Southern Exposure

Thursday, January 8

We followed our standard border crossing day plan and rose early. We ate breakfast and said farewell to the beautiful Costa Rican ocean view. Following up on the tip about a small town border crossing, I researched on ADV and found a great guide to finding your way to Rio Sereno. We decided it would be worth the extra riding to avoid the monstrously busy crossing along the main highway. We rode down the coast until it reconnected with the Panamerican, but road away from the border rather than towards it. Riding the entirety of 237 seemed better than the guide’s choice of riding the Panamerican and then going north before the border.

We rode north along the highway following a river. Naturally, since we were leaving the beach, it was finally a flawless sunny day. The course of the river gave the road a nice series of curves to follow and we wound our way towards our turnoff.

The road was paved, but narrow and it quickly climbed uphill to ride along a ridge line between two valleys. This was a real treat as we had splendid views of the Costa Rican landscape on both sides of us. After about an hour, we reached our turnoff town where we filled up our tanks and asked the police for directions to the border. Since there are hardly ever street signs, we weren’t sure we were going the right way, but the GPS did show us heading towards the border.

After only a few miles on the dirt road, we reached Rio Sereno. At the intersection of two dirt roads there was the Costa Rican aduana and immigration, and the Panamanian immigration and aduana. We were the only travelers here so there were no lines and no “helpers”. It seemed too good to be true. We checked ourselves out of Costa Rica and I walked into town to buy our Panamanian tourist stamps. We got stamped in and moved the bikes over to the aduana. It was a rocky, steep downhill and poor Inna fell over while turning into park.

The aduana process went reasonably quickly. The border agent was very sloppy in typing up our paperwork and I was constantly correcting his spellings and VIN numbers. Once through, we went to the obligatory fumigation. The lady doing the fumigation turned on the taps for maybe 1/10 of a second and absolutely nothing came out of the sprayers. She insisted we take some cloths and wipe down the bikes to remove the non existent pesticides from the controls so we didn’t get sick. I don’t know if she really thought she had sprayed the bikes or if she was just going through the motions.

We were on our way and soon riding through more lush countryside. The road was a great ride, with much tighter turns than we had seen in a while. The Panamanian engineers seem to like sharp corner entries with late apexes. We stopped on the road to take some pictures and a local rider we had passed stopped to see what we were up to. He was some sort of salesman who traveled by motorcycle. After chatting for a bit, he rode off and it started to rain. We rode through it until we passed Panama’s large volcano, ???, which was as usual hidden behind the clouds. I’m sure it’s pretty. We stopped and put some rain gear on, which signaled the heavens to stop raining.

We descended from the hills back to the Panamerican and we were shortly in David, Panama. It was getting dark as we looked for a cheap hotel. We finally found a reasonable hotel with secure parking and after making a quick trip to the store for water and juices, we retired for the night.

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Friday, January 9

This day was a proper transit day. It was 440 kilometers to Panama City, and we only stopped for gas. The scenery was neither beautiful nor ugly and not terribly memorable. The road was nearly straight, so we just cranked out the miles.

In the late afternoon we took the exit for the Puente Las Americas, the famous Bridge of the Americas that crosses the Panama Canal. As we approached the bridge, traffic began to congest and move slowly. The bridge itself is a huge steel trellis arch crossing the Panama Canal. The traffic was moving slowly because two lanes were closed, but even with the traffic, the exhaust, and the intense heat and humidity, it was immensely gratifying to be crossing the Panama Canal. This was a major milestone for our trip as it signaled we had reached the end of our North American journey. I had a huge smile on my face as I looked out at all of the freighters and tankers parked outside the mouth of the canal waiting for their clearance to enter.

My joy was short lived. Once off the bridge the traffic got worse and we were both soaked through with sweat from the heat. I roughly knew where our hotel for the night was located, but I hadn’t counted on the maze of Panama City. Unlike most of the colonial towns we had been in, Panama City was not based on a grid. It was a series of occasionally connect, non parallel one way streets. The major streets are marked, but the vast majority of streets seem to have no street signs so it was a real pain to figure out where you were. Naturally, the route I had previously chosen to get to our hotel consisted entirely of one way streets going the wrong way.

At one point we stopped to look at our city map, and a stranger pulled up and asked us if we needed directions. It turns out he was a fellow rider and I think even an ADV member. Miraculously I had stopped to look at the map only two turns from our hotel. After making the first turn, we came across Casa de Carmen, a full but well recommended hostel. As we rode by, we noticed Gregory’s distinctive bike with the reptile skin stickers covering the tank parked up front. We had been expecting to meet up with him again in Panama City, but not quite so easily. We went in to chat and make plans to get together later.

Panama City was very booked, as we had tried many, many hotels before we found a vacancy. Baru Bed and Breakfast was very nice, with an incredibly modern interior including a plasma TV in our room, and the best shower yet! Unfortunately, we were paying for the luxury. Luxury did not include secure parking so we parked the bikes in the very back of the property hidden in the shadows. Once settled in, we scoured the internet for a cheaper hotel for the next night, but no luck, we’d be staying another night. We crossed the street to Panaderia Noel (the famous city bakery), bought some tasty sandwiches, and spent the remaining evening hours enjoying our plasma TV.