Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
South to Bahía Damas and beyond
Heading further south, you come to the main camp of the former penal colony , whose crum-
bling, eerie buildings are slowly being reclaimed by nature; through the iron bars you can
glimpse half-opened filing cabinets and decaying documents waiting to be sorted. Continuing
south across Bahía Damas , the aquamarine reef-filled shallows of the eastern coast provide
many of the prime diving and snorkelling sites. Panama's last remaining nesting site of the
spectacular scarlet macaw is at the south of the island, near Barco Quebrado , though these
magnificent birds are more easily heard than seen in the forest canopy. Some tours take a
plunge in the invigorating thermal springs at Punta Felipe or venture into tangled mangroves
at Boca Brava , or at Punta Hermosa , on the more unexplored west coast.
THE PENAL COLONY ON COIBA
For almost eighty years Coiba was synonymous with fear and brutality, as horror stories of
forced labour and torture, political assassinations and gang warfare leaked from the island.
Designated as a penal colony in 1919, it was intended to be an open prison, staffed by ci-
vilians and aimed at reforming serious offenders - hence the inclusion at the main camp of
a school, rehabilitation centre and church. But with up to three thousand prisoners on the
island at one stage, scattered round sixteen different camps, most offenders were unable
to access these resources, and the planned civilian custodians never materialized. Instead,
prisoners worked twelve-hour shifts on farmland and forest on only one meal a day, suffer-
ing violence from gangs and guards, malnutrition, poor sanitation and scant medical care.
A peek inside the decaying high-security block is sobering. Here ten to twenty people
used to share a humid, windowless cell no more than 3m across, with nine bare concrete
“beds” and a hole for a toilet, incarcerated for 24 hours a day, with no exercise, no visit-
ors, and little chance of release. Unsurprisingly, escape attempts were frequent but usually
resulted in failure as those who managed to get through the island's dense undergrowth,
avoiding the crocodiles and snakes, generally came to grief in the shark-infested waters and
strong sea currents.
Far from the public gaze, the island also gained notoriety during the military dictator-
ships of Omar Torrijos and Manuel Noriega as a prime location for “losing” political op-
ponents, some of whose tortured bodies were unearthed in around 180 graves discovered
during President Moscoso's Truth Commission investigations. The penitentiary finally
closed in 2004; the only former convict still remaining on the island is “Mali-Mali”, now
the park's most famous ranger and much sought-after tourist guide.
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