As you know this is Transit day.
Our cruise lecturer is Chris Roberts and he
will be doing commentary all day.
I have been through the canal on 2 other
occasions and I must say this is the least exciting. I know it has mostly to do
with the season. When we crossed before it was dark as we entered the canal and
it was a lot more dramatic. There were black clouds and flashing lightning and
traffic control lights helping to guide the ship to the entrance. This morning
the sun is shining. Beautiful but not dramatic.
We got up at 5:30 and Ken went topside and I
made my way to Horizon Court. Picked up 2 coffee and 2 muffins then I made
my way to the front of the ship on deck eleven. That is where Ken could be
found. He plans to be out there in the extreme heat a lot of the day but I will
pass on that one. I gave him his coffee, had a good look to make certain
nothing had changed and I returned to our state room. The bridge cam is showing
me exactly what he is seeing and the television turned to channel 42 lets me
hear all of what is being said and the balcony doors let me know when to step
outside and take a photo. But I am comfortable with the air conditioning. I
just have to remember to leave my camera on the balcony because bringing it
inside results in the lens being very fogged up. It is very hot and very humid
outside already and it is only going to get worse.
We have put out our wind sock and we have tapped our Canadian flag to
one of the balcony doors. Later today when they film the people on their
balconies you should be able to pick ours out clearly. We have made a poster
and we will display that later .
I ordered room service breakfast to be delivered to the room at 8:30. By
that time we will be in the first lock. Princess was promoting Champagne Breakfast
on the balcony but we did not order it. Our exceptional travel agent Kim has
given us a Champagne Balcony Breakfast as a Bon Voyage gift but we are going to
have that breakfast on May 4th. On that day we will have been on a
Princess ship for 365 days so we are planning to celebrate in style. We will
begin the day with Champagne breakfast and finish the day with Crab Pot in the
Bayou Café. It should be amazing. The wonderful pendant is my gift from Ken to
commemorate the special day. It is part of the EFFY waterfall collection and I
just love it.
Passing through the canal on your way to Gatun Locks is a very quiet
experience. You cannot hear the motors of the ship but you can clearly hear the
sound of the jungle birds singing. When I step out of our room onto the balcony
the humidity hits me and it is like stepping into a steam bath or a sauna. Temperatures
will continue to rise as summer approaches. I could not live here.
Once inside the lock it seems very strange to not be moving. We are not
going forward; we are going up as the water coming into the lock raises the
ship. In all the ship will be raised 85 feet before it reaches the lake at
Gatun. After travelling across the lake the ship will enter another set of
locks at Miguel Flores where the ship will be lowered that 85 feet to enter the
Pacific Ocean. I never cease to be amazed at how close the sides of the ship are to the walls of the locks. Panamax ships just fit.
How Does It Work??
The Panama Canal serves as a maritime shortcut that saves time and costs
in transporting all kinds of goods. The 80 kilometer waterway connects the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in one of the narrowest points of the Isthmus of
Panama.
Since its opening in 1914 more than one million ships from all over the
world have transited that canal. The historic million mark was reached on
September 4, 2010 with the transit of the bulk carrier Fortune Plum
The interoceanic waterway uses a system of locks with two lanes that
operates as water elevators and raises the ships to the level of Gatun Lake, 26
meters or 85 feet above sea level, to allow the crossing through the
Continental Divide, and then lowers the ships to sea level on the other side of
the Isthmus.
The water used to raise and lower the vessels in each set of locks is
obtained from Gatun Lake by gravity and poured into the locks through the main
culvert system that extends under the locks chambers from the sidewalls and the
center wall.
The Panama Canal took ten years to construct and was completed in 1914
The project changed hands several times over the course of the 400 years from
conception to construction. Thousands of workers, up to 50,000 at one point-
helped to carve through 51 miles of earth and hard granite to form this safe
and convenient passage from ocean to ocean. Several thousand lives were lost
during the construction. Most workers lost were from the West Indies. Not all
lives were lost because of accidents, many died from Malaria and Yellow fever. The
Panama Canal cost over 350 million to complete and cruise ships today pay over
100,000.00 to pass through. Our ship today paid 275,000.00 plus a meriad of
other fees to cross.
Richard Halliburton swam the full length of the canal in 1929 for a cost
of 36 cents.
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