The Travelling Teacher: Panama - Skyscrapers and Sky-High Humidity

April 12-15

Hello everyone!

The date of Easter is later than in previous years in which I have lived in El Salvador. That has meant a longer second term at work, and thus having to wait very patiently for a much needed, much anticipated two week break. The first week of this was to be spent in a new country for me: bienvenidos a Panamá!

A sloth hanging out on Cerro Ancon

Toucans were seen in other parts of the country, but not here

This was the first Semana Santa (Holy Week) in which we were flying somewhere. This is partly due to the never-ending car saga (update: we now have zero cars, having sold the second broken machine during this holiday), but also due to a desire to go somewhere new. Hannah and I thus took our first flight together since 2019 - before Covid - two hours south to Panama and its eponymous capital city, which felt almost suffocatingly hot and humid during daylight hours for the time we were there.

Enjoying a cycle on Cinta Costera

Copa is Panama's flagship airline

Things I knew about Panama before arriving:

It has, and is famous for having, a canal;
There is a famous ‘Panama hat’ that is not from Panama;
Some papers were released about it a few years ago;
They have a middling football team that have qualified for one FIFA World Cup.

We saw these being sold for $45. It's a hat.

I'm asuming these didn't cost $45, otherwise this
would be the most expensive street in the old town!

Not much, then. I didn’t know there would be sloths hanging out on a hill in the city, for example.

Panama is home to three species of sloth

As you'll see below, sloths move carefully,
efficiently and quicker than stereotyped

That hill, like a lot of this city and the country, has a storied and turbulent history connected with the United States of America. I will focus on that element of its history in the next blog. Before the Americans, of course, came the Europeans: not just the Spanish…

Panamanians couldn't come onto this
hill in Panama City until the 1970s

Sunset view of a church in Casco Antiguo

But initially the Spanish. Panama City was established in 1519 and maintained as the starting point for expeditions to Peru. As with the rest of the Americas, the Spanish imposed Christianity upon the indigenous population. One consequence of this is a proliferation of pretty churches.

Church of St Francis of Assisi

Panama City's Cathedral, illuminated for Semana Santa

Not all these churches are from this time, and the one that is, the Iglesia de la Merced, is no longer in its original location. This is because of a Welshman called Henry Morgan. You may know him as Captain Morgan, off of rum. He sacked Panama City in 1671, leading to much of the town to be moved west to an area now known as Casco Antiguo. Confusingly, it’s known as Panama Viejo. More confusingly still, the location of Casco Antiguo is also sometimes called Casco Viejo.

The faint circle on the right of the image
shows where the first city was located

The Iglesia de la Merced was transported brick by brick
to Casco Antiguo, and reopened in 1673

The legend of another church’s golden altar is quite funny. Upon realising a pirate attack was coming, a friar took the altar’s gold columns and dumped them in the Pacific Ocean. When Morgan arrived, the friar told him that the altar was under construction…before asking the pirate for more money to complete it. Taken aback by this, Morgan stated that “this friar is even more of a pirate than I am,” before giving him the money.

Iglesia de San Jose, in Casco Antiguo

The legend has been proven false - historians
have backdated the gold leaf to 1915

Casco Antiguo is a pretty, UNESCO-preserved old town with narrow streets and flower-laden balconies. Letting traffic through it causes annoyance, pollution and noise. At least they were dispersed in the evenings for the Semana Santa parades.

Falling ferns adorn many of the balconies

A band marching in the 'Brotherhood of
Christ the Poor' Holy Week parade

Traffic must have been so much worse before the construction of the Cinta Costera, a bypass which includes a 2.5 kilometre semi-circular bridge in the Ocean. Brilliantly, this includes a cycling and walking path to use. Being quite flat, Panama City is great for running and cycling…if you can do it in the heat and humidity.

Climbing Cerro Ancon gives a great view of Casco Antiguo and the Cinta Costera

They've made the cycle path quite pleasant

This is best viewed from the French Square of Casco Antiguo. The French invested heavily in Panama - not surprisingly, it’s connected to the creation of a canal. The southeastern corner of the old town is dedicated to France, complete with a large obelisk and statue with a cockerel. It also has a plaque commemorating the spot where a cannon was fired in 1903. This forced a Colombian warship to leave, and consolidated Panama’s independence from Colombia.

I found this vivid flame tree more appealing than the bird,
but you can see it in the background

Panama was part of Gran Colombia from 1821 to 1903

If all of this sounds quaint and sweet, a quick glance across the water reminds you of Panama’s relative economic might. Panama is commonly known as the wealthiest city in Central America, as shown by the sheer number of skyscrapers lining its Pacific shoreline. Panama City currently has 68 of these, the most in Latin America and more than the United Kingdom. This has possibly contributed to us feeling that Panama is an expensive place to visit, particularly compared to other Central American nations.

Skyscrapers are classed as buildings over 150 metres tall

The funkiest design surely belongs to the F&F Tower,
the city's 7th tallest building and one that came
7th in the 2011 Emporis Skyscraper Award

The Cinta Costera also connects with this section of the city and is easily reached on foot or by bike. It’s used a lot on Sundays when, like in Mexico City and Bogota, the main roads are closed for use by walkers, runners and cyclists. I love that idea and wish it would be implemented in more places.

It was busy even before 7am, with
exercisers trying to beat the heat

This road looked very different later in the week

Not everywhere is glitz and glamour, however. Inequality is stark here, with reminders even in Casco Antiguo of the wealth gap being separated by only one or two streets. A tight security presence is notable at the edges of the old town.

There were quite a few buildings in and around
Casco Antiguo that looked like this

I do appreciate a misspelled sign, particularly
one that suggests the problem is 'fiction'

What this does mean is that, with a bit of will, you can find cheaper food. Fondas are popular places to fill up with a hearty lunch. This contrasts with some of the coffee shops in Casco Antiguo, which offer one small piece of bread smeared with avocado of $8 when you include the extra 7% tax.

Smaller than is looks, and one piece of bread

Much bigger than it looks, delicious, $4.50

I did enjoy my croissant-coffee breakfasts at Saint Honore

Panama City is an intriguing mix of past and present, its position as a relative economic powerhouse helping it to preserve its history whilst embarking on modernising and becoming a 21st Century city. A lot of this, however, is connected to an 80 kilometre marvel that changed the world and has certainly played the most prominent of roles in the story of Panama: that deserves a blog of its own…