DUST AND WORKING GIRLS

TO QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 26
The Pan American Highway follows the coast. Flat land is given over to oil palms and billboards. Hillsides are forest interlaced with billboards and subdivisions. Glimpses of the ocean are small compensation for such cross-cultural horror. I intend sleeping the night in Quepes. The final 47 Ks are dirt. Massive trucks drag dust clouds. Construction machinery looms out of the dust. Rocks kick the front wheel and the rear wheel. Gritt fills my eyes. My butt is numb. My thighs cramp. More dust. A sign appears out of the dust. The sign warns of a bypass round an uncompleted bridge. Miss the sign and you hit a dead drop of twenty feet. This is not fun...

COSTA RICA IS FOR SALE

TO QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 26
Costa Rica is for sale. The country would be beautiful minus the billboards advertising subdivisions and condominiums, spas and country clubs, serpent farms and butterfly farms, horse ridding, surfing and canopy trails, plus every other type of crap that might gull a tourist into an investment.
I head into the hills a way in hope of escaping. No such luck- and I switch off the engine to make certain that I haven´t run a bearing. The screaching is cicadas protesting at billboard encroachment.

COSTA RICA COUNTER POPE

PANAMA/COSTA RICA BORDER: JANUARY 26
Entering Panama from Colombia, I was issued a 30 day visa. Customs gave me a 30 day permit for the bike. I received a fresh visa when returning from the US. Not so the bike. The bike has overstayed. Panamanians are understanding of such small irregularities. The Customs officer at Carpacho glances at the bike documents, stamps them and gives me a grin. The relevant clerk in Costa Rica is a small man, grey wiry hair, half moon spectacles and a power complex. I watch as he revels in exercising his authority over bus and truck drivers. Danes would call him a Counter Pope.
My bike documents are photo copies. I have crossed the length of South America on photocopies. He doesn´t give a damn for South America. I produce originals or I don´t enter Costa Rica.
I sit in an office and wait for the head of Customs. A woman customs clerk glances at me from behind the counter. She is plump and comely, wears a nose stud and smiles frequently. A while passes before she enquires as to my problem. She dissapears for a few minutes, returns and escorts me outside. She grabs one of the touts who seek tips for aiding travelers transit the border. "Get a lawyer´s stamp on an afidavit," she tells me.
The tout conducts me to a kiosk where a young Chinese Panamanian woman types my affidavit and complains that Costa Ricans are a pain in the butt.
A lawyer´s mother runs a dress shop. She charges me a poem for taking the affidavit to her daughter´s office in David.
The daughter charges $20 for a stamp.
The Costa Rican counter pope accepts the affidavit with ill humur.
The comely Customs woman accepts a kiss on both cheeks.
Finally I am on my way. I have been at the border four hours.

SNORING

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Cameron persuaded the Banana directors to go the workers co-operative route in Puerto Armuelles. The job is done. Cameron and his wife are packing. Next stop is Mozambique, Cameron will be overseeing a multi crop agricultural venture. This will be his first visit to Africa. He is in his late fifties. He has made a ten year commitment to the British investers. His enthusiasm is that of a twenty-year-old. He runs me back to the hotel at 2 AM. I have been moved in with one of the young boat captains from the US. He snores gently. I snore loudly. He retreats to a couch in the lounge.

JOY

My adoptive daughter, Anya, and her partner, Michael, are the parents of an extraordinarily handsom and intelligent son, Shane Ravi.

UNITED FRUIT COMPANY

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Puerto Armuelles is a typical United Fruit town. Housing is according to Company status. Three small bedrooms and a small yard for clerks and mechanics. Three medium bedrooms in a large garden for engineers and accountants. Offices and the guest house are zoned at the foot of a small hill that overlooks the town and wharf. Management houses are on the hill. The Regent's house is on the crest. 1 AM and I slump in an easy chair in the small sitting-room, drink cold beer and pump the good-natured Cameron for information.
Throughout the first half of the 20th century, United Fruit had a near monopoly. They produced for seven cents and sold for seven dollars. They enjoyed the wealth and power now wielded by narcotraficers.
At best they were paternalistic.
At worst, they chose and deposed Presidents and fermented civil wars: the clandestine war that crucified Guatemala for thirty-six years was a United Fruit Company creation.

LAST MAN STANDING

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Cameron is a big florid man in his late fifties. He is a Scot born in the Caribbean. His father was United Fruit. Cameron is Chiquita Banana. Cameron has been king in half a dozen countries. King? Take United Fruit's operation centered at Almirante on Panama's Caribbean coast. United Fruit began shipping fruit at the turn of the 19th century. The road connecting Almirante to the rest of Panama was completed in 1995. Drive from Almirante to Panama City, you had to travel via San Jose, Costa Rica – a four-day journey even in modern times. The bridges into Costa Rica were built by and belonged to United Fruit. Same for the road and railway and the port and the schools and hospital and 90% of the houses in town. King?
OK, Regent. The Company was King.
Here, in Puerto Armuelles, the workers came out on strike.
The King abdicated.

BEST SPORT FISHING IN THE WORLD

hookedonpanama boat shed: puerto armuelles

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
I have never pushed anythng in which I didn't believe. I believe in Hookedonpanama. The new lodge has ten cabins and a club house. The site is superb.
Rex has five boats in the water. Young captains from the US are fanatic fishermen. Marlin fishing is the best in the world. Opening date? March 1st.
Maria will continue to run the Puerto Armuelles guest house for drop-ins.

ONE MORE CRASH

thru trees at new lodge: hookeonpanama

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Rex landed an eight-hundred pound marlin last week. Today he is boat-building in an old United Fruit warehouse. His daughter, Maria runs the hotel and paperwork. His wife landscapes 20 Ks along the shore where they are building a fishing lodge in partnership with two Texan brothers from Maui.
The road is gravel. I hate gravel. A truck pushes me wide. The bike slides into scrub. I struggle out from under and heave the bike back onto the track. My leg is OK. Thank Alpinestars for great boots.

HOOKED ON PANAMA

new lodge


PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 24
Rex is a Texas boat builder. He, his wife and daughter run a Pacific Coast sports fishing operation at Puerto Armuelles. Puerto Armuelles is a creation of United Fruit/Chiquita Banana. The Company pulled out a couple of years back. A worker's Co-op runs the plantations. The Panamanian Government subsidises the Co-op.
HOOKEDONPANAMA run the Fruit Company's old guest house as a hotel. This is a great building, full of history, romantic, spacious rooms with a/c, splendid bathrooms, excellent chef. I sleep in luxury - recompense for fear,

SCARED HALF TO DEATH

TO PUERTO ARMUELLES: DECEMBER 24
I am out of Panama City. Nigel took me for shrimp breakfast, then depatched me north to a sports fishing operation close to the frontier with Costa Rica. The Pan American highway crosses hill country with magnificent panoramas of Panama's mountain spine. I descend to the western plains and cruise at 90 KPH. The rear tyre blows. I am on a section of duel carriageway. The bike skitters side to side. Klaxons blare. Tip at this speed - end of journey. I don't dare break. One hundred metres to halt the bike. Push the bike a further two hundred metres up a gradient to a gas station. A boy helps dismount the wheel. A three-inch nail has shreded the inner tube. I carry a spare. I could do with a spare leg and renewed nerves...

NIGELED

PANAMA CITY: JANUARY 21/23
I have been Nigeled. Is this a complaint or a boast at having survived. Nigel is a burly Brit more or less resident in Panama. He is a producer for Fox Sport and a fixer. He is happiest when speaking on two cell phones simultaneously – preferably whilst sneeking his car through an invisble rush-hour gap (he carries a reserve of Argentine Malbec on the back seat and steers with his knees).
Nigel is friends with a large portion of Panama's finance, real estate and hotel community. People enjoy his enthusiasm and his generosity. Visit Panama, he is the man to call. I called and was wined and dined and lunched and breakfasted for three days. I met people I hope to meet again, learnt statistics of Panama's property boom, placed a documentary movie project and did a live Spanish language radio broadcast.

BANKING IN PANAMA

PANAMA CITY: JANUARY 21/23
President Noriega comandeered Panama's banks. The US invaded Panama and arrested Noriega for drug trafficing and money laundering (and concurrently slaughtered a thousand or so innocent Panamanians – too bad).
Noriega was evil. He was a graduate of the School of the Americas (GOOGLE). He was a one-man band.
Now Panama is an international financial centre. The waterfront is spectacular so are the restaurants. Property prices have quadrupled in five years. So have the number of banks. Many are US subsidaries.
What do the banks do?
Launder drug money?
Surely not...

COPPER ROBBERY

PORTO BELO: JANUARY 19
I am at Marco's house on the hill above Porto Belo (Marcos on whose yacht I sailed from Cartagena).
Marcos returned yesterday from visiting his family in Canada over the holidays. He sails with passengers for Cartagena on Wednesday. He has much to do. A thief has stolen all the copper wiring from his boat. This is the village Marcos professes to love. Good luck to him – and good luck to his monkey and Rotweiler; they must remain a further three weeks at the animal posada.
Two of Marcos' passengers are French, young women on vacation from a year at University in Cali, Columbia – part of a five year degree course at Lille. A third is Sicilian, perhaps in his late thirties, a tailor of men's and women's suits. He was a master diver with the Italian marines and has a disability pension – small reward for an embolism in the brain.

JUNIOR IS MY HERO

Miss Junior discussing toy catalogue

COLON: JANUARY 19
One night to recuperate, then on to Colon by bus. My bike gleams in Junior's yard. Junior's bother-in-law opens the gates. Junior lies under the surgeon's knife in Panama City (hasn't Junior has suffered enough?). I dawdle sorting clothes and loading the bike. Junior's wife calls. The operation is successful. Junior is in recovery. I can talk with him on Monday.

ROAD RAGE - ROAD TERROR

panama city skyline


ADVICE FOR BUS PASSENGERS: JANUARY 18/19
Panaline coaches depart San Jose at 1 PM and are scheduled to arrive in Panama City at 5 AM. The fare is US $25.
The highway south from San Jose heads for the mountains and keeps climbing. Don't look out unless you have a head for heights. Never watch the road: oncoming traffic will scare the hell out of you.
I read a book. A truck removes our side mirror. Our driver halts on the soft shoulder. My idiot fellow passengers crowd that side of the bus to scope the drop. What they see is clouds. The bus tilts a little. I resist a desire to curl into a feetal ball.
8:30 PM – our driver swerves. Thump...We've killed a bicyclist. No lights on the bike.
An ambulance removes the corpse. Cops remove our driver He will be held six days pending investigation.
We wait for a replacement bus.
In England passengers would be in shock. Central America, dead bicyclists are standard. The small boy in the seat ahead drapes a sheet to make a play house. Even a pair of nuns smile. I keep thinking of the driver. Horror must be churning his belly. The family of the deceased - do they know he's dead? Or are they waiting up for him?
All these lives changed.
I was under a truck in Tierra del Fuego. How come I survived?
Terror almost did for me in Venezuela.
Giving up takes more courage than continuing - the shame factor.
A local bus arrives to take us to the frontier to meet a coach sent from Panama City.
I sit in the front seat and watch the driver. He drives with one hand on the wheel while jabbering into his cell phone. The bus shimmies on the soft shoulder as he overtakes a truck. An instance of murder being justified?

NYCPD AND BOOZE

SAN JOSE: JANUARY 17
A retired New York cop is a property developer. He began with rundown buildings on South Beach, Miami. Now he invests in San Jose. He owns a nine-bedroom town house that was a small hotel and two commercial buildings.
He plans opening a bar in one of the commercial buildings. Every New York cop dreams of owning a bar. The dream is a rebellion: for serving cops, bar ownership or dealing in booze is prohibited.
The ex cop is a Richard. He enjoys San Jose.
“You don't find it dangerous?”
“Nah,” Richard says – No, in English.
We drink a couple of beers while he considers.
Then, “Yeah, maybe a little.” Richard tilts his head to display the scar on the underside of his chin. A local kid knifed him, a real mess. A cosmetic surgeon worked magic.
We drink a few more beers. We briefly discuss US politics.
Were he to vote, Richard would vote Democrat – though all the Presidential candidates are full of shit.
The bar owner buys a final round. Then Richard escorts me to the Posada Amon. His nine-bedroom home is on the next block. At first glance I took him for mid-forties. Closing on sixty is correct. His father is back in Florida. They have enjoyed eighteen cruises together on cruise ships over the past few years.
Richard is a nice man, unusual...

LIFE

SAN JOSE: JANUARY 17
A Costa Rican complains of gringos owning so many hotels and bars in San Jose – the bars tourists frequent. We are drinking at a bar owned by a US citizen.
“Even the beaches are owned by foreigners,” he says. “They build walls to keep us out, Resentment is natural. Violence is natural.”
I nod commiseration.
He buys me a beer.
I listen to his complaints.
Such is life.

RAZOR WIRE CAPITAL

SAN JOSE: JANUARY17
San Jose remains the razor-wire capital of the World. A cab is the safe way into town.
I am greeted with a kiss on both cheeks from the owner of the Posada Amon. My room is ready, the room I occupied on my previous visit. “And the grandchild?”
“No grandchild.”
Her sympathy is for my daughter, “Boys are always late.”

AM I A WHORE?

JFK, NEW YORK: JANUARY 16
AM I A WHORE?
Why do I ask?
Because the ticket lady at Taka Airlines upgraded me to First Class.
Did I do a calculated charm number on her – or merely treat her as a human being?