Friday – The Panama Canal

It’s Boxing Day in the UK. It’s St. Stephen’s Day in many countries. It’s Wren’s Day in Dingle. For us it’s Panama Canal Day. We’ve done canals before. Just last year we were on the Viking Jupiter going through the Welland Canal which connects the St. Lawrence Seaway, Lake Erie, and Lake Ontario. And years ago just the two of us piloted a 60-foot narrowboat on the canals of Wales and the UK. I was at the stern steering with a tiller. Elaine had to jump off at every lock to manually operate the locks and then jump back on after I passed the boat through. And there were plenty of locks. But the Panama Canal is the grandaddy of lock canals, so this was a grand experience. The weather, by the way, continues to be sunny, hot and humid.

Brief history – Ferdinand de Lesseps and the French started the Panama Canal project way back in 1880 after very successfully completing the world’s other best known canal – the Suez Canal. But Suez was way different. No locks for one thing. The French plan for Panama was for a sea level canal (a la Suez) with no locks. Well, they tried hard and failed miserably by 1903 with over 6,000 dead in the process. The United States wanted a canal too, but the original plan was to build it through Nicaragua. Eventually however in 1904, they bought out the bankrupt French project and took on the Panama Canal. They firsts managed a huge effort to defeat the mosquito so that malaria and yellow fever were not the issue it was for the French. And they promoted and succeeded in Panama gaining its independence from Columbia. Most importantly the US created a Panama Canal Zone that split the country and was to be totally governed by the US. The sea level canal idea was replaced by a lock system, and after lots of issues the Panama Canal opened in 1914. In 1977 we negotiated a twenty-year transfer process of the Canal Zone back to Panama and it was completed in 1997. In the 2000’s Panama created a second canal channel that could handle the ever larger ocean vessels that were becoming more common. It opened in 2014. Enough history. If you want the whole story read about the Panama Canal on Wikipedia or buy David McCullough’s book The Path Between the Seas.

We entered at the Gatun locks after going under the Atlantic Bridge. The Gatun locks are a series of three locks. Then we crossed Lake Gatun, entered the Gaillard cut, passed through three more locks at Pedro Miguel (1) and Miraflores (2). Then we sailed by Panama City into the Pacific Ocean under the Bridge of the Americas. It all took about eight hours. The three locks at each end take you first up 85 feet above sea level and then down 85 feet back to sea level.

Here’s a picture story of the crossing. First leaving Colon and the passing under the Atlantic Bridge.

Click on the galleries below to bring up scrollable windows with full size pictures – the gallery previews may show just thumbnails of the pictures. By the way, the pictures look much better on a tablet or a computer than they do on your phone. Just saying.

Then through the three Gatun locks:

We took a fewer pictures as we passed through the huge Gatun Lake. We hoping to spot some of the protected jaguars on the shorelines. But no such luck. We did see deer. And one lonely scraggily heron. All through the locks and the lake the ship is under the navigational control of local pilots who board off and on at different points. While they are on board, the Captain cedes control of the ship to them.

Then we passed through the second set of three locks. I only took a few pictures. Below you can see the electric “mules” that are attached to the ship when passing through locks. We had three on each side. They are very powerful and ensure that the ship stays centered in the lock. You can also see how close the ship got to the side of the lock.

Finally we were out of the locks and we passed under the Bridge of the America at Panama City as we sipped cocktails with a couple of our friends at the Living Room bar. Now we’re in the Pacific Ocean (unless, of course, Trump has renamed it).

Dinner was in The Restaurant with Peggy who is pictured with Elaine above in the bar. Peggy is from Australia. The other woman (whose name escapes me) is from Tucson. There are lots of people from Arizona on board.