Playa Venao, Panama - Day 154-155

Our next stop was Playa Venao, a beach on the Pacific coast of Panama. We camped for 3 nights at an Eco-lodge called Eco Venao. The area is under reforestation, and Eco Venao does its part to operate as sustainably as it can. We were there at the very end of the dry season, so unfortunately everything was very brown and barren, but there were monkeys everywhere!

Playa Venao is a surf hot spot in Panama. This is one of the few times Kris was able to stand up.

Bella playing in the waves. The water was the perfect temperature!

These howler monkeys were everywhere around the Eco lodge and provided hours of entertainment as we watched them while lounging in hammocks.

 

Panama City, Panama - Day 152

Panama city is Famous for the Canal which connects the Pacific ocean to the Caribbean and with it comes big business and the most modern city we have been to in a while. Although the city does not have a huge population (around 500,000), there seemed to be more sky scrapers than people. We stayed in the old section of the city, called Casco Viejo. Casco Viejo has inhabitants of extreme wealth and extreme poverty living right next to one another, as well as very modern buildings right next to dilapidated ones that were built by the Spanish Conquistadors. All of this was in high contrast after coming from the deserted islands. Instead of visiting the Panama Canal (which doesn't look any different than any other boat harbor), we decided to visit a jungle in the middle of the city called Parque Nacional Metropolitano.

Casco Viejo

Very old buildings next to new ones

View of Panama City from the park

Parque Metropolitano has hundreds of different bird species. We were lucky enough to find Woody The Woodpecker!

Sloth hanging out on a building

 

San Blas Islands, Panama - Day 143-151

To get to Panama, we chose a 4-day island-hopping boat tour through the San Blas Islands. Although it's not the fastest way to get to Panama by boat, it was by far the most scenic. Our journey to the San Blas Islands from Cartagen consisted of multiple bus rides and boats, but after 2 days, we made it. We spent the first 4 days island-hopping with 18 other people on our launch boat, called the Darien Gapster. We only spent about 2 hours each day total on the boat and spent the rest of our time swimming in the clear-blue Caribbean water, snorkeling among the coral reefs, and hanging out on tiny islands with white sand and coconut palms. Many of the islands are deserted and some are so tiny they only have room for 3 palms.

Those that are not deserted, are inhabited by the Kuna people. The Kuna are an autonomous community living with their own laws and systems. They even use coconuts as currency (although due to tourism, dollars are accepted here). They do not need tourism and can live sustainably fishing and farming on the mainland of Panama. Because Panamanian law does not exist here, many drug traffickers use these waters to transport their cargo between Colombia and Panama. Sometimes, the Kuna find contraband washed up onshore when the boats wreck on the reefs and sell it back to the drugs dealers for more money than they know what to do with.

After our 4 days with the Darien Gapster, we decided to stay on a very small island until Semana Santa (Easter Week) was over. We got dropped off on Isla Iguana to camp for 5 more nights. With only a few other people on the island, it was paradise. Unfortunately, even the secluded islands cannot escape Semana Santa vacationers, and the island quickly filled up with what seemed like 100 people throughout the weekend, but then died back down to peace and tranquility on Sunday.

The Darien Gapster

One of the Kuna villages we visited

Kuna bathrooms that we used during our stay in the village. Kuna bathrooms don't need plumbing; everything goes straight into the water and the fish gobble it all up!

Beautiful little beach we paddled to in a dugout canoe.

Brain coral. The water in San Blas was the clearest water we have ever snorkeled in.

Huge ray that swam by

This was the smallest island we visited, roughly the size of a tennis court.

Our first campfire during the whole trip! rum n' cokes and s'mores included.

Isla Iguana is about the size of a football field. The Darien Gapster dropped us of here to camp for 5 more nights.

Side view of Isla Iguana.

Our front porch

For $1, the Kuna will cut down a fresh coconut for you, and when you're done drinking it, they will chop up the rest for you to eat...delicious snack.