It is the most cosmopolitan city of Central America; it is a fabulous universe of tourism facilities with options to please all tastes, treasures from ancient times and modern infrastructures. It is also a huge international bank center and worldwide known as a shopping destination boasting a wide variety of stores and products from world leading brands are sold there.

The Calzada Amador, the 10-kilometer road linking the Culebra, Naos, Perico and Flamenco islands and lined with lookouts, hotels, docks, restaurants and other attractions; Old Panama, with its remains and ruins of the most ancient Spanish settlement in the American Pacific coast such as the famous Torre Lookout; the Historical Center with its squares and historical colonial buildings, and that fabulous piece of engineering work that is the Panama Canal, are just a few references of everything that can be seen and enjoyed in the capital of this small but great country. Drive and modernity Looking out the coast in Panama City, new neighborhoods have proliferated around the bay shaping a skyline of skyscrapers, banks, restaurants and shopping centers, as a vision of modernity and drive boosted by everyday life. One of the most outstanding areas is Punta Paitilla, one of the nicest places to live or walk around in the city, featuring spacious residences, over 50-story buildings, medical centers and related facilities equipped with cutting-edge technologies, bank offices, big shopping malls and entertainment centers like the Multicentro, a complex covering the Radisson Decapolis hotel and also a casino, several movies and reception halls, one supermarket and restaurants. Marbella is another fascinating neighborhood in the city as well as Punta Pacifica, two of the most elegant and modern residential areas of the city, with several high-rise glazed condominiums furnished with state-of-the-art comforts. There is also the popular Multiplaza Pacifico, a huge shopping center selling top-quality products from the most prestigious retail companies of the United States and Europe. Urban areas on the outskirts of the city like Costa del Este and Albrook offer a more relax and bucolic environment and they are the threshold to the exuberant Panamanian nature, parks and wildlife refuges in the area around the city, for example the Barro Colorado island; travelers can have all of this and still enjoy the advantages of being close to the center of the Panamanian capital.

Thanks to the interoceanic canal and the Free-Trade Zone of Colon, Panama City has consolidated as a huge business center. It boasts important store complexes with everything you can think of, from jewelry to household items of the most famous American and European brands; meanwhile the main avenues, neighborhood –from the most centrally located to the most distant ones– compete with each other to attract clients to their businesses, which generates a constant flow of public in both directions, like a gigantic bazaar. Albrook Mall, Multiplaza Pacific, Multicentro, Los Pueblos, Los Andes and El Dorado are some of those facilities.

The Older Quarter The Older Quarter of Panama City or San Felipe is an interesting cluster of ecclesiastic public and apartment buildings from the 18th and 19th centuries with squares and parks that were declared World Heritage Sites by UNESCO in 1997 and being target of constant renovation and care, little by little they have recovered their former splendor. The Cinco de Mayo Square is an excellent starting point to explore this part of town; ancient mansions boasting their facades with beautiful balconies of iron structures and big gates flanked by exquisite pilasters. This is the perfect tour to enjoy the history and the romantic environment of a city that has been deeply loved by many and about which writer Graham Greene stated after knowing her: “I have felt like at home in this small paradise of my dreams and like I never felt before in any other place of the Americas.” The Church Saint Joseph and the Cathedral, at the Main Square; Paseo de las Bovedas which used to be a fortress and a guardroom back in the 18th century; and the beautiful Plaza de Francia square are the most recommended places in this fascinating area of the Panamanian capital.

The Canal, an engineering wonder Added to its commercial and economic value, this is one of the most important tourist attractions of the western hemisphere. People can visit it during the day and watch its activity from Miraflores, a former administrative building where there is currently an information center, a cafeteria and a restaurant that visitors can enjoy. The Canal has three sets of locks and for each ship that sails through it 197 million liters of fresh water from the Gatun Lake are used. The lake is the great natural guarantor of this engineering wonder. In the crossing, ships are raised more than 20 meters above sea level in the Gatun Lake (to the east) and they are later lowered on the Pacific Ocean; it takes almost 10 hours to cross the canal which is approximately 90 kilometers long.