Davis Suites Colon

... or have long collapsed, beggars and homeless everywhere, and traffic that was bumper to bumper with no road rules to speak of.

We drove to the port and were able to escape the craziness of Colon found outside the metal fences. We ran into a Floridian that had been at the Police Station with us in Panama City and he highly recommended that we use his helper to get all the paperwork passed for customs. Christina and I ...

... from the US having been opened in 1914.
- It´s quite impressive and just watching a boat complete its journey through the locks is extremely educational, even if you have to wait a while if it´s outside of rush hour!

I made sure to tick off the real touristy bits as quickly as possibly so visited Mi Pueblito (My Village) to pass away some time on my last day. It has life size replicas of rural villages and folk ...

... back and again the first truck by picked us up. Great fun. Sandrina also showed me an edible fruit one of the trees...what fun! Felt like a nice little adventure and I really like this young woman. She is amazed that I am doing this at my age and on my own. Her English isn't that good so we speak Spanish together. I would hitchhike with her around the world She's fun! Very open and friendly. They ...

... of the poorest parts of the world where people are very dependent on their local environment for survival. Unfortunately, mangroves are disappearing rapidly because of development, misuse, and, increasingly, shrimp farming. National Geographic has an excellent article on mangroves at http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2007/ 02/mangroves/warne-text called Forests of the Tides. After studying the 3 mangrove species ...

... cost was $902 per bike, in cash.  Wow.  So then we went to Copa Airlines cargo and they quoted us $650.   having all this information we drove back to Colon.   We were a little discouraged because of the cost of doing this but we thought we might try one more thing - finding a private boat would be the best option.   So we decided that we would get up in the morning, load the bikes and stay out in the coastal town of Portobelo to find a private boat and then make our decision Thursday morning.,...

... the town center to be relatively quiet. Portobelo was full of music, most of it so loud that you couldn't think, and all of it competing with the rest for dominance. So we were glad to be a few blocks away from the epicenter of the chaos. The town of Portobelo has an interesting and visible history. Right now, it's an economically depressed little fishing village with a steady trickle of tourists, most of them waiting for a boat to ...

... di viaggio effettivo (senza che io avessi mai dormito), perché ci aspettavano altre due ore di macchina per giungere infine alla barca, carichi di bagagli e con le bambine (per non parlare di me) esauste e stravolte. Inoltre dopo un paio di ore Chiara, nonostante il pesante debito di sonno, è stata svegliata comunque dal suo orologio biologico settato sull'ora di Milano e dunque alle 4 del mattino (ora local) e dopo oltre 24 ore di veglia mi sono trovata a giocare con i cubi ...

... info over at 12 but were then told we had to wait until 1 as the appropriate person was at lunch. Wrong again we got the final price at 1.30 only to find that it had gone up by almost $2000 not really a small increase. Obviously we queried this rise, since the original quote was only 12 days old. Eventually Mike spoke to an English speaking senior person who told us OK it should be able to go for the original price if it would fit on a single rack, We ...

... going of the edge of the road. On arrival the fort looked quite a small, compact group of buildings. It was only after walking in that we found out how large it really was and how spectacular the outlook was. Until the railway was built the river alongside was the main route to get to Panama City and so the fort was built to protect the gold route. The first fort was built in 1595, but was taken by Francis Drake in 1596. It was then heavily reinforced but again fell to the pirates ...

... Panama Canal for 2006 was $569.7 million, if they fail to maintain the locks, the American administration can take back the administration that the reliquished to Panama. The canal has just been approved for an upgrade, which will cost over $5 billion, to do this, they will be raising the transit fee from $52 a ton, to $72 per ton. This upgrade will take 8 years, and will allow bigger ships to transit the Panama canal in the future. Some facts about the Canal ...