 | Panamá City Things To Do | Tips 1 - 10 of 128 |  |
Popular Things To Do | Other Things To Do Tips | All Tips (128) Of course the main attraction of Panama City is the canal. The first set of locks, Miraflores, is a short 15 minute drive from the city. The Miraflores locks include a museum and visitor's center. Admission to the visitor's center is $8. Leave a Comment
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Ancon Hill is the tall hill just north of Casco Viejo topped by a gigantic Panamanian flag. The hillsides are preserved as jungle filled with an ecological array of life including capybara, boa constrictors and bird and insect life of amazing variety. A narrow road goes up to the top - open from 6 am to 6 pm - through the old Zone residential area of Quarry Heights - where you will also find VT’s own La Estancia (see the accom tips and the pages of snoopy9109 ). The hill was heavily fortified in earlier times - a huge bombproof bunker built into the mountain during WWII. The views from atop over the City and surroundings are very grand. Because of the slightly out-of-the-way nature of the hill, not many tourists seem to get up here.
On the city side base of the hill you can find many buildings that used to house administrative offices of the Canal Zone. Most of these have been now taken over by the Panamanian government - for example, the old Zone courthouse is now home to the Panamanian supreme court; the former American hospital (a major portion being built by the French before) is a hospital specializing in oncology. The top administrators of the Canal still live up here above the Panama Canal Administration Building next to Quarry heights and that same building built for the American Canal administrators serves the same function for today’s Panamanian administrators. Leave a Comment
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Isla Taboga is about 1 - 1.5 hour ferry ride (aboard the lovely Calypso Queen) from the docks in Panama City. It's a great place to go to relax and stroll around a place that's a lot less bustling and modern than Panama City.
While the beaches were not that great, the small, hilly streets of the Island are a great place to get lost for a couple of hours and the Island boasts what’s reputed to the second oldest church in the Western hemisphere. And the best part of Isla Taboga is the ride to and from the City. Breathtaking views of the Puente de las Americas, the city, the island and the evening sunset. Leave a Comment Address: 20 km offshore from Panama CityDirections: Take the ferry from the terminal in the Balboa district of Panama City
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The Old City is located in the East end of Panama. We walked there, and the walk was almost as interesting as the Old City itself.
Walking to this part of town shows the visitor an area of the city that is different from any other part we saw. Vacant and slightly menacing for part of the walk, the area nearest to the Old City is filled with a unique character with a few tiny local shops and car mechanics; and kids running all over the place.
The Old City is actually a large area of ruins of the first city that the Spanish built here. Lots of buildings, including an old church, are identifiable and remain a testament to the Panama's colonial history. Leave a Comment Address: East End of the City
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This building has very unique architecture and is worth a visit. Skip the museum its basically two small rooms of paintings and artifacts. Leave a Comment
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To visit Panama City without seeing the Canal at some point is just plain wrong. Most tourists to Panama visit by transiting the Canal on gigantic cruise ships during the Panamanian dry season - their ‘summer’ - mid-December to mid-April. Other land-based tourists can experience the 80 kilometer Canal on Saturday cruises from the Panama City side of the Canal. Partial transits are offered every Saturday while at least one Saturday per month - usually the last Saturday - complete transits are offered. We had already see the locks at Gatun, so we decided to take the partial tour which disembarks at Gamboa on the south side of Gatun Lake - remember, the Canal goes in a north-south direction and Panama, itself, runs in an east-west direction. The difference in cost is $50 - partial tour being $99. The difference in time is 4.5 hours for the partial tour and 8 hours for the complete. For more on the partial transit, see my two travelogues in these pages.
The tours, run by the Canal Bay and Tours company from Muelle/Pier 19 in Balboa. They leave from there at 0730, heading out to the Puente de las Americas and then back through both the Miraflores and Pedro Miguel Locks before moving up into the Gatun Lake and through the Culebra Cut (and the Continental Divide) to Gamboa. Here, partial transit passenger disembark, while complete transit passengers stay aboard for the passage across the lake and through the three locks at Gatun. At the end of either transit, passengers are then bussed back to the point of the tour’s origin. Food, coffee, water and soft drinks are all available aboard - beer costs $2 per can. The bilingual guide - English/Spanish - will tell you all you need to know about the Canal’s history and operation. Tip boxes for the guide and crew come out at the tour’s end. Leave a Comment
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The San Felipe Church is now is ruins but attached is a small museum of religous art. Probably not worth a visit by itself but worth a look if your in the neighborhood. Admission is $1. Leave a Comment
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This plaza contains the remnants of the original city wall and the farthest most tip of Casco Viejo. It affords a fantastic spot to watch the modern city or to watch the ships lined up for entry into the canal.
Down below the walls are monuments to the men instrumental in building the canal. Leave a Comment Directions: Casco Viejo
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Panama Viejo is the original city established in 1519 and abandonded in favor of Casco Vieja after pirates sacked the city in 1671. The site is free on sundays ($2 other days)but there is not much but the ruins of buildings. Leave a Comment
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The National Institute of Culture is the agency responsible for preservation in Casco Viejo and running the museums in the rest of the city. This Main headquarters has a small exhibit of local artists Leave a Comment
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on February 20, 2005
on June 24, 2005
on October 3, 2004
