The Canal
Parts of the canal were as I imagined it. A straightened river, industrial ports, and massive just massive ships slowly plying its waters, but like the Mississippi River, the Panama Canal has backwaters, bayous, and tributaries that provide a haven for Panama's natural world.
We had two days to explore Lago Gatún and the Rio Chagres both connected to the canal. Our targets species were the primates that inhabited the forests around the river system and the Snail Kites who feed on the Apple Snails for Lago Gatún. Our encounters with the Panamanian White-faced Capuchin monkeys was virtually instantaneous once we approached the uninhabited forests. They came to the trees at the water's edge as our boat glided to a stop. I'd love to say it was a chance encounter or they were simply curious, but I believe the reality is they've grown to expect handouts of food from boats.
They seemed mildly disappointed that we didn't give them any food, but hung around near the water's edge giving us very good looks.
Their facial expressions can be very human like, but their agility through the trees is anything but. Leaping from branch to branch and using their tails as both balance and anchor, they were as comfortable navigating three dimensions as we would be walking down a road. Always seemingly in search of food, but constantly chatting with each other and connecting with each, it was clear they functioned as a group.
We heard the Howler Monkeys all the time particularly in the early morning and toward dusk, but I was only able to obtain a few photos of one pair of Howlers seemingly stranded on a small forested island due to rising waters.
Right next to the Howler Monkeys, the was the only sloth we saw the whole trip. Sleeping high up on the trees as sloths are want to do and oblivious to our boat and the Howler Monkey's movements.
My favorite primate we encountered was the Geoffrey's Tamarin. A species I had never seen before and so full of character, I was entranced watching them for well over an hour. You can't tell from the photos below, but they're tiny, almost squirrel size, inquisitive, and playful yet graceful.
A trio of Tamarin's pause to check out another boat coming over to the shore.
As much as I loved watching the Tamarin's, being a bird nerd, they could only hold my attention for so long and it was time to get back to the birds.
Below, a Limpkin rests in the shadows of some palms.
One of the target bird species to photograph in Lago Gatún is the Snail Kite which proliferates down here due to the invasive Apple Snail. Their diet is exclusively snails. Notice their elongated beak, its especially designed to pull a snail out of its shell. Here a snail kite goes in to grab a snail shell floating on the surface of the lake.
And now flying off with her catch.
Their were numerous other birds. We saw lots of parrots and a few toucans, but only from afar. Both parrots and toucans love the treetops and have an uncanny knack for positioning themselves direclty between the photographer and the sun.
We did find a few other birds to photograph like these two Lesser Kiskadees sharing a yummy grub. Lesser Kiskadees are relatively common, but this was my first sighting of them. These a few others around the canal added another 37 birds to my Life List. I've left Panama with 1212 birds on my Life List.
I've seen Purple Gallinules before in the Florida Everglades, but at water level popping up amongst the Water Hyacinth they were one of my favorite birds to photograph of the trip and as almost the last ones we photographed a fitting setting for the end of this amazing experience.
Sunrise on the Rio Chagres was the last photo I took as I was finishing packing for the ride to the airport.
Air travel on the return leg are anti-climatic. They're typically just a chore. The trip is over. I miss my home and family and just want to get home. All I ever hope for in airline travel is for it to "uneventful". I was planning on catching up on work, wading through email, and maybe when that was done, finishing the book I brought with me on my flight back to the States. It didn't work out as I planned, but I was perfectly fine with it.
By sheer chance I sat next to a woman named, Carole Turek, on the plane from Panama City to Atlanta. She’s 76 years old and just got back from a week in the Darien gap. A little less than a year ago, she snuck into Venezuela over a mountain pass, and then slept on top of a mountain for six days looking to find a photograph a particular Hummingbird. All on her quest to photograph all the hummingbirds in the world. I don’t know if I have enough guts to do either of those things and I'm 15 years her junior. And here’s this woman who looks suspiciously like my mother fulfilling her version of a grail quest. She’s starting to now write a book about her adventures. My time with her and the stories she told was one of the most inspiring conversations I’ve had in a few years.
