Hello Panama
Hi there,
In case any of you were wondering, Panama is really hot.
After the Really extremely bumpy 45km long dirt road in Costa Rica, we had a really potholed paved road to the Panamanian boarder. The holes were easily avoidable on bicycles, but a pain in the butt to vehicles with 4 wheels.
Our last night in Costa, we were not really in a nice looking spot for camping, and the locals eventually told us to camp at the school, where we tented up behind the soccer goal. Since it is expensive here, our breakfast cost $1.90, eggs, rice, black beans .. the usual.
The boarder crossing to Panama was civil, which was a really nice change, and the roads here look like something out of Texas, which is completely out of place down here. 4 lanes, divided, with a shoulder for the first time. Well that lasted for 30 km, and then got a little beat down, of course it has the familiar mix of broken glass, and flattened sugar cane.
So what happened to the other countries.
El Salvador: I really liked this place, they used the US dollar, it was reasonably hot. The thing that sucks is that 13 families own virtually the entire country, so a lot of the stunning beaches were private. But it was not super´Americanized.
Honduras: I rode across this in 22h. Back to garbage, it was a really hot day, they had not had rain since June, which is good, because I would guess that they will have rain again soon. Lots of people begging.
Nicaragua: Safe, the guards just have Machetes here and not guns. More begging people, we were hassled a few times in both these last countries, though nothing came of it. One of the locals was bragging about how long his country was. Yeah I rode through it in 2 days 90 minutes.
Back to Panama, it is cheap here, and again they use the US dollar and their own money which is called the Balboa, and is equal to the dollar. I spent the day riding towards the town of David, kinda biblical, eh. Here in the purple hostel, for 25 cents, I got shaved ice from a street vendor, which was coconut flavored. Then I spent an hour sitting in the supermarket looking at girls. Turning me into a proper Panamaniac.
While I was riding I though of a lot of interesting things to mention, but this is all that I can remember for now.
Take care,
Nat
