Thursday 9th April
Panama Canal
Today is our transit of The Panama Canal. We went through the canal two years ago but this time we are going in the other direction starting at the Pacific side. We passed under the Bridge of the Americas just before 7o'clock and about half an hour later got to the first set of locks - the Miraflores Lock. The two chambers here raise the ship up 54 ft. It is amazing to see how quickly the chambers can fill up with water. We then went through the man made Miraflores Lake and got to Pedro Miguel Lock. This is a single chamber and raises us up another 31 ft. We passed under the Centennial Bridge and along the Galliard Cut to get to Gatun Lake. This is a very large lake with lots of islands and ships waiting for their turn to go through the locks. The last part of the canal was the three chambers that make up The Gatun Locks. These locks take you down 81ft to the level of the Atlantic Ocean. The photo was taken at The Gatun Locks and shows the ship in the parallel lock. The ship has just entered the lock and you can see the huge lock gates holding back the water. Our ship is almost as wide as the lock and wires attached to 'mules' - like small trains - keep us from touching the walls of the locks. However at the last lock a rail that runs along the outside of the ship touched the walls on both sides and broke some of the brackets! We weren't supposed to be quite that close!!