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Panama has been a beautiful but challenging country to cycle. Having been getting regularly soaked for over a month I am used to this, but the rainy season seems to have reached a new intensity in the last week and the afternoon storms have often forced me to stop cycling. The visibility drops, roads become rivers, trucks carry on regardless and it is no place for a bike! It has also played havoc with my cameras and other electronics.

My only time off the bike in Panama came soon after the border when I spent a day visiting a howler monkey sanctuary, seeing an and then going on a night hike in the rainforest to find snakes and tarantulas. It was a wonderful experience, and to see the native culture and also wildlife in such close quarters was a real privilege.

After the rainforest visit I was given a tough target to reach a boat by Monday, only to find that this schedule was changed, so in a classic 'hurry up and wait' I have raced to Colon only to have two days off - which is a welcome break!

There is literally no road that joins Panama in Central America to the South American continent. The formidable jungle frontier of the is nearly impassable. A few have made it and lived to tell the tale!

The other challenge is that my journey will continue in Ecuador and not Columbia, so I need a way to get there, preferably without taking a flight. Therefore, I am about to join a cargo boat, carrying fruit, from the port of Colon on a 60 hour voyage, through the Panama Canal and down the Pacific coast. This will be a great adventure and a brief rest for the legs before the big and very mountainous miles of South America.

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