Trip to Panama

We really wanted to see the historic parts of Panama City, but as maps appeared to be useless in the face of a lack of road signs, we decided to chicken out and book a local guide. Rony turned up bright and early and off we went.

We reached Panama City in about an hour, and our first stop after crossing the Centennial Bridge was the Visitor Center at Miraflores Locks. It was a smart new building about 4 storeys high. We paid our $8 to go in, and began to the tour. There was a theater with a short film, followed by 4 exhibition halls depicting the history of building the Canal. It was very interesting and full of artifacts, which showed the huge project from a historic, sanitary and technological point of view. The project was initially French, but after huge losses of life to malaria and yellow fever, and constant setbacks in digging, the Americans finally agreed to take over the project. Their success was due to systematically reducing mosquitos, which carried the deadly diseases, and by planning to raise ships to the level of the newly formed Lake Gatun, rather than lowering the landmass to sea level. This involved building the huge locks, which are still in use today at Gatun, Pedro Miguel and Miraflores.

The Visitor Center is built right alongside the latter locks with several indoor and outdoor viewing platforms from which to see the huge container ships pass through the Locks. We saw a container ship aided by 2 tugs slowly advance into the lock chamber. It was attached by ropes to several “mules” or engines, which held the ship in place while the water drained out of the chamber, and the ship slowly descended the 31 feet. The good thing about the viewing platform was that the whole time we were watching the process; a loudspeaker was relaying live information about the ship. We learned what the ship was called, where it was traveling to and from, and most amazingly what it’s toll was to pass through the locks. The fee is based on cargo, and this container ship paid a staggering $56,000 to pass through. What an incredible money-raiser for Panama – I hope they use it wisely. The Canal works 24/7 continually taking ships across from the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean Sea, which saves thousands of miles, tanker loads of fuel, and about 10 days, compared with circumventing South America.

After trying out the navigation simulator and playing with the lighted maps, we visited the snack bar and then we were on our way again into Panama City. Next we visited Panama Viejo “old Panama” which was not so well presented. Here were the ruined remains of Panama City before 1700AD. We saw they were not very well maintained or presented as we wandered around part walls and ruins of buildings and towers from long ago. We then visited where the new “old city” was rebuilt. This consisted of old streets lined with what were obviously fine buildings once, but now were just shells being rebuilt behind the old facades.

Rony was an excellent guide, his English was excellent and he made navigating the City very easy. He took us to various interesting viewpoints and to the shops at Amador causeway and Albrook. Apparently he considered he was well paid at $15 per day as a tour guide, but as we paid the Hotel $120, we might have disagreed with him! What amazed us was how long his working day was. He got up at 5.30 am to catch the local bus from his village to Coronado, arriving at 8am, and then did a full day with us before traveling back to his family at Farallon. It puts our 8-hour working days to shame.

Labels: Miraflores visitor center, panama canal, Panama City, tour guide