Panama City was the last stop on our Central American adventure and marked the half way point of this journey. Thinking of Panama City inevitably conjured pictures of the famous canal and for me personally very little else.
But how wrong was I, after spending several months in Central America where the tallest buildings are three stories high the sheer size of Panama City comes as a shock. It can only be described as colossal in a region that is well known for lack of development and political turmoil. We haven’t seen anything like this since San Francisco and Vancouver.
It’s a city with a lot of money and investment, the canal has made this a hub of International business. The skyscrapers have grown up out of the once tropical jungle and the construction is continuing as they saying goes business is clearly booming!
We spent our first day walking along the sea front, the sun was shining and we made the most of the first world comforts all around us.
Stopping to do some exercise on the sea front you could easily mistake this for Miami not Panama.
Following the sea wall for an hour or so takes you to the old town known as Casco Viejo
The original Panama city was founded in 1519 and was later sacked by the welsh pirate Henry Morgan, although these days he’s more famous for selling rum.
The town was later moved in 1673 to Casco Viejo which is what we see today.
There is a mixture of crumbling and renovated buildings, churches, museums, restaurants and bars. It’s definitely a must see tourist spot.
Of course there are the Panama hat sellers
But they were slightly out of our budget.
The rest of our time in Panama City was spent spotting wildlife in the Metropolitan National Park and checking out Albrook mall which is claimed to be the biggest shopping mall in Latin America.
Panama city signalled the end our time in Central America, strangely, it didnt feel like the Central America we have grown to love but more like where we started.
