Parque Metropolitano, Panama City

Just a 10 minute taxi ride outside of the city center is Parque Metropolitano, a tropical and dry forest park. We fancied taking a walk, so we made our way up one of the trails that took us to the highest point in the park to a viewing platform where we had a yummy picnic with views of the city and the canal. On our way we saw a cute marmoset monkey swinging through the trees, a hard-to-spot coati hiding in the bushes (dog sized mammal), giant blue butterfly's and lots of lovely birds.

Isla Toboga, Panama City

We took a ferry over from the causeway to Isla Toboga, an island plagued with some harsh pirate and conquistador history and where Panamanians now go to relax at the weekend. Only 45 minutes away from the city, the island is a little paradise where we enjoyed taking a stroll, eating some local seafood and spending the afternoon sunbathing on the beach.

Casco Viejo, Panama City

Casco Viejo feels worlds apart from the rest of the city, with gorgeous colonial/art deco buildings and views out to the city and to the canal causeway, its no wonder a lot of love is going into restoring the old quarter to its former glory. We had a couple of lovely days wondering around Casco Viejo, enjoying some beautiful restaurants and visiting the canal museum (which is brilliant!).

The highlight was getting tickets to the National Theatre (1908) to watch a surreal production that was part of a week-long art & culture festival. The old theatre is beautiful and we even had a private box looking straight onto the stage. Afterwards we had a special dinner at Mostaza which is one of the best in the city and had a fab atmosphere with all the theatre organisers eating there too.

Here's some snaps of outside the theatre, in our box, enjoying dinner at Mostaza and around the old quarter. The video is of the curtains closing on the production, these three actors ran the whole production with so much energy in several different languages!

Panama Viejo, Old Panama City

We had a week to explore Panama City and made one of our first site-seeing stops to Panama Viejo; the ruins of the old Panama City and former site of the capital. We had a lovely afternoon walking around the old ruins of the city, founded by the Spanish and that saw mountains of treasure, gold and silver passing through on its way from Peru.

Apart from being threatened by a big fire or two, it wasn't until Henry Morgan (of Morgans rum!) marched over from the Caribbean with 1400 of his pirate friends in the 17th century that the city came to its end. The attack left the city burnt to the ground and in disarray, leading to the city being rebuilt in the area that is now known as Casco Viejo.

It wasn't until recent years that the site had been declared a UNESCO site, so quite a few of the buildings stones had been taken by local people! Recently it's undergone restoration and has been brought back to life!

After a visit to the museum, we rode of the worlds fastest chicken bus stopping off at parillada 'Jimmy' for a delicious lunch and some pink vino.

Panama City seems to have three distinct areas; the high-rise business / financial district where we were staying, Panama Viejo and the new city, Casco Viejo where we enjoyed spending a couple of our days...

Panama City, Meeting the Parents

From Bocas we caught a night bus to Panama City to meet the parents flying in from Miami! Linda and Tony had arranged for us all to stay at the 'Ejecutivo' (http://www.executivehotel-panama.com/): a great little hotel in the heart of the business district with old-school Panama charm, great views, a dinky pool and gym and the best breakfast in the city. When we arrived off the bus at 4am, the dinning room was in full swing with Panamanians in ball gowns and tuxes tucking into some serious post-night out nosh!

After some sleep, we chilled out, checked out the local area and visited an amazingly plush mall giving us an incite into the seriously monied of the city! There is so much development going on, the business district is absolutely littered with cranes putting up swanky high-rises and apartments in all available spaces. At night, the city scape looks like a mini Miami.

Linda and Tony arrived the day after, so we caught a local chicken bus to Tocumen Airport to greet them when they arrived. It was so great to see them and start off what was an amazing couple of weeks of adventure in Panama together...

Bocas del Toro - Panama

Arriving here from Costa Rica involved walking an old iron bridge across the border into Panama and taking a $10 A-team style truck down the coast to the port town of Almirante. From there we got a massive speed boat for the 45 minute trip out to the islands.

Bocas del Toro (Isla Colon) is the biggest and most populated of the archipelago, we checked into the wonderful Casa Amarilla, (757 9939), run by Dennis from Detroit. We partied the night away in a few cool hostels and went accross the bay on a $1 boat to a pool party with free drinks for the ladies.

Two days later after the hangover resided, we went on a boat trip to the beautiful Isla Bastimentos to a deserted beach and stunning Caribbean views.

Everyone should be able to experience beauty like this in their lifetime....

Last Central America Stop, Panama!

Last stop in Central America - Panama! This was the easiest, most hassle free boarder crossing yet, we literally walked across a seriously rickety old bridge from Costa Rica and into Panama picking up passport stamps on the way! Then we jumped into a taxi and onto a speed boat down river into the Caribbean towards the beautiful islands just off Bocas; Isla Colon and Bastimentos. Here's some snaps of our arrival in Panama.