Last full day in Central America!

Today was my last full day in Central America!

Will it be bitter-sweet to leave? Nope. I'm so ready to be home. Plus I'm in a bad mood - allow me to elucidate.

It all started about midnight last night. I came into the dorm and the A/C was unplugged - again. I plugged it back in and climbed up into my bunk. I was in the top bunk of the bed directly in front of the A/C unit. The girl below me was cold and after about half an hour, she grabs a twin mattress from who knows where and props in on its end in front of our bunk to block the A/C.

I was pretty miffed at first, but then I thought - maybe I can live with this if the room still gets cool. Nope! Our bunk is so close to the A/C, that the mattress shield isn't allowing the air to move and it's tricking the thermostat in the A/C unit into thinking it's already cold! So it switches to standby mode. Great.

I hop out of bed, throw on a t-shirt and go to the lobby to ask if I can move to a different room. I didn't want to freeze this chick out, but something had to be done. Unfortunately, there were no other beds available, so the guy working at the desk comes in and tells her she can't have the mattress there. She's obviously unhappy and I don't blame her too much ... but as I think about it I do blame her. If you don't like the cold, why would you come to the hostel that has A/C? There are plenty without! I chose this place because it has A/C! Argh ...

Anyway, I ask her if she wants to switch bunks. Clearly upset, she asks "do you think it will help?" I assured her that heat rises ... and besides, she wouldn't be directly in the path of the A/C up there. She climbed up, huffing. I returned to the desk and asked the guy if he could find a blanket for her, which he did.

I was kinda worked up by this point, so I didn't sleep very well. The good news is that chick isn't in the dorm anymore. Don't know where she is, but I'm not going to miss her :)

I only got about four or five hours of sleep, and when I woke up, it hurt to swallow - yeah, yeah I know. It's because of the A/C. But I gotta have it!

I got up and hopped in a cab to the train! There's a passenger train that runs alongside the canal from Panama City to Colon twice a day. It's only an hour long trip to Colon, but it was pretty fun. This may not be the last country I cross in a train - I'm talking to you, Simon.

Took a bus back to Panama City and found my way back to the hostel before heading to Mercado del Mariscos for lunch. This place is a fish market that has a restaurant inside. The whole place obviously smells overwhelmingly of fish - my first thought was "no way could Mom handle this." Hahaha! The food was pretty good. I had shrimp ceviche and calamari. Shortly after lunch I realized that these probably weren't the wisest choices in light of the fact that I'll be spending roughly seven hours on a planes tomorrow.

My stomach was making funny sounds earlier, but all seems well now ... fingers crossed!

Check out this fish vendor! I had to take a picture cause the name is pretty funny - "the white hope." Haha!

After wandering around the Via Espana for awhile, I headed to Albrook. The cabbies here always try to pick up multiple fares, so there was someone else to drop off before the mall. After a few minutes I began to suspect that we were driving through a ghetto. After dropping off the other passenger, the cabbie confirmed my suspicions. He told me the name of the neighborhood (can't remember now) and then said "muy peligroso" after which he made a gun with his hand and proceeded to make "pchew! pchew!" shooting noises. The good news is that was the closest we got to getting shot at and we made it to the mall!

Check out this shirt I found there! Pretty great right? Those of you who are familiar with my previous hair situations know that I used to rock this look - pick and all! I went in to buy one. The largest size they had was an XL, which would normally work. But this was a Central American XL! I couldn't even get my shoulders in it! Had the same problem in China ... had to shop for 3XLs there.

Also, as proof that this mall is ridiculously huge, I took a picture of this TCBY! Isn't that crazy?! I don't think I've seen a TCBY in the States since about 1997!

While in Albrook, I saw The Smurfs and Something Borrowed. Didn't expect too much from The Smurfs cause it's a kids' movie and it was in Spanish. Something Borrowed was suuuuper bad. I have low standards for chick flicks, but this still managed to disappoint! The acting was bad, all the jokes were telegraphed, the only character (John Krasinski's) who was entertaining and whose motivations were identifiable was onscreen for about seven minutes total ... Just a really terrible movie. Don't see it.

Anyway, I'm tired and I've just finished watching a terrible movie and I get hassled by a cab driver. He wants to charge me double for the cab ride to the hostel. And I let him cause I'm just over it now - constantly having people try to hustle me. But I'm still upset - mostly at myself - for being too lazy to talk him down.

Haha! Well, I can't let this downer be my last post, huh? If all goes as planned, I'll be in Chicago tomorrow night! I'll post something more uplifting then ... or maybe the day after :)

Quiet Day

Had a fairly uneventful day today. It started with me sleeping in till 8:30am!

I was a little worried I wouldn't be able to sleep last night, cause when I got into the room someone had unplugged the A/C unit. I promptly plugged it back in, ready to do battle with anyone who dared try to unplug it again. Fortunately, no one did. I mean, I get why they unplugged it - I think I'm getting some kind of cold from the A/C. But if I have to choose between a cold and not sleeping, I'm plugging in the A/C every time.

Some of these hostels in Panama offer free breakfast. This amounts to a huge bowl of pancake batter set next to a few frying pans on the stove. The frying pans were awful, and after two failed attempts, I grabbed a granola bar out of my mochila (backpack).

The rest of my morning basically amounted to watching South Park episodes online (again, thanks Matt and Trey for being pretty much the only show available outside the US!) and doing some reading while I did laundry. Fortunately, it was pouring for a good part of the morning so the heat was bearable.

After I finished my laundry, I hopped in a cab and headed to Casco Viejo. This section of town is pretty interesting. It's really old and it shows. probably twenty percent of the buildings are in ruins. The others are an odd and disorganized mix of touristy restaurants and hotels as well as housing for locals who seem to be fairly poor. This area seems to be in the process of being built up.

There are lots of neat churches and buildings here as well as an obelisk ... with a chicken on the top. Kat and Nati told me about this, but It was still pretty bizarre to see for myself.

I had lunch at Coca-Cola diner. The chicken fried rice was really good, but if you go there and order some, watch out for bones ... you're gonna get some bones. Anyone? Anyone? Okay, moving on.

After lunch, I finally had a Pitufo Sundae! Kinda looks a little bit like a smurf, right? With the little white hat thing sticking up? So here's the secret recipe - vanilla soft serve, plus blue M&M's, plus blue sauce. The blue sauce is eerily transparent. It looks and feels about the same consistency as watery toothpaste. But it actually tasted pretty good!

Next on my list of McDonalds ice cream treats to try is the current special flavor - Hershey's McFlurry. Looks like it has little bits of chocolate and possibly some caramel mixed in. Kinda wished they mixed things up like this in the States. I mean what do we get? A shamrock shake and an eggnog shake at their respective holidays? Not bad, but we can do better!

After desert I walked back to the hostel to pick up my Kindle and catch a cab to Albrook. I wandered the mall for a bit and then saw Captain America! It was good! Also really glad that Mike Morris advised via Facebook to stay after the credits! Thanks, man!

I'm probably getting a little too cocky for my own good, but I caught a mis-translation in the Captain America subtitles (the movie was in English)! They translated "borne" (like "carried") to "nacer," which is "to be born." Felt pretty good about catching that! Maybe if I write them a letter about it they'll offer me a job? :)

Unfortunately, the movie started at 5:35, which means that I got back to the hostel around 8pm. Only about an hour fifteen left before they turn on the A/C now!

After I finish posting this, I'll probably just watch bad movies in the living room. They have some kind of LaCie media hard drive loaded up with about 500 movies. Seems like every night, the same joker is working the remote and he has pretty bad taste in movies. Last night it was Quarantine. They just now finished watching Ninja Assassin - can't wait to see what's next.

Tomorrow morning I'm planning on taking a train ride! There's a train that runs along the canal between Panama City and Colon. It leaves at 7:15am and the trip takes an hour. Once I get to Colon, I'll hop on a bus and head right back to Panama City - Colon is supposed to be a really, really rough place. Most of what I've been hearing is "don't go there." That'll put me back in Panama City around 9:30am. All I have to do is find a way to keep cool for the rest of the day - I head back to the States Tuesday!

Panama Canal

I spent most of today going through the Panama Canal!

I journey began an 6:30am-ish in the Pacific just outside of Panama City. We finished up around 5pm in the Atlantic! Pretty cool.

I'm glad I did it, but I was slightly surprised to discover that going through the Panama Canal is almost exactly like going through locks on the Mississippi River ... which I (along with Simon) did 37 times ... So the novelty of going through locks was completely lost on me - old news. But it was still cool to go through the Panama Canal. It's kind of big deal I guess - you know - in terms of world commerce and historic engineering feats.

Honestly though, the locks didn't even seem bigger than some of the locks on the Mississippi - I know for a fact that at a few locks on the Mississippi we raised or lowered significantly more than we did on the Canal. And the Panama Canal locks didn't seem wider (I just now did some google research and found out that many of the locks are the same width). And, just as I suspected, the Army Corp of Engineers had a hand in the Canal! Those guys are crazy.

It was really cool to see ocean liners going through the Canal - fully loaded they carry an insane amount of cargo. One of the liners we saw coming through was a car carrier called Indiana Highway. Evidently these car carriers have the capacity to hold 3,000 cars!

We even saw a cruise ship coming through!

These large ships are guided through by "mules." They're kind of like little locomotive engines (with electric motors) that run on tracks on either side of the canal. They tie off to the ships with ropes and ensure tat it stays in the middle of the canal. "Mules" is an interesting nickname because (unless Mom has woefully misinformed me) they used to use actual mules (or maybe horses?) to pull boats through some canal in southern Indiana. I'm guessing they used the same system in other canals as well, but I'm too sweaty to look it up right now.

So I was surprised to find that there were only about ten native English speakers on the tour and we were all Americans! I usually run into more Aussies and Brits than Americans. Most of the people on the tour were either Latino or German. There were lots and lots of Germans on the tour ... and in Panama in general I'm finding. Check out this German dude - slipped a little gin onto the boat to spice up his orange soda :)

Our trip ended in Colon, where buses picked us up and took us back to Panama City - only a one hour trip by bus. Turns out that Colon has the second largest free trade zone in the world - the largest is in Hong Kong.

I had the bus driver drop my off at Albrook which is Panama City's bus terminal ... which happens to be in front of the country's largest mall of the same name - I learned that from our boat's cook, Marie. She and I sat together on the bus on the ride home.

The mall is crazy massive - like really, really, really, ridiculously ... big (you thought I was going to say "good looking" didn't you?)

Anyway, I grabbed some dinner in one of the food courts. Taco Bell isn't as big a hit here as in Guatemala. There were people there, but McDonalds and KFC were far and away more popular. Still haven't had a Pitufo Sundae, but don't worry - I'll get to it!

So at my sketchy hostel, they don't turn on the A/C in the dorms until about 10pm. Therefore, my goal is to stay out of the hostel until 10pm. On one-and-a-half recommendations, I saw Quiero a Matar mi Jefe - in the States it's called Horrible Bosses. Couldn't help myself - I'm a big fan of Jason Bateman and Charlie Day.

So that's probably where I'll spend a lot of my day tomorrow and Monday. The only problem is I've seen most of the movies they're showing. The only ones I haven's seen are Captain America, Something Borrowed, and The Smurfs ... this could get ugly.

Quick Update

I'm back in Panama City! Just got back from Boquete this evening.

Tomorrow I'm taking an all day tour of the Panama Canal. Should be good! If I can manage to think straight in this oppressive heat, I'll post some pictures!

Panama

Made it!

Panama is really unique!

The city itself is pretty big with lots and lots of skyscrapers and highways and even street signs!

I'm staying in Casco Viejo (or Casco Antiguo) which is the old part of town. I spent a little time tonight wandering the streets. There were lots of people out tonight! Casco Viejo reminds me of a run down Caribbean version of New Orleans. It's very hot - which makes sense cause it's right on the Pacific. I'm thinking that tomorrow I may head north into the mountains and then return here a few days before I fly out. We'll see.

As I wandered around tonight, I came across a McDonalds. Whenever I'm in a foreign country I like to peek in and see what, if anything, is different about the menu. They have a Pitufo sundae! Pitufo means Smurf! It's a promotion for the new movie. The movie looks bad, but I think I'll try the sundae :)

For some reason, I'm unable to sign into my blogger account ... Evidently the internet here in Panama city uses US IP address? My computer thinks I'm back in the States - I can even get on Hulu. But blogger is saying "hey, you don't usually sign in from this location - answer these security questions." I have, of course, forgotten the answers to all these questions. So I'm reduced to emailing posts to the blog until I get this straightened.

Good news! I can log in again! As you can see, I've added pictures. Also, I'm definitely heading to Boquete tomorrow. I'll probably spend two days to get there and back and then a day just chilling. The bus ride is eight or nine hours, but I need to kill some time, and I don't really want to stay in the capital the whole week. I spoke with an Australian couple tonight, and they confirmed my suspicions - Panama City is mostly just a big, expensive western city.

Adios, Guatemala!

Yo estoy en la aeropuerto del Ciudad Guatemala esperando por mi vuelo a Panama!

Hace diez minutos me despedi a los Gilmores. Yo soy un poco triste. Esta verano fue maravilloso y a mi me encanto compartiendo este tiempo con Donna and los chicos. Yo voy a extrañar ellos!

Gracias por todo, Gilmores! Yo espero que nosotros vamos a reunirse de nuevo pronto!

Rather than translate this, I'll let those of you who don't habla español copy and paste it into Google Translate - it's incredibly good.

So now I'm off to Panama! I'm going to be there for about six days. Not really sure what all I'll do in Panama for six days, but I'm sure I'll figure out something. Unfortunately, Panama is pretty expensive - especially Panama City. They use US currency and while it's not as expensive as the States, it's certainly much more expensive than other Central American countries.

Maybe this is good for me though - take baby steps back to US prices.

I'll let you know what my story is tomorrow!

Semuc Champey

I made it to Semuc Champey, thus completing my list of must-visit places in Guatemala!

I wasn't going to go, but then Ann-Marita and Kira said it was their favorite place that they visited here, so I had to make it happen.

There's a shuttle that leaves Antigua at 2pm for Semuc Champey, but when I arranged for it to pick me up, they said it wouldn't arrive in Antigua until 4pm because the of the teachers' strike. Evidently the government hasn't been paying school teachers or something so they were demonstrating in the streets all over the country. Before I left the travel agency, they said the shuttle would arrive between 4:30 and 5, so I was planning on 6pm. Then, at 4:30 I get a phone call saying that the shuttle will leave Antigua at 9pm!

I was skeptical it would arrive at all, but it did!

Our driver drove like a madman and we arrived at our destination at 3am.

The next morning a group of us hiked up to the main event. It was incredibly beautiful! There were waterfalls everywhere! They spilled into tiered pools of vivid blue water. We swam around for a bit then climbed the path up the mountain to mirador for a view of the whole park.

After returning to the hostel, we grabbed some inner tubes and headed to the river to do some tubing! But first, we jumped off this bridge ... This has to be the highest thing I've ever jumped off of. I'm guessing it was 30 or 40 feet high. Really scary. Not everyone jumped, but I figured I had to - it's practice for the little adventure Dodrill and I are going to have! Mark your calendar man - we're gonna do it August 10th!

The tubing was disappointingly short - like 10 minutes long - but still fun.

After tubing, we headed to my favorite part - the caves! We walked/swam through about 1.5 kilometers (if I remember correctly) of pitch black caves carrying candles! We had to climb a few waterfalls and there was one point where a few of us jumped off a 20 foot ledge into a pool below! Pretty scary jumping off something in the dark.

On the way to the caves, Jemma (she's Irish) commented - "what a beautiful plant, what is it?" It took me a sec to figure out what she was talking about ... I looked around for awhile, but the only plant I saw was corn! Haha! The Dutch dude (I couldn't pronounce his name so I won't even try to spell it) and I couldn't stop laughing! Muy chistoso (very funny).

Now I'm back in Antigua, sin motocicleta! Matt drove my little motorcycle back home with him. It was a bittersweet parting. She was a good little bike. Hope she treats you well, Matt!

Today is Ellsworth's birthday! Feliz cumpleanos, Ellie! We celebrated on Saturday with a pinata! It was a lot of fun. Afterwards, Joe made a mask out of the pinata's head and chased the kids around. Grace got a turn too.

It's also our last day in Guatemala! I was supposed to fly out on the 5th, but the Julianelles left yesterday and the Gilmores leave tomorrow, so rather than sticking around Antigua all by my lonesome, I changed my flight and I leave tomorrow a few hours after the Gilmores.

Now I'm going to be spending a week in Panama. Not really sure what I'll do, but it should be interesting!