Portobelo

Portobelo was founded in 1597 by Francisco Velarde y Mercado for its deep natural harbour, and it quickly replaced Nombre de Dios as the Caribbean port for Peruvian silver, carried across the isthmus from Panama City and shipped on to Spain. A year earlier, the English privateer Francis Drake had died of dysentery and been buried at sea in a lead coffin off its shore, remembered by Drake Island at the mouth of the harbour.

The wealth of the trade fairs drew attackers. Henry Morgan took the town in 1668 with 450 privateers, overcoming its fortifications. In 1726 and 1727 a British fleet blockaded the port, and thousands of its sailors died of disease while anchored off Isla Grande. In 1739, during the War of Jenkins' Ear, a Royal Navy siege captured the town. The Spanish built and rebuilt the forts from 1600 until the last works at Santiago and San Fernando in 1753, and an attack in 1744 badly damaged the customs house.

The town's economy received a major boost in the late 19th century during the construction of the canal. In 1980 UNESCO inscribed the Fortifications on the Caribbean Side of Panama: Portobelo-San Lorenzo, including the ruins around the bay and Fort San Lorenzo near the mouth of the Chagres, as a World Heritage Site. In 2012 the site was placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger, citing environmental factors, lack of maintenance and uncontrolled urban development.

Portobelo is a centre of the Congo tradition, kept alive by the descendants of enslaved Africans brought to the isthmus in colonial times. The dance of the Congos, which goes back to the enslaved people of that era, survives here: in the Carnival season, dances, drumming and masked devils re-enact episodes of slavery and the rebellions of enslaved people, many of whom escaped to found free settlements. A museum in the old customs house tells the story of the Congo people and of the town's devotion to a dark image of Christ.

That devotion centres on the Black Christ, a life-size wooden statue in the Church of San Felipe, built in 1814. It was found on the shores of the harbour. Its robe is changed twice a year, for Holy Week and for the Festival of the Black Christ on 21 October, when pilgrims arrive from across the country, some walking from the capital and some crawling the final stretch to the church.

Portobelo is small: the town had about 1,300 inhabitants in 2023, and it serves as the seat of Portobelo District in Colón province, which had 10,320 inhabitants in 2023.

Daily life depends on the sea and on visitors. Two dive centres take visitors to the reefs, launches carry day-trippers to the beaches, and the harbour is a meeting point for sailing boats, some of which offer passages to Colombia. Buses run along the coast road to Sabanitas and Colón from early morning into the evening, connecting the town with jobs and shops on the canal side of the isthmus.

The forts and the customs house are part of the townscape, with houses standing close to walls built around three centuries ago. Its placing on UNESCO's danger list in 2012, citing environmental factors, lack of maintenance and uncontrolled urban development, drew attention to how the ruins are protected. The Festival of the Black Christ, the biggest religious and cultural celebration in Portobelo, brings pilgrims from across the country each October.

The cooking of the Caribbean coast makes much use of coconut. Arroz con coco is rice cooked in coconut milk, and fish is stewed in coconut milk or fried whole and served with patacones, twice-fried green plantain. Rondón, a West Indian stew of seafood, plantain and yam in coconut milk, is typical of Colón province.

The town's restaurants are simple places, and alongside the coastal dishes they serve the everyday Panamanian staples of rice, beans and stewed meat. Sancocho, the chicken, yam and culantro soup, is the national dish, and arroz con pollo is part of the traditional Christmas meal across the country. Breakfast can be hojaldras, a fry-bread, or carimañolas, cassava fritters stuffed with beef.

West Indian influence, carried by the Afro-Antillean communities of Colón province, shows in dishes such as rondón. Street and festival food includes raspao, shaved ice, and chicheme, a drink made from pounded maize, while the usual drinks are local lagers such as Balboa and Atlas and seco, the national spirit.