Gordon Frost Folk Art Tours
 
Cuna Mola Magic
San Blas Islands, Panama
Craft Tour
 

Dates: to be announced. If you are interested in this trip, please register your interest by clicking Your Future Tour Interest and please make a comment.

This wonderful Cuna/Panama adventure is scheduled every two or three years as the demand for it dictates.

Travel with Gordon Frost

White sand beaches, coral reefs, & coconut palms dot the Cuna's pristine Caribbean islands. Meet the astonishing mola makers (reverse applique). Their molas are a surprising, inventive artistic expression. Mola art digests old myth, new news, and humor with an elegant, dynamic use of design & color. The ubiquitous folk wood sculptures, the Nuchugana, while usually only six to fifteen inches tall are powerful & meaningful. Meet the Cunas: canoe makers, fishermen, & farmers as well as the saylas, chiefs; igar wisids, chanters; ina duleds, medicine men; & neles, shamans. Visit the onmaked negas, gathering houses and the inna nega, chicha (native beer) houses. Listen to storytellers, singers, flute, & pan pipe players.

Join us as we island hop in small planes and motorized dugout canoes to survey these special places and timeless culture.

ITINERARY: This itinerary is flexible so we can take advantage of spontaneous opportunities.

DAYS 1-2: fly to Panama City. See the Miraflores Locks of the Panama Canal, colonial Panama, Ciudad Vieja, and the Smithsonian’s Marine Center at Cuelebra Point.

DAYS 3-7: Fly to the central Kuna Yala. Travel by motorized dugout canoe to several islands. Be in Cuna homes and see first hand Native American traditional life. Meet Cuna artists and crafts people; learn how molas are made with friendly mola artists. Snorkel or relax in a hammock in
the Cuna’s Caribbean paradise.

DAYS 7-10: Fly to Panama City. Visit a mola collector/dealer, then fly to Bocas del Toro. Bocas del Toro is composed of 68 tropical islands and hundreds of mangrove keys surrounded by emerald green water. The Bocas del Toro water is so beautiful that when Christopher Columbus visited the area on his fourth and final voyage (1502) he named it Veraguas (green waters). Explore & snorkel around the area’s beautiful islands & beaches including Bastimentos, a national marine park.

DAYS 11-12: Fly to Boquete, home of the Guaymi Indians & rare birds including the Resplendent Quetzal. Boquete is a tranquil, flower garden town with a delightful climate. Guaymi women wear naguas, dresses of classic full style of rainbow colors finished with applique. Guaymi men make charcaras, fine (looping technique) bags. See cloud forests, flower gardens, and coffee ranches.

DAYS 12-13: Fly to Panama City then fly home thinking about diverse, beautiful Panama.

Price: the price that includes hotel, ground transportation, entrance fees, activities, and all breakfasts, five dinners, and four lunches is $2,495 per person. Single rooms are available for a supplementary charge of $495. Approximate international airfare roundtrip is $510 from Los Angeles or San Francisco plus $196 for flights to the San Blas Islands, Bocas del toro, and Boquete. Please request airfare from other USA cities. The land price does not include any airfare. Gordon Frost will send you information about your air arrangements.

Small Group: 15 members.

Reservations: request reservations for this trip by completing and sending Tour Enrollment Form