Panama City

Riding into Panama City was hectic. Terrible shoulder, lots of traffic, my back wheel unknowingly came uncentered (it was far too loud to notice) and I tore up my sidewall (luckily my Schwalbe should still be intact). While going over the bridge of the Americas we took over an entire lane because pretty much the only way we could stay safe was to force people over into the next lane. If we ride all polite-like people just take advantage of us and zoom by at unsafe speeds and distances. So sorry to all you people who have felt the need to snarl at us along the way from your horns and open windows...if we could trust everyone out there to drive nicely we wouldn't have to stop traffic just to get by narrow bridges, roads without shoulders, lanes with drop-offs, etc. Whew, a little venting there.

Back to the story...then we got a police escort. For the first time on this trip we encountered a neighborhood where we just couldn't go. White, on bikes, lots of gear = no passage through El Chorrillo. We were stopped by two men who were sports leaders through a local church in hopes of helping the barrio youth avoid joining gangs and getting involved with drugs and violence. They told us straight up that we would for sure get robbed if we continued on alone (an opinion that we heard repeatedly after arriving in the city, so it wasn't necessarily just hyperbole), so they called the national police to ensure us safe passage. We'll never know what may or may not have happened had we not met these two men, but we are grateful just the same. We followed the armed police truck along the waterfront lined with high-rise slum buildings. At one point we left an elementary school behind to the echoes of "Fuck you! Fuck you!" being hurled at us by a 9 year old. Just a few blocks out of one of the poorest urban areas we had seen, the scenery changed drastically, and we were left to our own devices to find lodging in the regentrified colonial neighborhood of Casco Viejo.

Casco Viejo is still a work in progress - UNESCO declared it a world heritage site so it is slowly being revitalized. Our hotel is stuck somewhere in limbo. At nearly 100 years old it used to house canal builders back in the day. Now, it is being renovated bit by bit. We were lucky enough to find it at just the perfect stage of ragged being replaced by modest comfort 'cause that means it's not too expensive - 15 bucks a night including breakfast. In exchange for bad carpet, a curtain that doesn't cover the window and no bathroom on our floor we get the luxury of a new mattress and sheets, funky lobby decor, a manual elevator straight out of Steampunk lovers' dreams, and original Spanish tile lining the walls and floors. The best, however, is a little terrace on the 4th floor with practically 360 degree views of the city. The poor elbows up next to the rich, and in one blink you can see the high-rise slums butting up against the Causeway teeming with BMWs and joggers.

Next up on our list of things to do is to pack up our disaster of a hotel room and move to the marina. There we'll camp for a few nights in the hope that some vessel will be willing to take two cyclists on an amazing ride up the canal. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Photos: Chandelier in the awesome elevator; view from the balcony, flags on the causeway, Eric exhausted after working on his wheel. Again. For several hours. Eric with one of his hard-earned coconuts