Gamboa Rain Forest

We flew to PC the day after Christmas and arrived at a very basic B&B called La Estancia on a hill outside of the city in what used to be officer housing for canal workers from the US. It is very interesting looking at the Canal Zone which used to be a little america and has now all gone over to Panama. We said goodbye to grandpa after dinner and the kids were devastated. We crammed together in a little room for the night and early the next morning were picked up by the bus of Ancon Adventures for our splurge - a jungle boat cruise of Lake Gatun. Lake Gatun is a natural lake that the canal goes throug and is amazing because you can see massive canal boats up close plus incredible wildlife. We were in a small boat with 10 other people. We saw 2 and 3 toed sloths, howler and white faced monkeys (climbing around right above our boat), 2 crocodiles, iguanas, perigrine falcons, kites, toucans, parrots and tons more birds that I cant remember. Then we´d cross the wake off a Panamax boat and be in almost white water! The kids loved it. Then we got dropped off at a hostel in Gamboa (town by the lake) which houses Smithsonian researches. There are two super fancy hotels there but the kids loved our super basic rustic room with no hot water. They had a blast running around with the caretakers 1 year old, Jesus. They cooked us dinner (for $10 for all of us) since there arent any restaraunts we could afford (only ones are at the resort). We saw Agoutis (very large hamster like animals) and coati mundi outside the dining room and a herd of Capybaras (pig sized rodents) in a field nearby. The next morning we went for a 2 mile hike along the pipeline road, which is one of the most famous birding spots in Panama. We saw a javelina and morpho butterflies but not much else (lots of birds the kids didnt give us time to identify). It was hot and muggy and the kids fell apart so I took them to the zoo and dave went back to the hostel to regroup. The Summit Zoo in Gamboa is very basic - it has more playgrounds than animals practically which was perfect for our age group. It off and on poured rain on us but our kids are so used to rain at this point that they hardly noticed. The high point of the zoo hands down is the harpy eagle - which is the national bird of panama but is extremeley rare. It is as big as Cassidy and has a 7 foot wing span! The other animal that made an impact was the jaguar who walked back and forth in front of the kids growling and licking his lips. With the state of that zoo i was slightly nervous that he would be able to get out and eat them as he clearly wanted to! Another odd thing was the coati mundis that would ¨paint¨with their noses. They seemed mostly interested in putting the paint on their tails and licking it but the paper did get covered in some way! I have a video of it if you are interested!
Then our Gamboa taxista picked us up and took us to the ferry dock in PC where we caught a ferry to Isla Taboga 12 miles out from the city in the Pacific.

Feliz Navidad

We are now in Monteverde but writing backwards since we havent written since before Christmas. Pictures will probably come later as internet here is much slower than Panama. Email me if you want to see our whole albums on snapfish. My email is meyerfamilytravels@hotmail.com.

We had a fabulous time in Bocas despite the fact that it rained HARD for 2 days and lightly for another two. Every day except Christmas when it was pouring insanely hard, we managed to go to the beach. Toby and Dave spent 6 hours at the beach one day when it was drizzling off and on. The water was so warm it was great even in the rain. On the way to the beach that day, Toby spotted a white faced monkey (fairly rare) and a sloth both really close. He was very psyched!. Some highlights for us were how incredibly into the water toby is and how comfortable cassidy even got. We would go out beyond the breakers and bob around with the boogie board and toby would swim around us in circles. Grandpa Bill had his best day of surfing ever on an offshore break near Isla Contadora with a neighbor of the lodge. I saw an anteater right in front of me while jogging in the rain one morning. He stopped to slurp on ants so close that i could hear him! We never really got snorkeling but thats ok. The kids were very psyched on Xmas even though we had very few presents. It was really cool to have a super low key, completely different christmas and have everyone very happy about it. We´d definitely recommend the lodge to anyone looking for a beautiful low key island escape! Our last day there was beautiful and we spent 5 hours at the beach before heading into town with Grandpa for the flight to Panama City.

Island Life

Hi all - Toby Cassidy and their new friend Alex (daughter of the owners of our lodge) are watching Alladin so I can try writing more.

We are staying at the Lodge at Swans Cay which is at the far end of Isla Colon, at the opposite end from Bocas town. In the first 10 minutes we arrived in Bocas we saw more gringos than we had in a month in Boquete. Mostly young surfer types but lots of others too. It is about a 45 minute rough road taxi road out to here which is a point of land on a gate locked road with about 10 gringo houses and this one lodge on it. Ironically, this place is run by a very nice family from Durango Colorado! Their daughter Alex is 7 and she and Cassidy are fast friends. There is a very nice small private beach below the house which is shaded by coconut trees. About a mile walk away is an absolutely gorgeous beach with no houses in sight. The waves are very mellow, sandy bottom and the best - there is a fresh water pool 20 feet above high water mark! We went there today with Toby's new boogie board and the kids dug a channel from the pool to the ocean that became a rushing river that we could ride down with the board! Then we headed out to the main road (which is basically sand) and did some snorkeling and then had dinner at the outdoor seafood restaurant where Toby lost his 4th tooth (see photo)!

We are having a blast with grandpa Bill and enjoying the relaxing island life. Dave and I hope to go snorkeling without kids tomorrow and Bill is going surfing Saturday. No big Christmas plans - boogie boarding and swimming??!

Hope you are all taking some powder runs for us

Love

The Meyers

Lodge at Swans Cay Bocas del Toro

update from Toby: Hello! I am Toby, I think you have met me before. I am having a great time in Panama, have you ever heard of Panama? This is where we are staying in the picture of the house above ok?! I hope you like it. Ive been having tons of fun in the ocean and have gotten a new builder truck with a trailer. Bye see you later!"

More from me later!

Lost and Found

We left Boquete on Sunday morning and headed to Bocas del Toro by way of the Lost and Found EcoHostel we heard about through a random post on the lonely planet travel blog. The owner is a great young Canadian named Andrew who picked us up in Boquete then drove us to Bocas the next day for less than a taxi ride would have cost us. Since the road in between is the most dangerous road in Panama, we were psyched to be in his care and not in an overcrowded bus with a maniac driver (the odd thing about panama is they are super laid and usually late, everywhere but behind the wheel of a car!). The Lost and Found is in La Fortuna national park, a seldom visited cloud forest park. We had to hike uphill through dense beautiful forest for about 15 minutes to reach it but it was well worth the walk. We saw lots of unidentified birds and transparent butterflies. The lodge is open air except for the rooms and had a great low key vibe. They have a pet kinkajoo that was rescued and a wild animal something like a coati mundi that visits at night and eats bananas from your hand (see photo). We hike out to see a gynormous (toby word) tree and then played risk under the metal roof to the sound a pouring rain! We met some super nice people and were treated very well (delicious dinner) by Andrew and his Panamanian wife Stephanie. The next day we headed to Bocas, up and over the continental drive and down towards the Pacific. The road is wild (and driven very wildly by most) and we could see the remains of many big accidents (usually big rigs rolling over in single vehicle accidents). It is the only way to access Bocas by road except from Costa Rica. The landscape on the other side of the divide is very different, as is the culture. The caribe influence is stronger and you begin to see africans. Im not sure what the indigenous tribe is on the drive, I think Comarca, but there are lots of very rough shacks along the road with naked children running about.

We got to Almirante, a very hot and depressing port town, around 1 and took a half hour water taxi over to Bocas Town. Within the 10 minutes waiting for our ride we saw more gringos (tending towards young and surfer/backpacker look) than in a whole month in Boquete. More on Bocas and our house in the next post!!

Horse and Immigration, last week in Boquete

We just finished our last day of school at Habla Ya. For anyone considering language school it is a great place. It is relatively cheap, the teachers are fabulous (total immersion) and Boquete is a great, low key place to live for a short time (or long). The temperature is perfect here. Unlike in David, the city we flew into where we just spent the good part of two days trying to extend our tourist visas so we could stay beyond 30 days. The first day we went down after class with Carlos, the director of our school. Thank god, because we needed to have proof of a flight out of Panama and a bank statement showing we had more than $1,000 or actually have $1,000. They looked at our statement and didnt want to accept it because it wasnt from Panama! As if people on a 30 day tourist visa would have a panamanian account. We had heard of people who had taken 6 hrs to get it done (and they had 4 little kids!) Carlos squared away this and other problems and we thought we had breezed through the whole process easily when they came out and said the person who had to sign them had just left for the day!! Our kids were amazingly patient it the hot cramped little office and we hated to do it again but we had to! We left town at 7:15 this morning to try to be the first ones there - we were second, and got the process completed with another hour of forms and waiting. Could have been worse! We went with the other fellow from our class who is Swedish. It was his second attempt (the first was too early?!) and they sent him away saying he didnt need one after many phone calls to Panama City. He called his consul who then called him back after we were almost in boquete saying he DID need another so he has to go again next week just to leave the country!!

On Tuesday the kids needed a diversion so we splurged on a horse back riding trip in Caldera, a village slighly below boquete. Cassidy rode with me and toby on his own horse but led by the guide. The kids liked it but only lasted for an hour - it was pretty hot. Cassidy and my horse was 14 yrs old and decided at the top that he wouldnt walk down! So eventually the guide had to lead us to. very embarrassing!! Toby told us he pretended he was Almanzo from "Farmer Boy" riding across the prarie while he was riding.

Hard to believe it is almost Christmas. I try again to climb the Volcano tomorrow (hoping for no more rain!) and then Sunday we head to a jungle hostel between here and the Carribean for the night then over to Bocas del Toro (Islan Colon) to meet up with Grandpa Bill for a tropical Christmas.

Love to all!!
Shannon and fam

Climbing in Panama

There is a great little sport crag right on the edge of town. There are about 20 routes from 5.9-5.12b. They are short but steep; a bit reminiscent of the moderates in Rifle, without the posers, Front Ranger egomaniacs, and polish. They are well bolted basalt and the climbs either ascend the broken ends of columns (like this picture) or cross horizontal columns (desperate slopers) or climb columns vertically with stemming and friction. The approach is about 30 seconds from the road. The locals have done an incredible job cleaning and the routes are well done. There are a handful of climbers here but this crag demands power so they are strong. If we had a crag like this in Carbondale, 2 miles from town with a 30 second approach, we would all climb a lot harder. They are working on a new cliff nearby that climbs out of a huge cave. They are finishing a new 4 pitch sport route that they think will go at 12b and it looks like there is lots more potential. Eduardo and Marcol also guide here and those passing through can get out cragging without bringing their gear. I recommend the guides- they are strong climbers, low-key, and willing to tolerate my Spanish even though they speak good English. Amazing to find high quality rock here and to learn that the word "pumped" is exactly the same in Spanish.