Crossing the Panama Canal

Yesterday we crossed the Panama Canal with our new boat friends Chris and Jess on their 40 ft Catamaran named OM.  It was a fabulous experience, a once in a lifetime type of thing. We learned a lot about the Canal and the process of going through it. It was not as scary as I had always thought it would be, it process is quite controlled by the Panamanians and the Line handlers. Here are some of the photos. I plan to make a power point slide show of the whole experience and will share it with you soon.

The Panama Canal (Spanish: Canal de Panamá) is a 77.1-kilometre (48 mi) ship canal in Panama that connects the Atlantic Ocean (via the Caribbean Sea) to the Pacific Ocean. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. There are locks at each end to lift ships up to Gatun Lake, an artificial lake created to reduce the amount of excavation work required for the canal, 26 metres (85 ft) above sea level. The current locks are 33.5 metres (110 ft) wide. A third, wider lane of locks is currently under construction and is due to open in 2016.

France began work on the canal in 1881, but had to stop because of engineering problems and high mortality due to disease. The United States took over the project in 1904, and took a decade to complete the canal, which was officially opened on August 15, 1914. One of the largest and most difficult engineering projects ever undertaken, the Panama Canal shortcut greatly reduced the time for ships to travel between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, enabling them to avoid the lengthy, hazardous Cape Horn route around the southernmost tip of South America via the Drake Passage or Strait of Magellan. The shorter, faster, and safer route to the U.S. West Coast and to nations in and around the Pacific Ocean allowed those places to become more integrated with the world economy. It takes between 8 and 10 hours to go through the Panama Canal.

During construction, ownership of the territory that is now the Panama Canal was first Colombian,
then French, and then American. The US continued to control the canal and surrounding  Panama Canal Zone until the 1977 Torrijos–Carter Treaties provided for handover to Panama. After a periodof joint American–Panamanian control, the canal was taken over by the Panamanian government in 1999, and is now managed and operated by the Panama Canal Authority, a Panamanian government agency.

Annual traffic has risen from about 1,000 ships in 1914, when the canal opened, to 14,702 vessels in 2008, the latter measuring a total of 309.6 million Panama Canal/Universal Measurement System (PC/UMS) tons. By 2008, more than 815,000 vessels had passed through the canal; the largest ships that can transit the canal today are called Panamax.^[1] The American Society of Civil Engineers has named the Panama Canal one of the seven wonders of the modern world.^[2]

We are currently stuck in Shelter Bay Marina without a weather window to escape, meaning the wind in going up and a storm is on it's way.  We are also stuck with a broken boat, there are a number of things wrong with the boat currently, not sure we will actually finish the planned itinerary. We shall see how it plays out, if we decide to leave, then we will go to one of our stops for a few weeks respit before heading back home. Then we will fly to see our potential new boat Sail la vie in Floride before we head home. It is a 42 ft Lagoon Catamaran with everything we are looking for, in our price range. So, life goes on...