Portobello, Panama
Seaduced
John & Jane Craven
Sat 18 Jan 2014 18:24
Portobello is billed as a charming town with a lot of history. There was the famous pirate, Henry Morgan,who worked the Spanish Main, he managed to take Portobello, and threatened to slay the whole population unless he received payment of 100,000 pesos! Also, Portobello was the main port for transferring riches from South and Central America back to Seville in Spain. Each of the forty five known fleets to leave Portobello had no less than 30,000,000 pesos worth of cargo, and in the 1600's that was a lot of pesos!
There are two forts in the bay used for defensive purposes, mostly ruins now, and the old customs house in town. The guide book says this has been beautifully restored, I can't imagine what it looked like before!
The Main Street
A pimped up ex-American school bus, used on all bus routes and usually driven very badly!
The 'beautifully restored' Customs House
One of the big 'attractions' here is the statue of the Black Christ in the local church. The Festival of the Black Christ of Portobello is celebrated every year on 21 October, and pilgrims have been know to 'walk' from as far as Costa Rico on their knees to pay their respects!
The Black Christ
The fort
The boys at the fort
John and David 'pretending' to be winos!
The town was a bit of a shock when we arrived, it certainly had 'charm' and a somewhat faded glory! It was not a place to visit at night - definitely daytime only. We found the only bar in the town, Captain Jacks, for a sundowner and returned for lunch on Sunday. There was a very unusual clientele in the bar, most of whom had been drinking since early morning!
A trip round the bay by dinghy took us to a Tiki Bar on the beach, where we thought we might have lunch, we had been told y the fisherman that the seafood and ceviche were good there, however all they had on when we arrived was pot noodles or octopus ceviche, neither of which we fancied!
After this it is next stop Shelter Bay to prepare for the Panama Canal transit, so it will be all systems go for the next few days!
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