El Valle, Coclé Province
El Chorro Macho
About 100 miles west of Panama City, El Valle in the Coclé province was our first stop … a stop that almost made us turn around and return to the comforts and sophistication of Panama City! The guidebooks describe El Valle as a picturesque and tranquil town known for verdant forest, jagged peaks, quaint handicrafts markets, and outdoor adventure. We found El Valle to be more of a David Lynch film. We observed many strange individuals on bikes, a small trash fire on nearly every corner, and many attractions that represent the central American equivalent to the world’s largest ball of twine.
Intrigued by the thought of local handicrafts, we headed to the much touted marketplace but instead of finding adorable knick-knacks painstakingly created by the indigenous Indian population, we found alot of slick salemanship and crap-tastic ashtrays and figurines made in Taiwan. Then, we headed to El Chorro Macho (the Macho Waterfall) which was fairly macho as far as waterfalls go. We stayed at the extraordinarily weird Hotel Rincón Vallero where we woke up to find heavily armed police escorting a huge bus of (evidently VIP) tourists. Behind the stone wall (in the below picture) is a huge stone cave of a shower with water pressure that would rival El Chorro Macho!
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Hotel Rincón Vallero
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