Thursday 1 May 2008

Our plane arrives promptly at 7. Our Lonny is flying with us to Panama too. His time with Dolphin Lodge is up. He is flying back to the city and his family. We have a stop at Playon Chico before fly back to the capital. At the airport in Panama Lonny introduces us to his wife and son. Nice gesture,  we find. We are picked up in Panama City a man from yourmaninpanama.com . With his minibus he drives us back to our hotel. WE can go directly to our apartment, although it has not been cleaned yet.  We go out for a coffee, get money and check our mail.  In the meantime our apartment is cleaned. We take a taxi  ($15) to the Summit Zoo ($1pp). The text in the Lonely Planet guide book is very promising, but reality is very disappointing. There are four parrots, one jaguar, a crocodile, two tapirs, a harpy eagle and some monkeys. It is not the only mistake in the book. Unfortunately  Rough Guides has no guide book for this country yet. It is due later in 2008. Today is Labour Day and lots of families come out to the zoo carrying heavy picnics in cool boxes. We make use of the very few and simple burger and hot dog stands.  After an hour we have seen it all and decide to head back to town by bus. We have to wait 45 minutes, but it costs only 55¢ and is a experience in its own right. The bus is one of the many old US school busses, custom painted by the driver it seems. He only forgot to remove the house rules for the American school kids. The door remains open during the ride and people have to jump in while the bus is in motion. The driver is well passed seventy, but is still going strong. After he has dropped us at Plaza Cinco de Mayo we take a taxi to the hotel. 

Late afternoon we drink a good glass of wine at the Wine Bar and take a taxi to an Indian restaurant in Bella Vista, but that turns out to be closed on Sundays and Holidays.  Another fact missed by Lonely Planet. We ask our taxi drive on to Madame Chang, a very good Chinese restaurant. After dinner we have beer in the Isthmus brew pub near our hotel.

 Weather: warm, few clouds. 32°c / 90°f

Friday 2 May 2008

We take a taxi to Casco Viejo, the old town centre of Panama after the devastation in 1671 by English pirates led by Morgan.  The old town fell to neglect after the completion of the canal, when the city started to grow rapidly and the town's elite moved elsewhere. But lately much work and effort is put into renovating the area. It is on the UNESCO world heritage list. We take a look at the cathedral and after that the San José church. It is here that the old altar miraculously saved from the hands of the pirates during the destruction of Old Panama, is kept. We go on to Plaza de Francia with the French embassy and a monument to honour the French efforts to dig a canal through Panama. We walk over hte esplanade on top of the city's ramparts and buy a Panamanian hat in an artisan shop. We walk past the former club where general Noriega used to hang out. Noriega was a Panamanian dictator, who got too much involved in drug trafficking to the likes of the US government. During an invasion the club was destroyed by US troops in 1989. At this time efforts are made to make an hotel on top of the ruins.  We visit the National theater from 1907. It is almost as beautiful as the the one in San José. The auditorium is artfully decorated, has nice boxes and of course a presidential box right across facing the stage. A further down is the presidential palace, Palacio de Ganzas, with two big herons as living mascots.  In order to enter the street we have to have our bags checked by a guard. 

Once we seen all there is to see in Casco Viejo we take a taxi back to the hotel. Around noon it starts raining heavily and our street changes into a fast running river. When the weather clears a bit we run to Martin Fiero, an Argentine restaurant close to the hotel. They serve succulent steaks and the salad bar is totally okay. Later we take a taxi to Multiplaza one of the many Mega Malls in town, geared to the rich Panamanian and the cruise passengers. Shop until you drop is the motto here. All big brands have their flagship stores here

Tonight we do get eat in the Indian restaurant "Massala Cuisine" in Bella Vista. Good food.

Weather: cloudy. thunderstorm. clear later. 28°C / 82°F

Zaterdag 3 mei en Zondag 4 mei 2008

We sleep in a bit and after breakfast and coffee Erik arranges with reception that we can hold on to the room until 6pm. That is handy as our airport shuttle will pick us up around 6.15pm. We take a taxi to Panama Viejo. The taxi drops us off at cathedral ruins. Here is also an artisan centre. The museum turns out to have moved to a new location about a 1km back. We buy a ticket for the grounds and the museum. The church tower can be climbed and offers great views of Old Panama, which was destroyed in 1671 by the English pirate Morgan. The town was moved 8km westward to the location of present Casco Viejo, where we were yesterday. The ruins have been neglected and were partially used as building material. The city of Panama expanded after the completion of the Canal until it  reached the ruins of  Panama Viejo in the 1990's . It was not until then that they realised the value of this oldest European settlement (1519) in the Americas on the Pacific side. Since 2003 Panama Viejo is on the UNESCO world heritage list. The ruins are in a bad state. It takes some imagination to picture the town as it once was. Only the official stone buildings have been saved somewhat. All wooden housing has gone. The Casas Reales, once the most important buildings, where the gold and silver from Perú was collected, weighed and guarded has virtually disappeared, reduced to a few walls. The monasteries are in a better state. We walk to the museum along the shore line. There is a lot of tourist police about. The site is close to a slum. The museum displays offer a good insight of the pre-Columbian era, the settlement of Panama and the English pirates who had an greedy eye for the town and the ships calling on it. Besides Morgan, also Francis Drake and Vernon were active in these parts. After the museum visit we take a taxi back to the hotel. We are able to share it with a lady and the ride costs us only  $2,50.

Later we go for steak at the Argentine steak restaurant Martin Fiero; just like yesterday. We drink a Marquez de Caceres (red Rioja ), the house wine of the  Paradors hotels in Spain. In the afternoon we take a stroll around the neighbourhood and wait for our transfer. Our man in Panama is on time and takes us to the airport while the night falls on Panama. He takes the toll road along the coast. The Iberia comes from Guatemala and will pick us up here. The airport has not an awful lot of places for food and drink (just one) and there no book or newspaper shop to be found.