The Tic Toc song I mentioned from our very long car ride day has been following us everywhere. It is apparently a thing right now. How can I not share this with you? According to the internet, the Panama soccer team made this famous. It is played at least once an hour on the local pop station.
Wednesday, we visited Montezuma falls, a three-tier waterfall up a stream very close to our hotel (the hotel’s address is literally “in front of the entrance to the waterfall”). It’s a path for a small ways, which turns into hopping on rocks and walking next to and over the stream. It’s a relatively easy hike, which I did (non-regrettably) in flip flops.
The first waterfall is about 80 feet high, plunging into a deep pool of deliciously cool water and tiny fish. It was relatively early and a small crowd had already gathered in the pool.
We had read about a mythical “easy” way up to the second and third waterfalls. I asked a few people in the pool, and they recommended climbing up a path directly behind us. The path was almost nearly straight up a very steep hill, marked by worn tree roots and an occasional rope tied between trees for safety. We backtracked slightly to see if there were stairs or a simpler path up – nope. Just this trail for mountain goats and stupid tourists.
Before you climb up, there is an ominous sign for emergency services, with a very easy-to-remember number plastered onto it.
Mountain goat trail up it was, past the emergency services number. We started scrambling up, and I decided to remain still in my flip flops. I am dedicated to the art of flip flopping anywhere I can. I am also quite stubborn.
Up was relatively easy. There were plenty of roots to grab, and the path had been worn by countless idiots before us making the scramble up the falls. Much to my bewilderment, a man going up the hill with his tiny puppy followed us, and then overtook us. With the dog. Wherever it could not hop up easily, he picked it up and set it down ahead of him, on top of a root. Miraculously, the adorable doggo did not fall, which is probably for the better as I would have tumbled down after it.
We reached the top without much difficulty (but behind the guy and his dog SOMEHOW) and followed a well-worn, leafy path around to the second set of falls. To get there, we had to go straight down some rocks, with only some nylon ropes tied to tree roots to prevent us from plummeting down about 150 feet.
Go hard or go home (Or fall and die, I suppose). If drunk spring breakers could do it, we could do it, and we carefully descended the rock face with the help of the ropes.
There was a tourist gaggle that had been brought there on a tour of sorts. They were jumping off rocks and had clearly not earned their waterfall stripes by climbing up and then down a death path.
We were warned (and had read warnings) not to jump from the top of the second falls as people had died doing this foolish act. There were flowers there to mark the passing of the two people. I tried not to fall off and succeeded.
After enjoying the area for a bit, we decided to head back the way we had come as we didn’t really want to walk a very long way around, possibly on some crappy dirt road with no reception.
I stubbornly gave up the flip flops and went back barefoot as I was not interested in falling off a cliff. The most difficult part was climbing up the rope part of the cliff face. I made Rhett shove my butt up as I climbed up the biggest step, which was just slightly taller than me without much in the way of footholds. I ended up with scrapes from the rock, but did not fall or die, which was more important.
After stepping on something particularly stabby on the leafy path and puncturing my foot, we had to climb our way back down the goat trail. This was done mostly backwards and with a great amount of effort. Fortunately, there were plenty of roots to grab and places where you could slide down on your butt safely, so it wasn’t as difficult as the descent with only rocks and ropes.
I decided that I won a dip in the falls so I swam under the waterfall and in the cool pool water for a while. So worth it.
I also discovered a third path up the waterfall: directly up the cliff face. Who knew?!
To make things even more crazy, the climber got about halfway up, whistled, and then jumped from the cliff face into the pool below. He lived!
We headed back because it was nearly lunchtime, and we also discovered the steps up to the top of the falls…oh.
After a lazy afternoon lunch at B Bar, we waited for low tide to head to nearby Isla de Cabuya. At low tide, you can walk across a land bridge to access the island. It’s used as a graveyard by residents of the nearby town, and is believed to be haunted (so don’t spend the night!).
Supposedly it also has pretty good snorkeling, but we were there for the novelty of walking out to an island (and seeing the cemetery).
Back at the hotel, we spent the sunset hours exploring the tidepools with urchins, crabs, and old people swimming in them.
