Fortifications on the Caribbean Side of Panama: Portobelo-San Lorenzo

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Spain's treasure fleets needed guarding, and Panama's Caribbean coast shows how it was done. The forts of Portobelo and San Lorenzo — superb military architecture of the 17th and 18th centuries — anchored the Crown's defence of transatlantic trade, with San Lorenzo commanding the Chagres river mouth and Portobelo's batteries ringing its bay. UNESCO inscribed the fortifications in 1980; jungle and sea now frame the cannon.
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