Cabana in Panama-Santa Clara Beach

We spent a great day at the beach. It was about two hours away from Panama and we saw about 10 people the whole time we were here. They had cabanas for rent for $10! The sun was hot and the only one who has a sunburn thus far is me! The boys had a great time playing in the waves, digging in the sand and hanging out in the cabana. I spent four hours laying on that hammock and reading!! It was paradise :-)

Panama

Panama is a tale of two cities. All of these were taken from inside our windows. I don't want to make our family a target with my camera. The first picture is some housing right below us. As you can see no roof. It rains a lot here. The second picture also out side our window is the entrance to the canal. You can see the boats waiting to enter. The canal saves them over 7,800 miles and it takes eight hours to get through it. The third picture high rises right next to the roofless home.

More pictures

Everyone dresses up for everything. Hiking 1,000 feet to a volcano heels yes!

Chris and the boys in front of the volcano

The boys in front of a coffee plantation.

The hydrangea's are huge!

Costa Rica -Volcano Paos

This is the back side of a leaf by Volcano Poas in Costa Rica.
We could not see the volcano too much fog but got to see the lagoon.

This is called a poor man's umbrella and our whole family could fit under it if needed. The leaves kept getting bigger the higher up we hiked.

An amazing waterfall on the side of the road about 30 minutes away from the volcano.

La Sabana Park and The Multiplaza Mall

We spent a lot of time yesterday at La Sabana Park which is the size of Lafortune Park in Tulsa. It was a great park with lots of trees and a big pond in the middle. This was my first time to see a Costa Rican squirrel and they more orange than brown and smaller. I tried to get a picture but it was fast and scared of me! I only saw one and it made me a bit homesick.

The mall was like the Galleria in Houston. It was huge and every American store possible. Also, the food court reminded me of stepping into the food court in Woodland except it was bigger and no authentic Costa Rican food to be found. The children were very excited about Subway. The mall did boast an impressive three McDonald's. The prices of everything were crazy. It was $40 for the four of us to eat in a food court. I was longing for a Costa Rican soda (diner).

It is getting chilly here which makes it hard to swim in the pool at the hotel. We are leaving for Panama tommorrow and the forecast there is 88 degress. It is bittersweet leaving Costa Rica, I really have enjoyed the natural beauty of the area but the children are very excited about seeing the Canal and checking out the beaches there.

Children's Museum

We spent the day at the Children's Museum. It was a great museum and occupies what was once a prison. They have converted the cells into exhibits. The children really enjoyed the avaition exhibit. They had a Boeing 737 cockpit the kids got to play in. They could have stayed in that thing all day.

Animals Everywhere

We have seen some amazing animals over the last few days including the vulenerable Squirrel Monkey. They are on the list because of deforestation, hunting and being taken to be kept as pets. They are adorable animals and full of personality but I'm not sure about a monkey as a pet. We were eating breakfast in our room and I looked up to see these little monkeys peeking over the roof right at us. They would peek over look at us then jump to a tree about 5 feet away. They had about 30 in the group and were very interested in the kids. The kids watched them jumping (first picture) around on the trees and on our roof for about 30 minutes. They were watching us the whole time. We also got to see two beautiful toucans. We stopped at a Costa Rican bar (I thought it was a restaurant) called Iguanas and there were two toucans who had taken up residence in a tree 10 feet from the tables. It was so much fun listening to 80's rock music with beautiful birds moving slowly beside us. They turn thier heads so slowly they look like robotic birds.