Taboga Island

We decided that we had spent enough time in the city, and thought we would head out for one night to Taboga Island. Taboga island is a small island on the Pacific side of Panama with a population of 900. When we first arrived we walked around and discovered that there was only one hotel on the island (which makes sense for an island with a population of 900). So, we rented a room, but were kind of ripped off and paid 77 for the night. We then began to walk through town. The town was obviously tinny, but was very beautiful. The center of town was a church that was over 500 years old, and is the second oldest church in the western hemisphere. The church was playing music, mostly Christmas themed, which I would have thought to be annoying, but as it turns out was very surreal, and made the whole town just seem nice. You could hear the music faintly over everywhere on the island, it was kind of cool, and made the whole island even more surreal.

We then walked out of town and began to hike to the top of the island, where there was a giant cross overlooking the rest of the island. As it turns out it was a cool walk, and was a good warm up for the Volcano which we planned to hike in a few days. The only issue was that we had sandals on, and it was difficult to climb without traction. The top was really cool, and you could see the whole town, and still hear the music from the church, which was really awesome. Mike then began to sing "Te gusta Banditos" over and over again, which became kind of the theme song of the rest of our trip.

When we got back, we changed and went to the beach. It was actually really dirty, and had garbage everywhere, which isn't what you expect for these remote islands, but it was the case. We went in the ocean, but the water was so salty, we just got out and laid on the beach. After a while we got bored, we played with the sand, and eventually buried me completely in the sand.

After that we went back to the hotel, and realized that they also had a monopoly on restaurants, so we were forced to eat an expensive dinner there as well. After dinner we walked around, but obviously the town doesn't have too much going on, so we ended up just making silly drawings in the sand.

The next morning we headed back to Panama City.