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Central America Here We Go!! After literally no sleep I was up at 3:30am doing my exercises and counting down the minutes until my flight. At around 6:30am I enjoyed my last full breakfast with the beautiful Gomez family - making sure to burn this image, memory in my mind for safe keeping. After saying goodbye to Lizeths Mum we exchanged a few little gifts: I received the most thoughtful of gifts; an emergency blanket (as I am always cold), some Arequipe snacks for the flight and a friendship bracelet with Colombian colours. Lizeth and her father kindly drove me all the way to the airport; we said our goodbyes (only for now) and then I made my way to the check-in counter. The check-in took quite a while as expected; this is only the second flight for this airline to Panama ever so I think its reasonable to expect some small delays. I then changed the last of my pesos for dollars (Panamas currency) and headed through immigration up to the boarding lounge. On the way there I met the very interesting Colombian born Teto - a wheeler and dealer of sorts but an incredible interesting guy none the less. Teto filled me in on everything to do with Panama and told me some amazing tales of his travels abroad. The flight was delayed an hour or so but I didn't mind as I had Teto and all his stories to keep me amused. We eventually boarded and I was reminded why the flight was so cheap but really can't complain. After just over an hour we arrived in Panama and you wouldn't believe it - it was raining but the humidity was certainly a step up from Bogota. The airport we landed out was Barron and we were literally the only airplane on the strip, we headed to immigration and they must of only had 2 people working as it took us an hour to get through. When we finally got through we exited the building out onto the street to find that the airport building was almost non-existent. A bunch of taxi drivers stood around offering passage to the centre for $20 per person - an absolute rip-off. I said goodbye to Teto as he was headed in a different direction and just as I did this lovely girl by the name of Fernanda walked up and introduced herself. Fernanda is a young Mexican girl who has just finished her studies in tourism and is on a bit of a short holiday before returning to Mexico. Fernanda had met this lovely old lady on the plane who had offered us a lift to the city with her and her daughter. Unfortunately the old ladies daughter had gone to the wrong airport so we had to wait an hour or so but it wasn't too bad. We headed to the city with the daughter and realized just how far away the airport really was from the city. We were met by a huge sprawling metropolis of a city something neither of us were expecting. We tried calling a few hostels but unfortunately they were all booked and after two hours of searching and driving around we asked to be dropped in the old city and to search on foot. We thanked our new friends for the lift and helping us and offered to give them a few dollars and they amazingly asked for $30 - I couldn't believe it: this sweet old lady had set us up haha Not to cause myself any stress I tried to let it go and focus now on finding a hostel. We walked around the beautiful old city going from hostel to hostel only to find there were no rooms available anywhere. We finally had some luck at an Inn turned Hostel by the name of Magnolia Inn. The dorm beds were $15 a night and the building and rooms were extremely well kept. I headed straight for a shower and a drink of water after what was a very long day. In our room we met two other backpackers: Didee and some guy from Portugal and we all agreed to go get some dinner. For dinner we headed to the fish market and on the way got to see a bit more of the beautiful old city. The others were starving hungry and stopped for some fried snacks at these roadside carts but I decided to wait until we got to the fish market. The fish market and broadwalk was absolutely beautiful and was right on the waters edge - there were people everywhere, music playing and people dancing. 100s of little resteraunts sold ceviche of fish, prawns, octopus, squid and other seafood treats at just $1.50 a small cup. There was also fried fish and fried prawns but at $10 we all decided to skip that I option and settle on Cebiche and a cold $1 beer. The Cebiche came with some crackers and although not a complete meal certainly did the trick for a short while. We walked around the broadwalk taking one amazing photo after the next before heading back to the hostel with a stop at the local supermarket to buy some drinks. I asked the Chinese guy working at the supermarket for what the locals drink and was handed a bottle of rum which made me very happy. Back at the hostel I cracked the bottle if rum and with a little ice and some fresh lime kick started the night. We met some interesting people in the hostel and by 10pm decided it was time to head out to a bar. I had been in contact with Rafa the head of the CS community here and decided to go and meet him and a bunch of other Couchsurfers before meeting up with the others later. I met Rafa and about 15 other CSers at a bar called Mojitos that was full of Americans playing the American drinking game beer-pong. At around midnight I headed back to hostel to finish off the bottle of rum and got talking to some Anerican expats who had been living here for 2 years. We then headed to Relics the most famous nightclub here in Panama City but after a quick look we all agreed to instead head back to another quieter place so we could chat and have a drink. We met a bunch of girls from Spain and spent a few hours chatting with them before I decided I was tired and it was time to go back to the hostel and bed. The funny thing was it was 3am and really the party was just beginning - Good God I am getting old!!
OBSERVATIONS:
- Vivacolombia Delays
- Met Teto - Colombian guy working in Panama
- Met Fernanda at airport - got lift with old lady and her daughter (cost us $30) got ripped off
- Hostel Magnolia Inn ($15 a night)
- Met Didee and Roberto
- Met CSer Rafa and friends
- Night out in old city: Mojitos sun mojitos bar and Relics nightclub
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