Panama
El Valle de Antón
A whole town spreads across the floor of an extinct volcano's crater.
The road tips over a rim and drops into a bowl of green, and the air cools as you descend. El Valle de Antón fills the floor of an extinct volcano's crater, a whole town ringed by forested walls, mist threading the canopy at dawn.
The India Dormida ridge, named for its outline of a sleeping woman, rises straight from the town's edge, and at its foot sits La Piedra Pintada, the valley's largest petroglyph boulder, carved with pre-Columbian symbols still argued over as a map, religious signs or a harvest calendar. Stronger walkers take Cerro Gaital for its views over the crater, others rappel beside the Chorro El Macho waterfall or soak in the town's thermal pools. The valley's most famous resident is also its most fragile: the Panamanian golden frog, extinct in the wild since 2007, breeds in captivity at the EVACC centre inside the small Níspero zoo. More than 300 bird species share the crater, and on Sundays the market fills with Ngäbe-Buglé and Guna craftwork and trays of fresh valley fruit.
Family
The golden frogs at the Níspero zoo hold children longer than any screen, the Sunday market suits every age, and the short walk to the petroglyph boulder doubles as a treasure hunt.
Couple
Cool crater mornings ask for a ridge walk; afternoons soften into orchid nurseries, butterfly gardens, thermal pools and a slow meal under the green walls.
Solo
A compact, walkable base with marked trails, more than 300 bird species and a market morning of easy conversation, all inside one crater.
Friends
Climb La India Dormida before the heat, rappel the Chorro El Macho waterfall after lunch, and race the downhill mountain-bike routes between them.
- The town fills the crater floor of the extinct El Valle volcano, ringed by green ridge walls with air cooler than the lowlands.
- La Piedra Pintada, the valley's largest petroglyph boulder, carries pre-Columbian carvings read variously as a map, religious symbols or a harvest calendar.
- The Panamanian golden frog, extinct in the wild since 2007, survives through captive breeding at the EVACC centre in the Níspero zoo.
- On Sundays the market brings together Ngäbe-Buglé and Guna handicrafts and fresh fruit from the valley's farms.
The Sunday market pairs craftwork with trays of fresh valley fruit; arrive hungry and graze your way along the stalls.
In the fondas around the centre, order sancocho de gallina, the slow-simmered chicken-and-root-vegetable soup Panama treats as its national dish.
Aberdare National Park
Kenya
Mist-soaked moorlands and waterfalls above a forest where leopards pass treetop lodges at night.
Sete Cidades
Portugal
Twin crater lakes, one emerald, one sapphire, filling a caldera wreathed in mist.
Blyde River Canyon
South Africa
Green canyon walls fold around a blue reservoir beneath three round mountain heads.
Ihlara Valley
Turkey
A 100-metre-deep gorge sliced through volcanic rock, its walls honeycombed with painted Byzantine churches.
Casco Viejo
Panama
Crumbling colonial balconies where jazz drifts over a skyline of glass towers.
Portobelo
Panama
Rusting cannons guard the harbour where Spanish galleons loaded Potosí's silver for Spain.
Gamboa
Panama
A rainforest town where ocean-going ships glide silently between the trees.
Bocas del Toro
Panama
Over-water bungalows on a Caribbean archipelago where sloths drift through mangrove canopies.