Hard to resist the colour, the music, or mood of Panama music, rain

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Hard to resist the colour, the music, or mood of Panama

What tiny nation (just 29,762 square miles) is the site of the Free Zone — the second largest import and redistribution centre in the world — boasts an international banking centre with more than 100 banks, the highest per capita income of its region, has a literacy rate of more than 90 per cent and an inflation rate of only 1.2 per cent?

It has some of the world’s most bio-diverse rain forests and more bird species (1,000) than Canada and the U.S. combined and its national parks cover five million acres. Hint: it’s also home to a canal through which some 15,000 million-plus ton ships transit each year. If you guessed Panama, you’re right.

The U.S. military phased out its many bases and operations in Panama some ten years ago, and this now democratic nation is moving quickly away from its previous third-world image.

Traditionally a tourism underachiever, although a business traveller’s Mecca, Panama is now steadily attracting worldwide attention.

Known for the 97-year-old Panama Canal, an unequalled engineering marvel, Panama is, in fact, vital to world economics for much more than the hundreds of millions of dollars generated by the canal each year. Boasting a myriad of rain forests, relatively untouched indigenous peoples, pre-Columbian artifacts and ruins, hundreds of islands, 780 kilometres of Caribbean coastline and 1,200 kilometres of Pacific beaches, peaks towering to 3,500 metres and lush hill country and valleys formed by extinct volcanoes, Panama is an ecotourism paradise.

This link between two continents, never more than 200 kilometres wide, is home to countless animal species of both North and South America. Panama, unlike many other countries with equatorial rain forests, depends upon rainfall to maintain the water level of its economic lifeblood, the canal. Over ten per cent of the land is part of a protective network of national parks, harbouring more than 10,000 species of trees, 950 species of orchids, over 100 types of palms and 800 bird species.

Panama City, the capital, even hosts Metropolitan Park, a rain forest within its city limit. Visitors are welcome in the Smithsonian Institution’s Tropical Research Centre (Barro Colorado Island,) open to the public for a nominal admission charge. The city is actually ‘three’ cities: the modern capital with its skyscrapers, sprawling highways and sleek waterfront luxury apartments; the 17th century Casco Viejo, which is the chic colonial section being lovingly restored; and Panama Viejo, the ruins of the 16th century city where the Spanish settlers established themselves.

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Ecotourism agencies are abundant and eager to take visitors to see toucans, macaws and endangered Harpie eagles, to name just a few. From Panama City, it’s less than an hour to the Panama Rainforest Discovery Center, where you can spy from a close distance on exotic tropical birds and animals from a 100-foot nature observatory tower. (www.pipelineroad.org.) Animals such as jaguars, rare golden frogs, monkeys, sloths, bushdogs, anteaters and capybaras are visible in the various rain forests just short drives away from Panama City. There are over 500 species of fish in Panama, with superb diving and snorkelling in the coral reefs and excellent deep sea fishing off both coasts.

A perfect time of year to explore Panama’s variety is during Carnival, those few days of wild celebrating before the religious Lenten season begins. While the carnivals in the countryside, (provincia) are especially renowned and adored, even Panama City puts on quite a spectacle, attracting thousands of people annually. Much more family-oriented (no topless here) than Rio or New Orleans, expect to see lavish floats, bedecked local beauties, town drum circles, clowns and a whole lot of music and dancing. Friday is when the festivities begin, with the coronation of the queen. The celebrating continues for the next three days, with different themes.

Perhaps the most awesome of all sights in Panama City is the Canal, built between 1880 and 1914 and claiming 75,000 construction workers’ lives — and finally handed over to the Panamanians in 2000. In Panama City, more than 1,000 tourists a day visit the Miraflores locks, the Canal’s opening to the Pacific.

For a thrilling side trip, visit the San Blas Islands, a palm-bedecked 300-plus island archipelago stretching across approximately 200 miles of the country’s Caribbean coastline. This area is particularly noted for its world-class snorkelling as well as its distinctive Kuna Indians, who still live in simple, traditional ways and dress daily in their exquisitely appliquéd Mola blouses, headdresses and elaborate ornamentation.

Yet as Panamanian hips sway gently to the infectious rhythms of merengue and salsa emanating from a doorway, or as a luscious-looking, chilled papaya cup beckons from a sidewalk café, Panama’s own pulse plays to you. You’ll fall for its very unique charms, garantizado.

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During Carnival’s few days of wild celebration is the perfect time of year to visit Panama.

Older gardens with statues on columns and impressively high walls.


The country’s rain forests are home to a wide diversity of animals including monkeys. — submitted Photo


The chic colonial section of the city is currently being lovingly restored. — submitted Photos