Panama Day 2 - Panama Canal

Today's adventure was a trip through half of the canal. We started out in Gamboa and ended up in the Pacific. We learned a lot about the canal and Panama's future plans for the canal.

They are building a new canal that can accommodate larger boats. This canal will parallel the original canal. Below is a pic of some large equipment working on this new construction. They plan to have the new canal finished in 2014, 100 years after the original canal.

Here are some pix of the first

They use these vehicles on tracks to help move large ships through the locks.

This is the final locks we passed through. The birds in the air have learned that when the fresh water spills out into the salt water the fish all die and then they can just scoop them up.

This is a view of the locks as we head out into the Pacific.

This ship is used to dredge the banks in preparation for the new canal.

This is a picture of the "Bridge of the Americas". Apparently this road can take one all the way to Alaska.

Panama Day 1

Greetings from Panama! I hope to post a bit every day of the trip.

Even though we arrived yesterday, today is our first official day in Panama. The trip here was exhausting and 13 hours long. Everybody was extremely tired.

Today we spent most of the day in the ocean.

Here are some pix of the house where we are staying.

One of the most interesting things I have learned so far is how cashews grow. We have a a cashew tree in the yard and they are growing now (I think it is toward the end of the season though). The nut actually grows beneath a large fruit kind of shaped like an apple.