Jaqué

The area around the town of Jaqué (pop. 2,244) is even more deforested. They actually graze cattle here — thankfully the only place along this stretch of coast that does. They mainly fish and grow crops that include rice, plantains, yuca, and yams. It’s considerably larger and relatively more affluent-looking than Puerto Piñas, with some fairly substantial houses, but it’s still a place where people live pretty close to the bone. There’s an airstrip, a hospital, two hospedajes, a soccer field, and a handful of basic places to get a bite or a drink. A police bunker is at the edge of town near the mouth of the Río Jaqué, and there’s a camouflage netting–covered main cuartel (police station) in the center of town. In 2000, the Colombian civil war pushed hundreds of refugees from the Colombian town of Juradó over the border into Jaqué and its surroundings. Stories appeared in the Panamanian press at that time saying that some of these refugees had been placed on Colombian death lists, and there was concern the war might spill over the border into this area. This didn’t happen, and a beefed-up police presence in town and up the Río Jaqué has apparently kept things peaceful in the years since. The town is mellow and the people nonintrusively friendly to strangers.

Those who come to Jaqué by boat must get from open sea to the mouth of the Río Jaqué, and doing so often means riding waves that can be three meters high or even bigger. Managing this requires an experienced captain with a feel for surfing, and no one should attempt it without life jackets. This wave actually can be surfed, though few have made it all the way down here with their boards.

There are four indigenous villages on the Río Jaqué within about 20 kilometers of the town of Jaqué: Biroquera, Lucas, El Coco, and El Mamey. There are police posts in each village, but the upper reaches of the Río Jaqué beyond El Mamey are not patrolled and are supposedly used as a rest spot by combatants in the Colombian civil war. All the villages are Emberá except the first one, Biroquera, which is Wounaan. It’s about 15 minutes by fast boat from Jaqué and at the time of writing was the only village Panamanian authorities allowed foreign travelers to visit. For your own safety, do not attempt to travel farther upriver. Note also that getting to the Río Jaqué by sea can be rough.

Biroquera is a fairly tidy and spacious village built right on the edge of the river. It’s worth a quick visit. Houses are a mixture of traditional white cane–walled huts on stilts and more “modern” huts with walls made of wooden planks. A concrete path winds through the village, which is lit for a couple of hours in the evening by a small generator. The Wounaan are renowned for their crafts, particularly woven baskets, carved tagua nuts and cocobolo figurines, and it should be possible to buy directly from their makers. However, all the artists were in a meeting when I visited so I couldn’t check out the quality of the local wares. It should be possible to hire a boat from Jaqué to Biroquera for about $20 for a small group.