La Palma

La Palma, the capital of the Darién, is a perfect illustration of just how undeveloped this province is. At the end of a peninsula where the Tuira River flows into the Golfo de San Miguel, La Palma has just one commercial street with a handful of government offices, basic restaurants, and rustic hotels. It has one of the Darién's few airstrips, but commercial flights were suspended in 2012, so the nearby Reserva Natural Punta Patiño and Emberá villages of La Marea and Mogue can only be reached by a combination of road and boat from Panama City, or from a cruise ship.