Barro Colorado Island & the Panama Canal
We flew into Panama yesterday, boarded National Geographic Sea Lion. With our first Canal pilot on board, off we went to cross the Gatun Locks into the Gatun Lake. From the Caribbean Sea, to the north side of the country, we will move by tomorrow all the way south into the Pacific Ocean. Our giant car carrier companion ship was like a third wall in front of us, leading and protecting us into the Gatun Lake.
Really early this morning the second pilot of our canal crossing came on board and led us to our anchorage spot just off of Barro Colorado Island (BCI). Right after breakfast we gathered in the lounge for a quick and fascinating introduction by Dr. Anthony Coates, former Deputy Director of Barro Colorado Island and currently a Staff Scientist Emeritus of the Smithsonian Institute, on the island and the research that goes on in it. We were fascinated by what he said, but mostly by how he said it. The complexity of the tropical rainforest is certainly easier to grasp now. Out into the forest or onto a Zodiac we went; American crocodiles, yellow rump caciques, spotted antbirds, rusty margined flycatchers, monkeys, and many others welcomed us into their realm. We came back on board excited, and aware of the need to rehydrate as we are not used to the Neotropical heat.
After lunch, the third pilot of our transit came on board and we headed south into the Culebra Cut. This is the section of the Canal that cost more lives and the one which kept the Panama Canal from being a sea level canal. What an environmental disaster that would have been! Predatory star fish from the Pacific would have devastated the coral reefs of the Caribbean. After the Culebra – or Gaillard – Cut, we entered the Pedro Miguel and Miraflores Locks with an enormous container ship called the Star Gran. Welcome to the Pacific Ocean our narrator said, as we crossed the Bridge of the Americas. What an incredible journey from north to south, from the Caribbean to the Pacific, the path between the seas. The Panama Canal changed the course of history in the western hemisphere; we can only hope that it will hold a special place in our memory and life experiences as well.
