B.A.B.E. Week 19: Who knew Panama was great for a 4-month old?

This past week of vacation was all about the "B" and "E" aspects of B.A.B.E.dom:  baby and exploration.   Wilson and I got to spend tons of time with Elle.  In fact, Elle seemed to really miss Wilson when he left the house on Monday.   And as for exploration?  Wilson went easy on me for this vacation.   Instead of our usual hectic pace of constant movement, we only slept in two places – El Vallé de Anton and Panama City.   We also visited a couple of beaches on our drive from El Vallé to Panama City.   And out of these locales, the highlight for me was Panama City.

We stayed in El Vallé first.  El Vallé is a small town in the rainforest about a two hour drive from Panama City.   It was amazing to be in a rainforest after living in the Bahamas.   This is because the island that we live on in The Bahamas is surprisingly not as rich in species as you would think.  Sure, the ocean and coral reefs provide a lot of biodiversity but the landmass of our island, New Providence, is not as conducive to the evolution of life.  This may be because there are no river ecosystems or very little topsoil.   But in any case, it was nice to be in a mountainous rain forest of one of the most bio-diverse countries in the world.   

Biodiversity or species richness came in at several points of our trip even though we were only in Panama from Tuesday night to Sunday morning.   First, the lushness of El Vallé was incredible.  And it was so nice to hear the calls of frog (super loud and like video game noises) as we walked to dinner from our airbnb.   Then, when we were visiting beaches on our way to Panama city, we saw a very disturbing sight – a dead hacked sea turtle.  What made this sad sight even more disturbing was the fact that the dead turtle was only 300 hundred feet from a marked sea turtle conservation nesting site.  Very sad to think about the human beings who seemingly  kill this beautiful and threatened creature for no reason.

Frank Gehry Biomuseum

The last important aspect of biodiversity of our trip was Frank Gehry’s new biodiversity museum in Panama City.  It was a fantastic museum (although currently small with enlargement plans).   Throughout the museum, Elle was an angel throughout our visit.  We had her in our BECO Gemini carrier outward facing while she was awake and inward facing while she was sleep.   When she is outward facing, she is displaying her full charismatic skills.  She is now shrieking with laughter to communicate with people and stuffing her hand in her mouth to self-soothe.  And then, when she is inward facing, she can sleep for up to 90 minutes (not as long as when she was an infant but still a good stretch).

Elle seemed to enjoy the time in the carrier and the stroller in Panama.  Surprisingly, Panama felt cooler than the Bahamas.  So we could be out and about during the day more often. Also, there are some great paths in Panama City for our stroller so we were able to take Elle out exploring with multiple modes of transportation.   The Gehry museum and the accessibility of Panama City wasn't the only thing that made the city so great.   Of course, there is the Panama Canal, which is on par with the engineering feat of the Great Pyramids.  So it was cool to see parts of the Panama Canal and learn that, until 4 million years ago, there was no need for a Panama Canal because Panama didn't exist and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans weren't split.   This is one of the reasons for the extent of Panama's biodiversity.  I would love to take Elle back when she is older to witness more of Panama's biodiversity.

Because of the shortness of our stay in Panama, we didn't get to explore as much of its biodiversity as I would have liked.  And that's why I think the least-specie rich part of the trip was actually my fave -- Panama City.  In Panama City, we stayed in the old part of the city -- Casco Viejo.  To be fair, much of Casco Viejo has been rebuilt but it is still charming and most important -- urban.  Urbanity is something that Wilson and I have really missed in The Bahamas.  Here, we have to drive to restaurants, to see friends, coffee shops, etc.  Staying in the Casco Viejo neighborhood of Panama City meant that we could walk to an abundance of interesting places --restaurants, markets, coffee shops, etc.   Experiencing a new place by my own locomotion is an important part to me of the "exploration" aspect of "B.A.B.E.dom"  and Panama really delivered in this aspect.