Panama City - Casco Viejo and the Pool

The next morning we didn't have to get up quite as early, so the sun was up when we got up, and we could see all the ships waiting their turn to go through the Panama Canal.

We went to the club level to check out the breakfast, and the girls were very pleased with the cereal and yogurt selection, plus there was bacon for Vivian.

At 8:30 we met our guide for the day in the lobby, and she and her cousin took us in two cars to the old part of Panama City, Casco Viejo.  Jeff was really excited to see it, since the last time he had been to Panama City was almost 12 years ago, and it was an area where he was told not to go because it was so unsafe.  Since then, there has been a major renovation effort, and Casco Viejo is now a UNESCO World Heritage site.  Of course, this means that prices for properties have skyrocketed into the millions, and the people who used to live there have been priced out. There was a big sign in one of the plazas.

It is definitely the hardest part of urban development to balance the economic benefit of having a tourist friendly, scenic old town with making sure that everyone in the city has access to affordable housing.

For our part, we were happy to admire the renovated Casco Viejo and do our part to put some money in the local economy.  The overall architectural look was really interesting.  It felt kind of like a combination of Cartagena and New Orleans.  There were the white and pastel colored buildings, but instead of Cartagena's wooden balconies, there were lots of French looking wrought iron balconies.  Our guide explained that this was because Panama City had also had a French influence.  The result was beautiful, and we were snapping pictures left and right.

One of the first buildings we went into was the American Trade Hotel.  It's the one with the statue in front.  Our guide told us that this was one of the fanciest hotels in Panama City.  It was beautifully redone, but they also tried to keep some of the history of the area.  The staircase was lined with photographs of all the gang graffiti that had lined the walls of the building before it had been renovated.

There were also some really cool older stone ruins that our guide told us were still used as settings for parties and get togethers.

The last one was filling up with people in traditional outfits as we were leaving.  There were also a couple churches that had been carefully preserved and were still in use.  The first one we saw wasn't open to the public, so we just took pictures from the outside.

The second church we went to was simple on the outside, but quite ornate on the inside.

Elena was intrigued by the pulpit, and really wanted to go up and check it out.

To distract her, I drew her attention to the pews and explained that the cushioned part was for kneeling and praying.  She asked me to explain praying, so I did it as best I could.  She then said that she wanted to talk to "The God", and she would be a minute.

Like so many people before her, she was perplexed when The God didn't answer her.  We explained that that was just how it worked, but she could talk to him any time she wanted to.  This seemed to satisfy her, and she was then willing to come with us to the church's basement to view an incredible display of large portions of the Bible.

Jeff got pictures of every scene, but I'm not going to put them all in the blog.  In the same room were also old wooden statues that used to adorn the church.

By this point, the girls were getting pretty close to their sightseeing limit, but luckily, the next stop was for them, a chocolate store with a chocolate tasting!

It was getting hot by that time, so we all appreciated the air conditioning and sweet treats.  Elena even got a picture with the store's sloth mascot.

Next up was a walk around the part of the old city along the water.  We had a good view of the cool Frank Gehry designed Biomuseo.  I kept trying to convince the family to go visit it, but I got vetoed. 

There wasn't much shade, and the girls were getting hot and whiny, so Mom solved it by buying them little bobble head animals.  Elena was so pleased that her running skills came back to her.

Luckily the next part of the walk was in the shade provided by beautiful flowers.  We even found some big flowers for sale in the next square.

Our next church was the main cathedral of the city, and it had been specially renovated for the Pope's visit a couple years back.

The inside was lovely too.

Elena convinced Vivi to have a chat with The God with her.

After the church, we caught a glimpse of the President's house and went through one more square with some interesting buildings.

We got a picture with our guide, and then it was back to the hotel for lunch.

We tried one of the buffet restaurants for lunch, and discovered they had a pasta station, which was a big hit with the girls.

By common consensus, the rest of the day was spent in the pool rather than sightseeing.  The hotel provided a lot of different floats, which was a strange decision considering how windy the pool area was, but my swimming crew tried out as many as they could, and then found a place to anchor them, so that they wouldn't blow away.

The next morning we had a few hours before we had to leave for the airport, so, big surprise, we headed back to the pool after breakfast.  In our hunt for shade, we settled in a new area with grass, hammocks and other interesting seating options.

Mom and Vivi even ventured out for a dip in the Pacific.

It was a fun way to end our Panama City vacation.  I'm so glad we made it happen before we left South America.

Panama City - Panama Canal

Panama is right next to Colombia.  In fact, Panama used to be part of Greater Colombia.  The flights to Panama City are short and cheap, and Mom really wanted to see the Panama Canal, so we took a long weekend, made it a day longer, and headed off to Panama.  I know my people though, so even though we had a full Panama Canal crossing and a tour of the old city planned, I also made sure to pick a hotel with a pool and a beach.  Mom, Dad, and Judy flew to the hotel on Thursday, and then the Goerss family came from Bogota on Friday morning, which was also Valentine's Day.  Before we even got started, Judy was sending pictures from the hotel asking where her valentines were.

When I showed the girls the picture of the pool area, they got super excited.  We had an early start, because there were supposed to be strikes that Friday, so we left for the airport earlier than we really needed to, just to be absolutely sure that we didn't miss our flight.  We got there smoothly, and then spent some time hanging out at the only sit down restaurant at the airport.

The coloring and breakfast eating wore the girls out.

The flight itself was less than two hours, and we had arranged for a transfer to the hotel.  I'm really glad we did, because Mom said that they had to conduct some heavy negotiations with taxi drivers when they got to the airport, and I hate doing that.  Our driver was really friendly and spoke great English.  I think he was actually kind of disappointed that we spoke Spanish.  Our hotel was on the other side of the city, facing the Pacific, so it took a little while to get there, but we found an enthusiastic greeting party awaiting us.

It was too early for our rooms to be ready, but Mom and Dad had their room already, so we went up to change, and then headed to the pool.  It was pretty full, but with some patience, we managed to acquire some good seats in the shade.

Vivian and I also went for a walk to explore the beach area.

There were a lot of shells, so we had fun picking the best.  We also found this really cool sign that someone had made with shells.  We couldn't resist taking a picture.

Back at the pool, everything was relaxed until we were visited by a lizard that almost gave Mom a heart attack.  One of the other guests scared it back into the bushes, but we took that as our sign to leave.

We had fed the girls poolside, so we cleaned them up and left them with a movie while we went to check out the club level.

They had quite a spread, including romantic mashed potatoes.

It was good food combined with a great view, so we were really glad we had paid the little bit extra per day for it.

The next day, our start was too early to check out the club breakfast though.  We had to be at the marina at 6:30 for our Panama Canal full day crossing.  We had some snacks for the girls though, and we knew we would get a real breakfast on the boat.

The marina at sunrise made a for a beautiful send off.

We could see Panama City waking up in the distance.

Even though we got to the boat at the time we were told, it was already quite full, so it took us a little while to find seats.  We ended up finding a great space for us though.  It was a big raised table near the front and surrounded by windows, so we set up shop there.  

They had divided the passengers into color-coded groups and given us corresponding bracelets.  We were purple, so we had to wait to be called for breakfast, but once we got it, the fruit and coffee cake were big hits with everyone.

While we were eating breakfast, the boat's captain was being given instructions on our canal crossing group.  Because it takes so much water to operate the canal, they try to put as many boats or ships as possible in at one time.  We were given two buddies, a big ship carrying wind turbine parts and another tourist boat.  Once we had our group, it was time to enter the canal.  First, we went under the Bridge of the Americas.

Our boat was going from the Pacific side to the Caribbean side.  That meant we had to go up to the lake level, across the lake, and then back down on the other side.

While the whole day was fun, the first lock was definitely the most exciting.  The big ship went in first, then our buddy boat, and then us.

Our buddy boat tied itself to the big ship, and we tied ourselves to our buddy boat.  The big ship also had metal ropes tied to "mules" on either side to help stabilize it.  We had a guide on board giving commentary throughout the whole thing, and he explained that without these precautions, we could potentially start spinning in circles with the force of the water entering the lock.  Even with the precautions, you could see where boats and ships had left paint marks on the sides of the canal.

He also explained that when the doors to the lock opened, a huge amount of fresh water came and mixed with the saltwater.  This stunned all the fish and sent them floating to the top, so it was a seabird "sushi buffet".  

Once we were all in and secured, it was time for the doors to close.

We were amused by the canal workers who were calmly waiting for the doors to close all the way, so that they could walk across.

Slowly, but surely, we worked our way up.

We went back and forth between watching from the inside and watching from the outside.

Judy helped me check out the "mules" along the side of the canal.

Eventually, it was time to eat again, and the lunch was pretty good, with things the girls were willing to eat.

We had different canal pilots for different parts of the canal, and Jeff caught a photo of one of them getting off our boat.

It was definitely a long day, but we had brought devices for the girls, and they also found fun in unexpected places.

When they got a little stir crazy, we just took them out for some fresh air.

When we got to the other side of the canal and the locks taking us back down, the big ship came behind us, which was a bit alarming, but gave us a fun new angle for photographs.

When we got to the Caribbean side, it started raining pretty hard and we were bouncing around quite a bit, so we were very glad to arrive at the marina on that side and transfer to the bus which would take us back to Panama City.

It was definitely a LONG day, but I'm so glad we did it.  Mom got to see the canal, and we all got to enjoy it with her.