Panama!!!

"Should we go to Panama?" Tam asked me this morning as we stood facing the road, packed and ready to go.  "Yep," I replied, grinning.  We were ready to take on the next country, our last in Central America.  But it wasn't that easy.  About 30 km of shoulderless, trafficked road lay between us and the border, and while we knocked it out pretty quickly, it certainly was stressful.  Trucks and buses and whatnot.  Anyway, the border still snuck up on us and the bureaucracy wasn't too tough to negotiate, so soon we had our feet on the soil (ahem, pavement) of Panama!  The road was much wider than that on the Costa Rican side, all the trucks were forced to wait at the border, and we had a tailwind, so, despite the humidity, we enjoyed the ride.  Yet, as we approached the city of David, Panama's second-largest, our shoulder turned to gravel and the traffic increased to the point of being an almost continuous line. The last few kilometers were slow while navigating the shoulder and the trucks, and finally we made it into the city, where we're staying at a hostel.  

I didn't take any pictures today, so here's one from the archive:

End of the Dalton Highway, northern Alaska

Tonight was spent planning: there's only one road that connects here with Panama City, and it's under construction for about 200 km, so we hear, and then very busy near the city.  Not too many riding options.  As for tomorrow, we're going to head north into the mountains, to, and perhaps past, Boquete.