Thanksgiving!

The big event of the past week was the Thanksgiving party for all Peace Corps volunteers in Panama.  160 of the 200 volunteers made the trip to Cerro Punta, in the province of Chiriquí, at the base of Volcán Barú, the highest mountain in Panama at 11,300 ft.  Most of the group stayed at the resort of Los Quetzales.  We, however, stayed at a hotel down the road as Los Quetzales filled up before we got our request in (we were in the States.)  It was a good time to get together with our training group and meet new volunteers from other sectors.  Here is a photo of most of the volunteers from the Azuero peninsula (two provinces - Los Santos and Herrera.)

The hotel was the perfect venue for our get together.  Here is the room divider in the restaurant.  You could pick a banana whenever you liked!

A large team of the Peace Corps volunteers was needed to make a Thanksgiving dinner for 160 people.  Here are a few people getting the turkeys ready.  We had four 26 lb. turkeys.

Here is the final product.  It sure tasted good!  

We also had ham, mac and cheese for the vegetarians, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, candied squash, green bean casserole, salad and rolls.  The desserts were chocolate chip cookies, pumpkin sheet cake and apple crisp.  It was wonderful.  Everyone had all they could eat (and then some).

The Los Quetzales resort had some wonderful cabins way up in the rain forest.  Some of them were over an hour walk from the lodge.  There were jeeps to take people up, but they were only allowed one free trip a day.  Here is a picture of one of the highest cabins.  It had no electricity, but the location was exotic.

The weather was not good enough to climb the volcano, but we did get a chance to hike in the jungle and cross a river several times.
  

Heather and our guide Ramón

Savi crosses with Ramón's help

We stayed in a hotel a few miles away.  It was nice to be able to retreat to peace and quiet when the party got going in earnest. 

The grounds of our hotel

Flowers along the road

Parade time!

Back in Chepo, we had already celebrated the separation of Panama from Colombia (1903) on Nov. 3 with a parade.  On November 28th we celebrated the independence from Spain (1821).  Panama was still part of Colombia, but it was no longer under Spanish control, so that called for another parade.  Actually, there were two parades:  one típico on Nov 25 with folkloric costumes, and one cívico on Nov 28 with the school band and color guard.   Of course we had to elect another queen - the fourth one of the year.

Here are a few pictures:

The queen on típico parade day

The queen on civic parade day

Of course we had to dress up in our típico outfits!

Another queen - of the graduates

Youngsters dressed up too!

This girl needs practice in posing!

We'll head off into the sunset for another week!  This picture is from the opposite end of town from our house.