Places to visit
Panama is a beautiful country, the undiscovered gem of Central America. Below a few pictures that proof this.
I still need to reorganize this section a little bit….
In and around Panama there are many many interesting places for small ship cruises. In this section a few pictures of sites we plan to explore.
We start with Ft. San Lorenzo, at the mouth of the mighty Chagres river. Fort San Lorenzo is one of the old forts constructed during the reign of Philip II of Spain who ruled from 1566 to 1598. Immediately following the period of exploration of the early 1500s, Spain began building for the defense of her riches discovered in the new country.
The Emberá people reside in the Darien Jungle beside rivers, and along the coast. While we transit the Panama Canal, we can make a visit to a village of the Embera Woundaan indian tribe on the banks of the Chagres river. The Embera are thought to have migrated here from northern Ecuador and southern Colombia in the mid-1800s. Their population in Panama today is estimated to be around 15,000. The Emberá thrive by practicing subsistence agriculture, hunting, fishing and raising poultry. They also create, on a small scale, plantations to grow commercial crops such as plantains, bananas, rice, and maize.
Emberá homes are built on stilts up to 10 feet off the ground, with wooden floors. The stilts protect them from insects on the ground and flooding during the rainy season. People get into their homes using a log in which they have carved steps. Typical houses are composed of two rooms, the largest with hammocks, for sleeping, and the other room for their fire pit and living space. One or two sides are closed and the rest of the house is left open to take advantage of the breezes that cool the house and keep insects from congregating in them.
Their hand-made baskets are beautiful.
Kuna Yala, better down as the San Blas Islands, at Panama’s Caribbean coast are the ideal place for small ship cruises. Hundreds of small islands, mostly uninhabited.
Kuna Yala is home of the Kuna Indians who enjoy a high degree of autonomy. The women make the beautiful MOLAS.
Of course we’ll also transit the famous Panama Canal. Below the Pedro Miguel locks, the last stop before entering the ‘Culebra Cut’. Over 20 thousand people died when the French first tried to build the Canal. When the Americans took over and figured out malaria was caused by mosquitos it just became a (very big) engineering and logistics problem. Highly recommended reading: Path between the Seas by David McCullough.
Spanish explorer Vasco Nuñez de Balboa was the first European to see the Pacific Ocean. Panama city was the first European settlement on that same ocean. Yacht cruising in Panamanian water puts you in the steps of famous pirates like Francis Drake and Henry Morgan who came to Panama, looking for the gold the Spaniards took accross the istmus from Peru.
And did you know there was a Scottish colony in Panama of over 1.400 people? Their only colony really and it went terribly wrong, creating a financial crisis that eventually forced them to join the UK.
Panama, so much more than the Canal!