The Sloth and the Hormiga- Panama City, Panama
In our quest to see the world, while also working a demanding full time job, you sometimes only have a long weekend to experience a country, so....you pick the ones closest with the shortest flights. That was how we ended up in Panama City for a weekend in October 2022. Panama City is a hub airport and is a quick flight from Bogota. We flew in on a Friday afternoon and back on a Sunday night. This gave us 2 evenings and 2 full days… and we used every second of it.
Although I researched the activities we signed up for, the hotel was a lucky guess. I just picked the one with the coolest pictures and wound up in the heart of the old city, which was perfect. We stayed at La Compania, which was an older historic building turned into a boutique hotel. There were lot of great little restaurants, cafes, and bars in the area to walk to. Our first night, we walked to a little seafood place with a laid back, beach vibe, that had swings for chairs at the bar.
The next day, we did a full jungle tour and went ocean to ocean. I had studied the history of the canal when in grade school, but to see it live and hear the history told by the people who live there was a different experience altogether. Watching the ships enter the enormous locks and learning how these worked and taking a boat ride in the canal next to a shipping container boat, and then driving through the jungles and seeing the diversity in plants and animals made for a great day.
We stopped at an old fort for lunch. On the drive there, we saw a sloth in the trees. When we got there, there was another sloth hanging on a tree branch above where we ate our lunch. On the ground, were the hormigas, giant ants carrying leaves 10 times their size. They are incredible to watch… all walking in a uniform line, all contributing to the task at hand, working hard…. While the sloth rests above without a worry in the world.
After a very long day of exploring the country, we were back in old town. My husband and I both have tattoos. Most of mine are from my travels, done in the countries I have visited. My husband suggested we finish the evening with a coffee and a flash tattoo. I was game. We aligned on the definition of a flash tattoo: quick, cheap, non detailed, easy, small. We easily found a tattoo parlor and they were able to fit us in, however, they were not familiar with flash tattoos and didn’t have any examples readily available. We began the search online for our designs. I chose the hormiga. I had seen them that day, they amazed me and I could easily do a flash tattoo that met the requirements. I sat for my tattoo and less then 10 minutes later, I had my hormiga on the shoulder.
My husband sat down for his tattoo and I grabbed a coffee and chatted it up with the barista who convinced me to try her frothy specialty… which I had never tasted before and was delicious. I realized I had been there for a hot moment and went over to my husband…. Who was getting a detailed sloth tattoo on his arm. Not a flash tattoo and not what we agreed upon. When he was done, much later than we planned, he had this beautiful, cute sloth to remember our trip to Panama… and I had a little ant.
