Last days in Panama-Return to the USA

Ferry to Tabago Island

Cristo Negro

2nd oldest church in the Western Hemisphere

Little Havana, Miami

Domino Park (Members Only-that's because they are scared of my skill)

 

Sunday, April 29 2012
We woke up early, had our daily huevos y pan from the lady at Hostel Amador and caught a taxi to the causeway ferry in Panama to take a boat over to Isla Taboga.   The ferry was supposed to leave at 10:30 so Jon wanted us to leave at 9:30 to catch it on time.  This being Sunday, it took us about 15 minutes to get a taxi.  After we did, the taxi driver then picked up another passenger which is very common but he dropped this guy off first and then was blocked by traffic cones and had to go the long way back out and this added another 15 minutes to our travel time.  We arrive to a very long line for the ferry so I jumped in line while Jon went to buy tickets.  While we waited and waited in the sun a guy behind us thought it was ok to let his overweight, overbred, jacketed, poor excuse for a dog to continue to brush up against our legs.  He would just say, "He's ok, he doesn't do much but eat and sleep," as if this was an explanation of why it's ok for it to it touch us.

They loaded the boat and when the couple in front of us got to the ticket taker they were stopped and the gate was closed.  No one said anything but we assumed the boat was full.  After waiting about 10 minutes Jon went and asked when the next boat would be. We waited for a total of about 30 min in the hot sun after the ferry left before a second boat arrived for the remaining passengers.  The ferry ride took about an hour, so we didn't get there until noon.  We had return tickets for 3pm so that didn't leave us very much time on the island.  Jon wanted to hike but I was only interested in a little jaunt and swimming since it was blazing hot out.  I told him he could go but he didn't think it wise to leave me I guess and we just went for a little walk up the road into the jungle until we came to someones plantation then turned around and went swimming at the beach.  There were tons of people at the beach and some Latinas were having a salsa dance party in knee-deep water while wearing their thong bikinis.  Everyone wears thongs down here...I felt a little over dressed in my one piece. We then walked a little more through the town looking for a place to grab a quick snack and drink before we had to catch the ferry.

 We couldn't find a great place to eat so we just got some ice cream bars and waters at the local tienda.  After the oversell of the ferry at 10:30 we learned our lesson and got on our 3pm boat at 2:30.  Even at 2:30 the boat was almost full and left at 2:45. So, when they said 3pm they really meant 15min earlier.  We returned to Hostel Amador, finished our Funky Mark movie Contraband, made dinner and spent our last night in Panama.

* I just wanted to give you a quick history lesson on Taboga Island because it is pretty interesting.  The island was discovered in the 16th century and was originally named Isla de San Pedro by the Spanish explorer,Vasco Nunez de Balboa Its current name derives from an Indian word, aboga ("many fish"). The island's first settlers were Indian slaves from Venezuela and Nicaragua. The small town of San Pedro was founded in 1524 by Hernando de Luque. The town church of the same name is claimed to be the second oldest church in the hemisphere
~Marcie


 Monday, April 30 2012

Last day in Panama!  Also, last day in Central America before we fly to Miami later in the nite.  Our flite was at 2 am so we had a lot of time to kill.  I arranged a late check out with our hotel in Amador, outside of Panama City and went for a walk by myself because I’d go stir crazy sitting in the hotel room until 2 pm with nothing to do.  Marcie on the other hand is more tranquillo and has no problem idling away the hours. 

So out I walked in the hot Panamanian sun with no destination in mind.  I ended up walking down by the old canal, a little confused, I remember well.  I had just left my cheap hotel where there’s no neon burning brite. 

The banks of the Panama Canal near the city are an industrial zone where all the business of boats goes down.  When the way I was walking ended in a shanty town of shacks I continued on down a dirt path that looked to lead south down the canal’s east bank and under the Bridge of the Americas that spans the waterway.  I was a little uneasy because usually unregulated, overgrown areas like these on the outskirts of town are a prime petri dish of homeless lawlessness.  But I didn’t see a single soul as I walked under the bridge.  It was a really nice way to have some thinking time and bring some mental closure to this leg of our journey. 

All along the bank grow mango trees with branches heavy with fruit.  Most of the low hanging ripe ones have been picked by locals so you’ve got to work a little if you want some fresh free fruit.  I’m not a pro picker yet and I proved that by knocking one out of the tree and having fall and hit me in the face.  Both the mango and myself were a little bruised from the blow to my brain but I got to eat the unblemished half of the fruit.

Back at the shack Marcie and I checked out and put our backpacks into a storage area so we could get a cab to the Albrook Mall.  When we got there we were wondering how come there were so many Panamanians there at 2:30 pm on a Monday afternoon.  We later found out that everyone had off from work and school for the May Day holiday that is celebrated in Latin America but not the US and Canada.  The place was packed and we had to wait in line for over an hour to buy tickets to the movie The Avengers.  Marcie says the movie was good but I wouldn’t noh because I fell asleep about an hour into it and I remained resting thru all of the loud special effects and fite scenes til Marcie woke me up as the credits rolled.

We still had lots of time before our flite at 2 am so we took a cab out to a restaurant called El Trapiche.  This place supposedly serves the best tipico (local Panamanian) food around.  But we wouldn’t noh because it was closed.  So we walked next door and ate at a place that specializes in holy grail of all Latin American food: The Churro.  I also drank a whole lot of sangria because we ordered a pitcher and when it arrived Marcie said it was too strong and she wouldn’t drink any.

Finally we made it out to the airport and after doing all the details required by the airline and by security I passed out laying down across 3 seats at our departure gate.  Monday turned into Tuesday and pretty soon we were in the air leaving Central America after about 120 strait days of adventure.  3 hours later we touched down in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida at 5:50 am est. 

Tuesday, May 1 2012

We’re back in the USA (mentally insert your own emoticon here).  Marcie and I talked about the future of the blog and wayed our options, what’da’ya say?  To blog or not to blog?  Are we going to keep on writing a blog every day for the rest of our lives?  Of course not.  Then why write a blog while we’re in the USA?  We decided to keep on bloggin our noggins until we return home in a couple of weeks and then take a hiatus until we fly back down to South America to continue our travels (and blogs) on or around June 11^th. 

If you the reader, whomever you are, out there in the world wide womb staring at your screen in some backwater of Bulgaria don’t want to continue reading that's fine.  I noh at least Marcie’s mom still will.

So we continue on in life as it takes us thru the groggy early morning line at US customs at the Ft Lauderdale airport.  Some guy working there thot it was alrite to let a couple of people in wheelchairs and their families cut us in line.  I’m not ok with this.  Why should someone get to cut in line just because they get around in a wheelchair?  Maybe some of our readers can help me out here but I don’t see what the connection is between waiting in line and whether or not you can walk.  At least these people get to sit down while they wait, as the rest of us stand.  Of course I have sympathy for the disabled but we all have problems and just because all of ours’ aren't as obvious as theirs’ does that mean that they should get to cut in line?  I’m deaf in my left ear.  Do you see me going around cutting in line?

Anyway, we jumped thru all of their hoops and were on our way.  We caut the Tri Rail from the Ft. Lauderdale airport to the Miami airport because we had a hotel booked in Miami and we had to pretend that we flew into the airport there so that we could have their free airport shuttle pick us up, saving the expensive American cab fare.  On the tri rail I was painfully reminded of how aggravating this country can be.  There was this young late 20’s early 30’s woman sitting in our rail car talking way too loud to her who friend sitting rite next to her.  The friend was speaking at an appropriate level so that I could not hear what she was saying, but this other bimbo was bellowing belligerently about her face book something or other and about a whole bunch of other trivial bullshit that no one else cared about but we now knew all about because of how loud she was talking.  I was already wishing I was back in Mexico and we had only been in the US for about 2 hours.

At the hotel we were conveniently able to check into our room at 9am.  It’s the first time that I’ve been able to eat the continental breakfast at a hotel on the day that I checked in.  After a nap we headed out on foot to explore a little of Miami.  Neither of us had ever spent a significant amount of time here before and we had a few days until New Beige arrives at the port.  The city is set up on a compass quadrant grid so it’s pretty easy to navigate.  Our destination for the afternoon was Little Havana. 

We boarded a city bus, paid the $2 fare and asked the driver for the transfer stub.  We don’t do transfer tickets, she informed me.  Like being cut in line, this is another thing that I’m not ok with.  I’m sure that many of our 6 readers have taken city buses before and noh that very often you need to take more than one bus to get where you’re going.  The subsequent buses are usually included in the price of the original fare.  Not in Miami.  We rode the #36 bus east for about 15 blocks and then had to pay another $2 each to ride the #27 bus south to Little Havana.  I think that’s a shitty way to run a bus system. 

You probably guessed or already new that Little Havana is the Cuban section of the city.  For us it was like a halfway house to ease us back into the English speaking world of America because here almost everything is in Spanish but with a familiar American setting.  We walked around for a while down Calle Ocho past lots of cigar lounges and salsa clubs to the famous Domino Park and then had a dinner/lunch at nice Cuban café.  I had a really tasty Cuban style ale that surprisingly was not brewed in Cuba but by Thomas Creek Brewery of Greenville, SC, the same people that make the famous Pig Swig beers.  We thot we ordered tamales to eat but when the plate arrived it was mostly filled with rolled up slices of ham, other pieces of pork and pickles.  One thing that we were looking forward to when coming to America was the clarity with which we would be able to communicate with the waitstaff at restaurants and the lack of surprise when our food came.  Maybe next time. 

~Jon