Beth: The night before we got to Panama, I started getting sick. Stomach-issues sick. Ever the hypochondriac, I was sure I was running a fever and would need to take CIPRO before it was all over with. Lauren and I also were wary of the warnings about the budget area of Panama (”don’t walk outside after dark”) so we decided to splurge for the night and get a nicer, air conditioned hotel room in Congrejo - the business district.

We checked in and went upstairs to our clean, king-sized bed with cable TV and Lauren watched old movies while I journeyed between the bed and the bathroom.

Later that afternoon I started feeling better, so we took a taxi to the bus station and bought our tickets to Bocas Del Toro, where we would be heading the next day.

One the way back, we ran a few errands before going up to the room. Two women we talking in the hallway, and we passed them, unlocked the door to our room and walked in.

The first thing I noticed was that the bed was made. It didn’t make sense, since we had just checked in, for a maid to be in the room. Then I turned around a noticed my backpack wasn’t there either — nor was anything we owned.

Lauren: After taking stock on the bed and processing that someone had been in the room, I looked immediately to the table and noticed that our Palm Pilot was gone. I whirled around the room, looking for our stuff, and then Beth said…

“Everything is gone!”

My mind went into 1984 DOS mode, clicking through various options, and then assessing their viability…

C:>They thought we hadn’t paid and came and took our stuff to store it.
C:>ERROR
C:>There was a problem with the room and they had to take our stuff out.
C:>ERROR
C:>They wanted to move us for some reason.
C:>ERROR
C:>Everything got stolen. Everything is gone.
C:>EVERYTHING IS GONE!

It seemed the only possible answer, and my heart started racing. I had one last thought.

C:>This isn’t our room.

Beth: Lauren ran from the room and checked the number on the door. It was 220, not room 216 — our room. We ran passed the women who must have heard us screaming that ‘everything was gone’ and opened the door to our room. Everything was perfectly in place.

After we managed to calm down (and the women outside had gone back into their rooms), we went and checked the lock again on room 220. Yes, it was locked. Yes, our key worked perfectly in it. Lauren sneaked down the hall to another room and tried the door. It didn’t work. So while the key wasn’t universal, the rest of the time we were at the hotel, we were constantly nervous that someone else might accidentally barge into our room with their key.

We convinced ourselves to leave the room again anyway, wanting to visit the Causeway, a road connecting several islands and the end of the canal that was supposed to be a beautiful, touristy area with lots of restaurants.

To get there, we jumped on a Diablo Roja (”Red Devil”), the local bus, into the downtown area. From there, we wanted to catch another bus to the causeway.

Unfortunately, our guidebook was a little vague on exactly where we could catch this second bus. Lauren asked a police officer who pointed out a matatu-looking minivan and we made a run for it.

We took the matatu all the way to the end of the causeway, planning on walking back. But where we had been let off, there were fun water-side restaurants with great views of the city, so we decided to stay where we were.

The outside tables were crowded, so we asked a waiter about the possibility of getting a seat. He pointed to a table that was almost ready to leave, so we waited patiently for them to pay their bill.

While we were waiting for the table to be cleared off, a very large Panamanian woman and her very large daughter went and sat down. Lauren ran over, smiling and nicely explained in Spanish that we had been waiting for the table.

“Well, I’m here now!” the woman rudely replied.

Lauren tried to keep her calm while she argued with the woman in Spanish that we were in line (a great way to practice one’s Spanish), and even the waiter came over to explain as well, but the rude woman refused to give up.

Eventually the waiter pointed out another table to us and this time, we sat down the second they got up to leave.

Lauren enjoyed her salmon lasagna and Panama’s Balboa beer while I choked down a gingerale and bread before having to go back to the hotel again with stomach issues.

That night, our digital camera stopped working. It had developed some issues in Chile — the lens did not want to close, or sometimes, it didn’t want to open. We had developed some techniques for tricking it, but our usual tricks weren’t working.

The next day were going to go to the Panama Canal. We couldn’t not get photos — or not have photos for the rest of our trip — so we decided to spend the morning trying to find a cheap digital camera.

The first place we stopped that morning was hopeful — while they didn’t have the best digital cameras, they were less than $200 — and because we were in Panama, we discovered, there weren’t enormous import or sales taxes.

After wandering a couple of blocks, we spotted a huge electronics store and went in. The had exactly what we wanted — the 7 megapixel upgraded version of our current camera. It was $260 — less than I feared but more than we wanted — but we managed to barter him down to $250 and bought it.

Satisfied with our purchase, we jumped on another Red Devil bus and went into town. Again, we couldn’t find the stop, but after a few wrong turns and darting across four lanes of traffic (twice), we managed to get on a sweltering school bus that was heading our direction.

The bus dropped us off at a sign that said “Miraflores Locks” on the side of the highway, but there wasn’t anything in sight but a long road. Lauren and I started walking, watching people zip by in minivans run by tour companies.

After about 20 minutes, we finally saw the building. We decided to grab a quick snack since we hadn’t eaten anything all day, but as we ordered some empanadas, we heard an announcement of a boat coming through the lock.

We ran up the stairs in time to see a massive tanker being towed in. Lauren and I ogled and shot pictures as the boat was slowly pulled into place, and then the water slowly drained to lower the boat. Little tow trucks then pulled it to the next part and it was lowered again.

The whole process took 30-40 minutes, but we were enraptured the whole time…. as well as preoccupied by trying to take photographs around the large crowd that had gathered.

Afterwards, we went inside to check out the exhibit and movies. It had the history of the building of the canal, large insects native to the areas, and even a fun simulation of driving a boat into the canal. (I think I wrecked it.)

At 5pm, announcements were made that the building was shutting down. The only part that would stay open was a restaurant, so Lauren and I went to check it out. After inquiring about the cost of the buffet ($19!), we decided that we’d head to the causeway where food was slightly cheaper.

We had planned to take a taxi back, since it was going to be dark soon and the 20 minute walk back to the highway to flag down a bus wasn’t appealing. When we went outside, however, there were no taxis in sight. We wandered around in the heat for a while asking several people, all of whom told us that yes, there are normally taxis but no, there aren’t any here for some unknown reason.

Finally a guard offered to call us a cab and it arrived 10 minutes later. We headed to the edge of the causeway, where Lauren ate nachos and I snacked on plain potatoes while looking out over the water.

Afterwards, we got a cab back to our hotel and grabbed our bags before heading to the bus station to catch the bus to Boca Del Toro, our first beach in months and where our friend Kassie would be joining us.