Panama Canal

As we sat out on our balcony with our glasses of wine last evening, we saw literally hundreds of flying fish. They were incredible to watch – they didn’t just fly from wave to wave; some flew two or three hundred feet! They looked more like birds than fish.  Then early this morning we entered the Panama Canal. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised. I thoroughly enjoyed the passage through the Canal. This wasn’t high on my bucket list but I had always heard about the Panama Canal and the stories about how 27,000 men died digging it and getting it operational.  I knew that it was a short cut from the Atlantic to the Pacific, but it is really a rather interesting operation to witness. I found the working of the locks fascinating. We had seen locks on the Eric Canal – but this was different.  To see these huge freighters and cruise ships squeeze into these little locks is impressive. There are two sets of locks side by side.  I swear the ship beside us looked like they were going to have to grease her sides to get her through. I don’t believe it had 2 inches of clearance on either side. I heard scrapes from time to time! Even the operation of the “mules” (electric train engines) that pull you into the locks was fun to watch. I was curious about what they charge for the transit. I assume they charge the freighters by the ton – cruise ships are charged a hundred dollars a head. It is based on how many people your ship could hold – then there is a slight reduction if you have  empty cabins.  I didn’t realize there were sets of locks on the Atlantic and Pacific sides and a huge manmade lake in the middle. I was expecting a skinny canal all the way through. The landscape is tropical – the forest/jungles are beautiful with every kind of tree you can envision from hardwoods to palms. One small island here has more varieties of trees on it that they have in all of Europe. They also have 970 varieties of birds. Without Courtney and Jim here to spot things for me I didn’t see much in the way of wildlife. I only saw some birds and one baby croc, but they supposedly have all the wildlife that you would expect to find in tropical jungles and waters.  As you might imagine with ships getting larger and larger they are in the process of constructing a third set of longer and wider locks. Each lock will be about the size of a football field. I am also amazed at the traffic. About 14,000 vessels transit the canal each year. Ships are lined up in front of and behind us for as far as I can see.  The 80 kilometer cut saves ships thousands of miles of travel time by not having to go around the tip of South America.  I need to close now. It is dinner time and since I have only had about 8 pounds of food today, I wouldn’t want to miss a meal.