Costa Rica in a heartbeat. Panama just didn't do anything for me. Perhaps some of the Panama ex-pat communities are different but that place seemed like one of the most foreign places I've ever traveled. Never really felt all that safe walking around Panama City at all.
Yeah I've been meaning to follow up with you on that. Nobody here, tico, gringo, Venezuelan or otherwise, has had good things to say about Panama and have completely contradicted the travel blogs and magazines.
There was a scene in Narcos when Escobar and his crew had to leave Colombia and they went to Panama...and that scene depicted everything that people down here has said about Panama(crap food, srude an shitty service etc)
It was pretty funny