A trip through the Panama Canal

Here we are making our approach for the second lock. The first one was at 7am and I was sleeping. :)











Here is our starboard tug heading in to attach to us.


And here is the port side tug coming in.


Way ahead is a bridge. It took forever to get to it since we were being tugged.


These are the directional reflectors to help the ships maneuver.


The canal is getting narrower!


The tug is almost done with us and ahead is the pulley car.

This is where we hooked up to the pulley car. They are little trains on both sides of us that drag the ship along the narrow section right before the lock.








Goodbye tug!



Hello Trolley! Look how close to the walls we are!!






There was a band playing as we went through. It was cool!


See the big cables attaching us?


There's the lock, finally!




Right after we broke for dinner we entered the lock. I didn't realize we hadn't passed through yet, so I went to change instead of going out to the heli pad on the bow of the ship. Luckily the bow cam was on in my room and I saw us. Didn't have time to get to the heli pad, though!









It's grainy from the TV, but still really neat looking, eh?

Now the lock is full so we can pass through.


Kate, Mykal, Harvey and I tendered into Panama for dinner. We were at this little pier for yachts and it was nice. We had shrimp right out of the ocean and I think Harvey has a steak. We also had grilled calamari that was AWESOME! (Like the bag? Helen made it for me for my birthday!)


Here's us on the tender on our way back tot he ship.



Home again, to the Infinity!

Okay so that was my long picture narrative of the Panama Canal. I had a lot of fun and saw some cool stuff. I also got a certificate saying I had been through. I think our fee to travel though was $144,000.00. I KNOW! I watched a documentary that said the highest fee was over a million dollars and the smallest was 34 cents when a guy swam the Canal.

heh heh I think I'll stick to cruising through.

Okay next up is Costa Rica and Mexico. I'm working my way around.

I believe I had cruised 3000 nautical miles at this point. Whew!