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Last Updated: 07/22/03 |
        
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Photos: Mouse over to see caption; Click to enlarge Titles: Underlined titles link to corresponding journal entries Panama City: We spent a whole month in Panama. This small country has so much to offer... from the city... to some of the most beautiful beaches and islands in the world... to lush rainforest. We started here in Panama City which has its own extremes -- old colonial ruins and new modern skyscrapers. Pretty much something for everyone!
Panama Canal: The canal truly is an engineering wonder. The locks work completely by a "gravity water feed" system... no pumps involved to lift and lower huge ships from sea level to lake level then back to sea level. Here we went through two sets of locks next to huge cargo ships
The Canal Jungle: The shores that line the Panama Canal and the Gatune Lake which feeds the canal are teeming with life. Its technically a rainforest! Turns out this environment is absolutely essential for the canal to continue working because it needs massive amounts of rain to replenish the lake which in turn is used to run ships through the locks. Interesting note... it took us two tries to complete this tour. On the first try our boat broke down and we had to be towed back by a second boat. We were out in the canal stranded for over an hour and watched many huge cargo ships go by. Thank goodness we weren't any closer to the actual shipping channel because trying to paddle away from freighters would have been quite a job!
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