Of course if I’m on a beautiful beach, I must take photos! This is part of our getaway at the Las Olas Beach Resort.
There are also a couple videos:
A view of the beach –
Joel battling the strong waves!
The Panama Adventure 
I’m glad nothing happened to him out there. Every year people drown at that beach in the surf which develops a tremendous undertow, and as you know, there aren’t any lifeguards there. Secondly, and something few people think about…every time you go swimming in the ocean you are voluntarily entering the food chain where you are no longer the top predator.
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Oh yes we know. That beach is notorious for rip currents. The undertow is also strong enough that it’s hard to stand up at hip deep level. I think the main danger is people get pulled out in a rip current and panic, and try to swim against it until they are exhausted. We are familiar with how to handle that from living in FL, but thankfully we didn’t have to put our skills to use on this outing. Are there many incidences of shark attacks here? That happened in FL too, but rarely when you consider how many people get in the water there.
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I don’t know about shark attacks here, but where I grew up, Orleans, Mass., out on the elbow of Cape Cod, there have been numerous great white shark sightings in the last few years. We never had them when I was growing up. The reason,now, is that seals are a protected species and their numbers have swelled to outrageous proportions. Thousands, in fact. And what are seals? They’re FOOD for the great whites. I know that our beach, Nauset, has been shut down to swimmers several times already this year because of great whites coming close to shore.
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They have great whites in northern CA in my daughter’s area too. In FL in warmer waters there were other kinds of sharks. I imagine it’s similar here.
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I live in the condos next to Las Olas. This is our vacation all year round! The ocean is extremely dangerous at high tide, but at low tide it is quite pleasant, especially on calmer days. Today the surf is higher than normal so there is a lot of “rock and roll” going on. There have been fatalities here, most of them have been alcohol-related. The undertow is strong and people tend to panic when there is strong resistance to their attempt to move back to shore. Remaining calm and waiting for the next wave to push you in the right direction helps a lot. If you are not a strong swimmer, don’t venture out deeper than chest level. I hope you enjoy your time here as much as I do every day.
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Apologies for the very delayed response! Somehow your messages ended up in the spam section which I don’t check that often. Thanks for the tip about high and low tide. I can swim, but waist level felt plenty exciting for me because that undertow is definitely strong. It’s very fun to play in the waves though, and we’ll definitely be back out there again. It’s such a beautiful spot 🙂
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Out there in the natural habitat of sharks and maybe salt water crocks ???
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I suppose there is always something out there! I haven’t heard any talk about salt water crocks, but there was that caiman in the river across the street.
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Thanks for the reminders. We spent 4 days at Las Olas when we visited Panama in January. It is like a throw back to the old vacation resorts in the U.S. before everything was run over by thousands of tourists. We leave for our Third Life in Pedasi, Panama in 24 days.
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24 days! You’re getting closer and closer 🙂
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Great pics once again Kris. Do you think that there’s more people that visit during Dry Season? And I try not to think about what’s in the water when I go in, unless of course I swim through a school of little “stingers”. LOL!
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I suppose there might be more people in dry season since a lot of people have vacations at that time of year, and it would also be cold up north at that time.
I don’t worry too much about what’s in the water either. I figure if you leave the wildlife alone it generally leaves you alone. The biggest problem we had in FL was people accidentally stepping on rays and getting stung, so it was recommended you shuffle your feet along so they could get out of the way before you stepped on them. Here, I know there is a lot of life in the water but I think the greater danger is the currents. You don’t have to go out too far to feel the power of that water.
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Wow, what a gorgeous beach – i love the spaciousness!
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It sure is, glad you like it too 🙂
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