Thursday, March 14, 2013

Santa Catalina, Panama

Santa Catalina
Oil  6" x 8"
$100.00 + $10. s/h

My husband and I recently got back from three weeks in Panama.  We like to go some place warm for a bit each winter and a visit to the Panama Canal was on our list of places to see.  So, off we went.  We spent four days in Panama City, part of one day at the Miraflores Visitors Center ie:  the Canal Museum, and one day on a trip through the canal.  We chose to do the full transit, which took all day as you go from the Pacific all the way across the country to the Caribbean side.  But, that was one of the reasons we went to Panama, so the full transit, vs the partial transit, was it for us!

We spent the rest of the trip in three different towns, Bocas del Toro, Boquete, and Santa Catalina. 
This painting is from Santa Catalina, which is below the town of El Tigre on the 
south west-ish side at the bottom of the smaller peninsula.

This is the front lawn of our hotel.
  I had no idea that the tide was so great, 18 to 20 feet!  When we arrived the first evening and looked out at the ocean, we saw just that:  ocean.  The next morning we saw more or less 2-300 yards of rock, then the ocean!   Much of the time we had overcast, grayish days.  Even still, the sun was strong!

This is the view from the hotel front lawn.

Here's the beach down the road from our hotel.  It was interesting to me that one beach in Panama had black sand and just a few miles down the road the beach was white sand.  In this picture the tide is way out.  When it came in, most of this was under water.  Santa Catalina is a surfing beach and town.  We estimated that the surfers had to paddle about a quarter mile out beyond the rocks to the big surf and huge swells. 


6 comments:

Nancy Van Blaricom said...

Loved reading about your Panama travels ... and seeing your easel set up.

Here in the pacific northwest, Washington state, South Puget Sound area, we get pretty high tides. It can be pretty impressive especially if you are not use to seeing this. Wikiipedia says we get tides to 14 feet: Tides in Puget Sound are of the mixed type with two high and two low tides each tidal day. These are called Higher High Water (HHW), Lower Low Water (LLW), Lower High Water (LHW), and Higher Low Water (HLW). The configuration of basins, sills, and interconnections cause the tidal range to increase within Puget Sound. The difference in height between the Higher High Water and the Lower Low Water averages about 0.3 feet (0.091 m) at Port Townsend on Admiralty Inlet, but increases to about 14.4 feet (4.4 m) at Olympia, the southern end of Puget Sound.[1]

Then you can go to Hawaii and the tides are about 2 feet. I'm just happy that I don't have to explain 'why' to anyone *giggle.

Pam Holnback said...

Nancy, This is so interesting!! I just don't know that much about tides. I didn't know that you could have 2 tides in one day. I though they were connected w/ the moon. We were in Hawaii last winter and the tides didn't make much difference at all on the beaches, in comparison! Thank you!

Nancy B. Hartley said...

Great post, Pam! Thank you for the travel info, and lovely painting!

Autumn Leaves said...

Love the green palm fronds in the painting, Pam. Thank you also for sharing photos of a place I'd never see on my own.

Pam Holnback said...

Thank you Nancy! I am really enjoying your weather series!

Sherry, thanks so much. One never knows what the future may hold.

Karen Bruson said...

Love these greys.