Layovers, do you love them or hate them??
I don’t necessarily like layovers but if there is no escaping them I’d rather it be a long layover so I can venture out of the airport. The longer the layover the better chance I have to see the country and get two trips out of one.
When I started looking for flights to Trinidad the options for short layovers were almost nonexistent, the layovers were either in Newark for a couple hours or an overnight layover in Toronto. I didn’t understand why I would go further north to go south. Then, I came across a layover in Panama and was sold. It was a five hour layover and I wasn’t sure if that would be enough time to explore but I was determined to try. I quickly did an online search for things to do on a long layover, but all of the articles recommended leaving the airport if you had six plus hours, I didn’t. Doubt began to creep into my head, I was not about to miss my connecting flight to Trinidad. I started to think I wouldn’t be able to do it with factoring in immigration and customs. But I also knew if I didn’t at least try I would regret it.
I landed in Panama at 2pm and my flight wouldn’t leave until 750pm. I cleared immigration and customs within an hour and found secure transportation at the exit. I expressed to my driver what time I wanted to be back and what I wanted to do and he did just that. When it comes to local taxis I can be skeptical that are ready to take advantage of tourists; so when he told me he would drive me around for 70 USD I thought that may be a bit expensive so I opened the Uber app to compare cost and his price worked out to be cheaper than Uber.
I wanted to see the Panama Canal, and as I arrived there was a cruise ship waiting to pass. It was pretty interesting to see the engineering of the canal opening and closing of the locks to let the ships pass through. Since I was on a schedule, I could not see the ship pass through the canal entirely; it was a pretty long process and I stayed for about 40 minutes. When I left the ship was at the last lock.
I grabbed a caprese flauta and we were on our way. I did not want to leave too late. It was 4pm and I wanted to take traffic into account since it took us about 45 mins to get to the canal from the airport.
We arrived back at the airport with plenty of time to spare. In hindsight I could have stopped to see the PANAMA sign but my driver expressed that we wouldn’t have time to do both since the parking would have been a little trickier. I guess I just need to take another trip to really see Panama. It is definitely a beautiful island with so much to see.
If you are planning a trip and cannot avoid that dreaded layover consider taking it, maybe take an overnight one so that you can explore! You will not be disappointed.
Takiyah Travels 