Granito de Oro & Coiba
Quite early this morning, we were pleasantly surprised observing distant heavy rain showers that were accompanied by a very thin and very high water spout; one of these uncommon oddities of nature that we get rewarded with occasionally.
Today, on our final day in beautiful Panama, we have visited ironically one of the smallest islands, that is adjacent to the largest island in Central America. Our activities today will take place on the pristine white sandy beaches, and adjacent rocky coral reefs, of a precious tiny island called Granito de Oro. Looming at a short distance and resembling the mainland coast is the gigantic Coiba Island with an area of 503 square kilometers. Coiba and the tiny Granito de Oro are off the Pacific coast on the Panamanian province of Veraguas.
As it is our costume we arrive just at the break of dawn and by Zodiac landed on the immaculate beach of the island, ready to spend a relaxed day on the very best beach location and snorkeling opportunity of the trip. Upon disembarkation many of our guests readily started taking turns in trying their skill maneuvering the kayaks, while others tried the snorkeling on the rocky reef.
Among the snorkelers there were a few persistent brown pelicans constantly plunge-diving, competing with us for the fish! To be more precise lets just say that the fish were just merely involved with us, but on the other hand, seriously “compromised” in their relation with the pelicans. In the end, all adding up to the show! Some of our guests chose to relax and combed the beach, looking at the intricate shapes and colors of the many shells, much to their surprise finding several of these shells already occupied by hermit crabs.
Among the kayakers there were even a couple of adventurous guests, who tried the limits of their balance; aside from also successfully accomplishing to test the capabilities of our self-inflating life jackets. (Needless to say they all indeed worked perfectly!) In the afternoon and after returning for lunch to the National Geographic Sea Lion some guests decided to return for more time on the beach, while others decided to take it easy and stay onboard. It was in all a very relaxed last day in Panama, in preparation for all of the oncoming hikes in the rain forest in Costa Rica, our destination for tomorrow.
