Running! Whale watching!

 Running!

The saying "when it rains, it pours" seems particularly apt in Panama, so perhaps it's not so surprising that my search for running buddies was doubly rewarded last Saturday.  First, I got to run about 6K with a new friend from church.  She warned me that she was kind of out of shape, and I gave my favorite reply: I can run slower than anyone I run with.  It's my super-power.  So when Sofí wanted to walk up some of the hills we faced, I was 100% ready to support her.

Sweaty and happy.

Later that same day, there was a charity walk/run at the Cinta Costera, with hundreds upon hundreds of people in attendance raising money to fight childhood cancer.  A FUNDAPROMAT volunteer who'd heard I like running invited me to join her company's team.  I got the obligatory t-shirt (themed t-shirts are such a thing here), and started across the bridge with her group just ahead of a group that was marching with trombones.  Lovely!  

Most of the group I was with wanted to walk, but two young guys decided to run, and I joined them.  They immediately reverted to English, and we had a lovely conversation together.  (At some point they, too, switched to walking.  This little 4-second video was from a segment where we'd briefly started running again.)

So, 12 K of running/walking with other people.  Awesome!  That was Saturday.  And then Sunday . . . 

Whales!

With my friend/host, we headed out from the Amador Causeway on Sunday morning.  This causeway was built with some of the dirt excavated from the Canal; it connects a collection of islands off the south coast of Panama City, and it's a very touristy place to visit.  Of course, we had to take our photo by the PANAMÁ sign; that's obligatory.

Jeanette is standing between the A and N; I
m poking my head out of the middle A, with my orange hat on.

From there, we took a two-plus-hour boat ride through somewhat choppy seas.  It was invigorating.  I didn't get seasick (three of the 60 people on board did), although I admit that on Monday I was still having sensations of the world bobbing along on waves.

The breeze on board the ship was awesome.

Jeanette is (a) the one who really, really, REALLY wanted to see whales and (b) the one who loves taking photos, so I handed over photography to her for this trip (with one  exception below).  Here's one of her videos of the whales -- you can see the poofs of air and then fins; they dive and will return again toward the end, and there's even a tail fin!

Here's the official info from the excursion company, interspersed with some comments from me.  

🛥️ Traslado marítimo desde Panama city, Causeway de Amador

We left from the Amador Causeway, right on time. This company did a great job of reaching out to us in advance with directions and suggestions for things to bring.

🐳 Avistamiento de Ballenas Jorobadas

My family asked me afterward what kind of whales we saw, and I answered . . . um, the water kind? The pacific ocean kind? Okay, but this info says it was "ballenas jorobadas". That first word doesn't mean "ballerina", so they weren't ballerina whales, unfortunately. "Ballenas" means whales: these were humpback whales we saw.  Okay, so now I know.

🐳 Hidrófono que nos permitirá escuchar los cantos de ballenas o comunicación entre delfines en la embarcación

If anybody on the boat actually got to listen to whale songs, I didn't see that. We were told in advance that dolphins sightings were rare, and then we'd only get to see them if we were lucky. On this particular trip we were lucky to enough to see whales, but not lucky enough to see any dolphins.

🐳 Guías de sitio especializados en Fauna Silvestre y Biología marina

Our guides were excellent! Jeanette especially had fun talking to them, and might connect in the future to go visit turtles.

🐾 Cartillas de Identificación de peces, aves marinas & Cetáceos

There were laminated sheets that people could look at to help identify various kinds of fish, birds, and of course whales. I didn't actually look at these, though.

🐬 Visita a Isla Bartolomé

We attempted to visit this island, but the waves were so choppy couldn't land there. Instead, we spent more time at the next island.

🐬 Visita a Isla Pacheca

This island, we got to spend 2 or 3 hours at, after our whale sightings. By now, the waves had calmed down significantly. I swam a bunch in the lovely, warm water. I made a sand castle with many beautiful rounded rocks for decorations. For a while, I was rooting for the sand castle (and winning); then I got back in the ocean and started rooting for the waves, and eventually the waves vanquished the sand castle, so I won again.

🥙 Almuerzo (Arroz, Pollo y Plátano en tentación envuelto en hoja de bijao o Pide la opción vegetariana con el mix de veggies)

We ate lunch on the island, with only a little bit of rain coming down on us. The lunch was packaged really sustainably, wrapped in a giant green bijao leaf, with a bamboo fork to eat it. I tend to basically be happy for any kind of food, so I enjoyed it, but I can see why most of the other people on the ship said that the food was less tasty they would have expected for a cruise like this.

🐾Tobogán & Trampolín de la embarcación

🐾Tabla de Paddle & Kayak

These were fun: an inflatable slide and a water raft (not really a trampoline for jumping), and a standing board and kayak. With so many people on the boat, there were more people than boat toys, but I went down the slide 3 or 4 times before the line started, and hung out on the water raft after that. It was really relaxing.

🐾Cooler con Hielo (6 Bolsas)

🐾Tripulación Capacitada

🐾Botiquín y Seguridad

🐾Impuestos de Zarpe en la Autoridad Marítima

This was all admin stuff: yes, they had coolers for our snacks, trained crew, life jackets and boats, and our fees covered the sailing tax.

Here's the one picture I did take.  The island of Pacheca was as beautiful as you'd expect a tropical island to be.  We spent our time on the beach to the right of this outcrop, and the waters were magnificent.  This view of the outcrop (taken from the boat) was heartrendingly beautiful in person -- the waves lapping at the base of the rocks; the tree and ferns and moss hanging down from the top; the white house just barely visible through the trees; the geology of the outcropping appearing in striking visible stripes.  My cellphone camera doesn't do it justice.  

It had rained lightly off and on during our trip, but the fact that the day was a bit overcast was actually a true blessing, because we didn't have to deal with harsh glare of the sun bouncing off the water, and the temperatures were moderate (for Panama).   The trip back was just as long, but with many fewer waves, so it was a lot calmer.  I got back home at 6 p.m., and then the day's real deluge started, so we lucked out on the weather in many ways.