Panama Travelog #10
El Valle, Panama - Mon, 23 Dec 2024. 8pm.

With so many little things go wrong on this trip we're trying to keep our spirits up. Instead of remaining bitter about the things we missed because they were closed, broken, unavailable, swapped to a cheaper model, etc., we're trying to focus on what we do have.


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Panama Travelog #9
El Valle, Panama - Mon, 23 Dec 2024. 4pm.

After our tiring 2-hour drive in Panama today we arrived at Hotel Campestre in El Valle, Panama. This area, whose full name is El Valle de Antón, is in the caldera of an ancient volcano. There are mountains all around us.... They are the rim of the ancient volcano we are inside.


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Panama Travelog #8
El Valle, Panama - Mon, 23 Dec 2024. 3pm.

This afternoon we drove from Gamboa, Panama, the home of the Gamboa Rainforest Preserve, to Valley de Antón. It was a 132km trip. Along the way our only stop was a brief, foiled attempt to hike a waterfallDriving 132km, which is not quite 80 miles, can be quite an undertaking or can be a ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #7
Gamboa, Panama - Mon, 23 Dec 2024. 12:30pm.

First our hike this morning at the pipeline road was a bust. "Abundant wildlife!" gushed one recent review. Others praised the quantity and variety of wildlife we'd see. We saw none. None. It was just a walk through the rain forest on a dirt-and-gravel road ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #6
Gamboa, Panama - Mon, 23 Dec 2024. 12pm.

Today we checked out from the Gamboa Resort after breakfast. We wound up not doing anything resort-y during our time there, except that Hawk relaxed in the hammock on our balcony. I fret that we squandered the opportunity there. Shouldn't we have taken more advantage of the activities ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #5
Gamboa Reserve, Panama - Sun, 22 Dec 2024. 7:30pm.

This afternoon after landing in Panamá City (the one in Panamá, not Florida, US) and renting a car we drove around Panamá City and then north into the mountains along the spine of the country to the Gamboa Reserve. It was a drive of 45km that took about an hour due to some ( Read more... )

For lunch Saturday Hawk and I tried visiting a new-ish restaurant chain nearby, Sourdough & Co. I've eaten there once before and was disappointed with the high price for a modestly sized sandwich but thought I'd give it another try. In hindsight I should have known there'd be trouble when the restaurant didn't have its basic sandwich prices listed ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #4
Cd. Panama, Panama - Sun, 22 Dec 2024. 4pm.After arriving at the airport (PTY) in Panama City, Panama we had to clear immigration and customs, then pick up a rental car. Guess which of these took way longer than it should have ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #3
Tócumen Airport, Cd. Panama, Panama - Sun, 22 Dec 2024. 3:30pm.

Our flight from Houston to Panama City was uneventful. Largely it was uneventful because wifi didn't work. That meant, among other things, there were no on-demand movies or TV shows to stream to our personal devices. There was just a small assortment of TV channels ( Read more... )

Panama Travelog #2
IAH Airport - Sun, 22 Dec 2024. 6am.

We're headed to Panama. Now we're farther than a mere 10 miles away from home; we're about halfway there. We're making a connection in Houston ( Read more... )