Palm Trees on a Beach in Panama

A group of palm trees on a beach in Panama, as seen during our October 2024 Panama trip.

If you know me, you know I like palm trees. And beaches, too. So it was fun to see these palm trees while we were in Panama. However, we did not go out to the beach for a lazy afternoon of sitting in the sun. This was a working trip and not a recreation trip, after all.

Part of the purpose of the Panama trip was to visit and encourage the church in West Panama. And one way that we encouraged was to visit some of the church members in their homes or businesses.

On this particular day, the men of our group visited Keni, while the women had a Bible class for ladies back at the church building. Keni is a fisherman and lives in a fishing village, and he took us out to the beach.

We were not interrupting the fishing time, because the tide was out. Way out, as you can tell by the boats in this photo. I am used to the changing tides varying by 20 or 30 feet on the shores of the beaches in Florida, but in this bay near where the Panama Canal meets the Pacific Ocean, the tide goes out quite a long way.

And by a long way, I mean a really long way. They say that the tide comes back in quickly when it does come, but we were not around to see it. But it was fascinating to see just how far out the tide goes. We could see the water way off in the distance, but you can’t really see it in this photo. And I thought that mountain in the distance was interesting, too, although it does not really have anything to do with this story.

Once we reached the beach, we had a devotional to encourage Keni in his faith and in his work. I hope we were an encouragement to him. But it was also an encouragement to me, and I am sure to the rest of the group as well. We were encouraged by being in such a beautiful place and seeing God’s creation. We were encouraged by hearing how God had worked through Keni and his business. And so it was a blessing to all of us.

By the way, getting there to the beach was also interesting, but I will save that story for another time.

Of course, you do not have to go to a faraway place to encourage someone and be encouraged yourself. That can happen anywhere that you are if you look for those opportunities. You will be blessed when you find them.

Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. - 1 Thessalonians 5:11 ESV

See more from our Panama 2024 Trip!

About the Photos

The scene at the beach was beautiful, even with there not being any water at the beach. The brilliant blue sky definitely made up for the absence of water, and the color was magnificent. Hopefully, these photos capture some of what we saw.

If you are wondering, the last photo was taken with my phone, while the others were taken with my camera. And yes, as you can see, I remembered to wear a hat.

Photo: Each photo is a single Raw exposure, processed in Raw Therapee and GIMP.
Camera: Sony Alpha A7 II
Lens: Rokinon 35mm f/1.8
Date: October 9, 2024
Location: Panama City, Panama