Panama City

We arrived in Panama City around 7pm after a really great flight with Copa Airlines. The first challenge was to get to our hostel, the Lonely Planet says that there is a bus stop just outside the airport you can walk to, however in 30 degree heat and in the dark this isn't really advisable as it is actually quite a walk. So we settled for a mini bus for $12 each that would drop us of at the door of the hostel. Our hostel in Casco Viejo was the last stop so by the time we had dropped all the other passengers off at their swanky upper town hotels and reached ours it was about 9pm. Hostel Casco Viejo was a cheap but decent hostel located in the old town. This area is a beautiful part of Panama, previously it had a reputation for being a bit dodgy but there has been a lot of effort to clean up the area and there is a large police presence patrolling the central area so its perfectly safe to stroll around at night. We headed to the nearby supermarket for some pasta and sauce and whipped up an easy meal for our first night, getting an early night so we could be up early to get a bus to the Miraflores Locks on the canal.

We took a taxi to the bus station and then a local bus out to the locks, this was a really easy and cheap way to get there. After a walk up from the main road to the canal side buildings , we found ourselves entering a blissfully air conditioned building to view the museum before the first of the ships started entering the locks. The museum was really interesting, telling us about the original building attempt by the French, which was then taken up by the Americans, with a host of workers from many different nations using technology from all over the world, including a steamer from Clydebank in Scotland!! We also saw the plans for the new larger locks which are being built to take larger vessels in today's modern shipping industry. Leaving the museum we found ourselves on the top floor of the building on the viewing platform where we had a great view of the ships coming into the locks. The process is fascinating, there is very little room for error, as there is just a couple of feet clear at each side of the vessel. The captain of the boat must hand over control to the canal pilots who will steer the captain through the locks. Watching these huge vessels rising up as water floods into the lock was pretty cool.

After our morning at the Canal, we headed back to old town, We spent the afternoon wandering around the small cobbled streets, exploring the area. There is a beautiful waterside front area to chill out and some lovely, spanish style architecture to admire here.

After packing up and checking out we had breakfast in a little cafe a few streets away, then we had to go back to the bus station to buy the tickets to take us to Bocas del Toro. As we were there, we decided to pop into the Albert Mall next door for a browse round the stores. We then made the fatal mistake of booking cinema tickets to 'The Prince of Persia'. We didn't know it but this was a terrible error and that afternoon we were subjected to 2 hours of torture courtesy of Disney! Its a truly awful film, with a weak script, wooden acting, we could wait until the final credits came up to end our misery. Then it was back to the hostel to pick up our backpacks to catch the night bus to Bocas del Toro.