Penonomé Carnaval

One night when we were getting ready to go out to Carnaval, we were talking with the young guy at reception and he asked us why we were not at Penonomé. We had heard that a Las Tablas was the biggest party of Carnaval but it was 6 hours away and we didn't have a hotel room. We didn't know anything about Penonomé?! He told us that if he didn't have to work, he would definitely be there and that we should go. He said it is only about 3 hours away and that it is THE best place to be for Carnaval. He said it is an all day thing, that we should leave at 4 in the morning, go to a bus station and take a bus to Penonomé. He said we could find somebody to stay with or just stay on the street if we decided to stay there all night. We talked about it and decided that we had to go! We went to Carnaval that night, came home, laid down for 30 minutes, then got up to go to Penonomé at 4 am, just like we were told but none of us had any idea of what we were getting ourselves into!!

When we arrived, the town was deserted except for these massive water trucks lined up along the road and empty concert stages. It was about 8 am and everybody said that Carnaval started at 10 am, but then again, because this was the last day, it might start a little late. We had nothing to do except for try to stay awake and wait for the party to start. Darren was absolutely exhausted and really mad that we woke up so early come to this town when it didn't even start until 12 and ALMOST caught a bus back to Panama City. Luckily, Rachel was able to talk him out of it...

When 11 rolled around, huge crowds started coming out of nowhere. People just kept pouring into this little town on this little street that we were on. The music was on full blast and scantily dressed models started spraying everybody in the crowds with fire hoses from the water trucks! Eventually it got so crowded that we couldn't even walk around so we went around the water trucks to try to get up behind them because there were only a little bit of people and private stages back there. We asked what we had to do to get back there, and they said it was only 5 dollars!!! That was crazy because if we had been in Las Vegas we would have paid about $200 to get special treatment like that!

We spent the whole day up on our private platform with our private tables and private stage. Everybody kept getting sprayed and we were soaking wet from the second that we got there until the second that we left. It was the biggest party that any of us had every been to!! And the coolest part was that WE WERE THE ONLY FOREIGNERS THERE!!!!!!!! Seriously! We did not see one other person that was not Panamanian the entire day! The little town has very few hotels and locals book them up for Carnaval right after the one that just passed. We were the only people crazy enough to go to Carnaval in Panama City, not sleep, get on a bus and drive up there just for the day. The water party was over at about 4:00 and we found a bus back to the city just to party the night away at the last night of Carnaval in Panama City!! What a day!!