Panama

  

The ship made port in Colon, on the Caribbean coast of Panama.  It was an all-day excursion, booked through the cruise line.  Five buses —about 150 passengers.  Our tour guide explained how Panama had the first transcontinental railroad, built by Americans in the 1850’s to accommodate the California Gold Rush.  He explained how the French tried to build a canal but failed, how the Americans under Teddy Roosevelt were able to get the job done. How the US helped Panama gain its independence from Colombia. He talked about John McCain being born in the Canal Zone, and how Jimmy Carter negotiated the treaty that returned the canal to Panamanian control.

The buses took us to Gatun Lake, a man made lake in the middle of the country.  The lake feeds the canal. It’s also a “parking lot” of sorts — traffic travels either Atlantic to Pacific or Pacific to Atlantic, but cannot travel in both directions at the same time.

At the lake we boarded a ferry and began our journey to Panama City, on the Pacific coast.

  

The canal is dependent on a system of locks that take a ship up from sea level, then down to sea level at the other end.  This is because sea level on the Atlantic side is different from sea level at the Pacific.  We had to wait for a couple of large ships before the canal authority would open the locks for us.

The first lock was amazing.  The second was interesting.  By the t8me we got to the third … the afternoon was beginning to drag at bit.

We had lunch in the boat (nothing special) and eventually reached the Gulf of Panama.

Now, here’s where we ran into a problem.  “All aboard” the ship was scheduled for 5:30 PM.  But at 5:30 we were just getting off the ferry in Panama City, with a 90 minute drive back to Colon still ahead of us.

They held the ship in port for us.  They weren’t about to strand 150 passengers.

We arrived back at the ship around 7.  Had dinner in the buffet and saw the show in the main theater — Broadway cabaret.

The show relies heavily on jukebox musicals and movies that were adapted to the stage.  I would have liked to have seen more original Broadway material.  But I did enjoy the performance.