The whole country revolves around the canal. This is by far the most affluent city in Central America and all because of the canal. They have just completed the expansion of a third canal that is much bigger then the original two. Let me get through some stats.
It is 80km from coast to coast and takes between 8&10 hr to transit.
The average cost is $100,000 but can be up to $400,000 in the old canal and $800,000 in the new one
The ships pay by weight
Ships are measured in TEU's, the old canal only takes up to 5000 TEU, the new one takes 14,000 TEU.
Ships used to be made to maximum side to fit through the canal, 304 mtr long 33.5 mtr wide and 12 mtr draft. Now they make them bigger and don't go through the canal.
The ships are lifted 26mtr above sea level to Gaton lake that was created when the canal was built. When the lake was created (dam) it was the biggest man made like in the world.
They say they have between 30&40 transits per day but while I was there there was only 3 and they expected another 3 in the arvo so that is 6 in about 10 hour?
When a ship goes through the locks 100,000 litres of fresh water goes with it to the ocean.
The gates are 2 mer thick and weigh about 700 ton.
The new canal is 427 mer long 55mtr wide and 18mtr draft.
This means much bigger ships can go through and they pay much more.
They use a different system and the gates roll in and out and they reuse the water
The gates here are between 2100 and 4200 ton each.
More than 5% of the worlds cargoes she's through the canal.
So it was raining this morning so it was a good day to go. I found my way ok and got there just in time for opening. The visitor Ctr is 4 stories and you can look from ground, first and 4 th floor. I wanted to see so I went straight to the canal at ground level. I won't bore you but I ended up at all the different levels. At one point it stopped raining and I had a great spot on level four but it started raining again and they closed it and made us move. That made the available spaces super crowded. They have a museum there as well and I thought it was ok. They have a cinema and play a movie for about 10 min, and I thought it was pretty ****. They have better stuff playing on TV's.
It was a good day considering it was raining. I might go again later in the week, I really want to see a BIG ship go through.
I went back to the Canal today and got pics of a Panamax ship going through. Panamax means it was built to the maximum size to fit through the existing canal. Weather was perfect.