July 15 – 21

Monday we called a guy that had been recommended to us by our realtor and insurance agent to get our hair cut. He scheduled us for early afternoon that day. He is located just outside of the Coronado gates in a development called the Equestrian Club. Wayne met us at his gate and took us to his Bohio. (outdoor patio that is covered) right next to his beautiful pool. This is where his salon is! So, sitting outside we got our hair cut and I got color as well. His washing sink was on the outside of the bohio and only had cold water. Total for both of us was $50. While my hair processed Wayne and his wife Lise chatted with us.



They invited us to a Neighbors Helping Neighbors meeting at a restaurant & Bar named Paraiso that evening. It’s an effort to get a “911” type service that we can call if there is an emergency of any kind where a bilingual person takes the call and then calls the appropriate agency and relays the message in Spanish. He will have all of our information ahead of time such as where we are located, medications we may be taking, allergies etc. There was a band that was playing and several speakers got up and talked about the service and also someone had video camera set ups he was selling for safety. We met an interesting lady there that we chatted with. It had gotten late and we hadn’t had dinner yet so we stopped for a pizza at Gourmet Pizza near home. YUM! We had planned on eating at Paraiso, but no one ever brought menus.

Tuesday, we drove into the city and are no longer PriceSmart virgins. After filling out a ton of paperwork (I swear there was less to buy the car…) we got our pictures taken and cards were issued. My last name is Karies, but they got Greg’s right. We bought a ton of stuff. We had bought a desk next door at Office Depot (yep, same one as in the States) and we got a desk chair at PriceSmart. We bought a bunch of meat since finding good ribeyes in the local stores is impossible. Also picked up some pork and chicken…though chicken and smoked pork chops are good in our local stores. We got a later start than planned, so we stopped at whatever was in the parking lot of PriceSmart which turned out to be Pizza Hut. The menu is at least twice as big as in the States, besides the regular pizza selections they also offer sandwiches, chicken etc. to appeal to the locals. Pizza was quite good! No, we aren’t on a pizza diet…..

Wednesday we grabbed lunch at Coronado Café, a place we hadn’t tried before, but had been told it was quite good. We had yummy burgers and fries! We bought a Weber propane grill for the balcony and picked up a few other things we needed. We skipped Picasso happy hour since we were out Monday night.

Friday we drove to El Valle to have lunch and shop at the farmer’s market. The place we ate at last time was closed, so we tried Bruschetta Restaurant, but it wasn’t that great. We had a Mixto Platter (steak, pork and chicken) and plantains. The salad and the plantains were very good, but the meats were nothing special and the steak was so tough I couldn’t cut it with the knife or chew it if I did get a bit cut off. (crossed that one off our list…) We picked up a couple of pineapples, some red & green peppers and a couple cucumbers and some orejos. (small elephant ear pastries) After that we went to the local “zoo”. The Zoo El Nispero is actually a rescue center. It’s a lovely setting on about 7 acres with lots of different birds and animals. Many people go expecting a major zoo and I’m sure they are disappointed. This couple is doing a lot of good for these animals and we were impressed with what they have accomplished. They get support for researching the fungus that is killing the golden tree frogs. They have a nice frog & toad exhibit there.



Saturday we were invited to a fish fry upstairs at the social center, but we would need to bring a dish and with only an hour notice that wasn’t working for me. Picasso was having a band and we were going to go, but forgot…… ARGH!

Today we saw some powered paragliders over the beach. 2 went right past our balcony.



More misc. things about Panama:

It’s illegal to wear sunglasses inside a bank

Don’t assume foil or plastic wrap will have that metal thingy that helps you tear it off the roll….

There are no street addresses here. There are no zip codes. There is no postal delivery. When anyone asks what your address is, just Coronado will do. Some people kind of make one up from their lot number or apt. number and the street they live on.

We can pick up mail at the MBE here in Coronado and can mail things from there. It cost over $50 to mail the 3^rd set of fingerprints to the FBI using DHL. We do most everything online, but if we do need to receive something we use a mail forwarding service that also acts as our domicile in Florida. We request it to be sent along with anything we may have ordered from Amazon or wherever and it gets delivered to MBE. (so we pay double shipping charges, plus MBE charges their fees.) So, it’s not something we will do often, but if we really want or need something….we can do it! For any regular mail they just scan it and we read it online.

I just finished the Petra and Egypt albums on Picasa and now I am working on Jerusalem and the Dead Sea. I’ll be glad when I am finished! I need to get back to my Spanish lessons. Til next week…….