The Panama Canal

Bridge of the Americas behind us, we're on our way and waiting for our lockmate.



I’m sitting aboard Akimbo on a mooring buoy at about 6pm on Lake Gatun a little over a mile from the Gatun Locks – the northern exit from the Panama Canal into the Caribbean – with “four of my best friends.” Troya, Edwardo (nickname Blondie – can you pick him out in the photo?), Miguel and Edgar, now playing dominoes. We are here for the night and plan to finish our transit tomorrow. The good news is that we got the most turbulent locking – up – behind us. Locking down will be calmer water. The bad news was that the ship we were assigned to go with thru the first locks was late. We were all aboard (including the Canal’s advisor - Larry) and ready at 7am, Condor Bay was due at 9am but didn’t get there until 10. According to Larry, to finish the transit in one day we would have had to get to here at about 2pm, we got here at 4, even doing 7 knots at times. While the Canal doesn’t charge for the mooring, i’ll be paying for another day of my hired crew. This HAS been expensive. After the Canal Authority eventually sends back my $850 buffer, it’ll turn out to have cost a little over $1600. With my own crew and not using an agent, i could cut that down to about $700 – not including the meals i am required to supply. (I’ve had no complaints about the food and these guys won’t let me do the dishes!) After that “price of admission,” i’m making sure i enjoy the show.



In the first two locks, we were tied up in the center of the chamber. Condor Bay was ahead of us and held the same way by the little cable trains that pulled her thru. Amazing to me, little boats row out to these big boats to retrieve their lines that will haul the cables to them. WE were as close as i ever want to get to a big boat like Condor Bay, the guys in the row boats gotta have guts. In the third lock we tied up next to a tug.






Three locks up and into the canal. A rise of 85 to 90 feet. As “Murphy’s Law” would have it, the motor overheated. Once i blew out it’s intake hose it settled down and ran better than ever. We motored and sailed until some authority radioed to tell us to roll up the genoa – too bad, it gave us an extra half knot of speed. The weather was sunny and HOT thru the locks, the Gaillard Cut and most of the way across the lake until a squall moved thru. Visibility got a little short, but the rain cooled things off nicely.


Tomorrow? I was told to expect an advisor aboard at about 11am. I’ll spend tomorrow night at Shelter Bay Marina and head for the San Blas Islands (65 nautical miles away) early the next day. Or the next, given some clean-up i will want to do (and waiting for my agent to deliver my port clearance papers).

It’s tomorrow now. We all started to stir at about 6:30. I followed my crew’s lead by diving into the lake. I get some kind of kick out of the different bodies of water i’ve swum in. As opposed to the countries i’ve visited? Don’t know what that ego trip is. After i dove in, Edwardo told me to watch out for crocodiles. Big ones. But they didn’t show up. Drying off, sitting on deck in the sun and a light breeze, with coffee and bagel in hand, sumthin’ feels good this morning. I’m imagining many of you taking the place of these guys. Actually they’ve taken your place for now. Wish you were here, and so do you, for not an “ah-ha” but an “aahhhhhh” moment.

So there i am. Sitting on deck. Coffee and bagel. Never tiring of the sparkling dance (or is that dancing sparkle?) of sunlight on water, when comes to mind a conversation or three from years past. How many conversations do you wish you could replay? There are those we think of to “get even.” But i’m talkin’ about others. Ones where my relationship with someone changed, reached a “fork in the road” and we diverged. Where we lost further dialog. If i had been more present, could i have praised past harvests and suggested our next time to talk? If i ever see those people again, will i suggest a replay? I think we all have more to learn from each other. And maybe from each moment. “To feel abandoned is to deny the intimacy of your surroundings,” writes David Whyte. If we are present enuf how can we not be intimate not only with each other but with every moment? Isn’t it intimacy that we thrive on?

As anticipated, the canal advisor came aboard at 11 and we headed for the locks. This time we went in front of the ship with us instead of behind. Our lock mate was a car carrier. BIG slab sided thing named “Indiana Highway.” In the attached photos you’ll see the crew, Condor Bay, a cable car that mules the ships thru the locks, lock attendants throwing their messenger lines (there’s another term), the tug we tied to, her crew and captain, where we are on the chart (we’re the little blue triangle), the mooring buoy we tied to, the way we rigged our stern and bow lines, the approach and arrival of Indiana Highway, the slope between the adjacent locks, the gate opening to the Caribbean, our departure.




To build these locks in 1913 and have them serve into such a wildly unimaginable future for almost a hundred years was an incredible achievement! Construction is now underway to build larger locks and enlarge narrower parts of the canal to accommodate super tankers, due to be finished in 2014 (i think they’ll be late). The cable cars don’t hardly look up to their task. There was an fatal accident where there was miscommunication between the ship’s bridge and shore and one got pulled off its track and crushed between the ship and the wall. But such has been extremely rare. We were lucky to see it all in daylight – the locks run 24/7.



The comic relief came when i arrived at the marina and went to check in with the Port Captain. While he did his job…he asked me how i was with Jesus Christ. I told him to ask me after i die. But he just had to go on to tell me what a comfort it would be for me to believe like him. I held my tongue – after all, i didn’t need to get on his bad side – and imagined replaying the conversation even as it was happening. By the way, another thing Panama has over Costa Rica is reasonably priced moorage. $48 here as opposed to $144 in Pez Vela, the last dock i tied up to back on Aug 12.

Upon arriving in the Caribbean, a few sights reminded me to continue to pay attention: a waterspout at the leading edge of a BIG storm; and among the many ships anchored one that had "come to grief." We may have "arrived" here but we've got no less significant a distance and challenge to meet.