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Travel Related
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PENONOME |
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 Founded
in 1581 as a reducción de Indios - a place where conquered indigenous
groups were forcibly resettled so as to be available for labour service
- and briefly the capital of the isthmus after the destruction of Panamá
Viejo, the lively market town of PENONOMÉ was named after Nomé, a local
chieftain cruelly betrayed and executed here by the Spaniards after
years of successful resistance. Now the capital of the province of Coclé,
apart from its small museum Penonomé doesn't have much to see, though it
makes a good enough base for exploring the surrounding area.
From the bus terminal on the Interamericana Penonomé's busy commercial
main street, called both Via Central or Avenida J. D. Arosemena, runs a
few hundred metres down to the Plaza 8 de Diciembre , which features a
statue of Simon Bolívar and the inevitable bandstand. It's flanked by
several government buildings and the unspectacular cathedral . From the
square, a short walk down C Damian Carles and a right turn opposite the
covered market brings you to the run-down Museo de Historia y Tradición
Penonomeña (Tues-Sat 9am-12.30pm & 1.30-4pm, Sun 9am-1pm; US$1), which
has some good pre-Columbian ceramics decorated with abstract designs and
colonial religious art. The streets around the market bustle with
campesinos from local villages selling agricultural produce (and
spending much of the proceeds in the town's many bars).
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