Millions of years before that, archipelagos of unconnected volcanic islands had surfaced between the separate land masses of North and South America and eventually spewed up enough lava to link and form an S-shaped isthmus. Plants and terrestrial animals could now move between the top and bottom of the world across this wasp-waist of the Americas. The coexistence and mingling of previously isolated species caused new land creatures to evolve. Conversely, the new feature provided an insurmountable barrier for fish and other marine organisms in the now divided Atlantic and Pacific. It also redirected the flow of the world’s oceans, gave rise to the Gulf Stream, and radically altered global climates. Densely folded mountain ranges bisect the isthmus, causing differing weather patterns on the Pacific and Atlantic coasts.
A few minutes water-ferry ride from Costa Rica and a short flight from the high-tech international banking centre of Panama City, Bocas del Toro has no muggers, no miles of tropical swamp and no mosquitoes. Everything moves on water: water taxis move people from island to island; big boats arrive with city goods and passengers, and little ones leave with fish, coconuts and bananas. It seemed an ideal place in which to relax and read up on Panama for my Observer article and on Henry Morgan for my own mad projects, so I carefully studied the hotel information offered at the airport and chose Punta Caracol Acqua Lodge, a complex of cabins on stilts with palm-leaf roofs. Solar panels provided the electricity while biodigesters debugged the drinking water. A complimentary glass-bottomed water taxi took me to a small complex of wooden gangways connecting guest rooms with restaurants and shops, all above a natural aquarium full of manta rays, barracuda and squid.
The hotel bar was still open after I had checked in so I ordered a Seco, sugar-cane rum and milk, known as a baja panties – panty lowerer – and listened to the sounds of nature competing with the dishes and glasses being washed and stacked. Nearby, playful dolphins ignored the impressive sunset.
An exquisite woman with gold rings in her ears and nose and coloured beads on her forearms and calves sat in the corner and smiled at me. She wore a pirate headscarf over her straight black hair, a bright cloth around her waist and a blouse printed with psychedelic symbols. I smiled back at her. She smiled again and left. She was at breakfast the next morning, this time in a denim mini-skirt and black bikini top. I sat facing her just one small table away.
The hotel restaurant stood on a floating wooden platform surrounded by coral atolls and hidden by mangroves in an inlet where dolphins ate jellyfish, gave birth to their young and popped up to greet children paddling canoes on their way to school. Cuddly two- and three-toed sloths hung from mangrove branches. Nearby, later in the day, turtles would crawl out of the sea and lay their eggs on the beach. A little farther away were playful manatees, the rare sea cows that sailors once believed to be mermaids. A friendly but mildly disturbing pelican swooped out of what might have been sea mist or dewy fog, perched on the back of a nearby chair and looked longingly at my plate of fried sausages and banana poppadoms. The beautiful woman started laughing. So did I.
‘Do you speak English?’
‘Sure,’ she drawled.
‘Sorry, I didn’t realise you were American,’ I said with obvious disappointment.
‘I hope you mean South American.’
‘Sorry again. I didn’t,’ I said with equally obvious relief, ‘but let me introduce myself. I’m Howard.’
‘Hi, Howard. I’m Rosa. You’re British, right?’
‘Right. You look as if you might be from round here but sound like you’re from New York.’
‘That’s where I learned my English, went to university and lived for a while, but you’ll find most Panamanians speak English with an American accent. Actually, I am of mixed race, part Kuna, one of our country’s seven indigenous peoples. We have always been here. Shall we sit at the same table?’
The pelican seemed slightly disconcerted by her presence but stood its ground.
‘Isn’t it beautiful? You know we have almost a thousand separate species of bird in our country.’
As it happened, I did know. There were also over a hundred species of cockroach and countless different butterflies, as well as miniature red frogs with venomous skin, golden toads with luminous skin, and square trees. I smiled and nodded. The pelican gave up and shot away across the clear blue water.
‘There are even more fish. I can tell you don’t like North Americans. Don’t worry; no one will hold that against you in Panama.’
For almost a century American troops had occupied and controlled the country, packing it full of military, air and naval bases. United States forces used it as a base to invade other countries, to hit drug barons and to train soldiers to fight against enemies real and imaginary.
But now the GIs have gone. Fort Grant, once the most powerful defence complex in the world, is now a route for joggers and strollers. Fort Sherman, former US Army jungle training camp, is an ecological showcase. Fort Clayton, the old headquarters of US Army South, has been converted into the City of Knowledge, an academic community and technological park. Canopy Tower, once a US military radar post, is a birdwatching platform. Fort Davis and other buildings that once housed munitions and armaments now accommodate light industry and factories. Abandoned construction cranes have become tools in pioneering studies of the ecosystem of the dry tropical forest canopy. Military bases are now tourist centres in a classic transformation of swords into ploughshares. The country runs itself. What happened?
‘Howard, you seem deep in thought.’
‘I’m here to write a travel article on Panama and was wondering why its tourist industry seems in some ways to have only just started.’
‘I guess we never needed tourism. Millions of people have always visited Panama but for other reasons. Don’t forget we were Uncle Sam’s favourite nephew. Now we have to survive alone, but our government is not investing enough in tourism; it simply doesn’t realise the potential. The exception is the cruise ship industry, which thanks to al-Qaeda is the fastest-growing tourist market. Until recently cruise ships made no stop at Panama; they just went through it. Now they stop at ports or anchor for the day in the middle of the canal’s lakes.’
*
Despite the country having miles of beautiful shell-covered beaches on two oceans and cheap high-quality hotels with excellent service and every conceivable water toy, there is no Panamanian tourist office outside the country. The weather is warm throughout the year, and the country exudes cheerful hospitality, extravagant scenery, the world’s best drinking water, an overdose of flora and fauna, a rich historical and cultural patrimony and several autonomous Indian communities upholding their customs and traditions, including hunting for supper with blowpipes. Hurricanes don’t get close, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions stopped long ago and tourists are almost impossible to find, while ecological awareness has reduced visitors’ potential for doing serious damage.
Panama has a rich Pre-Columbian heritage of peoples whose presence stretches back over 12,000 years. At the time of the European conquest the population of the isthmus numbered at least a million. Fewer than 500 years ago, Spaniards Balboa and Pedrarias (the Cruel) Davila discovered and founded Old Panama, the Native American meaning of which is ‘good fishing’. When the Spanish torched the small village’s huts and built a new city, they kept the old name and spread in all directions, capturing the Mayan cities of Central America and the Inca strongholds of Peru, plundering gold, silver, pearls and other priceless treasures. Old Panama, the oldest non-indigenous settlement in the New World, became the jumping-off point for further conquests north and south, its Renaissance-style architecture serving as the model for the other Central and South American cities built by the Spanish colonists.
Mule trains took plunder across the isthmus to Portobelo on the Atlantic coast, where galleons bound for Spain waited. Soon other merchant ships brought silks and spices from Spanish colonies in Asia for trans-shipment through this bullion pipeline. Old Panama became the met
ropolis of the Pacific.
After slaying most of the Indians, the Spanish imported slaves from Africa. Some ran away to the jungle or to the still largely deserted Caribbean coast and set up still-surviving communities, such as that of Bocas del Toro, where tourism has evolved without a local authority plan or multi-million-dollar investment.
‘Do you just write about travel?’
‘No, I write about all sorts of things, mainly drugs. I used to be a marijuana smuggler. When I was released from prison, I wrote a book about my exploits.’
‘A drug smuggler? Fantastic! Do you have a copy of your book with you?’
I did. A firm believer in blatant self-promotion, I always carry copies of Mr Nice to donate to hotel libraries and give to likeable strangers I meet on my travels. I reached into my plastic bag of history books, guidebooks and tourist brochures and pulled out two copies of Mr Nice, one in English and one in Spanish.
‘Take your pick, Rosa. I’ll be back in a few minutes. I’m just going to get my laundry together and bring it down to reception.’
When I returned, Rosa was engrossed in the English version. Her black eyes fluttered at me as her body language changed from mildly curious to flirtatious.
‘So you have met General Manuel Noriega. He was not as bad as the gringos make out and did a lot for Panama. We do not subscribe to the propaganda that gringos invaded our country to stop the naughty general from selling cocaine to Uncle Sam. They did it to smash the Panamanian army and economy and remind us we are not really a country, just a canal. Were you as big a smuggler as he was? The DEA seemed to think you were.’
‘Nothing like. Noriega smuggled cocaine, I only did marijuana. I smuggled greater quantities than he did, but they were worth much less.’
‘I love cocaine.’
‘I didn’t say I didn’t take it. Do you have any?’
‘Not here, Howard. It’s too dangerous. You never know who is watching. I don’t like to take it outside Panama City. That’s where I live now most of the time. By the way, where are you heading after here?’
‘I was thinking I would visit Portobelo. We have a Portobello Road in London. I lived there during the 1960s, when it was the centre of London’s hippy community. Few people are aware of how it got its name, so I thought I would mention it in my travel piece.’
Until the 1870s the houses and shops of Notting Hill extended only to Elgin Crescent. Between there and the village of Kensal Green were corn fields, meadows and a few farm buildings. Portobello Road was a rough country track leading to Portobello Farm, which had been named in honour of Admiral Vernon’s capture of the city from the Spaniards in 1739.
‘Portobelo is a beautiful part of our Atlantic Caribbean coast, which is much gentler than the Pacific coast, where the tides are tremendous. But there is nothing in Portobelo now, just a few remnants of old forts. What the pirates didn’t destroy, the gringos did.’
‘Wasn’t Sir Francis Drake buried there? I’m sure I read something about his body being put into a lead coffin and dropped into the sea.’
‘Yes. Gringos are still trying to find it.’
‘I also understand that my hero, Henry Morgan, made a name for himself in Portobelo.’
‘Ah, Henry Morgan, the English pirate.’
‘Welsh, actually. Confusing the Welsh with the English is as bad as treating South America as North America. And Henry was much more than just a pirate.’
‘But he was bad, no?’
‘If you were a Spanish colonist, yes.’
*
Spain and Portugal, with the blessing of the pope, divided the New World between them. At the end of the sixteenth century, Sir Francis Drake, with his partly Welsh crew, circled the world, on his way capturing Spanish galleons, burning the odd Caribbean settlement, and relieving whoever he came across of their treasures. In the following century fear of Britain grew in the New World, as Barbados and Jamaica were colonised by British gamblers, touts, pimps and dissenters who had come to own land, not work it. Demand for labour increased, and the Dutch and Portuguese slave ships could not move black flesh fast enough to satisfy it. Felons were paroled out of British prisons, and vagrants and beggars were lifted from London’s streets to be sent to work in the plantations. In this way Britain could profit from the human freight it fed, clothed and hanged. The Dutch and French followed suit and Caribbean islands constantly changed hands in repeated bouts of naval warfare. Peace treaties between the European nations were made and broken; the need for able fighting sailors increased, as did the job security offered by piracy. Easy-to-forge letters of marque flew out of the competing countries’ naval bureaucracies.
The lure of freedom and wealth turned indentured servants into pirates, but for many their harsh seafaring lives yielded scant reward. With no loyalty to their countries, their shared adversity bonded them into an autonomous power. Headquartered on the usually French but sometimes Spanish possession of Île de la Tortue off the north-west coast of present-day Haiti, they lived by raiding Spanish treasure ships and capturing animals for their leather, cooking their meat over smoking (boucan) fires, so earning the name of buccaneers. In 1640 they formed the Brethren of the Coast.
To join this democratic fraternity, a man had to subscribe to the Custom of the Coast, which took precedence over national laws and specified members’ wages and compensation for those maimed or wounded in service. A third of the Brethren of the Coast comprised fugitive black slaves, who had the same rights as white members in voting and sharing booty. The Brethren of the Coast was the first great international criminal organisation, the forerunner of Meyer Lansky’s International Crime Syndicate. Ethics more meaningful than blind patriotism and religious persuasion united the Brethren. No Brother stole from another. No Brother cheated another at gambling, hid knowledge of treasure or tried to get the better of any other Brother. Even crews of different ships on different raids would not swindle one another when declaring their spoils. Henry Morgan’s achievements as a Caribbean pirate soon came to the attention of the Brethren, who enrolled him as a member. In a few years he became their leader – the admiral of the Brethren of the Coast, the most powerful criminal in the world.
Henry Morgan had high cheekbones, a firm chin, sensual lips and smoky blue eyes. Commanding awe and respect through his deep-throated oratory, he walked like a tiger, swore like a trooper, spoke fluent French and kept his Welsh accent. He wore a scarlet bandana, matted his hair with marigold paste and was never without his pistol and cutlass. Women found him irresistible. He thrived on tropical heat and seemed to be immune to deadly fevers. Although a natural liar, Henry Morgan always kept his word.
‘The Spanish weren’t as bad to us indigenous Panamanians as they were to the people of the other South American colonies, although I think that is because they discovered no gold here. But I don’t approve of colonialists, whether Spanish, British or American. They are just criminals to me. Shit! Sorry, Howard, I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m not intending to imply you are a criminal.’
‘I’m not a criminal any more, but I used to be, obviously. And I have much respect for some criminal communities and their morals.’
‘The honour among thieves thing, you mean?’
‘Yes, stuff like that.’
‘But I don’t regard smuggling as a crime, Howard. Most people don’t.’
‘Henry Morgan didn’t regard ripping off the Spaniards’ plundered treasure as a crime.’
Morgan’s exploits had also impressed the British administrators of Jamaica, who gladly accepted his donations of plunder. In 1662 there was so much looted silver and gold in Jamaica the British government planned to set up a mint. The governor of Jamaica began to issue Morgan with letters of marque which allowed him to plunder cities as well as boats. Morgan thereupon attacked Puerto Principe, Cuba, which threatened Jamaica, and proposed attacking Portobelo, which after Havana and Cartagena was the most strongly fortified city in the Americas.
The Spanish colonists sold
their treasure at crowded fairs, the biggest of which was at Portobelo. With the galleons on their way from Europe, traders at the fair were desperate to secure as much gold from Peru, pearls and tobacco from Venezuela, and emeralds from New Granada – Colombia – as they could. At the same time, the port’s merchants and gentry were accumulating funds to buy the European-made luxuries the fleet would bring from Spain. It was the logical time to strike. In June 1668 eight disreputable vessels carrying 400 desperate characters followed Morgan’s flagship out of Jamaica’s Port Royal across the Caribbean to a sheltered cove three miles south of Portobelo. Protecting the narrow entrance to the harbour were the strongest fortresses in the New World. Against incredible odds, Morgan attacked and won.
The fall of Portobelo was a disgrace. Its inhabitants could have defended the town had they armed themselves at once instead of running to hide their valuables and money. Instead it was a rout. Morgan detailed squads to rush the monasteries and churches so the priests and nuns could not hide their treasures and with a flash of diabolical inspiration, decided to use them to storm the citadel. He knew the reverence Roman Catholics had for their clergy and shielded his attacking column with them. The pirates remained in Portobelo for two weeks, raiding, burning, torturing, raping and pillaging, and left behind them a ruined city, gutted of its valuables and defences. Henry Morgan had made the richest haul in history.