Happy New Year! My good intentions to post more stories went a little differently in December 2024. But now I'm back with a story from December, last month.
It was my birthday and I got a present from Hans, 3 days to Panama City. In the last 25 years we've only been to Panama City to get on a plane for our Dutch holiday. But not as tourists anymore. That was 27 years ago. I also got a nice present from friends of ours(who live in Casco viejo) who treated us to a nice dinner and then a ballet performance in the national theatre in the old town, Casco viejo. Wonderful to soak up some culture, that's one of the things I miss about the Netherlands. Of course Hans and I drove around a bit during the days we were in the city (we stayed at the Panama Canal..also good bird watching there! from our balcony..see the picture of the Keel billed Toucans down below, taken from our balcony), we had our own car. We really wanted to go to Metropolitan Park and we had never been on the Camino del Cruces. We did that.
The last time we were in the metropolitan park was during our first vacation in Panama in 1997. Back then it wasn't really that interesting, it was dirty and not well maintained. The second time I was there alone was in 2002 with a colleague who had a travel agency and went there with me...but that was in March and it was very dry then and it was a mess.
Now we were pleasantly surprised. It was on a Saturday December 14th and there is now a visitor center and you can buy some refreshments there and pay your donation. There was a nice man there who explained the trails to us in a very friendly way. The trails were well maintained. Hey, what a wonderful sight it was, this is good tourism. And what I also saw were enough taxis that can take you back to your hotel...that wasn't the case when we were there years ago. We had to wait quite a long time in a kind of uncertainty for the bus.
The people were all friendly. The advantage of such a forest/park is... birds and animals are used to people and therefore easy to see. Very special to go there and highly recommended.
The camino del cruces was also cool, it was handy to have our own car in that area. Of course Casco viejo is also very nice to visit, many old buildings are still being restored, but what has been restored is very beautiful... and at low tide you can see the sea birds very nicely.
This was a highlight of the month of December 2024... but I also did very nice bird trips with very nice bird watchers and we also had visits from Dutch friends... also nice. Up to the new year!!!
greetings from Terry
https://coffeeadventures.net/tinamou.html
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