Jeff on the Camino de Cruces

Jeff and I hiked a very, short distance on the Camino de Cruces. During the 16th and 17th centuries, the Camino de Cruces was the road that the Spanish carried all their loot from South America across the Panamanian isthmus and on to Spain.

Castle San Lorenzo and literally Driving through the Panama Canal

Andy Terry at Monkey Island in Sobrania National Park

Kellee and the Winner of Latin America IDOL

Kellee Farmer and Margarita (who won Latin American Idol). They met at the Presidential Palace in Panama while First Lady Laura Bush visited the First Lady of Panama.

Marine Ball 2008

We attended the annual Marine Ball which is always a good time. You can see it degenerated pretty fast. Pictured here is our friend Robin and my favorite MSG Ruben, who never looks this serious except in photos.

Jana and Nikki's Wedding

We attended Jana and Nikki's wedding on November 1 in Washington. It was a really, really beautiful wedding, and they had their reception at their new (gigantic, newly renovated, beautiful and perfect) house in Petworth. I was honored to light a candle at the ceremony.

The weather in DC was perfect, and it made us miss living there - we love enternal summer, but we miss the changing of the seasons too. We also gorged ourselves on Thai and Indian food, virtually unknown in Panama, and JB got his good beer. We returned home to Panama to nearly non-stop national day celebrations.

Diablo Rojos Near Colon

We can't help but love the pollution-spewing, dangerous, hot and crowded Diablos Rojos, because we don't have to commute in them to work. Did I mention that the drivers are often drunk and compete with each other for riders by speeding down the streets and cutting everyone off? As you can see, the best ones are brightly and cleverly painted. The back doors in particular are interesting - lots of times they sport pictures of wives/girlfriends or kids, but also sports figures, singers, actors (we recently saw Bruce Willis) and politicians. We have also randomly seen Osama bin Laden and Matt Lauer. We see lots of Disney characters and other cartoon-type pictures on the sides of the Diablos. These aren't the best, just the ones we've been able to get pictures of as usually I am trying to take a photo while Jim B is swerving away from the Diablos trying to spare our lives. These were parked in a lot near Portobelo.