I had been wanting to get away from the everyday annoyances of working in the city—the car horns and the phone calls and the 6 AM roaming broom merchants. More specifically, just over the past week or so, I had been exhausted from that fast-paced work atmosphere of the city, of pesky people scheduling meetings. I hate meetings: “Rome didn’t create an empire by having meetings,” I’d tell them. “They did it by killing people.”

The excuse for this little trip was a person. Greeny. Greeny has always been a friend who is impossible for me to gross out and impossible for me to offend: our relationship based on the values of curiosity and trust. I could call him on a dark and hungover Sunday morning to tell him that I just threw up. “What color is it?” he’d ask. “No, like what shade of yellow?” Greeny is impervious to those kinds of things.
As you might have guessed, Greeny is not his real name, yet it was born in that hilarious way that college nicknames are—going from a totally logical nickname to this bizarre, unrelated alias over the span of four drunken and polluted years. While the lineage of his name is beyond me, I can surely say that the Greeny of today is exactly the same Greeny I met five years ago. It is of no surprise that the two things that I perhaps admire most about Greeny—his inquisitiveness and his numbness to gross things—have led him on the industrious path to becoming a doctor. Greeny is the sort of guy that, if left to his own devices, and access to some powerful dynamite, could probably take over the world. For our trip though, we just wanted to have some fun.

Only a few hours into our voyage, we paused for lunch in Penenome, a town known amusingly for its woven hats and beautiful coastline. Gallo Pinto (spotted rooster) was a small room of a restaurant, which actually reminded me of a Latin version of my middle school cafeteria, with that terrifying stainless steel buffet that fed children slop and muck. Only difference was, food here was great: a nice pile of chow mein, braised beef, lentils and a bottle of lime-green hot sauce called Devils Inferno. Hot sauce, I thought to myself, is one of the few things that can get away with giving pain to the person who eats it. Anything else—for example, say, a flaming pizza or a blueberry scone that electrocutes you—would not sell well. But liquid venom that sets your mouth ablaze, and hurts your throat going down…it works. Overall, the meal was good and it cost no more than a highlighter.

In the confusion and haste of packing for the trip, I conveniently forgot perhaps the one most important article of clothing needed when exploring a coastline: my bathing suit. I have this horrible habit of forgetting important articles of clothing for trips: see me shivering jacket-less in Moscow in the dead of winter, or me atop a steep hiking trail in Spain wearing a battered pair of flimsy flip flops. So, forgetting my bathing suit on a trip along the Pacific Coast was only fitting.

We stopped in Las Tablas, a small labyrinth of a town, easy enough to navigate and pleasing on the eye. I wandered into a few stores, asking about swim suits yet the only thing buyable was this little red Speedo, probably no bigger than a scrunched-up eye patch. “I am desperate,” I told Greeny, “but not that desperate.” Not desperate enough to parade around in a small scrap of stretchy red nylon. I eventually found a pair of surfer shorts—a light blue pair of long board shorts that reminded me of a pair of Jams I used to own. Mission bathing suit proxy, complete.

Although this was not my first time into the heart of Azuero, the rolling hills and gleaming coast never cease to amaze me. We reached Tonosi and met up with Edwin, a 70 year-old local and retiree who walked everywhere with no shoes. “Doesn’t that hurt your feet?” I asked him. He responded with a Spanish proverb which most closely translates to “no pain, no gain.” Edwin was a thug. He was eager to show us a property he owned in Playa Bucaro (a microscopic fishing village near Cambutal.) Once out there, we treated Edwin to a lunch of fried snapper, in one of those moments that felt totally surreal and paradisiacal. We felt so removed from everything we knew. There Greeny and I were—sitting near the jungle, in a town so remote and secret, with the ocean waves lapping close by. We picked at the fish with our hands, pulling off giant chunks of succulent flesh and chasing them with crispy plantains which looked like thick little frisbees. They crunch and squish when you eat them. Greeny and I looked at each other in that life-aint-so-bad-after-all way and laughed. “Life aint so bad after all” we said.

The town of Tonosi is very rural and homey feeling and before departing on the next leg of our adventure, Greeny and I stopped at a little market to pick up some snacks for the turtle search—some crunchy pork rinds and a bottle of Panama’s national liquor, Seco, or as I like to refer to it—rocket fuel in a bottle. Greeny, now fascinated with the fact that sodas cost $0.25 down here, bought two Cokes. I also picked up some Calamine lotion, being that for some reason, I am more feast-worthy of insects than others. If the Eskimos have over 1,000 words for snow, then I my friends, have over 1,000 words for bug bites. Fire bump, stinging pickle, and spicy pickle bite being several.

We took a boat taxi to Isla Cana—a small circular island inhabited by only a few hundred people. Our boat, a small worn-out lanza, was captained by two children whose combined age couldn’t be more than ten or twelve years. Once on shore, we met our contacts Sr. Mercedes and Sr. Fernando, two important males in the community, and two men who would show us where to search for the turtles. Greeny and I set up camp right on the beach and after a game of pickup soccer and a sunset dinner of fresh clams, we began the search for the almighty leatherbacks—a species known to nest and lay eggs on in the winter months.

We bumped into a few fellow searchers, one of whom Greeny thought was a drug smuggler or a turtle egg thief, which was funny considering she was about 80 years old and had the face of a saint, yet with almost no teeth. “I’ve seen jack-o-lanterns with more teeth than that,” I said. This woman, Lucy, we’ll call her, showed us where the turtles like to go.

Around twelve at night, the turtles arrived: giant inner tube-sized Czechoslovakian turtles began swimming their way up the sand to the dunes where they would lay their eggs in a deeply-dug hole. We had to help one because she was so tired and couldn’t scoop out a big enough ditch. Greeny had to help another back to the ocean because in the midst of birth she had gotten confused and frazzled, thus losing her sense of direction. Helping these creatures was a pretty special experience, and one that I’ll definitely think about before I order my next bowl of turtle gumbo. Or turtle fritters. Or turtle Mcnuggets.

The next morning I awoke early, as I usually do after helping large creatures of the sea lay eggs on the sand. I wandered out into the ocean and finally understood what surfers have been trying to convince me of for years now: the unbelievably enlightening feeling of being alone in the ocean. The morning mist was still settling over the mountains and the water was warm with the first rays of sunlight hitting it from the other side of the island. Supposedly, the only thing that can top the feeling of being alone in such a massive landscape, is being out there with a good friend and Greeny had just woken up. Things on Isla Cana were good.

After a breakfast of ripe mangoes and lychee nuts, we packed our bags and headed out for more adventure, stopping at the island store to buy our wonderful hosts some cookies and soda—probably the last thing that those energetic squirrel children needed. Before we said our goodbyes, all the little kids brought us going-away-presents of freshly-caught sand crabs. Since Greeny and I had no use or real hunger for them we declined the offer, leaving more for them to enjoy. As we left, the kids and their tiny fluttering crab bodies waved adios.

On the way up the coast we stopped for breakfast at La Playita Resort, not in a million years, expecting what we would find. The entrance was blocked by three large ostriches, pacing back and forth as if they were guards in front of some kind of castle or fortress. (Might as well have been wearing red coats and beaver hats.) Slipping past the ostriches, we walked in upon this giant area of wildlife so diverse and jam-packed that you couldn’t open your eyes without seeing an interesting animal.

Up in the trees for example, sat giant scarlet macaws along side dark brown spider monkeys. On the roof of a small building crawled a tiny titi monkey who was very inquisitive and wanting to touch me. He looked like a small cat-chipmunk hybrid. Then, out of nowhere, this petit man came out from behind one of the buildings, wearing a brown shirt, some cargo shorts, and a giant piece of ice around his neck—the kind rappers wear. He introduced himself in spotty English: “I am Lester,” he said in this squeaky crow voice. Welcome to my home.”

Lester sat us down and explained the animal kingdom we had stumbled upon. “You see, I am a racehorse jockey in the United States.”

“Wow, how many races have you won?” I inquired.

“Over three thousand. I am probably the best.”

“Well what else do you do other than jockeying?”

“Well, I am a master of karate, a mentor, an instructor, philosopher, surfer, diver, karate master and gourmet popcorn chef. I also collect animals.”

“Oh how interesting,” I lied, really wanting no more than to fire up his giant ego on a kebab with some red bell peppers and a few porcinis. He's really cool though. Lester’s little resort is open year-round and has four rooms for rent. He does his own fishing tours, kayak and snorkeling expeditions and several other tours. Lester's resort impressively speaks for itself. My incomprable camera skills captured a scarlet macaw and a spider monkey in the same photo. Damn I am good.

Next stop: El Valle

I was venturing for my first time into El Valle or The Valley: a quiet artsy and nature community set in the base of the crater of an extinct volcano. The drive in was somewhat rollercoastery, revealing cosmic panoramas of rainforest, mountains and sea. The town itself is quaint and has the feel of a small mountain village in Vermont or Maine: a mini artisan market, several bakeries and restaurants, and two neat attractions, the thermal mud baths and waterfall, which we wanted to hit up. Greeny bought perhaps the most touristy of all tchatchkis, the Panama shot glass. He also bought both of those which come in second and third place: the cheesy Panama magnet and puffy monogrammed Panama t-shirt. Greeny is a gangster.

On our way out of town, we swung by what looked to be someone’s home—the home of someone who made beautiful wood furniture. The man standing on the porch looked wild, with a cowboy hat and gaucho-like roughness to his skin. We complimented him on the tables and chairs outside; several pieces which looked so unique and detailed, that we wanted them for ourselves.

The man, it turned out, was a master wood craftsman. He offered up several of his pieces for sale, including two stunning tables made from a thick tree segment. We bought the tables and watched as his little wood-working minions sanded then varnished away. Both tables together were $40—a price that, in the states, wouldn’t even cover the artists lunch bill. The tables now sit at home in our respective living rooms and in addition to each telling its own story, the tables simply remind the artists in Greeny and I, that we suck.

Matt is a consultant in Central America working on http://www.thepanamareport.com and http://www.panamatravels.com and http://www.tranquilobay.com