continued… It was exhilarating when the last Gatun lock doors opened into the Caribbean Sea. We did it! And with no damage to the boat and no injuries! Woo hoo!

We quickly untied and drove forward into the northern portion of the canal, which was located in the protected waters of Bahia Limon (note, we can’t edit the really old posts, so we want to note that the proper translation for limon is lime, not lemon). While we were in the locks, we’d been mostly protected from the wind, so when we emerged, we were a little surprised about how windy it was. Even in the protected bay, there were whitecaps.

Shortly beyond the locks was the Gatun Bridge, which hadn’t existed when we’d gone through the canal fifteen-years ago.

We passed many interesting structures along the way. We believe the first photo is Colon’s power plant. The second photo are the Colon cargo loading/unloading docks and other big ship infrastructures.

The pilot boat hailed us on the radio that they were approaching us to pick up the advisors. We slowed down, the pilot boat pulled up to us, then Amado and Thaddeus jumped aboard the pilot boat.

From there, we headed towards the marina, passing a boat graveyard along the way. Our advisors had told us that the majority of the boats in the graveyard had dragged in the heavy winds that are common here. The Panamanian government doesn’t remove the dead boats, so even though it didn’t happen often, the dead boats have accumulated over the years.

Speaking of heavy winds… due to unusually heavy winds lately, many boats heading into the Caribbean have not left on their expected departure dates, so the marina has been fuller than the staff had anticipated when taking reservations. We’d heard recent reports that boats that had confirmed marina reservations were told at the last minute that the marina was full and sent to the anchorage. We didn’t have a slip number yet, and were worried that we’d be sent away, too. When we called on the radio to notify the marina that we were coming in, we were relived when they assigned us a slip.

As you can see from the photo, the entrance to the marina was narrow, so Eric was a little nervous entering when the winds were so strong. Fortunately, all went fine with entering.

Our slip was right in front of the marina office/restaurant/hotel. It was a shallow, tight spot to squeeze into, but all went okay with docking.

Once tied up, we were all thrilled — this was the very last step. We had officially successfully transited the canal from marina to marina!!!!

Our crew checked into the hotel, which was on the second floor above the marina office/restaurant. Even though they’d had a confirmed reservation, the hotel had no record of them booking. Fortunately, the hotel was able to accommodate three people (they had single beds, so no sharing beds!), and it was decided that Brianna would spend the night onboard Kosmos.

We all got cleaned up and met for dinner at the marina restaurant, where we enjoyed a big celebratory meal.

Before we left San Diego, we had joined a cruising group called the Ocean Posse (formerly called the Panama Posse). They’d had an event in San Diego, so we’d met many people in person at that event, and many more via the chat groups. The fellow Ocean Posse members at the marina were expecting us, and several stopped by to welcome us.

Note: Thank you Mike, Kim, Brianna and Thaddeus for the photos and videos that you contributed to this post!