My companions in Portobelo
With all my talk about my solo trip to Tenerife, you may be wanting to rush out on your own adventures. While I highly recommend solo travel, it is only fair to represent both sides of the coin. So, with that in mind, I’ll tell the story of my drive to Portobelo, from my trip to Panama in 2010: a time I missed having a companion!
It began, as many of my misadventures do, with a rash decision. Waking up early has its charms, but also gives you a few hours before the rest of the city wakes up. So, at 7AM on Monday, after having four cups of coffee, toast with honey ”cambiara tu vida” [not sure the honey will actually change my life, but it is really tasty], showered and dressed, I decided I would rent a car and drive to Portobelo.
I had read books about Pirates while dreaming about Panama and Portobelo is a Spanish colonial town that the Pirates invaded multiple times during the 16-18th centuries. It’s about 70 miles away from the city, on the Carribean Coast [Panama City is on the Pacific Ocean]. On Saturday I had taken a tour with Kevin, an American guide, and he told me that getting to Portobelo was really easy…just rent a car from the domestic airport, follow the Panama Canal till you hit the toll road till it ends at Sabanitas and follow the sign to Portobelo. Piece of cake!
Not so fast…literally. My first clue should have been the 45 minutes I waited at the Hertz counter for the dot matrix printer to be fixed, but I was too excited to notice. By 9AM I was on the road! My white Nissan Sentra featured rollup windows and manual locks, but did have a decent stereo. I was jammin to what I later realized was Christian Tropical…”El diablo quiere que abres la boca, por que sabes que eres Mentirosa” [The devil wanted you to open your mouth, because he knows you’re a liar!]…and all was well for about 2 hours. The views of the canal were astounding, including watching a barge being lifted through San Pedro Locks, and the toll road rivaled any Interstate in the states, with absolutely no traffic.
And then, Sabanitas. The toll road ended into everyone’s worst stereotype of a Latin American town. Literally hundreds of people milled IN the streets, chickens everywhere, men who could have been cast in ”Romancing the Stone” eyeing me lasciviously. I”m sure I have been in places that were statistically more dangerous [The green line of the DC Metro comes to mind], but I will confess to feeling some panic for the 10 minutes it took me to navigate this pueblo. The sign to Portobelo couldn’t have come faster.
Ah, relief! About 10 minutes along a lovely country road later, I spot the Carribean, and 10 minutes after that, the first sight in Portobelo. By now it’s about 12.30. Portobelo is famous for two forts, which my guide book says are at opposite ends of the bay. I tramp around this one for a few minutes, then head back into my car. Almost immediately, I notice a small town to my left, but the sign in front of me says ‘Portobelo” with an arrow pointing straight, so who am I to argue…
…I kept saying for more than 90 minutes. The views were stunning, I still had lots of shoutouts to ”Christo!” jammin on the radio, and all was well. Granted, I was getting on more and more rural land, and after those 90 minutes even Christo had abandoned me. But, everytime I felt like I was lost, I saw a sign that authoritatively said “”Portobelo”” and sighed that sigh of relief. Until I realized that it had been ten minutes since I had even seen a cinderblock and corrugated tin roof hut and I had no cell reception. The thought ”if I blow a tire, I’m so screwed”” was now creeping into my vacation mindset. And then I saw the sign. Ah, Portobelo! Wait a minute. This sign points straight, right, and left. AT THE SAME TIME. It was at this point I remembered something I had read somewhere on the internet, although it wasn’t in my guidebook…Portobelo is not only the name of the historical site, but also the 12000 Hectare national park. ” I AM SO SCREWED” now moved to the front of my mind and parked there.
10 minutes later I flagged down the first human I saw, a six year old, who pointed me towards the town of Portobelo. At 315, I arrived at the town not 1/2 mile from where I started, which contained the 2nd fort. And it started to rain. No, not rain, pour buckets in the way only tropical rainstorms can pour. No mind, I came to see this fort, I’m going to see it, dammit! So I tromped around for a few minutes and decided to return to Panama City.
No problem, right…not so fast! The pleasant rural roads to Portobelo had now become streams I had to ford in my Nissan Sentra. The drive from Sabanitas that took an easy 20 minutes took a harrowing hour on the way back. The upside was that the Sabanitas banderos decided to go inside so the town was empty in the downpour. I hydroplaned through the town and was never so happy to see a toll road in my life! The day ended with me navigating rush hour traffic in Panama City…imagine your worst metro traffic jam with the added fun of no respect for your own life or property…and a double shot of rum!
So, the lesson here is…if you’re going to rent a car in Panama, be sure to have a bottle of Havana Club waiting for you at home!
Please share your mis-adventures!