Pedasi Airport
Private charter flights out of Albrook to Pedasi Airport are available daily and the flight time is one hour from Panama City. Domestic flights out of Albrook to Pedasi Panama have been suspended since the start of the rainy season, and are scheduled to resume in November. While flying domestically on one of Air Panama’s smaller fleet planes is beyond terrifying, I still prefer cranking the seat belt tightly and riding in the breezy cabin with dangling wires then making the trek in my truck. Those with more luxurious vehicles that have working suspension and working windshield wipers usually prefer to drive.
The current airstrip is on a private farm and has been sold. As part of the transaction, the purchasers of the old airstrip, Pinnacle Properties, agreed with the government to finance and facilitate the construction of a new strip. Currently a 1.2 kilometer road is being cut from behind the school in Pedasi out into the surrounding pasture where a 1,000 meter strip will be laid (hardly long enough to be international).
The time line for the entire project which includes: the remainder of cutting of the road (almost complete); paving; the construction of the strip; and the placing of electricity is 8 months according to the engineers in charge. The implications of this project, besides the fact that I will have a new road and much desired electricity at my house, is the ability for lager charter flights to land in Pedasi. It is rumored that a consortium of international investors are working to extend the runway by another few hundred meters to enable the landing and takeoff of small business jets.
The point being with the exception of a few times during the height of the dry seasons over the past two years I have rarely seen full flights.
The Pedasí area offers world-class surfing, diving, snorkeling and hiking, and nature lovers can explore Pedasí’s rich natural heritage, a utopia of wildlife exploration. Pedasí’s waters are also well known for fantastic sport-fishing, yielding record catches of blue marlin, big-eye and yellow fin tuna, Pacific sailfish, wahoo, mahi-mahi, grouper, snapper and amberjack.
andromedapedasi.com” target=”_blank”>Pedasi Real Estate market and town offers cafes and restaurants, supermarkets and souvenir shops. The bigger towns of Las Tablas and Chitre, with more extensive amenities, are just an hour’s drive on impeccably smooth roads, and Panama City with its first-world modernity is just 4 hours away on the Pan-American highway. A regional airport also receives several domestic flights a week to Pedasi, and is currently under expansion to receive larger charter flights.
While there are several excellent beaches close to Panama City, most of these are well-developed or well on their way. The first two hours’ drive west on the Pan-American Highway are littered with signs for beachfront resorts, villas and condos, offering dreams of ocean view lifestyles, but many of these have taken on an almost suburban feel, as the developed stretches now begin to crowd and bleed into one another.
At the bottom of the Azuero Peninsula, however, one feels almost at the end of the world. There is a timeless quality to daily life there, a blend of the ultra-modern with the centuries-old traditional ways. Impeccably paved highways slink through endless green fields and tiny clustered towns.
