Ashely, who lives in Colon where we ended our hike, spoiled us all with her cooking. She's a great cook, and they have more food in their house than a tienda (town store) due to a Costco run while her parents were visiting. Her pantry is probably on par with a typical pantry in the states. Our eyes were wide and our mouths were drooling over it all. She also had a bunch of recipe books, including one called Four Ingredient Cookbook. It is a really pretty book with lots of great recipes that don't call for a ton of different ingredients. Wihle some of them are a little impractical here due to some random ingredients, there are plenty of good ones I want to try. By the tiem Courty visits or whoever comes next, I'll have Hollandale sauce for eggs benedict, soup stocks, and breads and veggie dishes all from scratch. That's the hope at least. But at least I won't be at a loss of what to do when I don't have any eggs to cook or have too much cilantro than I know what to do with.

I just got back from some early morning birding at Gamboa, near the Pipeline Road. They have a huge observatory tower, rising over 100ft from the forest floor and popping out through the canopy. It offered a great vantage point for lots of birds, including a couple species of toucans, bright blue cotingas and danaskis, spotted doves, sloths, and more. And instead of a $60 cab ride, we only paid $18 each for cab ($25), binocular rentals ($5), and entrance fee ($10 for Panamanians). I just love being a Panamanian with all the deals I get with entrance fees. hehe It was a beautiful place though, and I want to coordinate with them for my Flying WILD stuff. And I don't remember if I told you, but they (the marketing and publicity director of Flying WILD in the States) emailed me since he heard from others in the office what I was doing down here and wants to include it in their newsletter that goes out to all the educators using the program across the states. Pretty good networking for when I get back, huh? :) I wrote my boss to cover my tail and make sure Peace Corps is okay with me saying whatever. I can't imagine they'd have a problem with it though, as that's good publicity for them too. Now all I've gotta do is hold the festival in my site! hehe