Hey there. I'm from Panama.<p>The Darien Gap still has foreigners (including wealthy tourists) going there with the crazy idea they can hike through it. The trash being left behind in just the past couple years is just heartbreaking.<p>Mountainous jungles in Panama are extremely easy to get lost in the overgrown vegetation. Tourists have died in hiking trails in Boquete, Veraguas or Cerro Azul by only going a few hundred meters off path.<p>Also, most Panamanians are against the idea of building a road between Darien and Colombia since most of us want to preserve as much jungle as we still can.<p>There is currently massive protests against the mining operation in Donoso by the Canadian company First Quantum Minerals (FQM). I imagine there would be similar blockades against foreign companies trying to build a road in the darien gap.
In the 1690's the Scottish invested an enormous sum of money and human capital to settle this region. The goal was to build and profit from an overland route to ferry cargo from the Pacific to the Atlantic, similar to the Panama Canal today.<p>Due to disease, less-than-accommodating natives, and geopolitical climate, the scheme failed miserably. Many argue the crippling financial effect on Scotland was a key factor in the 1707 Acts of Union which merged Scotland and England.
Recommend the 1970’s Land Rover documentary of a British expedition supported by 60 army core engineers successfully crossing the gap: <a href="https://youtu.be/u31yhCmIJ5E?si=GlpzSSvKZzxTn2FE" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://youtu.be/u31yhCmIJ5E?si=GlpzSSvKZzxTn2FE</a><p>There’s a lot of YouTube spam of people talking about the gap but precious little content from people who have done it.
I've always thought that "<i>too expensive and detrimental to the environment</i>" was a bit 'too simple, sometimes naive' for an explanation.<p>Panama was split from Colombia thanks to the US right before the Panama Canal was built. So an obvious line of thought is that the Gap has a defensive purpose to keep both sides well apart. It also helps reduce the flow of people.
Random related anecdote. I met a guy in Colombia who was cycling from Canada to Patagonia.<p>He'd made it all the way to the border according to his maps but was stopped by armed military/paramilitary troops and sent back to Panama by river in a dinghy full of (or made to appear to be full of) bananas.<p>In the end he had to fly that leg. It's also common to sail it, Panama city to Cartagena, but the other direction makes for a smoother trip.
I know several people who have made the foot journey across the Darién, and have heard many horror stories about it.<p>When I was in Bogotá last year, I met a Venezuelan man selling art painted on Bolivares. Inflation is so bad in Venezuela that Bolivares are practically worthless as currency. (There's also a beautiful irony that painting a picture of Che Guevara on a Bolivar makes it <i>more</i> valuable.) Many of his pieces were portraits of people who crossed the Darién fleeing Venezuela. He seemed to have a story for all of them. Most of them were working-class folks, engineers, teachers, lawyers. He himself was a former oil engineer who left Venezuela because of the economic collapse. These stories made me really appreciate everything I take for granted.
I’ve always been fascinated by the Darien gap.<p>There’s a TV show here in the Uk called “race across the world” and in last season they had to cross the gap. Was really hoping for racing jeeps and armed militia but sadly (and sensibly) they took a boat.
Related current thread: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37972271">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37972271</a>
I find it pretty funny that someone posted about the Pan American highway yesterday, and then the Darien gap today. It’s interesting how ignorant most HN’ers are just south of the USA.<p>The user PanamaNewb covered most of it correctly. It’s still a dangerous area. There are famous bloggers that have gone missing and literally only their bones have come back. The famous one thus far is: <a href="http://travelswithmitzi.blogspot.com/2018/10/killed-in-darien-gap.html?m=1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://travelswithmitzi.blogspot.com/2018/10/killed-in-darie...</a> Jan Philip<p>Most people mistake the issue there as a technical or engineering one. It isn’t. It’s political and human centric. The indigenous people don’t have a true connection or believe in the government of Panama or Colombia. Go back over a century and the whole land was just Colombia, but Roosevelt (yes, that US president!) wanted the a Canal thru Panama and thus Panama became a country.<p>Decades later it came up again for road construction but it was already heavily used for smuggling and other curious business. During the 60s through 90s it came up a lot for the cocaine trade. When that was gone, the power vacuum created a few gorilla militants that aligned themselves with the indigenous- most notably the FARC.<p>That doesn’t <i>really</i> exist anymore, but the people that belonged to several faction still do and many still have revenue from passage or related business.<p>Most people that need to legitimately get through just take a ferry to Turbo and vice Versa. The migrants walking through is a new phenomena in the volume that try to go through. If you can read Spanish and can find the telegram/signal groups you can even get day by day news of what happens and which days the migrants are told to wait and not try. It correlates to some curious activity or so I understand.<p>Most people outside of South America lack the understand the above history and the dynamics in general of this graft. But before you point fingers - everyone most likely is somewhat related from Panama to Panama military, Colombia and Colombian military. The anti government groups and the idginious people.<p>Tl;dr no one wants change except government of Colombia and people on the internet that have no idea of what happens there. Colombia government wants to build roads and tunnels for trade and then eventually enforce laws. But the later always has bad outcomes in Colombia.
This guy claims to have ridden his bike from Alaska to Argentina and doesn't even mention crossing the gap. <a href="https://explorersweb.com/teen-cycles-alaska-argentina/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://explorersweb.com/teen-cycles-alaska-argentina/</a><p>I thought the story was problematic the moment I heard it. I met someone who crossed the gap while migrating to the United States from Africa. When I asked what they thought about someone riding a bicycle through it, they shook their head. They said even carrying a bike would be problematic because there are parts which require you to climb.
Many secrets about that place:
Legends abound of a lost city of gold, sometimes called "El Dorado," in South America. While many associate this legend with places further south, some tales and searches for this city have placed it within the Darien Gap. Over the centuries, various explorers and adventurers have ventured into the Darien Gap, drawn by the allure of this hidden treasure. Yet, the dense jungle and the formidable challenges of the environment have kept many secrets concealed, and no concrete evidence of such a city in the Darien Gap has ever been found. Still, the legend persists and adds a layer of mystique to this already enigmatic region.