Well I wanted to take another hike on the Continental Divide and so we decided to hike across from Cope National Park to the mountain town of La Yeguada.This is a hike that takes you through mostly pine forest, a pine forest that is part of a pine plantation that was set up by the Panamanian government in the 1970s. 

The rain was falling again so the walk was difficult. If you are interested in making a walk along the Divide then try to do it between January and April. May is a little late and when the rain mixes with the red earth, the going can be either very sticky or very slippery. The pleasure of hiking from Cope to La Yeguada is seeing Lake Yeguada in the distance. The lake is set high up in the mountains and is very isolated. There is a bad road that reaches the lake but you need a 4X4 in order to climb it. The lake is very quiet and you can hear the wind whipping through the pine trees. There is a small community next to the lake and sometimes you will see a fishing boat or two out on the water. I used to visit friends who lived in the communities around the lake and the interesting thing about the lake is that it changes from season to season. It looks very different from one season to the next. The dry months are the best as the sun is hot and the winds high; during the rainy season the lake appears to be an almost pearl gray color and sometimes when you look at the lake it appears as if the sky is reflecting on the lake or the lake is reflecting on the sky; both seem to have the same color.

If you want to see the lake go around February or March. Start your trip in Santiago de Veraguas, from Santiago travel to Calobre, and then ask where the road to La Yeguada begins – this is where the road becomes bad. The town near the lake has electricity and they’re a few shops with the bare necessities. The lake in the summer would be a good place to set up a tent and camp. You can walk from the lake to the high mountain town of Chitra or you could walk to the coffee and orange producing town of Santa Fe. From Santa Fe you could walk over the Continental Divide and down the other side, through the jungles of Veraguas and out on to the isolated beaches of Calovebra’. There you might have to wait a day or two for the supply boats to take you to Colon. You can sleep on the beach, but terrible mosquitoes.  For that kind of trip be careful, because if you get lost all could end badly; there are plenty of snakes and wild cats on the Atlantic side of Veraguas and people have been known to disappear; again, if you think you want to try, go between January and March.

The Desert

Panama has a tiny desert located in the province of Herrera. The desert of Sarigua is very small and is located near the ocean, a visit to the desert is worth it. The desert formed because of deforestation in the region: slash and burn agriculture is very prevalent in Panama. The day we went to the desert there were few people and you could walk to where the desert begins and just look out and feel how lonely this area has become. There is a small look out tower which you can climb and see the desert in the distance. The desert is a National Park because of the indigenous people that once lived there. There are a number of archeological digs going on in the desert and important remnants of the earlier civilization that lived here have been found. You can see shell mounds and pottery shards that have been uncovered by researchers. The Smithsonian has been digging in the area looking for artifacts. One of the mysteries of Panama that archeologists have tried to uncover is where the indigenous communities smelted gold. You can find pre-Colombian artifacts all along the river valleys of Veraguas Province, but it has never been determined where the gold that was used to make these artifacts was actually smelted. Gold fever is still strong among the people of the interior. I remember a farmer that I worked with in the interior who spent two months digging large holes on his property hoping to find gold. He told me there was gold all around and he was going to find it. 

The rain was coming down strong again, as we left the desert and started our trip back to Panama City. We were tired and hungry and I almost fell asleep at the wheel, but I saved myself at the last second.