That is the Panama Canal! You can see a set of locks. And a few ships waiting behind. And a large one crossing in the parallel channel away from us. The ships fit very tightly in the canal. So, they have to be guided by the railcars on either side that you can see. In fact, all ships are categorized as Panamax if they can fit into the Canal. Now, there is another newer one built a few hundred yards away from this original one that can take bigger ships.

And you have to use a Panama Canal pilot to cross. The other two requirements are that you have to pay the tolls 72 hours before crossing and you have to fly a Panama flag in your boat when you cross. The toll runs into tens of thousands of dollars. The highest ever paid was $450,000! The lowest? 38 cents by an American swimmer who swam the distance of the canal!

But here is the crazy thing. I always thoughts the locks existed because of the height difference between the Atlantic and the Pacific. They are indeed different but not that much. The engineering marvel of Panama Canal was in utilizing the large lake of Gatun to minimize the digging. But the lake is 86 feet above the ocean level. So the locks lift the ships up to Lake Gatun and then bring them down on the other side!!

Also, geographically, the route is where the land mass takes the shape of a “S”. This means, when you go from the Atlantic to the Pacific, you will be driving the ship west to east (northwest to southeast to be precise) and not the other way round!!

All my childhood in India, I had heard about the Panama Canal. Of course, I had to get there as soon as we checked into the hotel room. We grabbed and Uber and went to the Miraflores locks to watch how they move the ships thru the locks.

Incredible number of highrises. As a matter of fact, Panama City has the most number of skyscrapers in all of Central America. For that matter, even in all the Americas, it is only behind New York City and Chicago. (I think Miami and Panama City have very similar numbers)

We crossed over from the Atlantic side to the Pacific side. As you can see the Pacific side water is not a great sight. The water is fairly murky and the shallow depths mean the tide comes in and out over a large swatch of area pulling and and out a lot of soil.

Panama City is visible in the distance.

Looks very green from here. We just crossed over from the Caribbean/Atlantic side.

A country I want to visit some day but not sure when the restrictions will ever go away. That is Bahia de Santa Clara (Santa Clara Bay) in front of us. And that small town on the shores is La Teja. Lots of clouds in the sky today.

If everything goes to plan, we will cover Country #59 and #60. Meanwhile, I would have visited airport #166 and #167. And taken Airline #38. Let’s see what the future has for us.

Speaking of numbers, this is a milestone anniversary for us. Not the 25th (we are not that young) or 50th (not that old either). It is our 31st and for a person with unhealthy interest in numbers like me, that is a cool anniversary.

I am sure you have heard this from me many times how I think 31 is a unique number. To go over it again…

31² = 961
Reverse of 961 is 169
169 is 13²
And of course reverse of 13 is 31.

So, the reverse of the square is the square of the reverse!!

I know, I marvel at the most inconsequential things in the world!!