I was there for a short visit, December 2012. I’ve been hoping to go back for ages.

Best Hooters, ever. All of the girls were pretty with only minimal makeup. (I know- I’m sleazy and borderline sexist. But why else do you go to Hooters? I don’t think it’s for the menu or the beer, even though Wings’n’Beer are flight crew staples.

I’ve no idea what hotel we were in, but it was fairly close as we had walked. It was decent quality, which airlines have a bad record for choosing.
Walking about outside, day and night, was absolutely fine. We had some folk who had built up some drama about Panama before we went, but I think it’s like most places. Keep your eyes open, don’t be so drunk that you can’t recognise where you are, or what’s going on. Keep your wits about you.
This route included a stop in Cancun. I liked Cancun, but there was a much stronger vibe of threat if you were to stray outside typical gringo areas.

Price wise, I thought it was quite reasonable. But then, compared to Quebec, many places would.

We did a day tour from the hotel to see the canal. I’d say it’s well worth it. Once.
The canal on its own may not appear to be that spectacular, but in the context of what it does, where it is, and what runs through it, it’s fairly impressive- deep down, the engineer in me still lingers. Quite a few of the Americans in the group were a bit ‘meh’ and couldn’t wait to be somewhere else.
None of my photos do it justice, though. Looking at the queue of traffic waiting to go through shows how important it is.

There was a huge thunderhead over the plantation area during our visit. Some spectacular lightning strikes.