Flying to Panama Like A Rock Star.

The biggest perk about working for a little non-profit that uses flight and film as our educational tools... sometimes I get to ride in a sweet plane. Yup, the same aircraft as the trip to Uvita... this time, to Panama City!

I've been in Panama exactly 12 hours, and I have, like, four blog posts already. really. For tonight, let's start with the flight here.
This is northern Panama... although one of many factoids I will be sharing with you like a know-it-all is the actual experience, finally, of understanding how Panama is a country that runs east-west, not north-south. Check it out on a map, it's true.

This is a shrimp farm:
I know, I need to stop eating shrimp. You can see how the aquaculture replaces what was a healthy, functioning mangrove.

As you approach the city, you start to see ships.
Then a few more.

Then a few more! All the world's ships, waiting their turn. So awesome.
I was trying to show you the causeway, a recreation area for Panamanians, and really beautiful from 500 feet up. But the internet just jammed. Tomorrow!

And this is the city!!!! Great light, great pilot, great landing. I like to think... technically... see, the runway (pictured in a sec) is to the right of the Canal... as in, South America. Now I've been to South America, right?! Right? (The city is to the right, seen here.)

And then, the really effing awesomest part, sorry folks for the faux-profanity. But here is the Bridge of the Americas.... the bridge that links the Americas, the Pan-American Highway. So awesome.
Yes Meggie, that is the plane dashboard, and some instruments. A small plane is just that... small. You sit nearly shoulder-to-shoulder. It is much, much smaller than a car. Louder, without air-co or a radio. (Well, the music kind.)

And then I wanted to give you one pic of the runway, because runways are so much cooler and more welcome than I ever thought, when you start jetting around in a Cessna 206. This is an international airport, Albrooke, but for small planes - not the one Delta flies to. It's for smaller airlines and civil aviation. (But again, internet jamming. So tomorrow. It's a beaut of a runway.)

Yup, civil aviation is now part of my vocabulary.

Tomorrow... Casco Viejo and Fun Facts About Panama! Plus tapas and an after-dinner drink with a stranger. (I wasn't alone, sheesh. Stop worrying!)