Lee n Tan

Wednesday January 13, 2010 – well didn’t we stuff up, we spoke to Luis this morning & he said ‘will you be out of your room by 11?’ we were a bit shocked as we leave tomorrow. Turns out we stuffed up & booked for 4 nights instead of 5! We spent an hour or more trying to find alternate accommodation but everything is booked solid. We waited for Luis to get back and asked if we could sleep in the lounge/TV room (where all of his overbookings seem to end up), no problems & the extra bonus is it’s heaps cheaper than our other room.

That all sorted I decided we should see this city & get some photos!! We hopped in a cab & headed for ‘Cerro Ancon’ the highest point of Panama City! The views were amazing!! We got to see the Miraflores Locks (where we visited Monday) from a different perspective with the ships heading out into the Pacific Ocean and of course the city with all it’s highrises!!

Our next stop was to head out to the ‘calzada’ a 2km long palm tree-lined causeway which connects 4 small islands to the mainland. From here we got awesome views over looking the bay with the city skyline behind. We had not picked up our obligatory magnet yet, so luckily there was a cheesy souvenir stand out there as well. All in all a fantastic day!!

Tomorrow it’s off to Carti to catch the yatch to Colombia!!!

Tuesday January 12, 2010 Took a taxi to the other Multimax store today to buy our camera. They didn’t give us much of a discount but at least we have a small camera again!

We hung out this arvo at Luis’ in the aircon & then headed back to ‘Chicken Pollo’ for dinner. The same group turned up tonight as lastnight & we ended up chatting with them – well trying to anyway. With their very limited English & our non exsistent Spanish – the phrasebook came in very handy – we ended up communicating most things we wanted to say. Edward, Jess & Aires (well that’s what we called them) were so generous, they kept buying Lee beers & me small bottles of wine.

About 3 hours later we rolled out of there & headed back to Luis’ the locals drove home. From what we could understand they won’t be there ‘manyana’ (tomorrow) which is a shame we had a great time trying to work out what each other was saying. Our sign language really improved!!!

Monday January 11, 2010 spent the morning just hangin out, then made ourselves a tuna sandwich for lunch (nice to have something simple). Then we hopped in a cab & headed out to the Miraflores Locks aka ‘Panama Canal’ got to view a few ships going through the locks, the last one they call a ‘Panamax’ the largest ship to be able to sail through the locks – 294m long, just over 32m wide & 12m sitting under the water. This leaves only about 60cm either side of the boat, a tight squeeze!! We were also told that the boat had paid around $291,000US in tolls to come through the 80km long canal. We went through the 4 floor museum which was quite interesting, during it’s construction they removed 152.9 million cubic metres of material, they say if it was put on railroad flatcars, it would circle the globe 4 times!!!

It was nearly 5pm when we walked out the front doors & there was about a dozen people waiting for cabs. Lee made the decision to walk out to the main road & flag one down. No sooner had we reached the main road, than a cab came out from the canal. Inside the driver already had a passenger, we later found out that the 2 of them work at the canal & they had just finished a 10 hour shift, he was a cab driver as well!!! Our ride back was very comical, the driver blasted his horn at everyone & swore & cursed his way through the streets!! He spoke very good English which was a nice change as not many people do over here.

We got him to drop us at the camera place where Sergio informed us that the store where the camera was coming from was closed for stock take today so we will taxi there tomorrow & pick it up, it’s x display so hopefully it’s all ok!
On the way home we grabbed chicken & chips from the place up the road that everyone has been raving about, it was pretty good & pretty cheap, so all round great!!

Sunday January 10, 2010 spent the morning walking around shopping centres trying to find a replacement for our Olympus camera, every place we have been so far hasn’t even stocked them! Today we were lucky, our friend Sergio will hopefully have one in stock tomorrow afternoon!!
The rest of the day was spent just hanging out. Tonight Luis fired up the barbie & Lee cooked up a great steak sandwich, it was so nice to have something different to rice, beans & chicken!!!!

Saturday January 9, 2010 – The bus didn’t leave until 11.30pm but this was not an issue as we arrived at the border at 5.20am, 40mins before it opened!!!! The journey last night was pretty uncomfortable even though we were on an Executive Class bus, I think it had less room than the tourist class. It’s 8.20am (3 long hours) and we are back on the bus!! I think this crossing takes the award, it was so disorganised we had to line up to then be told to go to another line for our tourist visa (but you couldn’t get this first). Then you had to get back in the first line to actually get your stamp for Panama, then once everyone had got their stamp they unloaded all our baggage & we had to go through the customs check, what an expedition! Also it was the first border where they insisted on seeing an onward ticket, luckily we had an email from the boat & along with the guys poor english we managed to fumble through. Just discovered that we are now an hour ahead so that shortens the journey that little bit more.
We arrived at the bus terminal at 4pm, right on time! We had forgotten what 1st class was like, we were given breakfast, lunch & drinks. The only downside to that is you don’t get to get off the dreaded bus so you just sit & sit & sit. To make things even worse the a/c was playing up & in the end was turned off, so we were all roasting!
We are now checked into Panama Hostel by Luis seems ok, we have the only private room upstairs which is right next to the a/c lounge/tv/Internet room & has a bathroom right next door, very handy! Now it’s time to have a shower then kick back & relax after 14hrs sitting on the bus & 3hrs enduring the border staff!!!!