Day 5 - "I want to schwim."

The morning of Day 5 brought more packing, but this time for a mini-vacation at the DeCameron Resort. That morning also brought a lot of "I want to schwim" from Mateo. Perhaps we prepared him a little too much and too early? This yearning to "schwim" also led to "I wanna get inna car." And so we did. As it turns out, we may have a little traveler on our hands. All of our car and plane rides have been relatively a breeze. Of course I would be remiss to not mention that delicious bribery, er, snacks might have been involved.

Good music helps, too.

When driving in Panama, the most assertive and aggressive usually wins. And don't be surprised to see someone from the right-most lane cross over two other lanes to make a left turn. Oh, and get used to hearing horns honking. They're a little horn happy over here. While on our way I was taking photos like a tourist with the blog in mind and noticed, to Rafi's driving benefit, that when I had my camera up, other drivers let us into the traffic flow. Score! Guess they figured we didn't know what we were doing. There are many very nice cars here just like at home, but cars like this blue one aren't exactly out of place either due to harsh road conditions, tropical climate, and abundance of fender benders.

Here are some en route photos. First up is the Estadio Nacional de Rod Carew. It's a baseball stadium named after a Hall of Fame Panamanian-American player, Rod Carew.

The Centennial Bridge spans across the Panama Canal. Construction on this bridge finished a few years ago. I got to witness it being built over a period of time. It's really neat because the cables all line up, so it seems really thin; it's quite a marvel of engineering.

Billboards are everywhere, and they're right up close to you on the road. Most of them seem to advertise cell phone service or show bikini clad women enticing you with beach front real estate or a resort stay.

Every now and then there is a walkway that crosses the busy highway. Keep in mind that a highway in Panama is a bit different than a highway in the US. The roads are fairly rough and pockmarked with potholes, so you can't drive too fast (though some do anyway). Still, they are fairly busy, so using this cross walk would be the safest way to go, yet I have never seen anyone actually use one. I always see people (and kids) just sprint across from one side to the median to the other side.

We call these little guys on the power lines "penguins." Don't you think they look like penguins?

Rafi's favorite sign and tree.

This is Quesos Chela. You MUST stop here when driving to the interior. You really must. The empanadas de queso are made with their own pressed cheese that is superb. Rafi enjoys the chicha de avena - a milky oatmeal drink. (I usually pass on the chicha de avena, as I don't even like pulp in my orange juice.) There are usually kids out front selling anything from food items to lottery tickets. This one posed for a photo.

On the way to Farallon (the town where DeCameron resides), we stopped by to see some friends at their beach house at Playa Coronado (which has a McDonalds for those who have a Big Mac attack). Mateo wishes to thank the always nice Fistoniches for the delicious cookies! They did the trick, as he fell asleep immediately after we left.

Soon enough we arrived at the resort. Rafi and I have been here at least 4 or 5 times, and Mateo twice, so we kind of knew the drill already. After we checked in, we immediately got ready to go "schwim." We surprised Mateo with a Finding Nemo kickboard, which he loved. He also demonstrated to us his whale impression. We didn't take photos of the actual swimming, as we decided to just enjoy the moment. Mateo got right in, though, with no hesitation. I enjoyed a pina colada, too.

Dinner time! After drying off and getting dressed, we gorged ourselves at the buffet. Mateo most enjoyed the watermelon, which he seeded (de-seeded?) himself. He made a smile out of it but didn't notice the dot of watermelon that landed on his nose. Who were we to tell him about it? Much better to just take a picture.

We let our food digest a bit and then headed off to see the kids' show, which disappointingly turned out to be a showing of Madagascar the movie. The adult show started after that, and we stayed for just a little bit, as it was already late. Mateo LOVED the dancing.

After putting Mateo to bed, Rafi brought up drinks (margarita and diet Coke), and we sat on the patio playing (iPhone) games. Soon enough our eyelids were heavy, and the bed called our names.