Above is the link to watch live as we go through the Panama Canal beginning at 6:30 am Eastern time, Sunday morning. Follow us live through the various locks using this link progressively as indicated.
Tomorrow morning at 6:30 am Eastern time our ship will arrive at the entrance of the Miraflores Locks at the beginning of the Panama Canal. We’ll transit the canal in an 8 to 10 hour period, going through a variety of locks and dams and also the man-made Gatun Lake that facilitates the millions of gallons of water supporting the canal.
The Panama Canal’s rich history is highlighted on numerous websites, including the above live webcam site at: www.pancanal.com, also on www.visitpanama.com.
Over the past week, Tom and I have attended five fascinating seminars outlining the history of the canal presented by “Uncle Marty” a diplomatic representative for the country of Panama.
Tomorrow morning at 6:30 am, we’ll be firmly planted in an ideal spot for viewing the transition through the canal along with the other 1816 Celebrity Century passengers.
Today, Saturday, January 12th, we’ll roam about the ship searching for the most advantageous viewing spot we can find. Hopefully, we’ll park ourselves in that spot early enough to ensure we can watch from the starboard (right) side of the ship, which appears to be most advantageous.
Since we’ll be close to land, we’ll be able to use our XcomGlobal Mi-Fi device to upload some photos along the way. Especially interesting to us is the fact that our ship at times, will have less than 24″ of space between the ship and the canal’s sidewalls. Certainly, we’ll upload photos of this surprising scenario.
The canal is being renovated to be completed in December 2014 to allow larger ships to transit from the Pacific to the Atlantic Oceans (and vise versa) to avoid the over 7500-mile journey around the horn of South America transitioning from the one ocean to the other, an engineering
feat, that opened on August 15, 1914.
The estimated cost for our ship, the Celebrity Century, to go through the canal is approximately US $350,000, the exact amount to be determined by the canal authorities after our transition.
Please stay tuned for facts and photos as we experience this passage, for which we are both so grateful to include in our year’s long adventures.