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.
Brianna and Keith near the Gatun BridgeBrianna and Kim taking a selfie near the Gatun BridgeContinue reading →
Continued… As we drove towards the Gatun Locks, we were told that this time, the large ship would be tied up behind us. That was fantastic news, as it meant we wouldn’t have to deal with the turbulent waters created by the ship’s prop wash this time around. We were also told that we would again be tied to the wall on the starboard (right) side with the sailboat nested to us on the port (left).
Maneuvering into the lock and tying up went smoothly.
Since Kosmos was already at the top of the lock wall, our line handlers simply handed the lines to the canal workers, who tied them to the walls — there was no dramatic throwing/catching of the canal’s lines, and no fears of tying the knot wrong and our line untying from the canal’s.
Continued… Once we exited the lock, we were officially in Lake Gatun. We needed to cross the 26 miles (33 km) lake to reach the set of locks that would take us back down to sea level. Fifteen years ago, we had started our canal transit in the afternoon, spent the night in the lake, and finished the transit the next morning. While we weren’t exactly excited about starting at 0400 today, we preferred an early start over spending the night in the lake (primarily due to lack of bedding for everyone onboard).
Lake Gatun is an artificial lake 85 feet (26 meters) above sea level. When the French had first started building the canal, they were attempting to dig a trench through the mountains so that the entire canal was at sea level. Due to the mountains being solid rock, the propensity of the mudslides in the areas that were not rock, and the propensity for flooding in the rainy season, a trench wasn’t viable. The French company went bankrupt. When the Americans took over the canal, they re-engineered it to be a gravity-fed lock system powered by water from this artificial lake, which was created by damming up the Chagres River. At the time, it was the largest artificial lake in the world.
As soon as we untied, Christi started making breakfast for the crew. None of us had eaten before leaving, and everyone was happy to celebrate successfully navigating the most difficult part of the locks (going up) with a meal.
Christi starting on breakfast
Eric had previously set a course through the canal, but the advisors weren’t happy with what Eric had set. They wanted him to run very close to the green buoys to leave lots of space for the faster traffic to pass us. This video was originally taken to document the vessels passing us.
But as you see in the video, Kim happened to catch the moment that Christi and Keith spotted birds fighting in mid-air over a fish. If you look very closely at the birds flying away, you can see the fish dangling from one of their mouths.
continued… We were now 54 feet higher above sea level than we had been before entering the first of the two Mira Flores locks. Here are our advisors strategizing about the next lock, while Eric waited for directions.
Amado to the left and Thaddeus in the middle
While we were waiting for the container ship in front of us to be disconnected from the trains (called mules) that held it in place while the waters were turbulent, a giant container ship pulled into the new, larger lock next to us.
giant container ship in the new, bigger lock
The construction on a third, larger set of locks to accommodate bigger ships began in 2007. We’d seen the construction when we went through the canal in 2009. The new set of locks was completed in 2016.
Sunday, January 19 — We’d meant to set the alarm for 0300, but Christi screwed up and set it for 0200. She was able to reset it, roll over and go back to sleep, but Eric was up for the day. Which worked out okay, because our crew was also up at 0200 and texting Eric about their status.
The crew arrived at 0250. Eric let the crew in the marina gate. Christi got up at 0300 and immediately started making coffee. We did all the last things needed to get ready to take Kosmos to sea, and untied at 0400. Eric decided to run the generator and AC all day so that the fresh lake water would flush out any salt buildup in the units, as well as keeping it cooler inside.
Eric drove us to the rendezvous site between buoys 4 and 6, where we did a loop until we saw the pilot boat approaching us. The pilot boat pulled up along side us and a man jumped aboard. Then, much to our surprise, a second man jumped aboard, as well.
The first man introduced himself as Thaddeus, a trainee advisor, and other man as Amado, his trainer. Thaddeus (the trainee) was very serious; Amado (the trainer) was more relaxed.
We drove towards the first of the two Mira Flores locks. The last time we went through the canal, we’d had five line handlers – three highly experienced boaters and what we’d thought were two professional line handlers (we later found out that only one of them was an experienced canal line handler). Christi was the videographer. This time, Christi was line handling, and none of our crew were experienced. But based on our experience the last time, we felt the crew was trained well enough and that all would be fine.
While the canal was normally calm, every time a large ships or pilot boat passed us, it created sizable wakes — and we really had to hold on!
