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| My new boyfriend (taken by Jennifer) |
As to Carnival was in full swing, Binnie and I decided to leave early to avoid probable road closures due to parades. We thought it might be fun to do some shopping at the huge Albrook Mall. Shopping would have been fun if the mall had not been closed. We did not expect such a huge mall to be closed for Carnival. Heck they don’t even close for Christmas. The only store open was El Rey Grocery store and I don’t think I ever walked so slowly through every aisle; to kill time as, Abby wasn’t ready for us yet. There were only so many aisles and knowing Binnie loves her Zerts, I remembered there was a good ice cream parlor in Amador we drove there. Around four o’clock we pulled into Abby’s driveway, where we were warmly created. She ushered us out to her patio, asked us to sit down and turned on the sprinkler. The sprinkler did its first “pfft” and in split seconds dozens of birds flew into a nearby small the tree and took a bath under the spray of the sprinkler water, it was amazing.
Dinner was wonderful and after a restful night we left early for La Chorrera to pick up Jennifer, before venturing to the mountains in the western part of Panama.
About half way to David near Nata lies El Caño, one of Panamas most important archaeological sites; a ceremonial and burial place of pre-Columbian times. Unfortunately, the site has been plundered in the 1920s by an American professor. The granite pillars used to have carved heads which the professor chopped off and exported to the US. El Caño was plundered during the Pérez Balladares administration and not only were the objects uninsured, but the government “conveniently” lost all photos, so that they couldn't be put on the INTERPOL watch list. Later there also was a robbery which was an inside job during the El Torrijos administration. Toro's relative Frank Iglesias, is still wanted by the FBI for trafficking in stolen antiquities while he was Panama's consul general in New York in the 1990s. And there was the inside theft from the Anthropology Museum's gold room during the Moscoso administration --- not all the pieces were recovered, and the higher-ups in INAC were carefully shielded from pro-corruption former Attorney General Sossa's "investigation." El Caño is now a protected national park.
The drive from Panama City to David is about 200 miles/320 kilometers.
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| Pineapple Farm |
About an hour past David and 20 minutes before Boquete, we stopped in El Flor where Abby’s friends Chris and Kit live.
We were warmly greeted and immediately had refreshing and yummy Hurricanes in our hands which later were replenished with probably the best Margaritas I’ve ever had. Dinner was wonderful and was followed by relaxing in their warm pool under a canopy of twinkling stars.
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| My view when I woke up |
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| Chris and Kit |
Next morning after a hearty breakfast, the 4 of us drove back to David and up the side of a mountain in the Chorcha rainforest to the Alouatta Lodge which is a rescue and sanctuary for Howler Monkeys.
“Alouatta” means Howler Monkey in Latin. As we got out of the car, a howler monkey with a peeled banana in his hand came running towards us, followed by a coati mundi. The owner quickly warned us about the little coati critter, “Ginger”: He Bites.
The coati mundi is a mammal in the raccoon family. This one was wild but had adopted the family and it tags along everywhere they go and loves to nip ankles. Luckily I had on socks and he managed to just bite the socks. The howler monkey was cute and we were all able to cuddle him for as long as he tolerated it. He seemed to be most fond of Jennifer, but then she was the only who groomed him like monkeys do.
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| Jen |
After explaining about the Sanctuary, we were led on a tour around the property of breathtaking views. The most incredible thing was our encounter with the rest of the howler monkeys. The cutest was the baby, but the most amazing was a wild male that had joined the group and just lately, a wild female that had been accepted into the group as well. The owners are hopeful that eventually these two will lead the orphaned sanctuary monkeys into the wild.
Plant life in this region is amazing as well. A leaf was handed to us and had a whiff, we all agreed that it was allspice. We learned that Cinnamon and nutmeg are growing here as well and I was jazzed to see the beautiful flowers of the vanilla orchid.
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| Vanilla Orchid |
After we all had our “monkey fix”, we headed to Boca Chica, which is a short drive from the sanctuary, at the mouth of the river that leads to David.
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| Goards |
There wasn’t much to see there, so we decided to drive to Playa Hermosa, just which 10 minutes away. Just as the name says Hermosa is a beautiful beach.
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| Abby, Jen and Binnie |
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| Nameless tree that put us in awe |
After posing for some photos we headed back to El Flor, stopping at a Liquor store to replenish margarita ingredients for Kit. When we arrived at her house, chilled Margaritas were already waiting for us. We had to endure another night of fun, good food and starlight pool cool down before another restful night.
Sitio Barriles was our next destination. Like El Caño it is one of the few archeological sites in Panama that’s regularly accessible to the public. It’s located several miles from the town of Volcán, in the highlands of the Chiriquí Province of Western Panama, at 1200 meters above sea level. In 1927 the Houx family bought the land to start a coffee plantation. In 1946 by accident, they found the barriles: stone carved barrels and statues of human size and also gold. In 1949 National Geographic visited this area and an excavation started. The sculptures found were not Mayan like, but showed a chubby male wearing a conical hat, sitting atop the shoulders of a naked man.
The owner of this property thinks it is a Chinese atop an African male.
One altar was found with many faces on it, but unfortunately, the sculptures and the altar too, disappeared.
All that remains are copies of the sculptures. Pottery of natural colors (white, black and red) and a variety of artifacts are still on display in a small room the owner hopes to rebuild into a museum. Not all of the artifacts on display were found on-site.
A few grinding stones are still on display in the garden. She demonstrated how they worked by easily rolling the 56 lb, cylindrically shaped stone back and forth in their stone trenches.
The tour ended in front of a fake excavated wall which showed how the urns with people’s ashes were found. Some of the rocks displayed on the property are magnetic and were used for healing; she proved it with a compass.
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| Healing stone |
(Later on Jennifer did some research on this place and found that many things the owner told us was not true. Some of the info here is what I found on the Internet). We found an amazing array of different flowers: Heliconia, Torch Ginger and an Ethiopian banana tree that does not produce bananas but the leaves are edible; and Naranja or Lulo.
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| Torch Ginger |
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| Heliconia |
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| Ethiopian Banana Tree |
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| Abby is holding a Heliconia that only grows in Panama |
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| Lulo |
Some of the plants she showed us were/are used for medicinal purposes, like a medical banana tree, where the banana is filled with seeds.
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| The banana seeds are medicinal |
Transinas, a type of cactus, is said to filter the air.
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| Transinas |
There was citronella grass and Amaryllis the well known Easter Lily.
The most interesting was the insect eating Aristolochia Grandiflora or Pelican Flower. This one is a deciduous vine with enormous flowers that emit an unpleasant odor that attracts insects.
An hour drive later in Volcán we visited Binnie’s carpenter, had lunch at a Greek Restaurant and drove up the mountain to Guadelupe which is the second highest village in Panama, near Cerro Punta at 6500f/2000m above sea level just south of the Continental Divide.
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| Beautiful scenery |
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| Out of all Sushi in the mountains |
We stayed at beautiful Los Quetzales Ecolodge and Spa, renting one of the many wooden suites. www.losquetzales.com
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| Lobby and Restaurant |
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| Suites |
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| Second floor balcony is our suite |
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| Living room |
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| Smokey fireplace |
The night was cold so we had the fireplace going. Unfortunately, it did not work right and filled the room with smoke, burning our eyes and throat. Luckily, the very comfy beds had down duvets which kept us warm. Well …. wearing pants, sweater and socks helped.
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| Freezing, Binnie and Abby under the cover |
Jennifer had booked Carlos for a birding day to the Quetzales trail. We were barely out of the car when we saw the first birds. Male and female Quetzales!
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| Unfortunately not a very good photo of the Quetzal |
What magnificent birds. They both showed off their flying skills and we were all in awe of the beautiful colors and long tails.
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| See the hummingbird |
I am amazed how many different bird species we encountered in just a short walk of about 1 kilometer. The afternoon birding tour took us to Lagos de Volcán, where we mainly encountered water fowls.
Not knowing much about birds, it was an incredible experience for me to see a total of 63 species:
Blue-winged Teal – Black Guan – Spotted Wood – Quail – Least Grebe – Great and Cattle Egret – Black Vulture – Purple Gallinule – Common Moorhen – American Coot – Northern Jacan – Wattled Jacana (very unusual for this location—Lagoons) – Scaled Pigeon – White-tipped Dove – Parrot (2 flying over lagoons, probably Red-lored Amazons) – Costa Rican Pygmy Owl (heard only) – White Collared Swift – Violet Sabrewing – Green Violet-ear – Rofous-tailed Hummingbird – White-throated Mountain Gem – Magnificent Hummingbird – Volcano Hummingbird – Resplendent Quetzal – Prong-billed Barbet – Blue-throate Toucanet – Oliveaceous Piculet – Red-crowned Woodpecker – Hairy Woodpecker – Spot-crowned Woodpecker – Plain Antifireo – Mountain Elaenia – Paltry Tyrannulet – Commen Tufted-Flycatcher – Tropical Pewee – Black-capped Flycatcher – Yellow-winged Vireo – Rufous-browed Peppershrike – Black-chested Jay – Blue and White Swallow – House Wren – Tropical Pewee – Grey-brested Wood-Wren – Black-faced Solitaire – Mountain Trush – Clay-colored Thrush – Long-tailed Silky-Flycatcher – Flame-throated Warbler – Black-throated Warbler – Wilson’s Warbler – Slate-throated Redstart – Collared Redstart – Sooty=capped Bush-Tanager – Summer Tanager – Blue-gray Tanager – Golden-hooded Tanager – Yellow-faced Grassquit – Slaty Flowerpiercer – Yellow-thighed Finch – Rufous-collared Sparrow – Buff-throated Saltator – Great-tailed Grackle – Thick-billed Euphonia.
We managed to survive another wonderful dinner, followed by a cold night under the feather duvets. And woke to heavy rain. Jennifer told us that this is really what the weather is like up here in the highlands and that we were lucky for the last two sunny days. The rain stopped but a drizzle stayed until mid afternoon. We all decided it would not be much fun bird watching in the rain and instead drove to the Orchid Farm “Finca Dracula”, founded in 1969and dedicated to promote education, research and conservation of orchids and other tropical, ornamental plant species. In the gardens are more than 2200 orchid species and other exotic plants. It has one of the largest collections of rare orchids in America and its owners have discovered about 150 species previously unknown to the scientific world. I have never seen such a beautiful garden anywhere, ever. (Click on photos to enlarge)
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| Rare Dracula Orchid |
In Volcán is a highly recommended restaurant, Cerro “Brujo Gourmet”. The owner, Patricia wrote a cookbook using just indigenous ingredients. So of course we had to have lunch there. The food was presented in French Cuisine Style, so portions where a little small, but the flavors opened a new palate for everyone. The restaurant is a little difficult to find, but oh so worth it. We enjoyed it so much we almost forgot the time for our facials and massages at Los Quetzales Lodge. That was one of the best massages I have had; including facial the cost was 70 dollars.
The first week of February the protests of the indigenous tribe Ngöbe Bugle in the western part of Panama have caused great problems in the Province of Chiriqui. Earlier, they had blocked the only (Pan America) highway between Chririqui and Panama City for almost a week. This land had been rightfully ceded to the tribe but now the Panamanian Government has found some copper on their land and approved mining and hydropower developments in their region. They want President Martinelli to exclude the indigenous area from industry to protect the natural environment, rightfully so as the hydropower plant would place their land under water. The protest was stopped for peace talks with the president. This protest of course affected us in a way of not knowing if we would able to go on this trip. We were able to go, but we knew that on Monday the 27th the protests could resume, so we were a little bit worried about getting stuck for a while. On our return from the Cerro Brujo Restaurant we saw a gathering of indigenous. Not good.
The decision was made to leave early to escape eventual protests but not before visiting Finca Santa Marta. http://fincasantamarta.biz/ Kim and Ron Miller are Kit and Chris’s good friends. They run an organic farm bordering the Rio Gariché near David. The tour was interesting, but hot in the blistering sun. The lunch Kim produced for us was the best and prettiest gourmet salad I have ever had. For desert, she made us Chocolate Maple Syrup Candy and believe me I don’t eat chocolate, but I tell you this one was out of this world.
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| Carambola/Star Fruit |
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| Abby, Jen and Binnie |
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| Kim in her kitchen |
Our plan was to reach Santiago before passable riots might start and we needed to make it to Santiago to be safe from getting stuck. Again, as on our trip to Chiriqui, we noticed motorcycle cops every few miles along the whole stretch back to Santiago, so we kept an eye on our speed. We saw a gathering of Ngöbe’s along the road with a big banner ready as well as tires to burn. We made it to Santiago, moved into the Hacienda Lodge and Casino and learned that just a half hour after we saw the Ngöbe group, they blocked the road. Huge sigh. We made it.
Food was great. The casino was smoke free and had 1 cent machines we did not understand, two Black Jack tables and one Roulette. Binnie and I shared a room and we had so much fun, our laughter at 10 PM disturbed our neighbors and the lobby called to shut us down. We were amazed by that, as Panamanians party late and never complain about noise. We found out the next morning a group of German’s were spending the night in the hotel. That explained it.
About an hour’s drive up a mountain brought us to a dirt road to the farm, which brought us by a ranch where the farmer was just in the process of making raw sugar out of sugar cane:
From here it was a short drive to the farm which was across a river with a hanging bridge for pedestrians. Cars have to drive through the river:
John the owner, says the secret is in the Garbage, meaning for fertilizer he uses only plants: “So… Grow Trash (dat is organic material to u educated folks) lots of Trash”. What he is doing different, is putting organic material on top of the soil, composting it in place without even chopping it up. He also grows material for composting to use around plants. The whole plantation looks disorganized, but we learned why. Most fruit bearing plants are the fertilizing plants when their leaves fall to the ground, decompose and become compost. Around important trees he has the compost arranged in what he calls a magical circle. It was very interesting and at the end he cut off pieces of branches of two different trees. One cleans the air, the other the soil. He handed us each a piece and told us to just stick them in the ground in our garden and it will grow. (I stuck mine into a pot and sure enough three days later leaves started growing out of the stick.)
On our drive back Jen popped a book on tape into the stereo and we all got hooked on it. However, by the time we arrived at Jen’s house, where she and Binnie got out of the car, the book was not yet over. So Abby and I kept listening as we drove to Abby’s house and still the book was not finished. Though we slowed down, we had 14.52 minutes left. But no problem for us, the next morning at 8 we finished the tape sitting in the car sipping our morning coffee to her husband’s puzzlement.
This was an incredible trip and now even more so I can say Panama is a very beautiful country.Wow. I learned a lot about birds and plants and flowers.
One of the most beautiful scents of flowers comes from Frangipani, Magnolia and my always favorite Jasmine. My new ultimate “always favorite” grows right here in Binnie’s garden. Every time I walked around her beautiful garden this incredible scent brought and still bring me to a halt, but I could never figure out where it came from until now. Ylang-Ylang (pronounced ee-lang ee-lang) are growing in all corners of her property. The flowers don’t really look like such but the scent is just sooooo intense and wonderful. Ylang-Ylang originated in Southern India, Java, Malaysia, Philippines and other Pacific islands and is the Chanel No. 5 Perfume Tree. I think I will have to buy some Chanel No. 5 or maybe just rub the flower on me!
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| I wished I could do a scratch off photo (Photo taken from Internet) |
We managed to survive another wonderful dinner, followed by a cold night under the feather duvets. And woke to heavy rain. Jennifer told us that this is really what the weather is like up here in the highlands and that we were lucky for the last two sunny days. The rain stopped but a drizzle stayed until mid afternoon. We all decided it would not be much fun bird watching in the rain and instead drove to the Orchid Farm “Finca Dracula”, founded in 1969and dedicated to promote education, research and conservation of orchids and other tropical, ornamental plant species. In the gardens are more than 2200 orchid species and other exotic plants. It has one of the largest collections of rare orchids in America and its owners have discovered about 150 species previously unknown to the scientific world. I have never seen such a beautiful garden anywhere, ever. (Click on photos to enlarge)
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