Panama Canal

The primary reason for “stopping” in Panama was to visit the Canal and see it operating first hand. It is an amazing testament to mans ingenuity and creativity, both things good and bad.

For the past 12 years I was involved in the import of many food products and the Panama Canal was a route many of the products traveled to reach the West coast of the U.S. For me to actually see how ships traversed the canal was a point of interest, and for the kids to learn about this important historic and economic feat of man was also important.

It is possible to take a tour of the Canal via boat. You are able to actually ride through the canal and experience first hand how the locks work, learn about the history of the canal and the current operations of the Canal.

The tour began at the marina just south of Culebra Island and began with an hour bus ride to Lake Gatun where we boarded the Pacific Queen, a 120 ft German built cruiser specifically designed for day tours. The ship was very comfortable and offered plenty of areas for viewing the spectacular sites of Panama and the Panama Canal.

Pacific Queen

We chose the 1/2 day tour, which gave us 6 hours of travel and sightseeing and traversed the Pacific side locks returning us to Flamenco Marina at the far end of the Amador Causeway. The last 2 hours of the trip we encountered heavy rain (i read somewhere that Panama City receives over 90 inches of rain each year. That is a lot of rain even for us Northwesterners), but their were plenty of spots to get out of the rain on the Pacific Queen and the journey was still a pleasant one.

An average of 36 transits take place each day on the Panama Canal. From 5 a.m. to 12 p.m. ships transit from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean, and then reversed until 7 p.m. every day. At night the smaller ships pass through the locks.

It is a tight fit for these large ships, only 24 inches of space remain once one of these giants are squeezed into a lock.

There are a total of 6 locks that must be traversed from one side of the Canal to the other, 3 on the Pacific side and 3 on the Atlantic side. Lake Gatun sits in the middle approximately 90 feet above the oceans. For our trip we would drop 85 feet from Lake Gatun to the Pacific Ocean.

The locks are designed to raise and lower ships using water. It is an incredible site to see! In the matter of 8 minutes more than 26 million gallons of water is moved in and out of a lock. The images below show you what I mean.

The first image is from the back of the boat is we entered the first lock. We are at the same level as Lake Gatun which is off in the distance. You can see the gates beginning to close behind us…

The photo below was taken about 5 minutes later from the same point. A little more than half the water has been removed from the lock and we are “sinking” having dropped approximately 15 feet from the first picture.

In another 3 minutes we will have dropped a total of 26 feet. The gates in front of us will open and the ship will pull out of the lock. The gate will close, and the far gate will open allowing the water of Lake Gatun to flood back into the lock ready for the next ship.

The same process happened at the next 2 locks until we were at the same level as the Pacific Ocean, we then cruised back to the marina for disembarkment & our taxi ride back to the hotel.

Last year Panama approved funding for the expansion of the canal. Since the opening of the canal a new breed of ship has been built that will not fit through the canal. Ships like those below carry 4,500 cargo containers, they are massive hunks of metal that dwarfed our little ship as we passed.

Cargo Ship

However, the new breed of super tankers can carry 12,500 cargo containers…nearly 3 times the capacity of the current ships. The expansion of the canal will allow for the passage of these ships.

The average cost for passage? $120,000 But the large ships also require the use of a Tug Boat at the cost of $3,000 an hour for the 12 hour passage.

We all had a good time learning more about the Panama Canal and experience how it works first hand. The kids thought it was their best “field trip” yet!