Canopy Tower (Panama)
Located just outside of Panama City is Soberania National Park, and one of the best ways to see its wildlife is to visit Canopy Tower. An old US military installation now owned by Panama is leased by Raul Arias de Para, a man with great vision and a love for animals and the environment. Raul has transformed this tall tower into an ecotourism site and it's a great place for birdwatching. You can stand on the tower's viewing platforms and peer over the treetop canopy.

There are many beautifully-colored - and rare - tropical forest birds that can be spotted full frame in Raul's scopes. Look in another direction, and you may see a sloth hanging peacefully in a cercropia tree; just past the sloth in the distance, Jack spots a huge ship making its way through the famed Panama Canal. From the balcony of our room, we have an eye-level view of toucans; down below, furry coati-mundis (relatives of the raccoon) and agoutis abound! Within just a few minutes of the tower is Plantation Road, another good site for spotting more curious little creatures.

Alberto Palleroni, a researcher from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Center, (located on Barro Colorado in Panama) shared with us with an extremely rare Harpy Eagle.

This eagle was injured and could not be returned to the wild. Instead, it was made part of an important breeding program. Alberto spends his life studying this amazingly powerful bird (probably the strongest raptor in the world), and is considering the Canopy Tower forest as a potential site to release one of his study eagles.

Gamboa Rainforest Resort (Panama)
After a very productive visit with Raul, we headed just a short distance to nearby Gamboa Rainforest Resort. This resort is right on Gatun Lake, formed when the canal was developed. The surrounding habitat is home to a variety of monkeys, birds, and reptiles! Quaint villas complete with white wicker furniture have been created by renovating former buildings that housed canal workers long ago. A fabulous new hotel overlooks the lake.

Of interest to Jack were the animals to be seen along the lake's rainforest banks - sloths, white-faced capuchin monkeys, the screeching howler monkeys, and caimans. A short hike through the the jungle led us to a former secret military radio station. It was amazing to witness what the fast-growing forest has done to the structure... trees growing through and up walls, vines all over, with bats roosting inside!

Also new are a series of animal displays that allow visitors to get close-up looks at the Gamboa area wildlife - frogs, snakes (including the extremely venomous Fer-de-lance) caimans (a type of crocodilian) and fish. For flower enthusiasts, walk through the orchid exhibit! And for a dramatic excursion into and through the forest canopy, take a ride on the aerial tram cable cars, or "teleferico" and glide silently high among the lush vegetation.

At just about any meal, you can look over the restaurant's deck and watch water birds while caimans stare motionless back at you!

We found it absolutely amazing that we could be filming a variety of animals and at the same time, watch a ship passing through the lake from the canal. One would think that the human activity would drive wildlife deeper into the forests!