Saturday, April 11, 2020

PANAMA and COIBA ISLAND

THE BIG DIG, DAVID LEE ROTH and MARIANO RIVERA
As a travel destination Panama was never on my radar, and for that matter neither was Costa Rica. All I knew about Panama was the canal, the song from Van Halen, which was really about a stripper, and a vague recollection that the Hall of Fame pitcher Mariano Rivera of the New York Yankees was Panamanian.

Well, this sailing adventure along the Pacific coast of Central America had proved to be a lovely surprise for the Costa Rican part of the trip. The beauty of the land, the biodiversity of the birds, animals and plants, the black sand beaches, the coffee and the Cacique had made Costa Rica an unexpectedly delightful visit. Topping those experiences in nearby Panama would only be possible if I got a chance to play catch with Mariano, or so I thought. Panama proved to be as worthy a destination with its own set of beauty and experiences.

HOW DID I GET HERE?
Serendipity and chance were very kind to us on this trip, because we simply followed a deal without any preferred destination, and we were rewarded handsomely. We just wanted to be somewhere warm in February.

We booked this trip in mid-December for a mid-February departure through Unforgettable Cruises, which is effectively last minute. Revenue is forever lost whenever a ship leaves port with empty berths, and we had seen the half-price special offered on their website. We had sailed with Unforgettable Cruises in Croatia last summer and the level of comfort and the range of experiences had us coming back. Turns out Unforgettable was helping another small yacht company Variety Cruises in the booking, but there was no drop off in care or comfort. In fact, with Variety we were alone on the Pacific, whereas our July trip in Croatia was a somewhat crowded race up the Adriatic with several other cruise lines plying the waters.

Good Advice:
Always check the specials offered by Unforgettable Cruises, and Variety Cruises, the two companies we traveled with this past year. You’ll never know where you’ll end up.



WHERE AM I?
Our last stop in Costa Rica was at Corcovado National Park, but before the M/S Panorama could leave for Panama, she had to rendezvous with customs and immigrations officials coming out of Golfito to pay an “exit clearance fee” and to check passenger and crew lists. At the time I thought this was out of the ordinary because of the Coronavirus pandemic that was just starting to spread, but was assured that although immigration officials could demand a full-face control of passenger and crew against passports, they just randomly checked the paperwork and paid the fee. This was normal procedure and not related to Covid19.

Once the ship pays its “exit clearance fee” she is not allowed to call on any other Costa Rican port or territory and must sail away.

Incidentally Costa Rica does require an “exit fax” whether flying out of the country or crossing the border overland. The airport fee is $29 usd or the equivalent in colones and this is usually included in your airline ticket. Check beforehand to avoid confusion at departure. The fee for crossing into Nicaragua or Panama by land is $7.00.

Here is the US State Department’s website on the exit tax:

TO HELL AND BACK
By 9 am we were still sailing for Coiba island, the largest of the 38 islands in the 430.000-acre Coiba National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2005. The beautiful and isolated Coiba Island is the largest island in all of Central America and has remained pristine and untouched from human contact. According to UNESCO Coiba’s Pacific Tropical rainforest maintains an exceptionally high levels of endemic animals, plants and birds because of “the ongoing evolution of NEW SPECIES” and is the last refuge of many rare and threatened animals that have disappeared from the rest of Panama like the crested eagle and the scarlet macaw. Abundant marine life in the park includes over 700 fish species, 33 shark species like hammerhead and whale sharks, the largest fish that can approach 20 meters in length, and 20 different species of marine mammals, like dolphins, orcas and humpback whales.
COIBA ISLAND PANAMA

The isolation and subsequently the conservation of Coiba Island proper has a dark history. Once a notorious penal colony Coiba was Panama’s version of Devil’s Island, the infamous French prison island off the French Guiana coast. The prison operated from 1919 to 2004 under deplorable conditions. The most dangerous felons and enemies of the state were sent there, some to cells and others to live in camps where groups of men fended for themselves by farming and ranching the land. Some men were sent to Coiba for a specified time, others stayed until they died. Stories of torture and of mass graves and dismembered bodies being fed to sharks still persist as Coiba was home to “Los Desaparecidos”, ‘the Disappeared’ during the dictatorships of Omar Torrijos and Manuel Noreiga. Hundreds perhaps thousands of political prisoners were dumped on Coiba, never to be heard from again.

This dark history of Panama has actually preserved the natural isolated beauty of Coiba and has flourished because many Panamanians, tourists and developers fearful of this dark place have stayed away after the prison was shuttered. Except for the crumbling structures of the penal colony, slowly being reclaimed by the jungle, much of the island is untouched. Today access to the park is highly restricted and accessible only by permits issued by the woefully underfunded Autoridad Nacional del Ambeinte or ANAM. The rangers’ task is daunting; to supervise the vast area and to protect if from poachers and illegal tree logging. 
 
VIEW FROM COIBA ISLAND
The ANAM maintains a small ranger station on the north side of the island where we finally spent a relaxing day on the beach and hiking around the immediate area including up a steep hill where we were rewarded by a beautiful view of the nearby islands of Coiba National Park. At the station there are several modest two-room cabins, with air conditioning, for overnight stays. Tour operators from the mainland offer ecotours, fishing, scuba diving and snorkeling trips and we watched several such groups come ashore to have lunch in the small pavilion. The crew of the Panorama also came ashore to provide us a Greek BBQ lunch.  Variety Cruises is a Greek enterprise.

ECOTOURISM?
Part of the allure of Coiba National Park is that it is possible to see whale sharks. The season to see these massive, but docile fish as they migrate through Coiba’s waters runs from January to April. Whale sharks often swim near the surface with their massive mouths wide open to capture the plankton they eat. Some tour groups offer scuba diving for around $150 or snorkeling trips for around $30 to see the whale sharks that feed near the islands of Coiba at this time. Usually the tour operators operate out of the fishing village of Santa Catalina on the mainland.
JUVENILE WHALE SHARK

Sadly, these beautiful endangered creatures are sought after for their fins, meat, and oil and according to the WWF even shark tourism presents a threat as it can interrupt their feeding. Because of their massive size these rarely seen gentle giants travel great distances in search of plankton and where the whale shark shows up is a good indicator of the health of the ocean. 

A few years ago, scientists tagged a whale shark, and she was recorded as having made an incredible migration journey of 12,000 miles. It was tagged in Coiba’s waters and eventually ended up near the Philippines. You can read that story here:

After our very satisfying and filling lunch we headed to a small beach on another nearby island to snorkel. Our little group was the only one there. The coral was beautiful and I followed a sea turtle for a while. He allowed me to keep up with him for a while as he kept looking over his shoulder at me before losing interest and gliding away effortlessly.


After dinner on the Panorama I decided to smoke a cigar, I had one left over from our stop in Quepos, Costa Rica and as I lingered over my martini I was joined by a number of other passengers as well as a flock (?) of beautiful moths that hitched a ride through the night This was a beautiful trip and a fantastic first day in Panama..

Thanks for reading. I guess I can’t say Pura Vida any longer because we no longer were in Costa Rica, but that serene feeling remains. 

SMALL SHIP PANORAMA COMES UP BIG
I would be remiss if I did not give a special nod to the crew of the M/S Panorama. We are safe at home now, but the crew of the Panorama are still out there and recently came to the rescue of Cuban crew members who were stranded because of the global pandemic and repatriated them to Havana. The Panorama was refueling in Barbados ahead of a transatlantic crossing returning to Greece when they learned 19 healthy crew members of the MSC Preziosa, a supersized cruise ship, were stranded with no appreciable way of getting home. Variety Cruises accepted a request from the Cuban government to repatriate the healthy crew, a seven day journey in the opposite direction from home. Cuba paid for the fuel, but Variety asked for no other compensation. It's an incredible story of kindness in this new normal we are living through. 

In case you're wondering. I never saw Van Halen in concert, but I did run into David Lee Roth at a Bottom Line show in NYC. He was drunk. 

Our version of Panama is much better.



LIVE LOVE TRAVEL 


© 2020 by Greg Dunaj

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