CERRO PUNTA – OUR FIRST FULL DAY IN CERRO PUNTA

            Last night we arrived in the mountain town of Cerro Punta, in Tierras Altas (High Lands) and all I can say is that I do NOT want to leave this place. Compared to the exhaustingly humid air in Panama City, the cool air and peaceful view of the mountains make this the perfect destination for me. It supposedly rains every day here and from what I’ve seen in the past day and a half, they are not wrong. Either way the first day was great, but this blog is about the second day.

            I woke up at around 6:15 today and the warm blankets with the contrast of the cold air made it very difficult to get out of bed. Once I did, I immediately regretted it and wanted to go back, but I had to get on with my day. My host mother, Mami Florin, said good morning to me and I went to take a shower. There is no warm water here in Cerro Punta and I’m pretty sure that most if not all of Panama has no warm water, so I was traumatized while trying to shower. After, Ryan and I had breakfast with Mami Florin which was very delicious.

At 8:30, we all went to the FUNDICCEP which is the building we were brought to when we first arrived here. We gathered our things and took a five-minute walk to the school where the summer camp was going to take place. One by one, the children started getting to the school and we played a game where we passed a beach ball to one another while saying our names. The kids all seemed pretty excited to be there and by the time they all arrived, we knew everyone’s names. For the next few hours, we played kickball, soccer, and then Ryan, Mr. Tricco, Alejandro, who was one of the kids, and I found a frisbee and had a lot of fun throwing it to each other. After the summer camp ended and we had lunch with the kids, we went on a tour of Cerro Punta and saw a lot of cool things. We learned a lot about the area’s agriculture and families, like how there’s a family in Cerro Punta that owns a lot of land here and raises racing horses that participate in professional horse racing, like the Kentucky Derby. We learned that the area of Volcan, which is where Cerro Punta and Guadalupe are, produces around 80-90 percent of the produce in Panama, which I thought was interesting. I also took a lot of pictures of flowers at the request of Avery mostly, and some pictures of the mountains and scenery. After the tour, we found a nice café and had snacks and coffee.