Mention Panama and most people think Panama Canal. There is no doubt that the 50-mile-long (80 km) canal that cuts across Panama from the Atlantic to the Pacific, completed in 1914, is one of the most spectacular feats of modern engineering. Any visitor to Panama should do at least a partial transit of the canal or a visit to Miraflores Locks to see the locks in operation.

Panama offers so much more, however: tropical rainforests for wildlife and bird viewing; beaches and islands for relaxing; and mountain villages for hiking. Panama City, located on the Pacific, has excellent hotels, good dining, a few good museums and two wonderful historic areas, La Vieja and Casco Viejo, both rich in remnants from Panama’s colonial past.

Twenty-five miles outside Panama City, the Gamboa Rainforest Resort offers visitors an aerial tram ride.

The older of these two sections is Panama la Vieja (the old one), located at the eastern edge of Panama City. Founded in 1519 by the Spanish conquistador Pedro Arias de Ávila, Panama la Vieja — the original Panama City — grew quickly to become one of Spain’s most important cities in the Americas.

With its prime location on the Pacific, it served as a conduit for the gold and silver flowing from the mines of Peru and Bolivia that was shipped here, then carried across the isthmus of Panama to Caribbean ports, and then by ship to Spain.

Panama la Vieja had a royal treasury, cathedral, eight convents and monasteries, churches, hundreds of warehouses and scores of elegant mansions, as well as thousands of humbler dwellings. Over 150 years the city grew and prospered, with its population reaching an estimated 30,000 by the middle of the 17th century.

Everything came to an abrupt halt in 1671 when British pirate Henry Morgan and more than a thousand of his cohorts attacked the city, routing the Spanish soldiers defending it, then pillaged and looted the city. A fire completed the devastation. La Vieja was abandoned and left unprotected, in ruins, for more than 300 years. It was only in 1976 that what was left of this colonial capital became a protected historic site. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2003.

Some of La Vieja’s most important buildings, the Casas Reales (royal houses), including the royal treasury, customs house, and governor’s mansion, were on a small peninsula separated from the rest of the city by a moat. Today they have all but vanished, except for a few stone walls and foundations.

Nearby, on the other side of the moat, the Plaza Mayor (Main Square) is still visible today, as are substantial portions of other buildings: the impressive Cabildo de la Ciudad (City Hall), the equally impressive Metropolitan Cathedral with its bell tower, the bishop’s residence, several large mansions and the enormous late-16th century complex of the Dominican Order.

West of Plaza Mayor stands the ruins of many of La Vieja’s 16th- and 17th-century monasteries and convents, shoulder-to-shoulder, facing the sea: the Jesuits, the Franciscans, the Mercedarian Friars, Our Lady of the Conception.