McGaffeys Abroad

On the night before departure for most of the crew we had a fabulous dinner at a restaurant that provided a show as well.  We sat in a covered patio that felt as if we were outside, but it was cool (as opposed to the reality of outside).  After a delicious dinner, the music changed to local Panamanian folk music and a series of dancers in fabulous costumes came out.

Couples courting dance

Women’s Dance with much flirting of skirts

And the skirts were beautiful.  Each dancer made her own in the typical style.  Some were flocked, but one had the entire design hand embroidered on it.

The dancer’s live music

We had  scheduled two extra days so we hung out at the hotel for one and went back to Casco Antinguo to go to Mass at La Merced  Church, walk around and shop at a local bazaar set up in the skeleton of a house across the street from the Cathedral.  Oh, and of course we went down behind the pink palace for another dish of passionfruit ice cream.  The trip would not have been complete without it.

La Merced (Our Lady of Mercy) church crowded in between other buildings

On our final (?!) day (two days after most people left) we woke relaxed, since our flight didn’t leave til 1:05 pm.  Two days earlier almost everyone else had left on a flight at 8:15 or 8:30, meaning that they had to be at the airport around 5 am.  Were we ever gloating over our sleep-in and leisurely breakfast.  Long bus ride to the airport, long wait there (during which we admired the clever quotes sprinkled above us),

It’s not the cleverest nor the most intelligent who survive but those who adapt best to change.

but no problems til we got to the check-in desk – three

Do not expect that things will change if you always do them in the same way.

hours early –  where they informed us that our flight had left one hour earlier! Turns out American had changed our schedule, informing us via page two of our itinerary, which we hadn’t checked. (They also sent us an email message, which arrived at 8:pm that departure day.) What could be done? Next flight with free seats would be a week later. Much telephoning, negotiations and anguish later, we got seats for a flight two days later, and a recommendation for a nice resort hotel 15 minutes from the airport.

The hotel was heavenly! No schedules, no traffic, and for the first time in two weeks, it was quiet! Panama, while exciting, is one of the noisiest places I know – at least in Panama City and the Canal Zone.  Their included breakfast was delicious, though they didn’t have the fresh pineapple I’d so enjoyed at the Holiday Inn.   It has a large lawn with the rooms around it and a pool in the middle.  If we hadn’t been so lazy, we might have gone for a swim.  But we didn’t.  We just watched the other guests’ children play chess with pieces almost as tall as they were and read our books.  The extra time also gave David a chance to follow up on a newly discovered possibility for donor-funding of GSI.  And I got a chance

98% of men do not want to see other men in ads for men’s underwear

to visit a mall near the airport that I’d been told had all sorts of things of interest to tourists.  Not!  It was pretty close to any mid-size mall in the States.  All the same stores with imported clothes.  We had a lovely dinner there and went back to the hotel.  We had to make it an early night because we had to be up at 4 a.m. to be at the airport by 5:30.  We were determined to be first on line.

And in fact we got to the airport before the American staff, and we were indeed first in line.  So we got on the flight without any problem, and Jennifer picked us up at SFO.  And so home, with missed appointments to catch up on, great memories and photos to process, and time to write this blog.

P.S.  Here are some interesting pictures that I didn’t include earlier:

Some of the hundreds of cranes at the Port

A loaded container ship–each square is a full-size container in the back row.  That’s 87 containers in each row up to the bow of the ship.

Canal History Museum designed by Frank Gehry.

The Centennial Bridge due to open in 2014.

As you go out of a lock, this is the way the wall looks. Notice the gate tucked away into the wall.

Rex Supermarket fairly near the Holiday Inn

And finally, the supermarket where we actually found passionfruit concentrate so we could extend our trip by enjoying  passionfruit juice for our breakfast for another week.

Miraflores Lock – note the water levels that must be equalized

On the morning of January 3, we went to see the Canal.  Panama has built a wonderful museum with a 4th floor balcony right over the Miraflores locks.  So we went up there first because a huge car carrier was transiting.  The ships don’t go through the locks under their

Electric Donkeys waiting for a ship

own power–they are pulled by four to eight electric donkeys.  That way no matter how large they are, they don’t bump the sides.  So this car carrier (huge block four or five stories high with no windows except in the tiny pilot house at the top) stops against the even larger rear gates of the lock.  Water is evacuated from the lock in front of the ship until the two boxes of water are at the same level.  The electric donkeys pull the ship into the lock.  Then a tiny, but powerful tugboat pushes it until it is completely within the lock and the gates behind the ship close. Immediately water balloons from

In the lock and rising

below and the ship rises as if on an elevator.  On the Pacific side there are three locks:  Pedro Miguel has two names but a single lock; Miraflores has two locks right next to each other, so it’s the most interesting to watch.  What you don’t see the first time, you catch on the second.  The ship is pulled to the rear gate and the level in the second lock rises until it is  the same as the level of the lake beyond.  Then the gates open, the electric donkeys go back to their starting place to wait for the

Through the locks and into the lake

next ship, and the car carrier steams off toward the Atlantic locks.  I’d always heard that the levels of the two oceans were different and that’s why they had to have locks.  But now I have learned that the locks raise the ship on the entrance side so that it can go over the Continental Divide, which passes through the mountain spine of Panama, and then the ship is lowered the same distance on the other end, so that it arrives at sea level again.  Makes more sense that way, doesn’t it?    Oh, I was talking about how the money from the Canal is distributed, but you probably wonder how it is earned.  Ships are charged according to their water displacement.  The average charge is $100,000 per ship with the largest amount ever charged so far being over $400,000 and the smallest amount charged being .39.  Thirty-nine cents???  Yes, Richard Halliburton swam through the canal, and based on his displacement of water, was charged 39 cents. $100,000 sounds like a lot, but is apparently only one-third or so the cost of sailing that ship around South America.

After that tour we had lunch at a lovely natural food place on the CdS property called Pan y Canela (Bread and Cinnamon).  I had neither, but I had a delicious tuna salad with a glass of passionfruit juice.  Passionfruit is becoming a theme of this trip. We’ve had multiple servings of ice cream, drink it with almost every meal, and bought some frozen concentrate to bring home.

In the afternoon we went to visit an NGO that is part of the CdS.  CATHALAC (Center for the Study of the Humid Tropics in Latin America and the Caribbean) focuses on water and the effects of climate change on human beings.  They have just published an atlas of Latin America and the Caribbean that concentrates on water and the changes expected in the near future. After we all admired the volume, CATHALAC presented each member of the board of Global Stewards Institute (including David) with a copy. Definitely worth its weight on the plane back.  We had two speakers; the first talked about climate change in the Canal Zone and the second about the rural areas of Panama.  Certain models of the effect of climate change suggest that the Canal zone will become drier than it is now. That would change the operation of the Canal, since the Canal needs immense amounts of water to operate the locks that enable ships to travel over the Continental Divide.  In fact, the new Third Canal has been designed to re-use water in the locks rather than letting it escape into the ocean at either end. If rainfall in the Canal area lessens, there could be real issues over the economic viability of the Canal.

Our second speaker at CATHALAC, a man of Indian ancestry, highlighted the effect of  climate change on the marginalized indigenous people of Panama.  They face a more serious problem: recently rains in areas outside the Canal watershed have increased tremendously. The flooding and landslides in the farming areas cause serious damage to the farming areas and to people living at the subsistance level.  Excessive rainfall over the past several years has led to landslides and the destruction of homes and fields, causing many deaths. Studies suggest that more water storage dams should be built, but they raise their own environmental questions.  He left us all with a lot to think about because he presented problems and questions that had no simple answers for the future of Panama.

In the evening back at the hotel we saw a documentary that had appeared on the History Channel about the building of the Canal.   It was amazingly detailed with photos of the original workers and their families as well as the supervisors.  I felt as though I had actually been in Panama for all those years.  So all my wishes were satisfied except I wanted to actually travel through the Canal.

The GSI trip included a volunteer day painting a Panamanian school, so we seized our chance to go on the Canal.  We went by bus up to the middle of the Canal at Gamboa.

Our boat for the trip down the Canal to the Pacific

There we boarded a tour boat and started back down the Canal toward the Pacific. So first we went out of the lake and into the Culebra (Snake) Cut.  It’s pretty narrow, but since we were in a small boat (3 decks–two inside and one out) we shared the route with a catamaran from Canada and a sailboat from Panama.  And since our boat was Panamanian-owned, we didn’t have to pay the full price.  Good thing!  So we reached the area where they’ve widened the Culebra Cut and we could see the new work across the cofferdam.  I guess when they’re finished, they’ll route ships through that detour and drain the old Cut, since they have to make it also 60 feet deeper.  It’s a massive work especially because they can’t close the Canal to do it.  Then the first lock: Pedro Miguel.  We slid up past the gates and into the lock and were tied to the walls with long slack ropes.  We had to wait a bit for the catamaran,

Tied to the sides of the lock

but when we were all in, the gates closed behind us.  So in the lock and in back of us, the water was up to the top

David

of the gates and in front of us, the water was at the

The water level begins to drop

3/4 down

bottom of the gates.  As soon as the gates closed, the water began to drain out–it was like riding in a down elevator.  It only takes 8 minutes to empty a lock, so you can imagine how quickly we went down.  When we’d gotten to the lower level, the front gates opened and we sailed out.

The gates begin to open

And through the gates

Same thing on the second (Miraflores 2) and third (Miraflores 1) and then we were in the Pacific Ocean again.  The boat dropped us off at a causeway that went over a group of

islands and then back to the mainland. We heard that the causeway helps protect the city beaches and gives

Handicraft Market – a new Government project

new economic life to the islands, and was built using the dirt and rock taken out of the new canal diggings. We decided to walk back a bit to the next island where there was a Handicraft Market that we’d seen on the way in.  It was worth the walk, but, because of the heat, we stopped for (you guessed it) passionfruit ice cream before we went into the Market.  We didn’t buy much, but we saw what was available and decided what we would buy if we could get the prices down a bit.  Then we grabbed a taxi back to the hotel for a dinner at the Irish pub next door and a good night’s sleep.

We were near Panama City on the south (Pacific) side of the country.

Maybe I should start with what we are doing here.  Global Stewards Institute, a group we’ve been working with as it tries to re-create the Scholar Ship experience only better, sponsored a “proof of concept” trip from December 15, 2012 to January 8, 2013.  The group has been on a ship since December 15, sailing to Cartagena, Colombia, then stopping at some Caribbean Islands, and spending a week in Cuba.   We didn’t join them on the first part of the trip, but arrived on December 30 in Panama two days ago ahead of the rest of the group of  GSI students and teachers.  And so here we are in The City of Knowledge near Panama City, Panama, in a lovely Holiday Inn overlooking the Canal.  The two silver lines just above the midline of the picture are the two directions of the Canal.  You can’t see it, but right at the edge of the road there’s a train line with almost constant traffic–didn’t bother us, but some found it noisy.

View of the Canal from our hotel room.

Yesterday we got up at a reasonable hour, had a lovely breakfast at the hotel, and took off for a ride on the On/Off bus.  It’s a British style double decker modified with a canopy roof so it’s comfortable to sit on top.  We wanted to see the Casco Antiguo (Old Town) built in the 17th century after the pirate/privateer Sir Henry Morgan destroyed the former capital.  Finally, after more stops and pauses than we had imagined, we arrived and got off the bus.  But, wait, we hadn’t paid.  The place to pay was the next stop, but as this was the last bus of the day (the schedule said it ran until 4:30 and it was now 2:30) we couldn’t get to the cashier.  Much agonizing.  Finally, we gave the driver $5.00 and went off into town.  (Panama theoretically has its own currency–the Balboa–pegged one to one with the dollar, but we never saw a Balboa, except a few coins. Everyone decided it was just easier to use the U.S. dollar.)

El Casco Antiguo is a lovely mix of churches, townhouses (many in the process of being                                                             

This house had a small forest growing inside.

One of many abandoned houses waiting to be restored.

rebuilt), street markets (rows of tables under awnings with colorfully dressed people selling red, blue and green molas (native Panamanian embroidered cloths), jewelry, small carvings, and ‘panama’ hats (made in Ecuador, of course)), restaurants and cafes, and ancient buildings of which only the four outside walls remain.

David in a little park.

The Cathedral with Elizabeth on the plaza

We wandered around for a while, and found that the Church of San Jose, famous for its solid gold altar, was closed.  That’s a story.  When somebody or other was attacking, the priest covered the altar with tar.  The attackers missed it entirely (should have come with a tourist guidebook) although they sacked the rest of the church.  And the houses and plazas still had some (very unconventional) Christmas decorations.

A government display outside the President’s House

A busy balcony

We went to see the Cathedral, but it too was locked.

By this time it was about 4, so we decided it was time for lunch.  Right on Cathedral Square was a restaurant called The Fork that looked good, white tablecloths and all.  We had lunch there, and it was better than good.  Wonderful place.  There was an (East) Indian family from Miami at the next table who had been in the city for a week, so we got into a conversation.  A very pleasant dinner.  Then we walked along the edge of the Pacific for a while and decided it was time to go back to the hotel.  Caught a taxi and got home in comfort for only $10, which David believes was much more than the proper fare.  The trick is that the driver asks you what the fare should be.  I always answer while David is thinking and, so far, have made two taxi drivers very happy. Oh, well, it’s the season.

And we had been smart (we thought) and brought our European cellphones (unlocked) for which we bought local sim cards. Oops, didn’t work. Turns out that when Panama built its cellphone system, it went immediately to 4G, and our 3G phones couldn’t access the network. We checked at a phone store, and found very cheap 4G Samsung phones which did work with our chips, so now we are prepared until the next generation.

The next morning we got up too late to do anything but have a delicious buffet breakfast and wait for the GSI group to arrive.  They did and were amazed and delighted at the luxurious hotel where they were to stay.  Apparently, the one in Cuba had some problems–but who needs hot water in the tropics.  Anyway, they were very happy with Panama.