One day with the Emberá Community
It all begins with…
Around 7:30am we were already packing for this day tour. Our guide told us to pack light and bring swimsuits already on, wet shoes or crocs and something to keep our phone and IDs safe from water contact.
8:00am ready for the pick up at the hotel an boarded the Blue Skies shuttle on time. After a 60 minutes drive, we arrived to the Chagres National Park. Our guide had everything ready and a cooler with beverages for our consumption.
So far it didn’t look much like an adventure but boy, it was about to be a journey we’ll remember for a lifetime.
Piragua Canoes
We really had no idea of how a Cultural Exchange starts until we got down the shutle and saw our Emberá guides were there ready, wearing traditional clothing, welcoming us and telling us to come aboard the traditional piraguas canoes.
Piraguas are long wooden boats, traditionally made by the trunk of a single tree and passed from generation to generation. Today’s piraguas keep the essence of the tradition but equipped with an off-board motor.
Our guides handed us our life vests and seated us in rows of 2. As soon as we were in the boat we were ready to go.
These guys are really masters of their craft. The piragua canoe ride was safe, fun, entertaining and giving us the sensation that we left all our comforts behind to go deep into the jungle.
During your piragua trip, you’ll see how the scenery changes with intense tones of green, sounds and smells of the jungle giving you a perpetual state of wonder.
This is a landscape that is constantly changing throughout the year. And unlike the forests we see elsewhere where there are predominant species, here you’ll see so many different tree species in one glance.
Panama Vacation Packages favorite tours
This is one of our best sold tours in our Panama vacation packages.
Good to know…
About wildlife
During your ride on the piragua boat, you’ll see beautiful wildlife as storks, lizards, monkeys, sloths, butterflies and many others. Animals could be hiding from human presence, so be calm and curious to find them.
You’ll get wet
This is a canoe and like any other boat trip, you’ll get your quota of splashes and possible rain as the meteorologic probabilities may be high, it’s more probable that you’ll enjoy your trip more.
Shoes are important
As soon as you get down the piragua, you’ll have to walk around 20 minutes on a dirt road. Guides will help you move around but if your shoes aren’t proper for this activity you’ll face some issues. Bring crocs, wet shoes or any shoe you can soak in a river.
Capture the moments
You won’t stop taking photos during the whole journey. Bring your phone or camera in a dry-bag or anything that can help keep those dry.
Also, bring some cash money to buy some top quality handcrafts right from the artists’ hands.
Getting to the Emberá Community
As soon as we unload our piraguas, we have do make a little walk of about 20minutes. The terrain isn’t demanding per se, but it might be slippery. You’ll find a helping hand beside you to help you pass any obstacles. The Emberás has prepared the trail so it’s very well maintained without tall grasses or anything that could entangle you.
After the walk, you’ll have the chance to dip in the Chagres river’s waterfall with cool clean waters and deep enough to have a little swim. You can sit on the rocks next to the fall for a refreshing shower and an opportunity to make great photos.
You’ll spend between 30 minutes to an hour at the waterfall. After this visit on our route to the Emberá Community we became even more anxious (and hungry) because the presentation card was so perfect, so “untouched” that it just raised our expectations on what was waiting for us at the end of this road.
The presentation card was so perfect… that it just raised our expectations
After the waterfall, we had to walk a little more to get to the community and we never imagined what was coming next.
I hear… d-drums?
The walk wasn’t that long, we did had to cross water, have our feet wet, but it’s all part of the adventure. After some minutes, scenery changes again, sounds of children playing, people talking and.. drums?
We heard faint drums on the distance and we started to see the Emberá people dressed in traditional clothes with bright colored Parumas that is a 3 meter long fabric with beautiful designs and some of them with Jagua tattoos which are temporary and produced from a fruit of a local tree.
Emberá people are warm, friendly, well spoken and respectful with the tourists. As soon as we arrived the sign we heard so many people giving us the usual “Buenos días”.
A few more steps and we could smell something sweet but couldn’t recall it at first, but I knew that was going to be delicious.
A Royal reception?
Well, almost! we were greeted by this beautiful lady on the photo is this community’s leader and our hostess for the rest of the day.
She received us all while the community was working together to prepare our lunch and introduce us to the Emberá Culture.
She explained everything in Emberá or Spanish and we had a translator who helped the tourists understand about their construction techniques, crops, and integration of technology. But everything is done aiming to be self-sustainable and with the lowest carbon footprint possible.
She also explained about handcrafts, the vegetable dyes they use, and many more things I won’t mention here, otherwise it’d be a spoiler.
After enough Embera cultural exchange it was time to put it on practice… on the dance floor.
Dancing with the Emberás
We had talented musicians playing traditional instruments. At first, we were like … dunno, I might not dance. Let me tell you, it’s impossible not to dance. Emberás take you out to the dance floor and after warming up and without knowing it, we were dancing, laughing and having the time of our lifetime.
Even I made some awesome moves leaving everyone in aw… but no one recorded it. But trust me, I remembered my teenage years when we enjoyed the very moment as if there was no tomorrow.
The taste of the local produce
When we first step in a piragua, we were already amazed of our surroundings and environment. But it was at lunch when all my senses unified to explode all together.
We got served fresh watermelon, bananas, papayas and everything was from their own crops right there from the community, with organic fertilizers… well, the difference between these and the ones you get from the super market is that the taste, the sweetness of each fruit it’s something you enjoy each bite as if it were the first time you tasted them.
For the main “plate” we got fried tilapia from their own aquaculture projects, and again, the taste was really delightful. This fried fish was served with fried green plantains known as “patacones pisa’os” as a version of the Panamanian fish and chips, ain’t it?
Do you know what relationship exists between the Emberá people and the first moon landing?