One of the best of Central America’s capitals, Panama City is where you can find comfort, relaxation, luxury, and nature all in one place.  Within the city you can find such luxury, international hotels such as InterContinental Marima, Marriot, Radisson Decapolis, and boutique hotels such as Bristol, and Canal House.  The Dining is also something to experience, where many establishments feature dishes from around the globe, such as French, Spanish, Lebanese and Chinese, along with Panamanian specialties from the traditional to the un-conventional.

 Declared a World Heritage site by UNESCO, the colonial district of Casco Viejo, is best traveled on foot, and here your feet will take you to architectural sites, ruins, museums and forests aplenty.  Here you can find the Metropolitan Cathedral, the ruins of the Santo Domingo Church, the golden altar of the Church of San Jose and Las Bovedas promenades.  In older Panama, or Panama Viejo, you will find the remaining ruins that range from the old city hall to a slave market.  Also visit the Panama Viejo Museum and the Metropolitan Park, which is the only protected tropical forest within city limits in the Americas, which has some 200 species of birds among a large array of animals.

 The nature-rich Canal Zone offers not only the 50-mile-long waterway it’s known for, but the other fascinating areas among the area.  An hour from Panama City you will find the Sobernia National Park, a vast rainforest where you can experience an environment inhabited with howler monkeys, sloth’s, and many bird species, making bird watching ideal along the 11-mile-long Pipeline Road.  On Isla Barro Colorado, in the middle of Lake Gatun, visit the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute.  This is the place to go to see Panama’s tapirs, coatis, peccaries, ocelots and rare red deer that inhabit the island.  And within this park, they offer two lodgings:  the Gamboa Rainforest Resort, which offers hiking and boating tours, cycling, kayaking, and spa; and the deluxe Canopy Tower Ecolodge, which is set high in the rainforest, giving you a breath-taking viewpoint of treetop wildlife.

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