Bird Island
Day Eight, Saturday May 29th 2016
Today was our trip to Bird Island. The real name of the island is Swan Island, but all the gringos call it Bird Island because it is a national bird sanctuary.
Not that protecting any species really makes much difference here. The people who are concerned about the eco-system obey the laws. The natives don’t get it. They still catch and keep endangered species of fish, go out to the island and steal the birds’ eggs and raid the leatherback turtles’ nests.
As they said in Beauty and the Beast, “It’s a story as old as time.”
The natives have been depending on these species to sustain them since before the dawn of time. They know it is against the law, but they merely wait until there are no police around (Which is like ALL the time). There’s no one to stop them, so no risk of penalty.
What they can’t seem to realize is that these species are endangered and every turtle or bird they eat brings them that much closer to extinction. They have no concept of the past or the future. They live only for today.
Wes arranged for Enrique to take us to Bird Island on his boat. Enrique is the guy who used to maintain Wes’s boat before he sold it.
Enrique arrived promptly at 9 am at Playa del Drago (Dragon’s Beach) in his twenty-foot panga with a fifteen horsepower outboard. We took off our sandals and waded out to the boat, climbed aboard and were off.
First we cruised along the beach, taking in sights we couldn’t see from land. Long white beaches, tropical rain forest, pretty girls in bikinis, it’s gets a little boring after a while (but we haven’t been here that long yet).
Today was our trip to Bird Island. The real name of the island is Swan Island, but all the gringos call it Bird Island because it is a national bird sanctuary.
Not that protecting any species really makes much difference here. The people who are concerned about the eco-system obey the laws. The natives don’t get it. They still catch and keep endangered species of fish, go out to the island and steal the birds’ eggs and raid the leatherback turtles’ nests.
As they said in Beauty and the Beast, “It’s a story as old as time.”
The natives have been depending on these species to sustain them since before the dawn of time. They know it is against the law, but they merely wait until there are no police around (Which is like ALL the time). There’s no one to stop them, so no risk of penalty.
What they can’t seem to realize is that these species are endangered and every turtle or bird they eat brings them that much closer to extinction. They have no concept of the past or the future. They live only for today.
Wes arranged for Enrique to take us to Bird Island on his boat. Enrique is the guy who used to maintain Wes’s boat before he sold it.
Enrique arrived promptly at 9 am at Playa del Drago (Dragon’s Beach) in his twenty-foot panga with a fifteen horsepower outboard. We took off our sandals and waded out to the boat, climbed aboard and were off.
First we cruised along the beach, taking in sights we couldn’t see from land. Long white beaches, tropical rain forest, pretty girls in bikinis, it’s gets a little boring after a while (but we haven’t been here that long yet).
Teak does grow on trees in Panama
We motored along Wes and Joyce’s beach. As usual, there wasn’t a soul around for miles.
At the house, we headed north, out to the island. It’s only a couple of miles off shore. What looks like a tiny piece of rock from their house grows into a magnificent little island spit up from the sea floor by some long dormant volcano.
It has sheer cliffs and must be two or three hundred feet high. Being made of volcanic stone, it is well eroded. On the seaward side of the island thousands of little holes are filled with birds’ nests. Each piece of the island is claimed by different species. Boobies live in one area, Frigattas in another. Thousands of birds fill the air or occupy the cliffs.
We made a circumnavigation of the island. On the landward side was a tiny beach. It is illegal for humans to go on the island, but this is where the poachers land. To the seaward side of the island is a large flat rock called, interestingly enough, Flat Rock.
The seas surge over the granite leaving it wet and slippery all the time. Okay, so we saw flat rock. It was no different than thousands of other rocks we’ve seen from the deck of a sailboat, but for some reason, the locals think it’s special.
After our excursion, we headed back to Isla Colon (remember, that’s Columbus Island) to do some snorkeling.
Enrique lives back in the mangrove swamps. He hadn’t brought the boarding ladder, so we had the opportunity to motor back into the swamps via a narrow channel.
I’ve never been in a mangrove swamp before. It was much as I’d imagined. Trees grow up out of the water. We didn’t see any water snakes or monkeys, but the smell was overwhelming. I don’t know how Enrique’s family can live amid the smell of rotting fish and animals, putrid vegetation and all varieties of waste.
Back at Enrigue’s house, there are a couple of docks and half a dozen boats. A flimsy wooden house is perched precariously on stilts up the hill a little. There are no beaches. That was fine with me. The water here is brackish and smells like sewage. I wouldn’t have gone in it to win a prize pig.
A wood fire burned in a pit outside the house. There a woman (probably Enrique’s wife) boiled a cauldron of water. She was doing laundry. She soaked the clothes in the hot soapy water, then pounded them on a flat rock until the water was gone. We didn’t see it, but I’m sure the next step was to hang them on a clothes-line of some sort. A couple of mostly naked boys played near the water’s edge. Life in the jungle.
All in all, it was a depressing little slice of life. I’m glad Enrique has a way to support his family, but I wouldn’t want to live like that.
With the swim step aboard, we headed out to the “coral reefs.” This was the most disappointing part of the day. Enrique anchored the boat in about four feet of water along the edge of the mangrove swamp. We put on our snorkeling gear and went over the side.
I immediately touched bottom, something I didn’t expect on a snorkeling adventure. I cleaned my mask, put it on and headed out in search of the “reef.”
What I found were a few coral heads on a sandy bottom. It was by no stretch of the imagination a reef.
Sure, in and around the coral heads we saw a few fish, a sea cucumber or two lay on the soft sand. Here and there an anemone clung to the young coral.
Wes had told me that Panama was one of the few places in the Caribbean that had growing coral reefs. The rest were drying up and dying. Well, that was true here. Maybe fifty colonies dotted the sandy bottom. Some were by themselves, some were in close proximity to others. When the tourists discover the islands and they become a tourist Mecca, about a hundred years from now, the coral might be worth snorkeling on. For now, find another reef.
Enough of the complaining. There are good snorkeling reefs here. We will visit them later.
Back in the boat, Enrique took us to Boca del Drago where we waded onto the beach, said our farewells and paid our guide. Wes gave him a twenty dollar bill.
Wes is known on the island as the Bank of Wes. Whenever the natives need a small loan, they come to Wes. He lends them the money, at no interest, and is not very aggressive about getting it back.
Enrique owes Wes sixty dollars. Wes expected to get twenty of it back. Enrique explained that he needed the Jackson to buy food and gasoline. Wes relented and paid up. Next time I need a loan, I’m going to the Bank of Wes.
We climbed into the truck, headed home, had dinner and flopped into bed exhausted.
At the house, we headed north, out to the island. It’s only a couple of miles off shore. What looks like a tiny piece of rock from their house grows into a magnificent little island spit up from the sea floor by some long dormant volcano.
It has sheer cliffs and must be two or three hundred feet high. Being made of volcanic stone, it is well eroded. On the seaward side of the island thousands of little holes are filled with birds’ nests. Each piece of the island is claimed by different species. Boobies live in one area, Frigattas in another. Thousands of birds fill the air or occupy the cliffs.
We made a circumnavigation of the island. On the landward side was a tiny beach. It is illegal for humans to go on the island, but this is where the poachers land. To the seaward side of the island is a large flat rock called, interestingly enough, Flat Rock.
The seas surge over the granite leaving it wet and slippery all the time. Okay, so we saw flat rock. It was no different than thousands of other rocks we’ve seen from the deck of a sailboat, but for some reason, the locals think it’s special.
After our excursion, we headed back to Isla Colon (remember, that’s Columbus Island) to do some snorkeling.
Enrique lives back in the mangrove swamps. He hadn’t brought the boarding ladder, so we had the opportunity to motor back into the swamps via a narrow channel.
I’ve never been in a mangrove swamp before. It was much as I’d imagined. Trees grow up out of the water. We didn’t see any water snakes or monkeys, but the smell was overwhelming. I don’t know how Enrique’s family can live amid the smell of rotting fish and animals, putrid vegetation and all varieties of waste.
Back at Enrigue’s house, there are a couple of docks and half a dozen boats. A flimsy wooden house is perched precariously on stilts up the hill a little. There are no beaches. That was fine with me. The water here is brackish and smells like sewage. I wouldn’t have gone in it to win a prize pig.
A wood fire burned in a pit outside the house. There a woman (probably Enrique’s wife) boiled a cauldron of water. She was doing laundry. She soaked the clothes in the hot soapy water, then pounded them on a flat rock until the water was gone. We didn’t see it, but I’m sure the next step was to hang them on a clothes-line of some sort. A couple of mostly naked boys played near the water’s edge. Life in the jungle.
All in all, it was a depressing little slice of life. I’m glad Enrique has a way to support his family, but I wouldn’t want to live like that.
With the swim step aboard, we headed out to the “coral reefs.” This was the most disappointing part of the day. Enrique anchored the boat in about four feet of water along the edge of the mangrove swamp. We put on our snorkeling gear and went over the side.
I immediately touched bottom, something I didn’t expect on a snorkeling adventure. I cleaned my mask, put it on and headed out in search of the “reef.”
What I found were a few coral heads on a sandy bottom. It was by no stretch of the imagination a reef.
Sure, in and around the coral heads we saw a few fish, a sea cucumber or two lay on the soft sand. Here and there an anemone clung to the young coral.
Wes had told me that Panama was one of the few places in the Caribbean that had growing coral reefs. The rest were drying up and dying. Well, that was true here. Maybe fifty colonies dotted the sandy bottom. Some were by themselves, some were in close proximity to others. When the tourists discover the islands and they become a tourist Mecca, about a hundred years from now, the coral might be worth snorkeling on. For now, find another reef.
Enough of the complaining. There are good snorkeling reefs here. We will visit them later.
Back in the boat, Enrique took us to Boca del Drago where we waded onto the beach, said our farewells and paid our guide. Wes gave him a twenty dollar bill.
Wes is known on the island as the Bank of Wes. Whenever the natives need a small loan, they come to Wes. He lends them the money, at no interest, and is not very aggressive about getting it back.
Enrique owes Wes sixty dollars. Wes expected to get twenty of it back. Enrique explained that he needed the Jackson to buy food and gasoline. Wes relented and paid up. Next time I need a loan, I’m going to the Bank of Wes.
We climbed into the truck, headed home, had dinner and flopped into bed exhausted.
After a long day of adventuring
Day Nine, Sunday May 30th 2016
Today nothing happened. Well, almost nothing. I drove into town to get gas for Cesar’s lawnmower. After that we sat around and read while Wes and Joyce packed.
It seems like a good time to talk about the wildlife (and no, I don’t mean at the local hotspots. That is if there WERE local hotspots.). I’m talking about the fauna.
We’ll skip the oceanic wildlife for now, because we haven’t seen enough to comment on yet. That leaves insects, arachnids, birds, reptiles and mammals. As far as I know, there are no amphibians here. (Are turtles reptiles or amphibians?)
I’ve already alluded to insects so let’s start there. Of course there are mosquitoes. They’ve been in the news quite a bit lately. Yes, they have had cases of the Zika Virus here. When people asked us if we weren’t afraid to go to a country where the Zika was running loose, Dawn answered them, “No. But we might come back with shrunken heads.”
Here’s the scientific facts. (Gimme the facts, ma’am, just the facts.) The virus is only a danger to women of childbearing age. It hardly affects the mother, for an adult the symptoms are like a very mild flu, but it devastates the baby. Babies exposed to the virus are born with tiny heads and shrunken brains.
It’s not a problem for us.
Now we come to ants. There are millions of ants in the rainforest. Everything from enormous fire ants to some so small you can hardly see them. We haven’t found any fire ants on the property yet, that doesn’t mean they aren’t here, but the tiny ones have a hell of a bite. From a tiny brown dot so small that you practically need a microscope to find it comes a bite that feels like you’ve been stuck with a hot poker. I was stunned by how painful it was. It burns for hours. I haven’t let any of those ants climb on me since.
Then there are the common garden variety ants. Of course we have them near and in the house, but when we walk through the jungle, we see hundreds of files of army ants carrying leaves back to the colony.
We have cockroaches, who doesn’t? However, in the jungle they’re everywhere. We’re fighting a constant battle to keep them out of the house. In addition to the ones you’re used to, there are giganto-sized roaches. They’re about two inches long. They come out at night, after the lights are out. When we sit and watch TV before going to bed, we see them.
Naturally, Heidi freaked out over them. One morning she and Dawn declared war on the roaches. It appeared that they (The roaches, not Dawn and Heidi.) were coming from under the stove. They took everything out of the drawers on the island and applied a liberal dose of bug spray. Behind the doors, under and behind the stove, behind the propane tank. Nothing was safe.
The giant roaches came pouring out by the dozens. Heidi screamed for me to get rid of them. Dawn just calmly washed all the drawers and everything that had been in them.
These monsters were done for. Some of them made it halfway into the dining room before they rolled over and died. I grabbed a broom, swept them up into a neat pile and swept them off the decks.
One night when I was getting ready for bed, there was a walking stick on top of the light. I didn’t think it was of any danger to us, but I picked it up and threw it out onto the lawn so it didn’t bother Dawn.
On another night I went to turn off my bedside light and was attacked. At first I thought the light was shorting out, it hurt so badly. Then I discovered it was an insect. I haven’t been able to figure out what kind of bug it was, but it was about three inches long with short, translucent wings. It had a stick-like body and what looked like a stinger on the aft end.
Needless to say, the bug declared war on me with its sneak attack. But like the Americans after Pearl Harbor, I finished the battle. I tracked the little bugger down and doused him liberally with bug spray. He flopped around for a couple of minutes, then was no more. I hurt for a couple of hours after that.
Today nothing happened. Well, almost nothing. I drove into town to get gas for Cesar’s lawnmower. After that we sat around and read while Wes and Joyce packed.
It seems like a good time to talk about the wildlife (and no, I don’t mean at the local hotspots. That is if there WERE local hotspots.). I’m talking about the fauna.
We’ll skip the oceanic wildlife for now, because we haven’t seen enough to comment on yet. That leaves insects, arachnids, birds, reptiles and mammals. As far as I know, there are no amphibians here. (Are turtles reptiles or amphibians?)
I’ve already alluded to insects so let’s start there. Of course there are mosquitoes. They’ve been in the news quite a bit lately. Yes, they have had cases of the Zika Virus here. When people asked us if we weren’t afraid to go to a country where the Zika was running loose, Dawn answered them, “No. But we might come back with shrunken heads.”
Here’s the scientific facts. (Gimme the facts, ma’am, just the facts.) The virus is only a danger to women of childbearing age. It hardly affects the mother, for an adult the symptoms are like a very mild flu, but it devastates the baby. Babies exposed to the virus are born with tiny heads and shrunken brains.
It’s not a problem for us.
Now we come to ants. There are millions of ants in the rainforest. Everything from enormous fire ants to some so small you can hardly see them. We haven’t found any fire ants on the property yet, that doesn’t mean they aren’t here, but the tiny ones have a hell of a bite. From a tiny brown dot so small that you practically need a microscope to find it comes a bite that feels like you’ve been stuck with a hot poker. I was stunned by how painful it was. It burns for hours. I haven’t let any of those ants climb on me since.
Then there are the common garden variety ants. Of course we have them near and in the house, but when we walk through the jungle, we see hundreds of files of army ants carrying leaves back to the colony.
We have cockroaches, who doesn’t? However, in the jungle they’re everywhere. We’re fighting a constant battle to keep them out of the house. In addition to the ones you’re used to, there are giganto-sized roaches. They’re about two inches long. They come out at night, after the lights are out. When we sit and watch TV before going to bed, we see them.
Naturally, Heidi freaked out over them. One morning she and Dawn declared war on the roaches. It appeared that they (The roaches, not Dawn and Heidi.) were coming from under the stove. They took everything out of the drawers on the island and applied a liberal dose of bug spray. Behind the doors, under and behind the stove, behind the propane tank. Nothing was safe.
The giant roaches came pouring out by the dozens. Heidi screamed for me to get rid of them. Dawn just calmly washed all the drawers and everything that had been in them.
These monsters were done for. Some of them made it halfway into the dining room before they rolled over and died. I grabbed a broom, swept them up into a neat pile and swept them off the decks.
One night when I was getting ready for bed, there was a walking stick on top of the light. I didn’t think it was of any danger to us, but I picked it up and threw it out onto the lawn so it didn’t bother Dawn.
On another night I went to turn off my bedside light and was attacked. At first I thought the light was shorting out, it hurt so badly. Then I discovered it was an insect. I haven’t been able to figure out what kind of bug it was, but it was about three inches long with short, translucent wings. It had a stick-like body and what looked like a stinger on the aft end.
Needless to say, the bug declared war on me with its sneak attack. But like the Americans after Pearl Harbor, I finished the battle. I tracked the little bugger down and doused him liberally with bug spray. He flopped around for a couple of minutes, then was no more. I hurt for a couple of hours after that.
Some of our many banana spiders
Now come the spiders. I know they’re not insects, but I’m going to include them here anyway.
Both Heide and Dawn are afraid of spiders. If they see the tiniest spider, they yell for me to kill it.
I do not kill spiders. Spiders are our friends. They eat mosquitoes, flies and all sorts of other insects that bug us. In my house in Lynnwood, we had a pet spider one fall. He was a big wood spider and spun a web in our bay window. I wouldn’t let Connie get rid of him so we named him George and watched him grow.
Several weeks later we discovered an egg pouch. I guess he was a Georgina.
Anyway, when the lovely ladies discovered a spider, I gently picked it up and tossed it outside. No harm, no foul.
There are some interesting spiders in the rain forest. I’m going to talk about the big man-eating ones. Down by the cisterns, and all over the yard, is a species about six inches across with long, thin bodies and black and yellow stripped legs. They look very fragile. That is, I thought they had long, thin bodies. A couple of days ago, I started seeing ones with swelled up bodies. I suspect that these are females and are getting ready to lay eggs.
One night Dawn called me to get rid of a large hairy monster in the bathroom. It was easily six inches across, but was covered in brown hair and had thick, strong looking legs and a robust body. We call it a jumping spider because it can leap for three or four feet. Dawn is afraid that it will leap on her and bite her. It looked like a tarantula, but it was brown. I do believe that tarantulas are black. I hate to admit it, but I thought it might be poisonous, so I sprayed it and removed its little corpse.
These big boys are now dubbed “alien, gigantic man-eating spiders.”
Other than that, there are dozens of other kinds of spiders, mostly small. I see them all over the place, but we keep the house free of them.
I have one more thing to say about insects, then I will have bored you enough.
We have hordes of no see ums. What do they look like? I don’t know, you can’t see them. But they are wrecking havoc on our legs. Both Dawn and I have numerous red bumps on our legs where they bite. The bites itch for days. I’m told that after a couple of weeks, they don’t bites as much, my bite per square centimeter of leg surface has gone down, but they still bite.
My suggestion? Use lots and lots of deet. This noxious chemical is available in any number of mosquito sprays, Joyce has the house well stocked with Off!
That’s the insect story. I hope I haven’t bored you so much that you quit reading our adventures. I still have lots of wildlife to tell you about, but I think that’s all you can handle for one day.
Just one last word of caution: if insects really bother you, don’t go live in a rainforest.
Both Heide and Dawn are afraid of spiders. If they see the tiniest spider, they yell for me to kill it.
I do not kill spiders. Spiders are our friends. They eat mosquitoes, flies and all sorts of other insects that bug us. In my house in Lynnwood, we had a pet spider one fall. He was a big wood spider and spun a web in our bay window. I wouldn’t let Connie get rid of him so we named him George and watched him grow.
Several weeks later we discovered an egg pouch. I guess he was a Georgina.
Anyway, when the lovely ladies discovered a spider, I gently picked it up and tossed it outside. No harm, no foul.
There are some interesting spiders in the rain forest. I’m going to talk about the big man-eating ones. Down by the cisterns, and all over the yard, is a species about six inches across with long, thin bodies and black and yellow stripped legs. They look very fragile. That is, I thought they had long, thin bodies. A couple of days ago, I started seeing ones with swelled up bodies. I suspect that these are females and are getting ready to lay eggs.
One night Dawn called me to get rid of a large hairy monster in the bathroom. It was easily six inches across, but was covered in brown hair and had thick, strong looking legs and a robust body. We call it a jumping spider because it can leap for three or four feet. Dawn is afraid that it will leap on her and bite her. It looked like a tarantula, but it was brown. I do believe that tarantulas are black. I hate to admit it, but I thought it might be poisonous, so I sprayed it and removed its little corpse.
These big boys are now dubbed “alien, gigantic man-eating spiders.”
Other than that, there are dozens of other kinds of spiders, mostly small. I see them all over the place, but we keep the house free of them.
I have one more thing to say about insects, then I will have bored you enough.
We have hordes of no see ums. What do they look like? I don’t know, you can’t see them. But they are wrecking havoc on our legs. Both Dawn and I have numerous red bumps on our legs where they bite. The bites itch for days. I’m told that after a couple of weeks, they don’t bites as much, my bite per square centimeter of leg surface has gone down, but they still bite.
My suggestion? Use lots and lots of deet. This noxious chemical is available in any number of mosquito sprays, Joyce has the house well stocked with Off!
That’s the insect story. I hope I haven’t bored you so much that you quit reading our adventures. I still have lots of wildlife to tell you about, but I think that’s all you can handle for one day.
Just one last word of caution: if insects really bother you, don’t go live in a rainforest.
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