After our goodbye party in the school, we headed to Panama City for the night in preparation for our trip to Isla Contadora the next morning. Isla Contadora is one of the Pearl Islands, about 35 miles from Panama City in the Pacific Ocean. It is a tiny island, only a mile or so long, but very peaceful and beautiful, just perfect for a few relaxing days.
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| Dave enjoys the boat ride out in calm seas |
There are no docks to land on, so our catamaran was met by a small fishing boat to unload the guests and their luggage.
We had a delighful little villa which was perfect for the four of us.
A golf cart came with the villa so that we could make our way around the island in comfort during the hot days. Here we are enjoying a glass of wine and watching the sunset.
A paddle board came with the house, and three of us tried it out.
There are only a few beaches on the island, but they are beautiful.
The last beach, Playa Larga, looks great. It was once home to Hotel Contadora, a resort of hundreds of rooms. The owner died, and the heirs couldn’t decide what to do with the resort. There were also problems with insufficient water, so they just closed it. It didn’t take long for everything of value to be carried off by the locals. Now it is just one ruined building after another.
There is even a ruined ferry boat in front of the ruined resort. In its day, this was a state of the art boat. It could crawl up onto the beach to let off its passengers, and crawl back in the water to sail away. It was beached and left there because it would have been too expensive to repair.
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| Not much was left behind by the locals |
Everything on the island is very expensive because it all comes in by boat. Here is a “store boat”, which lands at high tide and stays until the next high tide. It comes every week.
All too soon it was time to go back to the mainland so that Melissa could fly home. Shortly after this photo was taken, we took the catamaran back to the mainland. This time the waves were quite high, as the afternoon wind had come up. It was an exciting ride home!
Dave had three more days to spend with us. We headed for the resort town of El Valle, in the mountains not too far from Panama City. Our first stop was the town of Las Margaritas, where our Peace Corps friend Catherine lives. It was a hot day, so a trip to the swimming hole was in order.
Heather relaxes with fellow Peace Corps volunteers Catherine and Graycie
Dave and Steve did a double jump off the rocks.
Later that day we went a little further downstream where the water trickled over a very high falls. In the wet season this is a huge torrent, but it hasn’t rained here since December.
The next day it was time for a hike up the Sleeping Indian. Heather has been walking and hiking almost every day since her arrival here, and she has made great progress.
We later took a trip to the local zoo. They have lots of tropical birds, a jaguar, ostriches, and lots of frogs from the rain forest.
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| This pheasant caught our eye |
The “square trees” (arbol cuadrado) weren’t perfectly square, but it was interesting to see them. I think Dave liked the hole in the big tree better.
On our last day in El Valle we climbed up to a viewpoint on Cerro Gaital where we could see the whole town of El Valle, which actually sits in an old volcano crater.
The next day Dave flew back to the US and we headed back to Chepo for one more week with our people there, ending with another going away party on April 3rd. More on that in our next blog entry!
We fly back to the US on April 16th. In the meantime we are tourists!
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