Panama Canal Cruise Jan.2022
2022 1/28/22 - 2/12/22 - Panama Canal Cruise
1/27/22 - Left Kansas City for Fort Lauderdale, FL. Spent the night t Hampton Inn & Suites South Cruise Port, Hollywood. Nice that Taco Bell was within walking distance as we were hungry.1/28/22 - Shuttle from hotel to cruise port $15.00 per person. Very efficient check in to the Emerald Princess.
First stop was Deck 15 for some yummy pizza while we waited for our luggage to be brought to our room (Dolphin 522).
Second stop was Deck 5 at the Coffee Cafe for Chia Tea, Chocolate Cookie Crumb Mocha, and Hot Chocolate.
We received 24 free drinks as exchange for the mini-bar that was set up in our mini-suite.
From the balcony looking into our room.
From bathroom and closet area looking toward balcony.
January 31, 2022 - 9:43 a.m. Our view of Cartagena, Columbia. Unable to get off ship as requirement change asking for PCR Covid test within 24 hours. Ship still stopped for Columbia check to enter the canal.
9:45 a.m. Cartagena is a very large shipping port - second busiest port in Columbia. The terminal has a throughput capacity of 4.5 million TEUs. (Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit). The largest container ship can carry 24,000 TEUs or what would be a 44 miles long freight train!!
9:48 a.m. The Castillo Grande Lighthouse, built in 1973. is located at the end of a peninsula sheltering the inner harbor of Cartagena and marking the beginning approach for vessels to berth. The unpainted tower made of concrete block has an observation deck appearing to be off center with a white lantern. The light is active, flashing white every seven seconds, with a focal plane of 79-feet.
February 1, 2022 At 5:45 a.m. Atlantic Bridge in Colon, Panama Atlantic side of the Panama Canal. Finished August 2, 2019 it is the longest concrete cable-stayed bridge.
6:00 a.m. This is the Ferry Crossing that was used before the Atlantic Bridge was built.
6:00 a.m. We will be transiting on the left side. L - Aqua Clara Locks. Opened April 29, 2017. Ships one and a half times larger and transit carrying twice as much cargo. These are the lock are ship will use.
R - Gatun Locks - Opened August 1914.
Both sets of locks have three locks raising ships some 85 feet.
5:58 a.m. Remains of French attempt to build the canal. Their attempt was to build a sea-level canal. They began the attempt in 1880 and stopped in 1889 after some 22,000 laborers died.
6:15 a.m. The tug boat that will be in front of us in the locks. The tug boat keeps the ship centered. The ship moves through each lock on it's own power.
6:39 The first lock gate is opening for our ship. The large ship is ahead after being raised to the second lock.
6:45 a.m.
Firefighting equipment. Also notice the very short cut grass around the buildings. This is because there are 21 species of venomous snakes!
7:15 a.m. Leaving first lock.
7:27 a.m. Agua Clara Control Tower. Notice the stairway on the right is closed due to crumbling concrete!
7:45 a.m. Leaving second lock and into third lock.
8:13 a.m. Leaving third lock into Gatun Lake. Beautiful day. Commentary throughout our transit through the canal by a retired professor.
Canal officials installed storage basins alongside the new locks to recycle 60 percent of the water that is used in lockages before it is discharged. The recycling technology enables the new locks to use 7 percent less water than the existing locks
Some of the "fishermen" along the way. They wait as the opening and shutting gates stir up fish.
Brown Pelican - They prefer to live shallow, inshore waters, so the Panama Canal is an ideal place for this seabird. They eat mostly fish but include crustaceans, small reptiles, and occasionally other birds in their diet.
? Tricolored Heron - are carnivores (piscivores) and 90% of their diet is fish, but they also eat amphibians, crustaceans, gastropods, worms, leeches, spiders and insects.
Magnificent Frigatebirds eat primarily flying fish, tuna, herring, and squid, which they grab from the surface of the water without getting wet. They also eat plankton, crabs, jellyfish, and other items on the surface of the water including discarded fish from fishing boats. (Female)
Osprey feed primarily on live fish, which they catch from the water by using their long, hooked talons. An osprey can plunge so forcefully into the water that it will completely submerge. When carrying their prey back to the nest, osprey will arrange the fish so that it is facing upright, head forward
8:38 a.m. The Gatun Dam is a large earthen dam across the Chagres River in Panama. Constructed between 1907 and 1918 for the lake and hydroelectric plant. The dam at Gatun is so huge in its proportions, and was for years the subject of so much controversy, that it eclipses the two dams on the Pacific side.
8:39 a.m. Looking back as we travel Gatun Lake we see two large ships waiting to enter Agua Clara Locks.
10:11 a.m. One of the beautiful views as we continue in Gatun Lake. The transit is 51 miles and cuts across the isthmus of Panama.
10:27 a.m. An island. The islands seen along the way are the tops of covered mountains.
11:59 a.m. A small ladder seen on the bank allows local fishermen to come down to the lake. We also passed several small local boats with locals.
12:21 p.m. Old lighthouse on eastern side of canal. ? Name. One of several seen along the way.
12:24 p.m. PDL (Precision Directional Light) range uses white, red and green light sectors to let mariners know where they are in the channel. Activated by radio when needed, a solar-powered PDL range light system doesn’t require shore power. As seen in photo a green light indicates the ship is in the channel.
12:26 Passing a Northbound ship. A green bouy on the left. The main channel of the Canal has 289 permanent buoys. Lateral buoys located north of the Pedro Miguel Locks are painted red to indicate the west side of the channel and green to indicate the east side. The colours reverse south of Pedro Miguel.
Titan, better known by its former nickname Herman the German (US Navy designation YD-171), is a large floating crane currently serving in the Panama Canal performing heavy lifts for lock maintenance.
12:49 p.m. Chages River coming from Madden Dam it continues southwest to Gamboa, where it joins the Panama Canal at the north end of the Gaillard Cut. Its course then turns northward through Gatun Lake, created by the Gatún Dam (1912) with which are associated locks and a hydroelectric plant. The Chagres there leaves the canal and flows into the Caribbean Sea west of Limon Bay.
1:20 p.m. Centennial Bridge built in 2004 is a cable-stayed bridge in Panama. This is the second bridge that crosses the Panama Canal after the Bridge of the America. Build to supplement the Bridge of the Americas and replace it as the carrier of the Pan-American Highway. This is at the Continental Divide.
1:37 p.m. Rock that was blasted through. 27,000 metric tons of dynamite was used.
1:53 p.m. Pacific Locks. Each of the locks are a three system lock. L - Miraflores and San Pedro Locks R - Cocoli Locks
Panama Canal locks at Cocoli, built during the recent expansion to accommodate larger ocean-going vessels. Opened June 26, 2016.
2:27 p.m. Great Blue Heron - Lock Watcher Great Blue Herons eat nearly anything within striking distance, including fish, amphibians, reptiles, small mammals, insects, and other birds.
2:45 Pacific Entrance Range Rear Lighthouse (Inactive).
3:08 p.m. After an intensive construction program (2009-2016), the Cocoli and Agua Clara Locks added a third lane to the Panama Canal for the transit of Neopanamax. We are approaching the first lock.
3:48 p.m. Leaving the second lock to enter the third lock.
4:02 p.m. Used for target practice. Monkey fists are small balls of line that are attached to a thin rope that the canal worker throws at your boat with the hopes that you catch it or at least are able to grab it when it hits you. Then you tie the monkey fist around your large lines and they pull your line back up to them so they can secure it to the wall and walk you through the canal. (Don't know why a horse trailer is here).
4:21 p.m. Ancón Hill is an area in Panama that was used for administration of the Panama Canal. It was under U.S. jurisdiction as part of the Panama Canal Zone until 1977.
5:20 When leaving the third Cocoli Lock we are approaching The Bridge of the Americas with crosses the Pacific approach to the Panama Canal at Balboa, near Panama City. It was built between 1959 and 1962 by the United States.
5:23 p.m. Panama City also seeing Ancon Hill and Museum of Biodiversity and Port Fuerte Amador whichis built on a man-made peninsula. The extending peninsula is a 1 ml (1,6 km) long causeway artificially created by connecting 4 small islands with rocks excavated from Panama Canal. We wait till morning to reach port and be tendered into Panama City.
February 2, 2022 View of French Plaza and Casco Viejo from the highway build along the causeway as our tour bus circled to the new part of Panama City. Old Panama City was built in 1519 then destroyed in 1671 and rebuilt five miles away in 1673. (The wall and Las Bovedas (The Vaults) restaurant is all that is left of the original prison - The Spanish would chain prisoners in the cells below, and allow the tide waters to rise up to their lips - the crabs would then crawl down and eat the soft flesh - the screams of agony went on for days - everyone jailed above would sign whatever confessions were placed before them - relief came when the crabs finally ate the brain, and the poor souls died.)
Another view of Casco Viejo. To the left is seen the top of La Catedral Metropolatiana. Built 1796 Renovated in 2003, the cathedral, with its black and white checked marble floors and immense organ is the largest church in Casco Viejo as well as one of the largest in Central America. To the right is Iglesia San Francisco de Asia. Built in the 1700 and remodeled in 1918. (This tour didn't include Iglesia San Jose known for its decorative baroque Golden Altar, one of the few treasures that survived Henry Morgan’s raid of Panama Viejo in 1671. According to a local legend, the altar was painted in black to disguise its real value. It consists of carved mahogany that is painted and veneered in gold.)
The F&F Tower was a purely theoretical idea based on rotating geometry and a prism.(previously known as the Revolution Tower) is an office tower in Panama City.
Jose Maria Morelos was born in 1765. A rebel Catholic priest who fought against the Spanish Empire because of the social oppression and abuse, betrayed religious ideals. He was saved by a 12-year-old warrior, and worked hand by hand with pirates in order to obtain independence from Europeans using a European constitution as a base.
Still called the Trump Tower but now Marriott Hotel.
Vasco Nunez de Balboa born in 1475 was a Spanish conquistador and explorer, who was head of the first stable settlement on the South American continent (1511) and who was the first European to sight the eastern shore of the Pacific Ocean.
Vasco Nunez de Balboa - was a Spanish explorer, governor, and conquistador. He is best known for having crossed the Isthmus of Panama to the Pacific Ocean in 1513, becoming the first European to lead an expedition to have seen or reached the Pacific from the New World.
Unknown Monument
Old Town. Guide says this property is very valuable. Some parts are being restored. Some of the buildings ownership not clear.
Walking down the narrow streets.
Santa Maria la Antigua - In 1671 the pirate Henry Morgan (Capt. Morgan) set fire to the town so the decision was made to move the town and create a wall for safety. The church you see today was begun in 1688 and took 108 years to finish.
The old city's main square is also known as Plaza Mayor, or Plaza de la Independencia, since the country's independence from both Spain and Colombia were celebrated here. Busts of Panama's founding fathers are scattered around the plaza, at the center of which is a large gazebo. The plaza is surrounded by historic buildings
Manuel Espinosa Batista was a Colombian pharmacist turned politician who campaigned for a separate Panama state and became one of "Founders of the Republic". He is known for his philanthropy. Lived from 1857 - 1919.
Walking in the narrow street.
Built in 1678, these gorgeous ruins in Casco Viejo are what remain after two major fires brought down the church's tower and interior areas. best known for its Flat Arch spanning the interior that stood without supports for centuries. It fell in 2003 during celebration of 100 years of independence and has since been rebuilt.
Tropical Kingbird - Tropical Kingbirds feed mostly on large flying insects, which they capture by pursuit in flight.
France Square is located at the southern point of the city and showcases statues and large stone tablets narrating the story of French role in the construction of the Panama Canal.
Walking around the Plaza
Several vendors sell souvenirs such as Panama hats, handmade molds, baskets, carvings, fridge magnets, license plates, and artwork along Paseo de Las Bóvedas. Part of the walkway is under a flower covered arch.
Time for a fresh coconut drink. Walking around makes one thirsty.
In old town Vasco Viejo the historic district. Monument to Simon Bolivar This bronze monument with a condor flying majestically over soldiers carrying flags is a tribute to Simón Bolívar. Known as The Liberator, this Venezuelan military leader organized the Pan-American Congress in 1826.
February 4, 2022 - Costa Rico. Welcome musicians as we leave the ship to meet our tour bus.
To the town of Esparza - Local dancers will greet you at the park with colorful costumes; enjoy the masquerades while you learn about our traditions. There will be handmade souvenirs exhibitions at the Park, a little something to take home! Here they are doing a dance about coffee.
Heather with our tour guide with Iglesia de Esparza.
Narrow streets. Truck loaded with fruit. In the background is the Continental Divide with a cloud cover.
Old abandoned salt mine.
Passing fields of melons. They are covered with plastic till plants are up and ready to flower. Then plastic taken off and bee hives are located in the area for pollination and honey.
A stop at the el Jardin Marketplace in Orotina. A large souvenir shop, restaurant, and ice cream shop. We had some ice cream that was yummy on such a hot day.
Native statue in the garden by the Marketplace. Yes we got some souvenirs. "Pura Vida" socks and some local wood crafted trivets.
A school and church.
A cemetery
Our walk back to the ship from Puntarenas.
February 7, 2022 Our approach to Huatulco, Mexico. This was a planned tourist attraction i.e. Cancun with construction beginning in the 1980s.
Beautiful dancers to greet up as we came ashore.
A happy fisherman walking down the street.
Santa Maria Church.
The Blacksmith's Shop.
The son is working the bellows to make the fire hot.
Father and son pounding the rod to shape the tool.
The finished tool is used by the farmer in planting.
Star fruit growing by the house next to the Blacksmith Shop.
Green Parrot
Bathroom break at the Mezcal site.
Pile of dry corn that will be ground, cooked, and kneaded for making tortillas.
Maguey Plant - The general process for mezcal production is integrated in various steps: harvesting and cutting agave, cooking, mashing, or milling to obtain agave juice rich in sugar, fermentation, first distillation, second distillation, cask maturation (if the mezcal is rested or aged), and finally the bottling.
Showing the process of making Mezcal. Produced mainly in Oaxaca, Mexico from Maguey agave.
After seven to fourteen years the center - Piña - is harvested. The mezcalero selects the wood he wants—usually pine, scrub oak, or mesquite—and starts a hot fire in the bottom of the pit. The fire is then covered with volcanic rock to retain heat and prevent the agaves from contacting the fire. Once the fire has died back to coals, the agaves are piled on, then the whole thing is covered with tarps and finally earth.
Pile of hard wood ready to be used in the earthen pit.
In the tasting room there were samples of chocolate, mezcal, fried grasshoppers, and Oaxaca mole (combination of chiles, sesame seeds, tomatillos, spices, dried fruits, nuts, and chocolate). We bought some chocolate.
Mangos
Ixora coccinea (also known as jungle geranium, flame of the woods or jungle flame or pendkuli) is a species of flowering plant in the family Rubiaceae.
An herb garden tour. Medicinal plants, traditional food, sweat lodge, message, closed in balcony. We toured the herb garden and then had veggie burritos and hibiscus tea.
First saw tortilla making over a hot fire. Made with masa harina, salt, and water mixed into a dough. A small lump is placed in a tortilla press and then placed over the hot fire.
Copal incense pot waved around as we entered the garden. Then placed of this tree stump. "Copal is a powerful and gentle healer that removes and transmutes negative energies of all kinds and of all levels. The copal joins the powerful energy of the sun with the transmutative properties of the Earth. Copal is a powerful ally for spiritual, mental, physical, energetic and relationship health."
Coriandor
Basil
Mexican Calabash or Morro. The pulp is used to treat colds and asthma. The hard outer part is carved into various decorative items.
Cat's claw is a vine that the root and bark contain chemicals that might stimulate the immune system, kill cancer cells, and fight viruses.
Gobernadora - used for digestive problems, cramps, and gas.
Towel Gourd - a genus of tropical and subtropical vines classified in the cucumber family. Can be eaten in young stage. Fully developed fruit is the source of the loofah scrubbing sponge.
Cinnamon Tree - Mexican cinnamon refers to Cinnamomum verum, a variety of cinnamon often considered by bakers, gourmands, and consumers to be true cinnamon. Cinnamon comes from the inner bark of several different species of trees and bushes from the Cinnamomum genus. (There are four main species of cultivated cinnamon.)
Papaya Tree - The papaya, papaw, or pawpaw is the plant Carica papaya, one of the 22 accepted species in the genus Carica of the family Caricaceae. It was first domesticated in Mesoamerica, within modern-day southern Mexico and Central America. High is vitamins A, C, and E.
Returning back to the ship. Temperature check....
Aways good to remember that they have excellent medical facilities and staff on board the Princess Cruise Ships. As soon as the lines were secured this man was accompanied off for more extensive treatment.
Safety first - the dog seemed to enjoy his duty as he went around smelling bags and purses.
Serenaded as we find the meeting place for our tour.
In line for our tour of the city highlights.
El Faro Malecon Lighthouse - It is one of the three lighthouses located in the downtown area of Puerto Vallarta. The three of them have the same design and format, a square shaped base and white and black strips. When they were first built they had a light on top next to an optical system and a spinning mechanism to serve as a guide light for the ships at night.
The Malecon (seaside boardwalk) is especially known for its splendid collection of more than a dozen intriguing sculptures. The mosaic pavement was created using traditional river stone techniques by local Huichol artists.
Sculpture Lluvia (Rain) - 12/10/20 (the 34th sculpture) A man with open arms as a symbol of openness, positively receiving what the world offers him with a gesture of happiness and fulfillment eyes looking up into the rain without that affecting his peace but rather enjoying the water that falls on his body and making him feel free and alive.
Triton and Nereia Mermaid - Bronze sculpture in 1990. Merman and Mermaid reaching for each other.
The Boy on the Seahorse was the first sculputre placed on the Malecon in 1976.
Ignacio Luis Vallarta Ogazón was a Mexican jurist and governor of the Mexican state of Jalisco (1872–1876).
Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe. The Church, built between 1930 and 1940, was constructed on the original foundations of a chapel initially dedicated to Lady Guadalupe in 1901. The Church is dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe, also known as the Virgin Mary.
Inside the church.
Street shopping. One of the many pharmacies advertising medications to buy. Could be good or could be risky.
Most average-sized homes in Puerto Vallarta have a “tinaco” which is a container that holds a few days-worth of water. Generally water supplies are not a problem.
The little village of Mismaloya lies just south of Puerto Vallarta along Highway 200. This beach is famous because it’s where scenes from the 1963 Hollywood movie Night of the Iguana was filmed.
Tour of a family run tequila business. Informative guide who explained their tequila process from Blue Agave to tequila. Tequila is only produced inside the Mexican state of Jalisco and in some municipalities in Guanajuato, Michoacan, Nayarit, and Tamaulipas. Any agave-based distilled spirit outside those regions are called "mezcal."
First a dance wearing traditional costumes.
Explanation of the process: Harvest the agave. Modern tequila production begins with the traditional method of harvesting the blue agave plant. ... Steam the agave core, or the piña. ... Shred the piña and extract the agave juice. ... Ferment the agave juice, or mosto. ... Distill the fermented mosto. ... Age the tequila. Then tasting from plain tequila to the many additions of flavors.
The Blue Agave plants.
When leaving Puerto Vallarta we saw quite a few whales - unfortunately they were "spouting" at a distance. This was a quick shot of one that was semi close.
Definitely enjoyed the sea days relaxing and breathing the fresh ocean air. As we headed North the air became cooler. No longer into the swimming pool, but the hot tub was just right.
And so we say goodbye to the fun times aboard the Emerald Princess and the Panama Canal Cruise.
~ Heather ~
~ Harry and Gail ~
~ A beautiful sunset ~
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