Tea & Simplicity: Pelican Paradise

Just for good measure, Duane started his day - desayuno, breakfast - with an El Panameño plate that included bistek y chiles con tortillas - strips of beef stewed with mild peppers, onions, in a piquant gravy, served with what I'd rather call corn cakes than tortillas. In my world, tortillas are flat as steamrollered pancakes and floppy enough to roll up. The Panamanian tortilla is more akin to a hockey puck but loads more delicious - crispy on the outside and soft within!
The morning's activity was a refreshing and calming motor boat ride all around Isla Taboga, which didn't sound like a very long trip, but turned out to be a little over an hour which took us from the settled and civilized habitable area to the far side of the island which was a pelican/bird sanctuary that was prohibited to be developed for humans.
Though it isn't actually "pelican season" where they gather, breed, feed, etc., we saw quite a few of the majestic and enormous birds, perching on rocks, roosting in trees, and flying half a foot above the water, soaring in search of fish to scoop with their incredibly elastic beaks. The boat belonged to Tomas, because Geni and Steve "know a guy who knows a guy" with a boat and Tomas was willing, despite a busy day of property management for his expat employers, to take four Americanos for a water circuit of his home.
Once a hideout for the infamous pirate Morgan, the far side of the island is rocky and wild with jungle... or was it forest? One simply doesn't always know all the words for things in a foreign place. Captain Morgan (I'm assuming his military rank) used a cave on the island as a lair during his exploits, and the cave was accessible by a narrow inlet just wide enough for a rowboat. We did not venture any closer, although a more adventurous me would have wanted to pull in to the inlet, step foot on the sandy shore and wander into the cave that looked so intriguing. But all I got was a photograph, which as photographs go, will never capture what the human eye can witness.
The beaches here are renewed daily by the tide, which rises 18 feet over the course of the day. An entire sandbar where a hundred people stretched out on chaise lounges under colorful umbrellas was completely under water by evening. The beachgoers had ferried back to the mainland long before then, leaving some of their money which the Tabogans were happy to accept.
I bought a vanilla helado (ice cream) which was soft-serve ice milk and perfect for cooling, while Duane marvelled at the $1 cerveza... that is, until he came across another kiosk offering 75-cent cerveza! Paradise, indeed.
We kept the heat of the day, to which we are slowly becoming acclimated, at bay by taking a dip in the cool ocean then walking to Geni and Steve's to lounge in a crystal clear pool. The beach here is strewn with so many beautiful seashells and so much seaglass that I felt no need to grab every one I saw. I did pick up one small cobalt blue sliver, though, that upon closer inspection had the remnants of the words New York embossed on it. What a long way that little shard had traveled to be tumbled smooth by the waves and end up in my hand. Walking on the beach, to my tender feet, was like walking on yards of legos - ooch, ouch, aahr...
As the sun set, we ate a meal of sea bass in coconut passion fruit sauce, rice, shrimp and - my new favorite fried snack: patacones. Patacones, a popular Caribbean/Panamanian item is plantains, cut in hefty slices, smashed flat like a cookie and fried then lightly salted - pure delicious! After our meal, we strolled along the avenue from the hotel to the vicinity of the dock, where people still gathered in the cool evening, talking, laughing, and enjoying life. Same as in our small town. Wherever I wander, I always seem to find more things we all have in common than things that make us different. It's still one big small world.