Joyce Caldwell Smith

Six Weeks in an Isuzu: Crossing Borders from Chattanooga to the Panama Canal Joyce Caldwell Smith

A couple embark on a drive from their home in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to the Panama Canal in a 13-year-old Isuzu Trooper. This book details their day-to-day experiences over six weeks in 2004. With no definite plans except to drive to the Panama Canal, no hotel reservations, and no set itinerary, they begin their trip. Sometimes they stay in one place only one night, and other times they stay for several days. They encounter difficult border crossings, a nerve-wracking evening on the summit of the Mountain of Death, and a man?s body stretched out across one lane of a major highway. They also find a fascinating variety of ecological elements: tropical orchids growing wild, philodendron the size of trees, monkeys of various kinds, crocodiles, iguanas, geckos, volcanoes, huge lakes, and beaches with varying colors of sand. This account shows what they experienced and what they gained in their six-week drive from their home to the canal.