All the way south

Panama!
I’ve finally crossed the Panama Canal. I don’t know if that means that I am on another continent, but crossing the Canal for the first time driving to Panama City did feel like a major milestone on my trip. There are several bridges that cross the canal, but the one that connects the PanAmerican highway with Panama City is a HUGE suspension bridge. Unfortunately there was tons of traffic and we were unable to pull over and get a picture.

Panama City is a cosmopolitan city. We had sushi 3 times (yeah, I missed sushi). I’m not sure what typical Panamanian food is, but I’m sure you can find it in Panama City as you can find anything you want there.

We stayed at Hostal Mamallena. It moved recently and was a pleasure to stay there as everything was new and the people running it really had their act together. Plus we met lots of cool people there. I still don’t have my head around what the backpacker experience is like, so it is nice to stay at a hostel and learn about their perspective.

The majority of the time we spent in Panama was spent trying to find a boat. We talked to most of the hostiles in the area and were unable to find a boat that would be able to carry two bikes safely. There were a couple of boats that _could_ take two bikes, but we would have to lay them down flat on the deck. That sounds like a Really Bad Idea.

Our only choice was to wait for a couple weeks for the Melody, so we ended up going to the airport to find an air shipper.

We checked out Girag, DHL, and Copa. DHL was unable to ship directly and we would have to crate the bike and use a frieght forwarder, so that option was out.

Girag made us wait for an hour to give us disappointing news: $1000 to ship EACH bike. That was just unaaccecptable. For that price I would spend two weeks in Panama waiting for a boat.

Copa, on the other hand, was very professional and prompt with their good news: $700 to ship the bike to Cali, Medellin, or Bogota.

Theo and I decided to ship the bikes to Medellin and we were able to drop off the bike the next day and catch a flight two days later (Friday). The total cost was about $1000, $700 for the bike and $300 for the person.

Between the time of dropping off the bikes and catching the flight, we had a chance to actually visit the Canal.

I talked to some people and it was completely uninteresting to them, but it was really amazing to me. We spent a couple of hours just watching ships. Water level up.. boat floats in.. water level lowers.. locks open.. boat floats out. It really is amazing that people were able to cut a waterway through so much land.

Between David and Panama City

I got a flat tire while driving around Panama City.  Not a problem because we eventually found a tire shop and once I removed the wheel, they fixed the tire for $5.

Thanks man!  I told you I’d put you on the internet

Your shop too

Current level of flare.

Panama City skyline.

I will be flying over this ^^^

?????

I’m starting a photo series on bathroom signs.

Next stop Colombia