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We arrived in Portobello, Panama after 5 lovely nights at sea. We didn't even need to go to immigration, Paul and sindry went for us. We were planning on doing some diving in portobello but the dive prices were much more expensive than we thought they would be so we changed our plans at the last minute and headed straight to Colon. We caught our first chicken bus to Colon, these buses are all over Central America and they are old american school buses that are now public buses. Some our really colourful and look like they have been painted by the same people that paint funfair rides. Others are still bright yellow and still say school bus at the top with a stop sign at the side. We even saw some in Panama city that were used by the police and these ones were painted all black. Once we arrived in Colon we and the rest of our friends from the boat, jumped in two taxis to the train station even though it was only 500 meters away because Colon is notoriously dangerous.
The train was already there and looked really pretty, there was only one other tourist there, an obvious train enthusiast and we waited by a door to get on the train. After around 40 mins 2 bus loads of american tourists turned up and for some reason they were allowed to get on the train before us even though we had been waiting all that the time!
We found some seats after everybody else had got on the train and then it finally set off. The train journey took us from the east side of Panama all the way across to the west side right beside the Panama canal, and this whole journey only took 1 hour. Panama is so skinny here that's why it was chosen as the spot for the canal.
The train journey was very posh and we got to travel through actual jungle which was really cool, but too quick to spot any animals! The canal was not at all what we imagined and at some points it just looked like a natural river. We also went past some locks like the famous Miraflores lock, you can do a tour to this lock but we decided we weren't overly interested in canals and the train ride was enough. It was only an hour on the train so we the jumped in a taxi to take us to the old part of town where we had booked accommodation.
They didn't have our reservation, probably because we had only made it a couple of hours previously but lucky for us this meant we got upgraded from a 12 bed dorm to a huge four bed dorm! It also had air con and the whole place was really posh, although overly expensive. We haven't really got a solid plan on what were doing or going in central america so this has meant we have got really lucky with rooms or really stung on price. We ate chow mein at a place round the corner that was stupidly cheap and then went to bed. The next day we spent a lot of the time planning what we were going to do in Central and realised we really didn't have a whole lot of time to see central because of a hike we wanted to do in Guatamala. We needed to get a night bus to the next place and the owner said we needed to book in advance which we weren't used to. He also told us a brand new metro had opened yesterday in Panama city and if we walked down the road we would get to it. I love metros so this is what we did. What he didn't tell us is how long it would take us to get there! After stopping to buy shoes! (We now have shoes that are not flip flops hooray!) And eating at a McDonalds we found, we found the shiny new metro. Trouble was you needed a metro card to get on and that cost $2 each so the cost of a taxi. It was hot and we were bothered so we then got in a taxi instead ( we have started losing logic in central, we've been away too long!) So hours after we set off we arrived via taxi! The bus station was out of town and the only buses that went to Boca's del toro had a humongous queue. Every single other bus window was empty apart from this one. We could pretty much count people in the queue and know there was no way we were getting on a bus for tonight and gave up and went to the bus window next door to get a night bus to David which was half way between Panama city and Boca's which we actually wanted to go. Sigh. We went back in to the city via taxi and wandered around the old town which had a cool view of the modern city with all its skyscrapers. Old town was surprisingly small which was good because we hadn't left a lot of time to explore. There was a man selling panama hats at a table and I tried to persuade Dan to buy one because his head keeps getting sunburnt but he wouldn't. So I bought one. I bought the mans version though because its traditional and we both thought it was nicer.
We headed back then headed to the bus station but no taxi would take us for less than $10 which was ridiculous as it cost $4 earlier and then found one for $8. Once we arrived he 'didn't have change' so we ended up paying $10. So aggravating! Inside the terminal Dan tried his card again and we were pretty sure they had blocked it AGAIN!! Stupid NatWest! We then realised you needed the retarded metro card to get through the barrier to the buses. The woman kept telling us to go buy a card even though our bus was being loaded and the barrier only charged $0.10 cents! She wanted us to go buy a $2 card we would never ever use again?! Even a poor old man was having trouble. Why you can't just pay ten cents to the woman who mans 3 barriers is beyond me. Especially because the buses take you OUT of the city so most people that use them are not from the city and therefore do not need a bloody metro card! Stupid stupid place. Our wits are being tested and we are definitely becoming less tolerant to stupid countries! Haha. A lovely old lady used her card so we could get through and when we tried to pay her she wouldn't accept it. Yay to nice people! Finally we were on the bus and on our way north!
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