We walked out of the port area thinking the the Uber would be easier and cheaper outside. We wanted to walk up Ancon Hill for views. We found an affordable Uber at $4.50; however, it got lost(?) and kept getting further away based on time to arrival and not moving much on the map. All while taxis kept coming by and honking to get our attention and see if we wanted a ride. Travis went to talk to one while I was determining if I could cancel the Uber. It was looking good, and within that time, the taxi price dropped from $15 to $5. Though with waiting time used, we were running out of time for our hike up the the hill. Also, we hit traffic to our drop off point to the hike, which had traffic going the wrong way in order to turn around for the drop off point.
We saw this carving with a school field trip or scouts meeting around it. We needed to allow 45 minutes to hike up the hill. I'm also not fast up hills. We also needed to meet our monkey boat tour at 11am in the old town.
So, we decided to head to old town, called Casco Viejo. Unfortunately, we needed to walk through El Chorrillo, which we had flagged as an area to avoid. Maybe we would have had to walk through it after the hike too. We backtracked to avoid the pedestrian bridge over the busy road because it looked like people were sleeping on it. We had no issues. Arriving in Casco Viejo, we explored and then found the hotel where our monkey boat tour was meeting. I originally booked directly with Your Friend Mario, but then realized after I put that we were coming on a cruise ship that they expected us to get to Gamboa, where the boat dock was ourselves. This was about 34 minute Uber ride. Someone on YouTube recommended this company, but when they went, a pick up at port was still offered. The cruise port is on an island called Fuerte Amador (I believe that we learned that this island was manmade from dirt dug out of the canal in the book by David McCullough) and Panama City is a long causeway away. This book is highly recommended before a Panama Canal trip -- The Path Between the Seas. When My Friend Mario seem to not be able to move us to a hotel pick on the direct booking (I was emailing), I ended up booking the same company on Viator. It cost less and let us be picked at an old town hotel. I still think that it is confusing picking a pick up spot on Viator, but it worked. My Friend Mario whatsapp'ed a different hotel pick up the day before and an estimated arrival time and van number. With Travis's eSim hotspot, I got the communication, and they communicated well. Unfortunately, the new hotel location was under construction, the inside was gutted, I was hoping to get to use the restroom in our original hotel (they did stop on the tour before arriving at the boat dock with no restrooms for restrooms). With the construction, several trucks were blocking the area, there was a lot of traffic slowly moving through the intersection, and the window glass delivery arrived right before our scheduled pick up time. The glass needed to cross the street between the traffic.
On with the old town exploration. The Panamanian flag. Church of the Mercy had a beautiful wood ceiling. The remnants of another church.
Metropolitan Cathedral Basilica of Santa Maria the Ancient
Several people on our FB roll call were going on this Tomi car tour; it is Travis's sister's name. Interesting building and the Panama City skyline. We saw this one from the old town and the ship, it was further east than old town. We did not go to the big city part, and I was surprise that Panama City was so big with many skyscrapers.
Pictures from the Paseo de Las Bóvedas viewpoint. Some birds. Our ship and a big house across the water.
A rooster statue on the Panama Canal Monument, which is dedicated the French role in building the Panama Canal. The building behind had attracted birds. This building had vendors along the outside.
Biomuseo and Bridge of the Americas.
We then walked to the hotel for our tour pickup and waited, covered in part 2. After our tour, since there was a pick up at the Radisson Hotel, closer to the cruise port, we decided to get off here after the tour. Our walk back -- the Korea Friendship Monument. Travis found a lemonade shaved ice for the walk. Views of a big container ship going under the bridge and a pretty hill.
The park that we walked through; it was along the canal. A bird in the tree that I could not identify. We arrived at Biomuseo. It looked interesting to visit, but our tour took up too much of the day, and it closed early.
Back on the causeway. There were bike riders and joggers. It was hot and humid. On the other side, there were rental bikes available. There was also a little carnival setup. Our ship. The port was very modern.
Viking came through the canal and docked overnight beside us. They got to go ashore in the evening; I heard the announcement.
