Alex and I have been fortunate enough to crew on a boat that was transiting the canal twice now. The first was on “Flina” with Captain Flo—a professional snowboarded taking the season off--and Nina, his lovely girlfriend. We also had team Greg and Christine on our side as they were visiting at the time, and all six of us made a great group if I do say so myself. We left from the Caribbean side on Flo and Nina’s 35’ catamaran and met up with our adviser Roy before entering the canal. We rafted up to a powerboat that was already rafted up to another sailboat, this one larger ~42 feet. The three vessels made the canal transit in this buddy system, separating at the lake for our overnight stay. The lake has crocodiles apparently, but that didn’t stop our motley crew (except myself ) from diving in. In my defense, I learned in Australia where there are many crocs as everyone should know, that they always go for the smallest swimmer. Well, that would have been me, but of course I was too clever for the crocs and didn’t jump in—this time.
We got our new adviser, Caesar, the next morning and carried on toward the next locks. Each boat gets an adviser to guide you through the canal, ie. make sure you stay in between the appropriate buoys and raft up with other vessels of their choice safely. There are two sets of locks; three locks each. The first set is close to the Caribbean side just before Gatun Lake (called Gatun Locks) and the second set is just before leaving the canal to the Pacific side. The second set is broken up a bit with the first lock set apart from the last two that are on the other side of Mira Flores Lake (called Mira Flores Locks) representing the last step before the Pacific Ocean. Got it? Good. Anyhoo, our job on the boat was to be linehandlers which each boat is required to have four--one for each line for each “corner” of the boat. These lines position the boat and keep the boat from hitting the walls of the canal. For the big tankers and cruise ships they have little railway cars called “mules” to do this job, since a human doesn’t stand a chance of stopping a tanker by pulling on the line. Now as I mentioned we’d tied up to a neighbour and were on the outside so only needed two linehandlers (the powerboat in the middle didn’t require any) and naturally the other two linehandlers were on the second outside boat. So that means that Alex and Greg got to do the hard work. Suckers.
On our second time around—from the Pacific to the Caribbean—we were linehandlers on a Cal 46’ sailboat named "Blew Moon". The captain was Captain Houston, a retired nuclear submarine captain, and his lovely wife Gail (I'm mentioning professions to indicate the broad spectrum of cruisers out there). We rafted up to our (and their) friend Bob’s exact same Cal 46’. Unfortunately there were some rogue waves that really jolted both boats while tied up and snapped Bob’s stanchion and snapped Houston’s lifeline (fancy words for post and railing respectively). Other than that we had a fantastic journey (again Alex did all the work) and made wonderful new friends as there were six people on each boat—all wonderful individuals. This time around I did swim in Gatun Lake at our overnight stop, the prospect of being completely submerge in fresh water too compelling to resist. And I swam in the Caribbean the next morning after finishing our transit. It was awesome.
I just want to say that the people Alex and I have met by “linehandling”--or in my case just sitting around—have been really amazing and I’m so stoked to have met them and heard their stories!
Photos: three boats rafted up behind us--the one in the center is made entirely of carbon fiber!, Alex and I on Flina in front of a lock, don't look now but there's something behind you...., Alex and Morty while we were on Blew Moon, the little pilot boat dropping off our adviser (you generally don't stop, they catch up to you, this is the same for the big tankers, pretty impressive to see)
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