Across Panama by bus

We are back from our 3-day tourist visa renewal trip to Panama. We left by bus from Changuinola which is only a few kms across the border from where we live. For the most part the buses are 28-passenger vans – all very new and very comfortable. We traveled south along the coast sometimes parallel to the islands of Bocas del Toro. At Chiriqui Grande we headed up through the mountainous rainforest and the Comarca (autonomous territory) Ngobe Bugle. There were several “villages” along the sparsely populated trip. Almost all homes included a thatched building (see photo). We reached David (our final destination) in about 5 hours. The provincial capital (Chiriqui province) of David is a major shopping and transportation hub. Food and lodging were very inexpensive…basic hotel room with private bath but no A/C ran $16.50 per night, breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast, coffee was less than $2.00 per person; another dinner which included one hamburger with fries, good-sized shrimp cocktail, garlic bread and 8 bottles of beer came to $13 plus change! Cold beer was available at the front desk of the hotel for 60 cents each which could be enjoyed on the balcony overlooking Parque Cervantes across the street (see photo). On one evening there was a free concert with regional musicians and dancers at the park. The trip was short but gave us an opportunity to see parts of Panama that we had never seen before.