hand of piratery and won't pay more than 4 USD for our taxi ride to the hostel. It was not a big success. We were firm and skillfully negotiated the price from 5 to 6 USD.
Taxi drivers in Panama are just better than us. Nobody has a meter and nobody is scared to let a ride pass (a ride where we would pay double). At the airport after turning the first guy's offer for 5 down, we were waiting for the next taxi, which arrived 30 min later (in the meantime there were only very few people left) and took us for 6.
During the day were were trying to get a ride to the local Phoenix park. We were assured by locals that the fare should be 1.25 USD. We were thinking, that as we are tourists and don't speak Spanish, we take 3 USD. We had 3 taxi drivers turning down this price. I am not sure why this happens. Obviously there are more trips being asked for than taxis, then as well the drivers don't seem to operate for maximizing their own profits, but rather for maximizing the taxi driver communities' profits - a well working cartel? - I don't know.
Anyways busses are way cooler. Drivers decorate them to perfection, i guess like in India. My favourites are massive looking and sounding sport mufflers and countless spirits of ecstasy on the hood. Any trip costs 25c, but sady they dont go everywhere. So we will have to fight with taxi drivers in the next days.
Otherwise Panama city looks really amazing. The skyline can compete with Shanghai and the old town looks quite fascinating with ghost houses. (The city has been relocated twice. Once because of the pirate, who after destroying the city gave his name to a spicy rum, and once because the people didn't like the old spot any more.) So far we are still soaking up the amosphere, so we will have more details on everything later.

-some more pictures coming here-

Sun bathing stories from Bocas del Toro-Panama

After 3 weeks in Costa Rica, we headed south to the Panamean border to our first stop in Panama: The archipelago of Bocas del Toro. Crossing the border between Costa Rica and Panama in the dusty little town of Sixaola (50km from Puerto Viejo, 90min by public bus) was quite an adventure. The border is located on a rusty bridge where it seems easy to fall down from, if you check the pics below you´ll see what we are talking about. On the other side of the border, a pretty agressive bloke was waiting for tourists to charge them a higher taxi rate and of course as we were not too awake at 8 am, we could not say no and went with his taxi to the city of Changinola where we had to take a boat to the main Island of Bocas: Isla Coloñ. All in all, it took us 4h to reach Bocas and cost us 20$ each (which is 8$ less than the touristy shuttle mowhahaha).
The city of Coloñ is quite touristic (many american tourists) and most of the businesses and shops are tourists oriented. It´s of course a beautiful place with many green islands (full of jungle or mangroves) floating on an emerald water (emerald if sunny). There are not too many beaches and to reach them it´s necessary to take water taxi: pretty cool but not that cheap. We took a boat tour yesterday (with 2 Americans) with which we could discover more the area: we spotted a dolphin and enjoyed snorkeling around the Zapatillas Island. It was really amazing and we felt closer to Nemo and SpongeBob´s world.
Today we took a boat to go to an other island to go to the beach:the Red Frog Beach. It´s a beautiful beach (fine golden sand, emerald water, funky waves and surronded by the jungle) but this all area is subject of controversies as it got bought by an investment company which will transform it in the classic gigantic tourist complex. Despite Bocas del Toro is the main touristic destination of Panama, there are not yet any big hotels or big complex..so well it´s definetly time to visit it before it looses its charms but we would like this place a bit better if there would be less mosquitoes..I feel that my nights and legs don t belong to me anymore:(