For most people, Panama is synonymous with the Panama Canal, a fact that marketers working on the country’s image may have anticipated when they chose the slogan “mucho mas que un canal,” or “much more than just a canal.”
As a travel agency, we travel professionally in search of the best destinations, but our choice to visit Panama happened completely by accident due to a discount airfare. The goal of such exploratory trips is to visit all the exciting locations we can find, select the best, and then create a perfect itinerary to add as a permanent destination in our offerings. In terms of surfing and natural beauty, our trip to Panama exceeded every expectation. We realized several of our surfing dreams, the ones we hope will come true on every trip, but it took twenty years of surfing and numerous surf trips to experience the perfect combination of serendipity that awaited us here.
Halfway Between North and South America
Panama City is an intriguing mix of North and South America in every sense. The downtown business district is pure Miami, with glass skyscrapers and a tidy oceanfront promenade. The old town, on the other hand, feels like the most atmospheric parts of Havana, with cool rooftop bars, music schools, and beautiful plazas. The direct meeting of these two cultures gives the city a unique vibe. Nowhere else have we seen such a broad array of fast-food options as in one of the shopping malls, but just one block away, traditional fish fryers compete, ladling divine ceviche (raw fish marinated in lemon juice) into plastic cups. Including the canal, the place can be fully explored and appreciated in just two days, and it’s the most biodiverse capital city in the world, with a tropical rainforest within its boundaries.
Mountains and Tiny Islands
Our most anticipated destination on the Caribbean side was the Bocas del Toro archipelago. We zipped through mangrove channels on a scheduled hydrofoil and felt we had arrived as soon as we reached the main island. Colorful wooden houses on stilts, local residents speaking Jamaican English, and astonishing natural beauty welcomed us. Motorboat taxis connect the nine islands, with each restaurant, bar, and lodging having its own dock, where you can practically get a ride day or night.
In the turquoise, crystal-clear water, vibrant sea stars, rays, and dolphins swim, sometimes leaping beside the boats as if posing in mid-air. Some islands have never seen a car, lack paved roads, and beyond the small local population, boast jungles with sloths and hummingbirds sipping nectar from orchids. A strip of white sand beach separates the lush rainforest from the vivid blue sea.
In a week, we surfed at least twice daily, sometimes three times, at different spots, often entirely alone. Imagine this: the 29-degree tropical water, waves perfectly sized and paced for our skill level, in a paradise setting—and often, there was not a single other person in the water.
When we did get company, it was a few friendly locals or expats with whom we amicably shared the well-formed A-frames. We complemented these sessions with dawn or sunset walks to the beach right in front of our self-sustaining mini-resort nestled in the lush jungle.
Leaving One Paradise for Another
Bocas del Toro convinced us that Panama has a lot to offer, but we had one more destination left on the other side of the country. The San Blas archipelago near the Colombian border captured our imagination from the start. Many local travel agencies offered organized two-day trips here, but we wanted to explore it on our own, even though everyone tried to dissuade us. After reading numerous blogs, travel reports, and guides, we set off. This part of the country is the most sparsely populated and underdeveloped, with the Panama-Colombia border closed to foreigners on land. The drug trade poses a major challenge, countered by a significant military presence, and the area is exclusively controlled by the Kuna Indigenous people.
Only 49 of 365 Islands Inhabited
After winding our way through the rainforest on a one-lane paved road, we arrived at a checkpoint. This is where anyone without an off-road vehicle gets turned back and where the entrance tax for the Kunas must be paid. From there, it was another hour through dense jungle on a road that made the off-road rule quite understandable. At the port, there were more fees—parking, docking, the boat, entry to the archipelago, and, of course, for the boat crew, which always included two people: the driver at the back and someone at the bow constantly scanning the water and signaling to steer around the reefs that crowd the water.
Out of 365 islands, only 49 are inhabited; the others remain deserted. Rising just 1-2 meters above the turquoise water, these sandy islands with a few palm trees and a wooden shack gave us the feeling that we’d never seen anything so beautiful. It’s no coincidence that for years, Windows used a background image taken here as its default.
The stunning environment has an especially striking impact because there are barely any tourists. Navigating the islands is extremely difficult, and the region is nearly unreachable by land. The local community is very closed-off, with ongoing political tensions between the government and the Kunas, compounded by the fact that this area lies at the gateway to one of the world’s busiest cocaine smuggling routes. Although the natural setting is unmatched, it’s far from becoming the next Maldives, and we’re very happy about that. Since our first visit, we’ve returned many times, and it’s never disappointed us.
