Embera Indian Village
This
tour will show you one of the three Indian cultures of panama that are
still living the same way as when Columbus found them in the 1500’s. An
article about the Embera Indians was published in the National Geographic
magazine . You will learn about
their culture, see their ceremonial dances and hand-made crafts, taste
their native food with platano (a kind of
banana) leaves on which delicious fresh fish with fried platanos are
served, explore the area’s
abundant variety of birds and wildlife during a trek that takes you
through the untouched jungle and
past sparkling waterfalls and
if you want, you can get your body painted as they do, with a natural
fruit dye called Jagua...all
of this in just one day! Your visit to the Embera community will help them
economically to preserve their culture and environment.
After an hour and a half drive
we will reach the location where we will take a canoe
– called a “piragua” (a native boat)
to the extraordinary Embera village about a half-hour up the
Chagres River, observing the amazingly quiet and beautiful scenery
surrounded by beautiful tropical vegetation and water. At arrival we will
be greeted by the village, all traditionally dressed, and taken to
the main communal hut where the history of the tribe, their origins and
their life style will be narrated. We will assist to their dances, in how
women make beautiful straw bowls and plates from their own trees, dye
branches of trees with vegetable ink to turn the straw into different
colours and 
see their jewellery made
out of coins and different metals.
By lunch time we
will try their healthy and tasty homemade cuisine. Subsequently we’ll follow
the "medicine man" who will illustrate their
amazing knowledge in natural medicine contained in
their incredible forest full of natural medicinal plants
which alternative medicine therapists would die for. On our
way back we will freshen up, taking a dip in the cold water of a hidden
waterfall above Chagres River. Many visitors find it difficult to leave this
tropical paradise that the rest of the world has yet to discover.