We’re up at 4:00 a.m. to dress, grab last minute supplies
and dash out the door when the taxi driver shows up. The taxi driver carts us
the 35-40 minute drive to the airport; we’ve allowed plenty of time, at least
1.5 hours to check in and clear security at Orlando Airport. Everything goes
well.
COPA Airlines is a pretty nice airline—check in is handled
well and our luggage tagged for the proper destination and status. The want our
bags offloaded quickly.
Security is lined up at least 40 people when we get there,
so it was good we were early. My carryon
bag gets pulled for a security check because of the load of electronics inside.
The guard asks me if I have anything dangerous in it and I tell him, only my
disk drive. That’s enough for him, after he takes a look through each section
and helps me fit my PC back inside.
Starbucks is bliss but I wait almost as long for my Venti
Passion Unsweetened Ice Tea that arrives sweetened. I sympathize because they
are mobbed and the girl has my right ice tea to me in less than a minute.
Onboard the airplane, I’ve brought my copy of Freese’s
Essays, a poetry book, a writing book and pen and then end up snoozing. After
midnight to 4 is just not enough sleep. I’m trying to be positive about
formatting my hard drive and having to reload all my photographs. Talk about
stupid. Talk about a system that didn’t give an error message. Hopefully
Microsoft will add a drive letter to their warning about deleting all the
files. Luckily for me, Seagate apparently has run into this problem before and
had my driver ready for download. So much for articles that day.
Meanwhile, my seatmate is an elderly woman born in Columbia
who is very pleasant and I feel like a turd for not having learned Spanish well
enough to understand her question. I have Bob answer. Meanwhile, my ear is
slowly being tuned again to Spanglish and saying what little I know and the video has Portugese subtitles. I've learned to say Bim instead of Bueno. Next quarter though I am signed up for real.
Panama is warmer that Florida and very pleasant. The area
from the airport to downtown is mixed housing complexes and grazing land and
forest. Many trees are in bloom and smelly heavenly, especially the frangipani
or plumeria. Downtown is surreal—buildings like spikes out of flat areas in
random spacing and curving to follow the shoreline. Some really unusual
architecture makes me peer around for others—I liked the twist building, for
instance.
Our hotel is pleasant. Feeling stiff and grumpy and not at
all well-traveled, we try to get a walk in and restart at least five times
before it’s a real walk; we’re birding and emptying out after lunch. After it
rains twice, and my sandals dry out, I finally feel almost human. We do find a
good batch of birds, especially following the first rain when we have so many
that Bob runs back to the room for a second bird book then has to create an
index for it since he brought only the pictures.
Spotted today: Great-tailed Grackle (tons), Brown Pelican,
Blue-Grey Tanager, Barred Antshrike (stunning, probably not a lifer but both
male and female that hang together, Crimson-backed Tanager?, Common Tody
FlyCatcher*, House Wren, Tropical Kingbird, Yellow Warbler, Great Kiskadee,
Baltimore Oriole, Magnificent Frigatebird
Three probable Plumbaceous Pigeons but they’re not in the
right area and no one else matches. Field notes: light grey head, red eye, red
bill and legs, reddish wash on throat to about mid-belly, mostly grayish and
nondescript with no other markings. Also probable Gull-billed Tern but we
didn’t get enough id points and it’s a lifer for us. Also a probable yellow-bellied
sapsucker—we’ve got his nest though, and also the hang out for the Common Tody
Flycatcher who either makes a nest like a weaver, reuses a weavers nest, or
just likes the bougainvillea.
After drinks with our feet up, we get a good swim, then head
for the bar to write and use the internet. We have it in our room too, but sans
Bob’s gin. After he finishes on the internet, he has a fine time watching the
endlessly cycling Hooters Girls at the Beach photo shoot ad, can’t imagine why.
Wrote this blog 837 words, read half of Freese’s book, wrote
654 word on golf, hope to draft my essay (my previous one works better for the
following week). Mea Culpa about unfinished book reviews, I've read most, just need to write them and couldn't bring many of them with me.
Tomorrow is grammar day again. I hope I get to see
assignment 2, soon.
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