This is actually being written on 20 Sep 2008, but for completeness I will back-date it to appear above the postings of e-mails from the Zuiderdam cruise in 2006. Those postings themselves were made in 2008, back-dated to their original date and (roughly) time, without engaging in revisionism, but adding some notes where they were relevant. The additions are clearly identified.
In one of the posts below I mentioned a historical source for information about the construction of the Panama Canal. That is,
David McCullough
The Path Between the Seas
Originally published in 1977, the edition I have was published in 2002 for History Book Club by arrangement with Simon & Schuster, Inc. While probably not readily available in retail, you ought to be able to locate a copy in university libraries and good public libraries (yours may have to bring it in from another library).
But, if you are interested in all the facts about the canal's construction, this is the definitive book.
There is also a lot of on-line information available, google Panama Canal and you will be able to select from many thousands of pages with current facts, web-cams, whatever.
Since our transit of the canal in October 2006, much has happened. At the time of our trip, the Panama legislature was debating adding another set of locks at both the Caribean and Pacific ends to allow larger ships to transit than are presently able. At that time, there was significant opposition to this plan, both in the Panamanian people and some of their politicians, because of the opportunities for corruption such an immense project (billions of dollars) offers, an ever present reality in Latin America, but also in the rest of the world. That measure has since been passed by the Panama legislature, but I don't know when actual constuction would begin- obviously there is an immense amount of planning and engineering to be done before ever a shovel goes into the ground. Nor do I have any idea of a projected completion date.
Some thoughts however.
The ship in which we transited the canal, Holland-America's Zuiderdam is one of the largest ships that can make that journey, ie. is almost at the PANAMAX limit. I do not know if Holland-America's newest and largest ship Eurodam is able to transit the canal - perhaps so, because they seem to have mostly gone up, with an extra deck, rather than longer or wider, although looking through the current Holland-America catalogue of sailings (if you ever sail with them, you have friends for life, getting offers and catalogues almost weekly) Eurodam is notably absent from the list of ships doing canal transits.
The most significant limits seem to be length and width, with depth being a secondary, but not unimportant consideration. Thus, lengthwise, Zuiderdam was within a few feet of the length of the shortest of the locks (for reasons not entirely clear, at least not logically - there may be engineering reasons, but I can't think of any), the twelve locks in the canal (3 pairs at each end, although at the Pacific end there are 2 pairs at the Pacific level, and then 1 pair further inland) are not all of equal length (I am not sure about width). That means the shortest lock determines the PANAMAX length. Width is also important, and by visual observation, Zuiderdam was only a few feet narower at her beam than the locks. Depth (draft) is not observable, but obviously, when a lock is at its low level, the ship in it has to have some water (how much?) beneath its keel.
Thus, there are a large number of ships in current service, not just cruise ships, but tankers and cargo ships, that do not meet the PANAMAX specifications. (To be fair, the builders and owners kenw those specifications, and deliberately decided not to meet them.) However, more and more ships are being built that for economic reasons are designed larger.
The new locks will again be three sets of two at each end of the canal. Given real estate and engineering considerations, they will be some distance from the present locks (which will continue to be operated for vessels that fit them). The present shipping channel through Gatun Lake will continue to be the route from one side to the other, which will probably lead to interesting traffic control problems, given that many more ships will be travelling along a channel that is at times very busy. The biggest problem will be at the Gaillard Cut, a relatively narrow channel, which is continually subject to landslides.
However, environmentally the new locks will be better than the present ones. The present lock system requires 52,000,000 gallons of fresh water to move a large ship from one side of the canal to the other. All of that water has to be replenished by rain falling over the enormous watershed that drains into Lake Gatun. That puts a limit to the number of ships that can transit the canal annually, and apparently adding another set of locks, for larger ships (and hence needing even more fresh water for a transit), would exceed that limit. Thus, the proposed locks will "recycle" fresh water, using pumps to bring water in locks back up to Lake Gatun level, rather than simply allowing it to drain down to ocean level. The projected savings is that a transit through the new locks will require perhaps 50% of the fresh water it now does. However, considerable electrical poser will be needed to run the pumps; and interesting trade-off.
If you are fascinated by meg-engineering, this project will be one worth watching in the next years, even decade.
Friday, December 1, 2006
Friday, November 10, 2006
Nostalgia: e-Postcard about the Zuiderdam; 10 November 2006
2008 Note: the 1st part of this posting is somewhat morbid, and seemingly not relevant, although it will make sense if you are reading posts from "bottom" up; ie. from earlier to later posting dates. If you insist on reading "downward" please persist, and you will get to cruise information.
Obviously, this is being written long after our return to Canada, three weeks ago. There are good reasons for the delay.In our last few days on the ship, we, and a lot of other people, developed a dry cough. Despite the exemplary sanitary practices enforced on Zuiderdam (hand sanitizing stations at every restaurant entrance, with personnel enforcing hand cleaning; enforced hand sanitizing before getting back on the ship after being ashore; and a plethora of hand-sanitizing stations all over the ship) a bug seemed to have gotten on board. By the time we were on the bus from the ship to Miami airport, about half the people on the bus were coughing.
June got over the bug relatively easily after getting home, although she was quite ill for a couple of days. For Gerry it settled more deeply into the upper respiratory tract, and eventually a bacterial infection got started. The worst was being awake all through the night coughing, and not being able to get any rest during the day (sleeping sitting up is just not on!). Eventually a course of anti-biotics, and a couple of puffers (broncho-dilator and steroids) seemed to turn things around, although there is a remaining cough even today.
Then there was a whole bunch of work associated with planning Gerry's mother's funeral. Scott had done a magnificent job dealing with the immediate necessities and getting planning started, but he very wisely left anything non-urgent to Gerry. That way Gerry got to dealing with the reality of Maria's death in a rather hands-on way, which was good; given how far away we were when it happend, and how long it had been since she died, it had a rather ethereal quality about it
The funeral was last Friday, November 3, in the afternoon. We picked the day because it was the earliest weekend day on which there weren't other commitments for someone who had to be there. Every other day was later, and had the potential of being problematical in terms of weather. As it happened, we picked the worst day of all the alternatives. North of Barrie we ran into blizzard conditions, with cars going into the ditch around us as we slowly inched northward. Fortunately, as we neared Midland, the conditions improved, although there was a lot of snow on the ground from earlier in the day. As it was, if it were not terribly tacky to not go to one's mother's funeral, we might have turned around.The funeral, at Maria's church, Holy Cross Lutheran in Midland, went well, and was well done, even if the weather had done it's worst. The assisting minister (a layreader in Anglican terms) had gotten rear-ended in the storm, and was in emergency getting checked out for whip-lash. Thus the pastor, Wendell Grahlman (Gerry had been in seminary with him), had to make it a bit of a one-man-show, although we at least supplied readers, June and our friend Paul Schumacher, and Gerry took the chalice at communion. We sang some good old German hymns, with a few English hymns thrown in for good measure. The women of the ELW (Evangelical Lutheran Women) had outdone themselves putting together a lunch for after the service; Maria had been one of their stalwart members, and they weren't about to let anyone leave hungry. We ended up taking about half the food home with us (Mary and Scott were glad for the sandwiches, and used them the next day for a birthday party for Adam and Tamara, with enough left over to feed a couple of Mexican teenage water-polo players who were billeting with them into the next week). June and Gerry got "stuck" with the desserts. At 4 p.m. the family went to the cemetery for a private interment of Maria's cremated remains. (For Gerry it was yet one more winter funeral, standing at grave side up to the ankles in melting snow! Why should this one be different?) The solemnity of the occasion was relieved, to everyone's relief, by Trinity (our 3+ year old grand-daughter) suddenly taking it into her head to take a run at the flat grave-marker, which was wet, and suddenly doing a solid bum-plant on her great grandma's grave. A good thing there was a board covering the hole, or she would have been in it! Grandma would have laughed - probably did. We went out for dinner in Barrie on our way home; it was still snowing on the way south and in Barrie, but not much south of Barrie the snow stopped, and it looked like a normal Fall night.So, those are the events that got in the way of finishing the saga of the cruise, and so from the early blizzard of November 3, let's pick up the tale of June and Gerry's cruising, in tropical Ocho Rios, Jamaica.
-----------------------------------------
Epistle #5 in this series ended with us at sea on Tuesday, October 17, under way from Columbia to Jamaica. We woke up the next morning just as we were coming into Ocho Rios Bay, about in the middle of Jamaica's north shore. Ocho Rios used to be a small port, for fishing boats, banana boats, and notably, ships carrying bauxite aluminium ore from Jamaica to Canada for refining. These days, it is the cruise ship capital of Jamaica, welcoming a couple of ships a day during high season - which of course makes it a very commercial place!
The Royal Caribbean ship "Rhapsody of the Seas" came into port right behind us, meaning the cruise ship pier was too short for both of us - which meant that Zuiderdam, huge as she is, got to use the old bauxite loading pier all to herself - which also meant that those of us going ashore got to walk over old railway tracks, and past assorted old junked machinery, to a rather slummy area where we could pick up our buses.We had booked to visit something called Enchanted Gardens, and then the Dunn's River Falls. The first turned out to be a gem of a place. Formerly the grounds of a resort that had closed for renovations some years ago, and for unstated reasons never re-opened, it has been turned into a botanical paradise, with every Jamaican plant imaginable growing along tumbling waterfalls. It of course has its tacky, commercial side (a cage with parrots and other birds that will eat off your hand and sit [and possibly also sh...t] on your head, while the locals take your picture), but scenically it is well worth the visit.
After this stop, the plan was to take us to a shopping centre. But a curious thing happened; our rather small bus seemed to have mostly Canadians and Europeans on it, who had had it with shopping. It became a "hell no, we won't go" moment, much to the puzzlement of our guide. She eventually got the picture; even if the bus went to the shopping centre, we weren't getting off! So, off we went to Dunn's River Falls.
By this time it was early afternoon, and the predicted high of 33 degrees Celsius had been exceeded, but as long as you stayed in the shade, it was tolerable. Dunn's River Falls has of course been overworked in Jamaican tourism literature. A river originating in the low mountains inland runs about 600 feet from the top of a plateau down to the ocean, over a series of rock "steps" and through shallow pools. Even today, overworked as it is, it is very beautiful. It is possible to climb the falls from sea level up to the top, in groups, guided by locals. Given the heat, we didn't expend the energy, instead walking up and down the path to one side of the falls. The falls themselves are much as one sees them in the tourism pictures and posters, but the surroundings are a fairly (actually more than fairly) commercialized park. We made the mistake of waking into an "artisans'" area, and were almost mugged by people trying to sell us tacky "crafts." We escaped, wallets intact, and returned to the ship, for a late lunch and to cool off. At 5 p.m. the inevitable sail-away party was held on the stern, complete with over-priced and under "rumed" rum punches. However, the gathering thunderstorms over the island as we sailed northward, and the spectacular sunset, made it worthwhile.
We went to sleep with the ship's position (we had Gerry's car GPS with us, and thus could check where we were) somewhere south of Cayo Largo, Cuba (where we had been between Christmas and New Year's earlier in the year). We woke up on Thursday morning, October 19,, still south of Cuba, but near the eastern tip of the island, which we could see quite well with binoculars. Then through the Windward Passage (about 50 miles wide) between Cuba and Haiti, to continue on our way northward. (Factoid: the Caribbean is very deep in this area; more than 4000 metres, 12,000 feet, or over 2 miles - meanwhile, life on the cruise ship goes on, fine food, formal dining, playing bigo, and the evening cabaret, with no one worrying about just how much water was between them and solid ground!)
After a day at sea relaxing, that evening was the last formal night of the cruise. By this time there seemed to be a definite formal fatigue setting in, with a number of people simply not showing up in the dining room. This was also a time for the dining room crew to show off; not the least of which was a formal parade of the baked alaskas, accompanied by Strauss's Radetzky March! Then on to the show in the Vista Lounge, with a spectacular song and dance presentation by the ship's singers and dancers. And then to bed, knowing that the next day would be our last, and that somewhere along the way we would have to pack.
We woke up on Friday, October 20, just as the ship was anchoring in the bay at Half Moon Cay. Our room service breakfast arrived shortly after, and we sat on our verandah, looking out at the beautiful island scenery, while the tenders were preparing to take equipment and people ashore. (2008 Note: the picture that is at the top of this blog is of Half Moon Cay from the Zuiderdam.)
Half Moon Cay is a Bahamian island leased by Holland America, and used by its cruise ships, usually as the first or last stop in a Caribbean cruise. It has its own tenders, much larger and more comfortable than the ship's own tenders; meals cooked ashore by the ship's kitchen staff, and a number of exploration tours that look at the land and marine life on the cay.We went ashore, but found that unless one stayed in the shade, it was just too hot. Definitely sunburn territory. After lunch we went out on a glass-bottomed boat to look at marine life on the reef, but unfortunately the boat operator was a bit of a speed maniac, so what should have been a leisurely exploration of a lagoon became an exercise in stop, look at fish, go at high speed somewhere, stop, look at more fish, etc. We took the last tender back to the ship, and cooled off before supper.
That evening we packed, as our suitcases had to be outside our cabins by midnight in order to be off-loaded the next morning. This turned out to be not an insignificant exercise; somehow, what we had brought, and managed to stow in very little space, had grown, and our cases were bulging. Nevertheless, we got everything stowed away, and went to bed; waking up after the ship had docked in Ft. Lauderdale.We had our breakfast on the verandah, watching the unloading of luggage. This was done by forklift truck, with luggage on pallets, and every once in a while a suitcase or two would drop anywhere from a few feet to 15 feet to the dock - makes you appreciate airline luggage handling. Eventually, our colour/number group was called to disembark, and after clearing immigration we claimed our luggage, which appeared not to have been among the ones dropped, and found our bus (better, the line-up for our bus) to Miami airport. This part of the trip was not well-handled, and we stood in hot sun and high humidity for perhaps an hour, while the shore staff sorted out which buses were going where.
Eventually we did get to Miami airport, supposedly being let out at the Air Canada area, but it turned out we had to lug our belongings probably half a kilometer down a concourse before getting to the check-in. Not the best way to end. The flight down had been delayed by a minor mechanical, so the flight home was about an hour late, but we made up about 30 minutes of that. Terminal 2 at YYZ was as bad as always, and our luggage took forever (no tears when T2 gets closed early next year). Then we had a close encounter with a customs guy who just couldn't believe that we hadn't bought bags of jewellery for him to confiscate (it seems that people who cruise buy jewellery, and don't declare it; I guess we are not typical). We eventually got out, and home, not too late in the evening.So there you have it, the last of the sagas of the Longworth-Mueller cruise.
The on-line pictures are now complete, so check us out at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com.
And we'd be glad to have your comments.
June and Gerry
Back in good old Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Obviously, this is being written long after our return to Canada, three weeks ago. There are good reasons for the delay.In our last few days on the ship, we, and a lot of other people, developed a dry cough. Despite the exemplary sanitary practices enforced on Zuiderdam (hand sanitizing stations at every restaurant entrance, with personnel enforcing hand cleaning; enforced hand sanitizing before getting back on the ship after being ashore; and a plethora of hand-sanitizing stations all over the ship) a bug seemed to have gotten on board. By the time we were on the bus from the ship to Miami airport, about half the people on the bus were coughing.
June got over the bug relatively easily after getting home, although she was quite ill for a couple of days. For Gerry it settled more deeply into the upper respiratory tract, and eventually a bacterial infection got started. The worst was being awake all through the night coughing, and not being able to get any rest during the day (sleeping sitting up is just not on!). Eventually a course of anti-biotics, and a couple of puffers (broncho-dilator and steroids) seemed to turn things around, although there is a remaining cough even today.
Then there was a whole bunch of work associated with planning Gerry's mother's funeral. Scott had done a magnificent job dealing with the immediate necessities and getting planning started, but he very wisely left anything non-urgent to Gerry. That way Gerry got to dealing with the reality of Maria's death in a rather hands-on way, which was good; given how far away we were when it happend, and how long it had been since she died, it had a rather ethereal quality about it
The funeral was last Friday, November 3, in the afternoon. We picked the day because it was the earliest weekend day on which there weren't other commitments for someone who had to be there. Every other day was later, and had the potential of being problematical in terms of weather. As it happened, we picked the worst day of all the alternatives. North of Barrie we ran into blizzard conditions, with cars going into the ditch around us as we slowly inched northward. Fortunately, as we neared Midland, the conditions improved, although there was a lot of snow on the ground from earlier in the day. As it was, if it were not terribly tacky to not go to one's mother's funeral, we might have turned around.The funeral, at Maria's church, Holy Cross Lutheran in Midland, went well, and was well done, even if the weather had done it's worst. The assisting minister (a layreader in Anglican terms) had gotten rear-ended in the storm, and was in emergency getting checked out for whip-lash. Thus the pastor, Wendell Grahlman (Gerry had been in seminary with him), had to make it a bit of a one-man-show, although we at least supplied readers, June and our friend Paul Schumacher, and Gerry took the chalice at communion. We sang some good old German hymns, with a few English hymns thrown in for good measure. The women of the ELW (Evangelical Lutheran Women) had outdone themselves putting together a lunch for after the service; Maria had been one of their stalwart members, and they weren't about to let anyone leave hungry. We ended up taking about half the food home with us (Mary and Scott were glad for the sandwiches, and used them the next day for a birthday party for Adam and Tamara, with enough left over to feed a couple of Mexican teenage water-polo players who were billeting with them into the next week). June and Gerry got "stuck" with the desserts. At 4 p.m. the family went to the cemetery for a private interment of Maria's cremated remains. (For Gerry it was yet one more winter funeral, standing at grave side up to the ankles in melting snow! Why should this one be different?) The solemnity of the occasion was relieved, to everyone's relief, by Trinity (our 3+ year old grand-daughter) suddenly taking it into her head to take a run at the flat grave-marker, which was wet, and suddenly doing a solid bum-plant on her great grandma's grave. A good thing there was a board covering the hole, or she would have been in it! Grandma would have laughed - probably did. We went out for dinner in Barrie on our way home; it was still snowing on the way south and in Barrie, but not much south of Barrie the snow stopped, and it looked like a normal Fall night.So, those are the events that got in the way of finishing the saga of the cruise, and so from the early blizzard of November 3, let's pick up the tale of June and Gerry's cruising, in tropical Ocho Rios, Jamaica.
-----------------------------------------
Epistle #5 in this series ended with us at sea on Tuesday, October 17, under way from Columbia to Jamaica. We woke up the next morning just as we were coming into Ocho Rios Bay, about in the middle of Jamaica's north shore. Ocho Rios used to be a small port, for fishing boats, banana boats, and notably, ships carrying bauxite aluminium ore from Jamaica to Canada for refining. These days, it is the cruise ship capital of Jamaica, welcoming a couple of ships a day during high season - which of course makes it a very commercial place!
The Royal Caribbean ship "Rhapsody of the Seas" came into port right behind us, meaning the cruise ship pier was too short for both of us - which meant that Zuiderdam, huge as she is, got to use the old bauxite loading pier all to herself - which also meant that those of us going ashore got to walk over old railway tracks, and past assorted old junked machinery, to a rather slummy area where we could pick up our buses.We had booked to visit something called Enchanted Gardens, and then the Dunn's River Falls. The first turned out to be a gem of a place. Formerly the grounds of a resort that had closed for renovations some years ago, and for unstated reasons never re-opened, it has been turned into a botanical paradise, with every Jamaican plant imaginable growing along tumbling waterfalls. It of course has its tacky, commercial side (a cage with parrots and other birds that will eat off your hand and sit [and possibly also sh...t] on your head, while the locals take your picture), but scenically it is well worth the visit.
After this stop, the plan was to take us to a shopping centre. But a curious thing happened; our rather small bus seemed to have mostly Canadians and Europeans on it, who had had it with shopping. It became a "hell no, we won't go" moment, much to the puzzlement of our guide. She eventually got the picture; even if the bus went to the shopping centre, we weren't getting off! So, off we went to Dunn's River Falls.
By this time it was early afternoon, and the predicted high of 33 degrees Celsius had been exceeded, but as long as you stayed in the shade, it was tolerable. Dunn's River Falls has of course been overworked in Jamaican tourism literature. A river originating in the low mountains inland runs about 600 feet from the top of a plateau down to the ocean, over a series of rock "steps" and through shallow pools. Even today, overworked as it is, it is very beautiful. It is possible to climb the falls from sea level up to the top, in groups, guided by locals. Given the heat, we didn't expend the energy, instead walking up and down the path to one side of the falls. The falls themselves are much as one sees them in the tourism pictures and posters, but the surroundings are a fairly (actually more than fairly) commercialized park. We made the mistake of waking into an "artisans'" area, and were almost mugged by people trying to sell us tacky "crafts." We escaped, wallets intact, and returned to the ship, for a late lunch and to cool off. At 5 p.m. the inevitable sail-away party was held on the stern, complete with over-priced and under "rumed" rum punches. However, the gathering thunderstorms over the island as we sailed northward, and the spectacular sunset, made it worthwhile.
We went to sleep with the ship's position (we had Gerry's car GPS with us, and thus could check where we were) somewhere south of Cayo Largo, Cuba (where we had been between Christmas and New Year's earlier in the year). We woke up on Thursday morning, October 19,, still south of Cuba, but near the eastern tip of the island, which we could see quite well with binoculars. Then through the Windward Passage (about 50 miles wide) between Cuba and Haiti, to continue on our way northward. (Factoid: the Caribbean is very deep in this area; more than 4000 metres, 12,000 feet, or over 2 miles - meanwhile, life on the cruise ship goes on, fine food, formal dining, playing bigo, and the evening cabaret, with no one worrying about just how much water was between them and solid ground!)
After a day at sea relaxing, that evening was the last formal night of the cruise. By this time there seemed to be a definite formal fatigue setting in, with a number of people simply not showing up in the dining room. This was also a time for the dining room crew to show off; not the least of which was a formal parade of the baked alaskas, accompanied by Strauss's Radetzky March! Then on to the show in the Vista Lounge, with a spectacular song and dance presentation by the ship's singers and dancers. And then to bed, knowing that the next day would be our last, and that somewhere along the way we would have to pack.
We woke up on Friday, October 20, just as the ship was anchoring in the bay at Half Moon Cay. Our room service breakfast arrived shortly after, and we sat on our verandah, looking out at the beautiful island scenery, while the tenders were preparing to take equipment and people ashore. (2008 Note: the picture that is at the top of this blog is of Half Moon Cay from the Zuiderdam.)
Half Moon Cay is a Bahamian island leased by Holland America, and used by its cruise ships, usually as the first or last stop in a Caribbean cruise. It has its own tenders, much larger and more comfortable than the ship's own tenders; meals cooked ashore by the ship's kitchen staff, and a number of exploration tours that look at the land and marine life on the cay.We went ashore, but found that unless one stayed in the shade, it was just too hot. Definitely sunburn territory. After lunch we went out on a glass-bottomed boat to look at marine life on the reef, but unfortunately the boat operator was a bit of a speed maniac, so what should have been a leisurely exploration of a lagoon became an exercise in stop, look at fish, go at high speed somewhere, stop, look at more fish, etc. We took the last tender back to the ship, and cooled off before supper.
That evening we packed, as our suitcases had to be outside our cabins by midnight in order to be off-loaded the next morning. This turned out to be not an insignificant exercise; somehow, what we had brought, and managed to stow in very little space, had grown, and our cases were bulging. Nevertheless, we got everything stowed away, and went to bed; waking up after the ship had docked in Ft. Lauderdale.We had our breakfast on the verandah, watching the unloading of luggage. This was done by forklift truck, with luggage on pallets, and every once in a while a suitcase or two would drop anywhere from a few feet to 15 feet to the dock - makes you appreciate airline luggage handling. Eventually, our colour/number group was called to disembark, and after clearing immigration we claimed our luggage, which appeared not to have been among the ones dropped, and found our bus (better, the line-up for our bus) to Miami airport. This part of the trip was not well-handled, and we stood in hot sun and high humidity for perhaps an hour, while the shore staff sorted out which buses were going where.
Eventually we did get to Miami airport, supposedly being let out at the Air Canada area, but it turned out we had to lug our belongings probably half a kilometer down a concourse before getting to the check-in. Not the best way to end. The flight down had been delayed by a minor mechanical, so the flight home was about an hour late, but we made up about 30 minutes of that. Terminal 2 at YYZ was as bad as always, and our luggage took forever (no tears when T2 gets closed early next year). Then we had a close encounter with a customs guy who just couldn't believe that we hadn't bought bags of jewellery for him to confiscate (it seems that people who cruise buy jewellery, and don't declare it; I guess we are not typical). We eventually got out, and home, not too late in the evening.So there you have it, the last of the sagas of the Longworth-Mueller cruise.
The on-line pictures are now complete, so check us out at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com.
And we'd be glad to have your comments.
June and Gerry
Back in good old Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
Nostalgia: e-Postcard from the Zuiderdam; 17 October 2006
Cruise Day 18
After two very full days, we are enjoying a day at sea, so there is time to catch up with e-mail, and posting pictures. By the time you get this, our pictures at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/ should be caught up. (2008 Note: They are certainly caught up now!)
Sunday was spent transiting (is that a word?) the Panama Canal from the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean, or south to north, in the rather confusing geography of Central America. We arrived at the holding area just before 7 a.m., and because cruise ships pay a premium to transit the Canal, proceeded more or less directly to the Canal entrance, with Panama City off to the south. It was a rainy morning all around us, although it never actually rained on our ship, so the view of the waiting ships was through mist, with the occasional rainbow thrown in.
We were told that payment formalities are handled before ships enter the Canal, and cost is based on weight, as established from the ship's load calibrations painted on the hull. Payment arrangements have to be in place 48 hours before, and a ship is not allowed to proceed until payment confirmation has been made, these days usually electronically. No cheques or credit cards are accepted, only cash or electronic cash on the barrel. When you think about it, that is the only way that makes sense, since Panama would have no way to enforce payment once a ship has left its territory. Incidentally, the estimated fee for Zuiderdam on this transit was US$250,000! That seems outrageous, until you see the work and equipment involved, and the ongoing maintenance and improvement of the canal.
It takes 3 pilots to take a ship this size through the canal, two on the bridge, who relieve each other periodically, plus one at the stern. Unlike ports, where the pilot comes on to guide the ship's captain and advises on navigation, the canal pilot is in full command of the ship while in the canal, and the ship's Master is just along for the ride. Most ships, even those as maneuverable as Zuiderdam, have two tugs in attendance at all times, just in case, because the consequences of an 82,000 ton ship even nudging a lock gate at say one inch per minute velocity would be catastrophic, and shut down one set of locks until repairs could be made.
The transit through the locks is not under the ship's power, that would be too risky, instead, each ship has a number of diesel-electric locomotive "mules" that each attach two steel cables to the ship, each cable controllable by the mule driver for tension and the position of the mule relative to the ship is also variable. Thus not only can the mules move the ship forward, but can position it side to side in the locks. Each mule, in the currently used version, costs about 1.5 million US dollars, and a ship the size of Zuiderdam requires eight mules, two each side at the bow, and two each side at the stern. The drivers of the mules are in radio communication, and also have a back-up bell system, with which they signal each other.
Watching these mules do their job is like watching an elaborately choreographed ballet, except each dancer weighs perhaps 100 tons, and is pulling around its share of 82,000 tons. Very sophisticated, and yet, except for changes to the motive power of the mules, and the new communcations systems, not different from the original technology, which dates back to 1914!
All the locks are as originally built, the gates are the original ones, and the energy to make the gates and locks work is still only the force of gravity, which for one ships transit moves close to 100 million gallons of fresh water from the level of Lake Gatun, about 82 feet above sea level, to the Pacific and to the Caribbean. Fresh water which then has to fall as rain over a huge area of Central America, run through many rivers into a system of storage lakes, and then into Lake Gatun.
On the Pacific side, after passing through the Bridge of the Americas, one approaches the Miraflores Locks, a two-stage lock, each stage raising a ship about 23 - 24 feet. There is then a short run through Lake Miraflores and under the Panama Centennial Bridge, which now carries that Pan-American Highway over the Canal, relieving the Bridge of the Americas somewhat, to the single stage Pedro Miguel Lock, which lifts the ship the remaining distance to Lake Gatun level. Shortly after, one sails through the continental divide. It is in this area that there is a constant danger of rock slides, because the volcanic rock is quite fragile and unstable, and where there is constant work cutting back the banks to stabilize the slopes. (The canal has been shut down only three times in its history, and only once because of a land slide, a tribute to the engineering and constant maintenance.)
About an hour past Pedro Miguel is the town of Gamboa, which is the centre of the canal maintenance system, with huge dredging cranes and machinery moored, ready to be used when traffic is light at night, since most of it would not allow ships to pass. Gamboa is also a centre for fishing and tourism in Lake Gatun. Ships take about 2 hours to traverse Lake Gatun to the Gatun locks. The lake is scenically very beautiful, with many little islands, covered in jungle, and one can occupy the time watching the varied shipping passing in the opposite directions.
The Gatun locks are a three stage pair of locks, and, as are the Pacific locks, capable of operating in both directions, as traffic dictates. Here ships are lowered in three locks down to the Caribbean, and again, the motive power are locomotive mules, doing their ballet in reverse. It takes about 2 1/2 hours to go through the locks, and then there is a short channel that takes ships out past a breakwater into the Caribbean. Shortly before reaching the ocean one can look back and see the end of the aborted French attempt to build a sea-level canal, one without locks, that ended in bankruptcy of the building consortium after close to 25,000 men had died, mostly of yellow fever, malaria, and accidents. The American construction of the present canal cost another 5000 lives, and that construction was made possible by the discovery that it was mosquitos that transmitted yellow fever and malaria, not "night vapours" as the French had stubbornly insisted, while continuing to sacrifice workers to the "glory" and honour of France. The key was a mosquito eratication program, involving eliminating standing pools of water, and isolating the sick from being bitten by mosquitos, to prevent re-transmission. Today sanitation is still taken very seriously, and the canal zone has negligible risk of yellow fever or malaria transmission, and is rated as one of the healthiest places on earth.
After leaving the Canal, an overnight sail brought us to Cartagena, Colombia, arriving at the pier about 9:30. Although one can see the modern city's high rise buildings a long way out at sea, the entrance to the harbour is through a very narrow channel, with then a 9 mile sail to the docks area. A perfect natural harbour, which is why the Spanish picked it as their New World treasure depot, and why the French, the British, and the Dutch spent a lot of effort trying to sack it. The English, notoriously Sir Francis Drake, who was more of a pirate than English history records, did in fact capture the city, but failed to find the well-hidden treasure. Thus colonial Cartagena is a collection of outlying forts, and thick, up to 50 feet in places, city walls. The inside is indistinguishable architecturally from its namesake, Cartagena, Spain, as the colonials tried to reproduce their familiar homeland. Today Cartagena is a perfectly maintained and/or restored Spanish colonial city, although the modern city is as modern as anything in the Americas.
We had booked a tour called Scenes of Cartagena, which from its description promised a good oversight of colonial and modern Cartagena, with stops at significant points with the ability to then walk around. Unfortunately, it should have been billed as Shopping Scenes of Cartagena. (General warning to cruisers: tours sold by cruise ship companies are sources of revenue, and the most revenue comes from commissions on sales in the stores the tour "guides lead you to - There is a good reason why tour patrons are given colour-coded tags, and it is not to make sure you get back on the right bus!) One of the advertised visits to one of the colonial fortresses never happened, because, as our guide said, it would have taken too long, Another stop to a former prison forgot to mention that it had been turned into an artisan shopping arcade, with very aggressive pedlars and women in supposed native costume who practically forced you to take pictures of them, and then wanted US$ 1. I took a long, scenic shot, which happened to include one of them in the distance, and she had the nerve to actually demand money from me (which she might have got had she been more pleasant).
We did get a chance to walk around a bit of colonial Cartagena, but did not have time to visit the Cathedral, which is a notable landmark. We did visit the Nautical Museum, where we got to see a model of the fortress we didn't get to visit; not quite as good as the real thing.
Also at this museum, we had some folk dancers, energetic but un-narrated, hence it was difficult to know what we were seeing, and Columbian beer, which I thought was quite good, and beer doesn't need narration. The ever-present peddlers were even more persistent here (and the price varied considerably depending on the time to the departure of the bus - the $5 genuine, guaranteed 100% silver necklaces [I guess you buy it, and it is 100% yours] went to 3 for $10, or 5 for $20, depending on which guy you were near to).
A new feature for Columbia here, although we'd seen them before in Costa Rica, were women dressed in nurses' uniforms, collecting money. If you asked was it for health care, they didn't exactly say yes or no. In Puntarenas, we'd given them money; this time I read the fine print on their uniforms, and collecting containers - the English was not all that clear, but the Spanish was quite certain - they were collecting for an American "evangelical" organisation, in Central America, to "save" the people from their eternal fate. Since the people being "saved" are mostly devout Roman Catholics, I thought I'd be wasting my money. One of these hustlers was actually quite unperceptive, she approached me at least five times in as many minutes, and I was the only tourist wearing an Australian leather bush hat! As I continued to say "no thanks", she continued to smile sweetly!
The next stop was blatantly shopping, at a modern shopping centre, with nothing but English-speaking shops selling either emeralds, or native artifacts (reproductions, but you had to read the fine print for that). Our "guide" - maybe sales representative would be a better term - recommended some of them highly, because the owners were (supposedly) American - I guess that would matter to the mostly Americans on this tour. We decided to give it a pass, and after walking the gauntlet of people trying to entice us into their shop - even the armed security guards outside the gold and emerald shops were in on that act - we walked a few yards down the street to a lovely beach, full of Colombians having a wonderful time celebrating their national holiday, which apparently actually was October 12, the previous Friday, but, by Columbian law, all major holidays have to be transferred to a Monday, but if they fall on a Friday they are also celebrated on the Friday - i.e. by law, some holidays create 4-day weekends. Ahhhhhhhhh, Latin America! Anyways, the beach was full of families, sheltering in little cloth cabanas, maybe 4 ft by 3 ft, which one could rent (by the minute, for 100 Columbian pesos - 2300 Columbian pesos are roughly 1 US$) Allowing for some wiggle room, based on the tourist exchange rate versus the real exchange rate, maybe a buck for 30 minutes. Maybe the Colombians are more used to it, but me the gringo would have cheerfully paid the price to get out of the very blazing sun, and we did note that not too many of the cabanas were empty. Anyways, the beach was lovely, it was not full of tourists, there were no peddlers, and the view was great.
Back to the shopping centre, to find an air-conditioned washroom (the only advantage to the place). By then the costumed women had arrived (we think they were the same pair from before) to hustle more photographs. And peddlers of various goods were everywhere. Beating our way to the bus, to get cool, we only had to ingnore them trying to sell us stuff by sign language, through the window. Then back to ship, with a not bad drive-tour of the city - we just wish we'd had that instead and more of - for lunch, and getting cool. Despite all the whining, we really liked Cartagena, and would like to see more of it. Except next time, we'd probably hire a taxi (for what we paid for the bus "tour" we could have got 8 hours, we have discovered since), and promise the driver a really good tip, which would decrease by $1 every time he took us someplace and someone would try to sell us something!
Later that afternoon, we had a really fine Cartagena folklorico show, on the ship. A group of musicians, mostly drummers, plus an instrumentalist (clarinet and a local instrument like a large bamboo flute), with a group of dancers that gave us a good introduction to local dance - native, with Spanish influences. Again, like all of these local groups that we have seen, they were enthusiastic, energetic, and genuine. Then, later, much later (11:30 p.m.), we had the Indonesian Crew show; same comments. Eager to show off the art of their country, they put on a wonderfully genuine show. (Although, the M/C was our table steward, who should definitely keep his day job, and not seek a career in stand-up comedy; but to be fair, even the corny jokes were told with genuine enthusiasm.) New/old in this show was an orchestra playing instruments called "angklung" from West Java; these were frames on which were hung various-sized bamboo tubes, which when shaken made pitched notes; when played by about 35 persons, directed by a conductor, we'd call it a hand-bell choir! Odd sound, but with perfectly recognizable tunes - the hit with the mostly American audience was "God Bless America."
And so to bed, and today to relax. I had earlier tried to upload pictures, but the high-priced satellite system was down, to the frustration of a large number of guests who had paid much money to have this service, The alleged manager of the system was nowhere to be found. So I came back to the cabin to write this, and I will try later to send it. If you are reading this, I succeeded.
Tomorrow, Ocho Rios, Jamaica, where we are scheduled to see the Enchanted Gardens and Dunn's River Falls. Then another day at sea, and then Half Moon Cay, Holland America's private island in the Bahamas. Then overnight to Ft. Lauderdale, disembarkation, a transfer to Miami airport, and, God willing, a flight home on Saturday. There may be time for yet one last of the missives, or it may have to wait until we are home. Keep checking your e-mail.
Greeting to you all,
Gerry and June
On Board M/S Zuiderdam
Somewhere between South America and Jamaica
After two very full days, we are enjoying a day at sea, so there is time to catch up with e-mail, and posting pictures. By the time you get this, our pictures at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/ should be caught up. (2008 Note: They are certainly caught up now!)
Sunday was spent transiting (is that a word?) the Panama Canal from the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean, or south to north, in the rather confusing geography of Central America. We arrived at the holding area just before 7 a.m., and because cruise ships pay a premium to transit the Canal, proceeded more or less directly to the Canal entrance, with Panama City off to the south. It was a rainy morning all around us, although it never actually rained on our ship, so the view of the waiting ships was through mist, with the occasional rainbow thrown in.
We were told that payment formalities are handled before ships enter the Canal, and cost is based on weight, as established from the ship's load calibrations painted on the hull. Payment arrangements have to be in place 48 hours before, and a ship is not allowed to proceed until payment confirmation has been made, these days usually electronically. No cheques or credit cards are accepted, only cash or electronic cash on the barrel. When you think about it, that is the only way that makes sense, since Panama would have no way to enforce payment once a ship has left its territory. Incidentally, the estimated fee for Zuiderdam on this transit was US$250,000! That seems outrageous, until you see the work and equipment involved, and the ongoing maintenance and improvement of the canal.
It takes 3 pilots to take a ship this size through the canal, two on the bridge, who relieve each other periodically, plus one at the stern. Unlike ports, where the pilot comes on to guide the ship's captain and advises on navigation, the canal pilot is in full command of the ship while in the canal, and the ship's Master is just along for the ride. Most ships, even those as maneuverable as Zuiderdam, have two tugs in attendance at all times, just in case, because the consequences of an 82,000 ton ship even nudging a lock gate at say one inch per minute velocity would be catastrophic, and shut down one set of locks until repairs could be made.
The transit through the locks is not under the ship's power, that would be too risky, instead, each ship has a number of diesel-electric locomotive "mules" that each attach two steel cables to the ship, each cable controllable by the mule driver for tension and the position of the mule relative to the ship is also variable. Thus not only can the mules move the ship forward, but can position it side to side in the locks. Each mule, in the currently used version, costs about 1.5 million US dollars, and a ship the size of Zuiderdam requires eight mules, two each side at the bow, and two each side at the stern. The drivers of the mules are in radio communication, and also have a back-up bell system, with which they signal each other.
Watching these mules do their job is like watching an elaborately choreographed ballet, except each dancer weighs perhaps 100 tons, and is pulling around its share of 82,000 tons. Very sophisticated, and yet, except for changes to the motive power of the mules, and the new communcations systems, not different from the original technology, which dates back to 1914!
All the locks are as originally built, the gates are the original ones, and the energy to make the gates and locks work is still only the force of gravity, which for one ships transit moves close to 100 million gallons of fresh water from the level of Lake Gatun, about 82 feet above sea level, to the Pacific and to the Caribbean. Fresh water which then has to fall as rain over a huge area of Central America, run through many rivers into a system of storage lakes, and then into Lake Gatun.
On the Pacific side, after passing through the Bridge of the Americas, one approaches the Miraflores Locks, a two-stage lock, each stage raising a ship about 23 - 24 feet. There is then a short run through Lake Miraflores and under the Panama Centennial Bridge, which now carries that Pan-American Highway over the Canal, relieving the Bridge of the Americas somewhat, to the single stage Pedro Miguel Lock, which lifts the ship the remaining distance to Lake Gatun level. Shortly after, one sails through the continental divide. It is in this area that there is a constant danger of rock slides, because the volcanic rock is quite fragile and unstable, and where there is constant work cutting back the banks to stabilize the slopes. (The canal has been shut down only three times in its history, and only once because of a land slide, a tribute to the engineering and constant maintenance.)
About an hour past Pedro Miguel is the town of Gamboa, which is the centre of the canal maintenance system, with huge dredging cranes and machinery moored, ready to be used when traffic is light at night, since most of it would not allow ships to pass. Gamboa is also a centre for fishing and tourism in Lake Gatun. Ships take about 2 hours to traverse Lake Gatun to the Gatun locks. The lake is scenically very beautiful, with many little islands, covered in jungle, and one can occupy the time watching the varied shipping passing in the opposite directions.
The Gatun locks are a three stage pair of locks, and, as are the Pacific locks, capable of operating in both directions, as traffic dictates. Here ships are lowered in three locks down to the Caribbean, and again, the motive power are locomotive mules, doing their ballet in reverse. It takes about 2 1/2 hours to go through the locks, and then there is a short channel that takes ships out past a breakwater into the Caribbean. Shortly before reaching the ocean one can look back and see the end of the aborted French attempt to build a sea-level canal, one without locks, that ended in bankruptcy of the building consortium after close to 25,000 men had died, mostly of yellow fever, malaria, and accidents. The American construction of the present canal cost another 5000 lives, and that construction was made possible by the discovery that it was mosquitos that transmitted yellow fever and malaria, not "night vapours" as the French had stubbornly insisted, while continuing to sacrifice workers to the "glory" and honour of France. The key was a mosquito eratication program, involving eliminating standing pools of water, and isolating the sick from being bitten by mosquitos, to prevent re-transmission. Today sanitation is still taken very seriously, and the canal zone has negligible risk of yellow fever or malaria transmission, and is rated as one of the healthiest places on earth.
After leaving the Canal, an overnight sail brought us to Cartagena, Colombia, arriving at the pier about 9:30. Although one can see the modern city's high rise buildings a long way out at sea, the entrance to the harbour is through a very narrow channel, with then a 9 mile sail to the docks area. A perfect natural harbour, which is why the Spanish picked it as their New World treasure depot, and why the French, the British, and the Dutch spent a lot of effort trying to sack it. The English, notoriously Sir Francis Drake, who was more of a pirate than English history records, did in fact capture the city, but failed to find the well-hidden treasure. Thus colonial Cartagena is a collection of outlying forts, and thick, up to 50 feet in places, city walls. The inside is indistinguishable architecturally from its namesake, Cartagena, Spain, as the colonials tried to reproduce their familiar homeland. Today Cartagena is a perfectly maintained and/or restored Spanish colonial city, although the modern city is as modern as anything in the Americas.
We had booked a tour called Scenes of Cartagena, which from its description promised a good oversight of colonial and modern Cartagena, with stops at significant points with the ability to then walk around. Unfortunately, it should have been billed as Shopping Scenes of Cartagena. (General warning to cruisers: tours sold by cruise ship companies are sources of revenue, and the most revenue comes from commissions on sales in the stores the tour "guides lead you to - There is a good reason why tour patrons are given colour-coded tags, and it is not to make sure you get back on the right bus!) One of the advertised visits to one of the colonial fortresses never happened, because, as our guide said, it would have taken too long, Another stop to a former prison forgot to mention that it had been turned into an artisan shopping arcade, with very aggressive pedlars and women in supposed native costume who practically forced you to take pictures of them, and then wanted US$ 1. I took a long, scenic shot, which happened to include one of them in the distance, and she had the nerve to actually demand money from me (which she might have got had she been more pleasant).
We did get a chance to walk around a bit of colonial Cartagena, but did not have time to visit the Cathedral, which is a notable landmark. We did visit the Nautical Museum, where we got to see a model of the fortress we didn't get to visit; not quite as good as the real thing.
Also at this museum, we had some folk dancers, energetic but un-narrated, hence it was difficult to know what we were seeing, and Columbian beer, which I thought was quite good, and beer doesn't need narration. The ever-present peddlers were even more persistent here (and the price varied considerably depending on the time to the departure of the bus - the $5 genuine, guaranteed 100% silver necklaces [I guess you buy it, and it is 100% yours] went to 3 for $10, or 5 for $20, depending on which guy you were near to).
A new feature for Columbia here, although we'd seen them before in Costa Rica, were women dressed in nurses' uniforms, collecting money. If you asked was it for health care, they didn't exactly say yes or no. In Puntarenas, we'd given them money; this time I read the fine print on their uniforms, and collecting containers - the English was not all that clear, but the Spanish was quite certain - they were collecting for an American "evangelical" organisation, in Central America, to "save" the people from their eternal fate. Since the people being "saved" are mostly devout Roman Catholics, I thought I'd be wasting my money. One of these hustlers was actually quite unperceptive, she approached me at least five times in as many minutes, and I was the only tourist wearing an Australian leather bush hat! As I continued to say "no thanks", she continued to smile sweetly!
The next stop was blatantly shopping, at a modern shopping centre, with nothing but English-speaking shops selling either emeralds, or native artifacts (reproductions, but you had to read the fine print for that). Our "guide" - maybe sales representative would be a better term - recommended some of them highly, because the owners were (supposedly) American - I guess that would matter to the mostly Americans on this tour. We decided to give it a pass, and after walking the gauntlet of people trying to entice us into their shop - even the armed security guards outside the gold and emerald shops were in on that act - we walked a few yards down the street to a lovely beach, full of Colombians having a wonderful time celebrating their national holiday, which apparently actually was October 12, the previous Friday, but, by Columbian law, all major holidays have to be transferred to a Monday, but if they fall on a Friday they are also celebrated on the Friday - i.e. by law, some holidays create 4-day weekends. Ahhhhhhhhh, Latin America! Anyways, the beach was full of families, sheltering in little cloth cabanas, maybe 4 ft by 3 ft, which one could rent (by the minute, for 100 Columbian pesos - 2300 Columbian pesos are roughly 1 US$) Allowing for some wiggle room, based on the tourist exchange rate versus the real exchange rate, maybe a buck for 30 minutes. Maybe the Colombians are more used to it, but me the gringo would have cheerfully paid the price to get out of the very blazing sun, and we did note that not too many of the cabanas were empty. Anyways, the beach was lovely, it was not full of tourists, there were no peddlers, and the view was great.
Back to the shopping centre, to find an air-conditioned washroom (the only advantage to the place). By then the costumed women had arrived (we think they were the same pair from before) to hustle more photographs. And peddlers of various goods were everywhere. Beating our way to the bus, to get cool, we only had to ingnore them trying to sell us stuff by sign language, through the window. Then back to ship, with a not bad drive-tour of the city - we just wish we'd had that instead and more of - for lunch, and getting cool. Despite all the whining, we really liked Cartagena, and would like to see more of it. Except next time, we'd probably hire a taxi (for what we paid for the bus "tour" we could have got 8 hours, we have discovered since), and promise the driver a really good tip, which would decrease by $1 every time he took us someplace and someone would try to sell us something!
Later that afternoon, we had a really fine Cartagena folklorico show, on the ship. A group of musicians, mostly drummers, plus an instrumentalist (clarinet and a local instrument like a large bamboo flute), with a group of dancers that gave us a good introduction to local dance - native, with Spanish influences. Again, like all of these local groups that we have seen, they were enthusiastic, energetic, and genuine. Then, later, much later (11:30 p.m.), we had the Indonesian Crew show; same comments. Eager to show off the art of their country, they put on a wonderfully genuine show. (Although, the M/C was our table steward, who should definitely keep his day job, and not seek a career in stand-up comedy; but to be fair, even the corny jokes were told with genuine enthusiasm.) New/old in this show was an orchestra playing instruments called "angklung" from West Java; these were frames on which were hung various-sized bamboo tubes, which when shaken made pitched notes; when played by about 35 persons, directed by a conductor, we'd call it a hand-bell choir! Odd sound, but with perfectly recognizable tunes - the hit with the mostly American audience was "God Bless America."
And so to bed, and today to relax. I had earlier tried to upload pictures, but the high-priced satellite system was down, to the frustration of a large number of guests who had paid much money to have this service, The alleged manager of the system was nowhere to be found. So I came back to the cabin to write this, and I will try later to send it. If you are reading this, I succeeded.
Tomorrow, Ocho Rios, Jamaica, where we are scheduled to see the Enchanted Gardens and Dunn's River Falls. Then another day at sea, and then Half Moon Cay, Holland America's private island in the Bahamas. Then overnight to Ft. Lauderdale, disembarkation, a transfer to Miami airport, and, God willing, a flight home on Saturday. There may be time for yet one last of the missives, or it may have to wait until we are home. Keep checking your e-mail.
Greeting to you all,
Gerry and June
On Board M/S Zuiderdam
Somewhere between South America and Jamaica
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Nostalgia: e-Postcard from the Zuiderdam; 14 October 2006
Cruise Day 15
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For webcam watchers: You can watch the Zuiderdam transit some of the Panamal Canal locks live, at www.pancanal.com - click on English, go to Multimedia:Webcams, and click on the link See More. We are scheduled to arrive at Miraflores Locks at 10:10 Eastern Daylight Time, and at Gatun Locks at 16:10 Eastern Daylight Time. Transit time at Miraflores Locks is about 70 minutes, transit time at Gatun Locks is about 100 minutes. Times are approximate and subject to local weather-delays due to fog are possible, even likely.
2008 Note: The above link will let you see what is happening now at the Panama Canal locks; you will not see our transit.
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It is late in the afternoon on Saturday, warm, but overcast, so I am able to sit on the verandah and write this as we sail more or less eastward towards the Panama Canal. Right now we are sailing south-south-east; by later this evening we will turn almost northward into the Gulf of Panama toward the canal. We will have reached our southernmost latitude at just a little more than 7 degrees north, and from there on will begin to move northward.
Yesterday we were in Puntarenas, Costa Rica. We arrived early in the morning, and because the tidal currents in the Golfo de Nicoya on which the harbour is located are very strong, we waited for slack tide to actually dock. The town of Puntarenas is not very much - the name is descriptive, Sand Point, and it literally is a several miles long sand spit that juts out into the bay. In places it is only about 100 meters wide, in others it might be half a kilometer. Much of the immediate area of the cruise ship terminal is industrial, although there is a branch of the University of Costa Rica in a large building just off the harbour, and a thriving artisans' market along the Malecon by the pier.
Our tour left the ship relatively late in the morning, so we had the opportunity to watch the activity on the dock for a while. Aside from the loading of tour buses, and the ferrying of other passengers into town on a little complementary "railroad" the ran from the ship to the land end of the rather long pier, we spent some time watching the unloading of provisioning trucks onto the ship. Since some of the hotel staff were at dockside doing quality control checks (by eating something from every different container!) we could see what was being loaded. Tropical fruits were to be expected, and they had all kinds. But also there were strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries, whose origin we could not see. Also fresh fish, probably local, since tonight Costa Rican fish was on the menu. But there were crates of apples, clearly marked as from Washington state, which was cause for reflection on how complex our trading systems have gotten, since our ship went by Washington state about 12 days ago, yet these apples had come to Costa Rica by other means, we suspect by truck! And the logistics behind this-someone in Holland America's office in Seattle had ordered these apples for this day, and this time; since the unloading area was quite small, and everything had to come on to the ship through a 6 foot by 6 foot hatch, and since they were provisioning all day, the arrival time of each order had to fairly precise. All this activity, just so that our cabin steward can each day replenish our in-cabin fruit basket with two apples, an orange, a pear, and a banana!
Costa Rica is an anomaly among Latin American nations, in several ways. Most notably, it has no armed forces, having abolished them in 1948, and by law the money it cost then to have armed forces, 8% of the GNP, must be spent on education. An immediate visual consequence for the visitor at a ship's dock is that there are no uniforms to be seen - with no military to be kept busy, there are no uniformed soldiers employed to check out the tourists. In fact, no Costa Rican authorities check papers as you enter and leave the dock area, and it is ship security that is the only check that ensures you actually belong.
There are police, and there were actually two cops on the dock, but mostly they directed the traffic of provisioning trucks, buses, taxis, etc. that descend when a cruiseship docks. The reason they were not immediately obvious was that they were "uniformed" in shorts and t-shirts, and while armed, did not have the "gangsta" look that is popular among Latin American police. As our tico tour guide (Max, only Max, not Maximiliano-named after Max Schmeling by his grand-mother, a boxing enthusiast) later explained to us, not having armed forces and putting the money instead into education has other consequences; the highest literacy rate, 98%, in the area, which is in fact higher than North America, very little corruption because the country is run as a meritocracy, where intelligence, skill and hard work are rewarded, rather than connections. Very few very rich or very poor people, most everyone is middle class. Health is very good, the infant mortality very low at 8 per 1000, and so on. The unemployment rate is below 5%, in bad times below 6%, which is effectively full employment.
For those of you with Latin American experience, ticos or ticas are what Costa Ricans call themselves. It comes from a verbal anomaly in their Spanish (incidentally, on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, which was settled from the West Indies, English is spoken extensively, but with a West Indian flavour, while on the Pacific coast Spanish predominates). In Spanish, to make a word into its diminuative, ...ito or ...ita is added as a suffix. In written Spanish this also happens in Costa Rica, but they pronounce the suffix ...tico or ...tica, hence their name.
The social safety net is extensive, and relative to Canada is actually better. 9% of income is an employee's contribution, and employers pay another 9%. For that, medical care of all kinds, including drugs, is free. Dental care is free, although they need more dentists, and thus waiting times for more complex work can be long. Dependents are fully included, and dependent is defined as anyone being supported by someone working, who are not themselves working - meaning literally no one is excluded. Education is free to the end of high school, and 96% of children are in school. The public universities are open to all by competition, and tuition is low, of the order of $100 per term (which includes all materials), and government scholarships and loans are freely available. There are private universities, but they are considered to be less desirable, and academically of lower quality, and they basically take the overflow from the public universities.
Our guide used himself as an example. Coming from a very poor family, he went to university on scholarship, for which he was expected to work - by playing french horn in the university orchestra. He is now a Master's student in eco-resource management, and working for an eco-touring company to pay his way. In between he has traveled extensively studying eco-policies of various countries, and he expects to work in rain-forest preservation, a subject about which he is passionate, having grown up in the jungle.
Ecologically, Costa Rica is unique, and not only for its preservation policies. With a land area of less than 1/1000 of the earths surface, it is home to more than 5% of the world's species. It is the most bio-diverse place on earth. We got the full explanation from our guide, who obviously has studied the subject! For those of you who are familiar with the Latin American need to contextualize, he started with the big bang, but very quickly progressed to the time at which the earth's original single continent split into the present large land masses, but when North and South America were not joined. As the various plates drifted about on the earth's surface, life developed independently, but when North and South America finally were joined together, it was at the present location of Costa Rica. It was there that the species of two independent continents began to merge with one another, hence the present diversity.
After a few false starts (such as deciding to clear the rainforests to get into beef growing in the 60s, and having the bottom fall out of the beef market) Costa Ricans are now dedicated conservationists. 27% of the country is national park, biological preserve, wildlife refuge, or protected area. (Back to the cutting down rainforest for beef production: this was done with no thought for resource management,and the cleared trees - mahogany, ironwood, balsa, red cedar, and so forth were simply left to rot. Recently an academic estimated the lost value of all these trees, and came up with a number almost equal to Costa Rica's national debt. Although, the Costa Rican national debt is less than $1000 per person, this was still a great waste of resources. And the land, being tropical soil, was not really that good for cattle, or anything else. Costa Rican have learned from their experience.)
The tour we took was advertised as an aerial car ride through the rainforest. This involved a 75 minute bus ride each way, hence the ability to get a two hour lecture from a graduate student on Costa Rican natural, social, political, and environmental history. And, there are reasons why this country, of all of Latin America, has been democratic for a long time, has no army, and is passionate about conservation. I won't bore you with them, but those of you who share my enthusiasm for experiential learning, I'd be glad to talk to you about this experience, and why I think Costa Rica might be a destination worth considering for a study tour!
After the bus ride (through a very varied countryside; dry forest, rainforest, and semi-desert, crossing some rivers with crocodiles visible) and the 1st half of the lecture, we arrived at the site of the aerial tram. This was built by a company, one on each coast of the country, as an educational tourism destination to teach about rainforest ecology and management. Some of the profits are reinvested to buy rainforest land for preservation, and for educational and research purposes (eg. research into medicinal uses of rainforest plants). The guides are mostly university students and graduates who work in eco-resource management; thus are very knowledgable. We took a one hour forest walk in small groups of twelve with a guide, viewing the plants, animals, birds, etc. with explanation. Some of this is scripted and prepared, some just happens. Thus our path was paralleled by thousands of leaf-cutter ants, carrying their leaves back to their nest, over distances that in human terms would be thousands of miles, with loads several times body weight. Where the ants crossed the path, temporary "ant-crossing" signs had been placed to protect them. So we got a lecture on the role of leaf-cutter ants in rainforest growth and health. And, they do have a vital place, allowing light to penetrate lower down into the canopy, which is good for the tree on which they are working (they do not take the entire leaf) and plants on the forest floor.We saw a species of snake (not a big hit with June!) that played a vital role in the evolution of hummingbirds. It is a bright yellow, and lives in trees, where it coils into a shape that looks like a flower, luring hummingbirds, which it then catches (or at least once did more than it does now). Originally, hummingbirds could fly in all directions except backwards. This snake provided the evolutionary pressure which selected for the ability to fly backwards within the hummingbird population, and over the many generations, hummingbirds evolved to fly backwards, to escape the snake. It still catches hummingbirds, but not nearly as many!
After the forest walk, we rode the aerial car. Each car holds 8 persons, two side by side, with a guide at the rear who does narration. The length of run is about 2000 feet up the side of a mountain, and then the return, the total ride being about 50 to 60 minutes. At the lower levels, varies species of toucan (or onecan if they are not in pairs - just quoting the local joke) can be seen, but as one gets higher up, very few bird and animal species can be seen. As our guide pointed out, most animals do not have the burning desire to be seen by humans, and the jungle is dense enough that in some places a pink elephant with bright blue spots could be fifty feet away, and totally invisible. But the plant life is plentiful in varied, and there is lots to see, not to mention the magnificent view out over the Pacific Ocean on the trip down. We passed by the tree that the leafcutter ant colony was working on, perhaps 500 feet up the hill from where we had seen them on the valley floor (consider 500 feet up a perhaps 50 degree cliffside in ant terms, and they were climbing a mountain higher than Everest, and then climbing a 70 foot tree when they got there, to cut out a perhaps 5mm by 5mm piece of leaf per ant, and then carry it home!). This ride was the best shore attraction we had experienced so far this trip. We had done a similar cable car ride in Australia, over a much longer distance of about 7 1/2 km, but that one was over the top of the rainforest canopy, whereas this one was through the canopy.
Afterwards, we had a typical Costa Rican lunch: green salad, rice and black beans, fried plantain, with chicken poached in a mildly spicy tomato sauce, also fresh papaya and water melon, and fresh mango juice. Then back to the bus, for the return to the ship, and the second half of our lecture on Costa Rica. Several factoids; Costa Rica has removed the restriction very common in Latin America against politicians being re-elected to office, especially higher office. With this, they have removed a large amount of the incentive for corruption, as politicians no longer have to secure their future over a relatively short working life. It also allows for good politicians to be re-elected, to continue doing good for the country, and not wasting experience and talent. Thus, the current president is a Nobel Peace laureate, who was first elected in the 1980s and was a major influence in negotiation a peace in the Nicarauguan war, was out of office for a bit, and has now been reelected several times on a what we would call a "green" platform, but green with a responsible development and conversation flavour.
Someone asked about the almost universal prevalence of window bars on the houses that we passed, and whether that meant a high crime rate. The crime rate is actually quite low, but the bars are a status symbol, indicating to the neighbors that you have something to protect. Max likened it to some of our people having the need to drive large off-road capable vehicles. When he first toured North America to visit national parks, he thought that we all were passionate about our nature preserves, and needed these vehicles to tour the wilderness. Then he discovered that most parks had better roads than cities and highways, and realized that our fascination with vehicles with capabilities we don't need is the same as the tico need to have window bars on a house that no one wants to break into.
After the end of the tour we walked around Putarenas for a while, mostly the artisan market. Lots of nice stuff, most of it quite non-commercial, but we have decided that we don't just want to buy stuff, and then have to carry it home, and find places for it, unless it really speaks to us. I was tempted by a "Pura Vita" t-shirt. Pura Vita is the universal tico answer to questions of the "Como esta" variety- how are you, how is it going, how is your life, are you doing ok, ... ? Pure life, life is good, is the standard answer.
After dinner we went to the top deck for the sail-out at 8 p.m., the time of slack tide. Pitch black night, with only the shore lights growing dimmer, but the ocean illuminated by a spectacular lightening storm to the north of us. We never got rain, but we did get a great light show.This morning we cruised the Golfo Dulce, a small body of water just north of the Panama border, probably the result of an earth quake along one of the many faults in the area. Maybe 20 or 30 miles long, it has several large rivers running into it, and is nearly fresh water, hence the name. It is isolated, and home to a variety of sea life. Normally the bow of the ship is off limits to passengers for safety and security reasons, but the captain allowed passengers onto the bow today, and again tomorrow for the Canal transit. We saw dolphins and whales, lots of sea birds (pelicans, cormorants, and some we couldn't identify) sea turtles, and one flying fish (probably lost). We also had a compulsory lifeboat drill, as we had gone beyond 11 days at sea, and thus needed reminding of emergency procedures.
Afterwards, on leaving Golfo Dulce, we sailed south-south-east, to get around the large part of Panama that sticks out into the Pacific, before turning north into the Gulf of Panama towards the Canal entrance. That turn happened sometime after we dressed for the 3rd formal dinner of the cruise, and had gone to the restaurant. But this ship sails so smoothly, that we didn't notice the change.
We will arrive at the Canal entrance sometime before 7 a.m. tomorrow morning, and will begin our transit sometime around 9 a.m. It will probably be a busy day, watching, and getting pictures. The batteries are charging and the SD cards (camera recording cards) are going to be emptied tonight, so that we are ready.I am going to send this still tonight, and try to upload some pictures, although the latter may not happen until tomorrorw night.
Hope all is well with all of you.
Gerry and June
On Board M/S Zuiderdam
Somewhere in the Gulf of Panama
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For webcam watchers: You can watch the Zuiderdam transit some of the Panamal Canal locks live, at www.pancanal.com - click on English, go to Multimedia:Webcams, and click on the link See More. We are scheduled to arrive at Miraflores Locks at 10:10 Eastern Daylight Time, and at Gatun Locks at 16:10 Eastern Daylight Time. Transit time at Miraflores Locks is about 70 minutes, transit time at Gatun Locks is about 100 minutes. Times are approximate and subject to local weather-delays due to fog are possible, even likely.
2008 Note: The above link will let you see what is happening now at the Panama Canal locks; you will not see our transit.
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It is late in the afternoon on Saturday, warm, but overcast, so I am able to sit on the verandah and write this as we sail more or less eastward towards the Panama Canal. Right now we are sailing south-south-east; by later this evening we will turn almost northward into the Gulf of Panama toward the canal. We will have reached our southernmost latitude at just a little more than 7 degrees north, and from there on will begin to move northward.
Yesterday we were in Puntarenas, Costa Rica. We arrived early in the morning, and because the tidal currents in the Golfo de Nicoya on which the harbour is located are very strong, we waited for slack tide to actually dock. The town of Puntarenas is not very much - the name is descriptive, Sand Point, and it literally is a several miles long sand spit that juts out into the bay. In places it is only about 100 meters wide, in others it might be half a kilometer. Much of the immediate area of the cruise ship terminal is industrial, although there is a branch of the University of Costa Rica in a large building just off the harbour, and a thriving artisans' market along the Malecon by the pier.
Our tour left the ship relatively late in the morning, so we had the opportunity to watch the activity on the dock for a while. Aside from the loading of tour buses, and the ferrying of other passengers into town on a little complementary "railroad" the ran from the ship to the land end of the rather long pier, we spent some time watching the unloading of provisioning trucks onto the ship. Since some of the hotel staff were at dockside doing quality control checks (by eating something from every different container!) we could see what was being loaded. Tropical fruits were to be expected, and they had all kinds. But also there were strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries, whose origin we could not see. Also fresh fish, probably local, since tonight Costa Rican fish was on the menu. But there were crates of apples, clearly marked as from Washington state, which was cause for reflection on how complex our trading systems have gotten, since our ship went by Washington state about 12 days ago, yet these apples had come to Costa Rica by other means, we suspect by truck! And the logistics behind this-someone in Holland America's office in Seattle had ordered these apples for this day, and this time; since the unloading area was quite small, and everything had to come on to the ship through a 6 foot by 6 foot hatch, and since they were provisioning all day, the arrival time of each order had to fairly precise. All this activity, just so that our cabin steward can each day replenish our in-cabin fruit basket with two apples, an orange, a pear, and a banana!
Costa Rica is an anomaly among Latin American nations, in several ways. Most notably, it has no armed forces, having abolished them in 1948, and by law the money it cost then to have armed forces, 8% of the GNP, must be spent on education. An immediate visual consequence for the visitor at a ship's dock is that there are no uniforms to be seen - with no military to be kept busy, there are no uniformed soldiers employed to check out the tourists. In fact, no Costa Rican authorities check papers as you enter and leave the dock area, and it is ship security that is the only check that ensures you actually belong.
There are police, and there were actually two cops on the dock, but mostly they directed the traffic of provisioning trucks, buses, taxis, etc. that descend when a cruiseship docks. The reason they were not immediately obvious was that they were "uniformed" in shorts and t-shirts, and while armed, did not have the "gangsta" look that is popular among Latin American police. As our tico tour guide (Max, only Max, not Maximiliano-named after Max Schmeling by his grand-mother, a boxing enthusiast) later explained to us, not having armed forces and putting the money instead into education has other consequences; the highest literacy rate, 98%, in the area, which is in fact higher than North America, very little corruption because the country is run as a meritocracy, where intelligence, skill and hard work are rewarded, rather than connections. Very few very rich or very poor people, most everyone is middle class. Health is very good, the infant mortality very low at 8 per 1000, and so on. The unemployment rate is below 5%, in bad times below 6%, which is effectively full employment.
For those of you with Latin American experience, ticos or ticas are what Costa Ricans call themselves. It comes from a verbal anomaly in their Spanish (incidentally, on the Caribbean side of Costa Rica, which was settled from the West Indies, English is spoken extensively, but with a West Indian flavour, while on the Pacific coast Spanish predominates). In Spanish, to make a word into its diminuative, ...ito or ...ita is added as a suffix. In written Spanish this also happens in Costa Rica, but they pronounce the suffix ...tico or ...tica, hence their name.
The social safety net is extensive, and relative to Canada is actually better. 9% of income is an employee's contribution, and employers pay another 9%. For that, medical care of all kinds, including drugs, is free. Dental care is free, although they need more dentists, and thus waiting times for more complex work can be long. Dependents are fully included, and dependent is defined as anyone being supported by someone working, who are not themselves working - meaning literally no one is excluded. Education is free to the end of high school, and 96% of children are in school. The public universities are open to all by competition, and tuition is low, of the order of $100 per term (which includes all materials), and government scholarships and loans are freely available. There are private universities, but they are considered to be less desirable, and academically of lower quality, and they basically take the overflow from the public universities.
Our guide used himself as an example. Coming from a very poor family, he went to university on scholarship, for which he was expected to work - by playing french horn in the university orchestra. He is now a Master's student in eco-resource management, and working for an eco-touring company to pay his way. In between he has traveled extensively studying eco-policies of various countries, and he expects to work in rain-forest preservation, a subject about which he is passionate, having grown up in the jungle.
Ecologically, Costa Rica is unique, and not only for its preservation policies. With a land area of less than 1/1000 of the earths surface, it is home to more than 5% of the world's species. It is the most bio-diverse place on earth. We got the full explanation from our guide, who obviously has studied the subject! For those of you who are familiar with the Latin American need to contextualize, he started with the big bang, but very quickly progressed to the time at which the earth's original single continent split into the present large land masses, but when North and South America were not joined. As the various plates drifted about on the earth's surface, life developed independently, but when North and South America finally were joined together, it was at the present location of Costa Rica. It was there that the species of two independent continents began to merge with one another, hence the present diversity.
After a few false starts (such as deciding to clear the rainforests to get into beef growing in the 60s, and having the bottom fall out of the beef market) Costa Ricans are now dedicated conservationists. 27% of the country is national park, biological preserve, wildlife refuge, or protected area. (Back to the cutting down rainforest for beef production: this was done with no thought for resource management,and the cleared trees - mahogany, ironwood, balsa, red cedar, and so forth were simply left to rot. Recently an academic estimated the lost value of all these trees, and came up with a number almost equal to Costa Rica's national debt. Although, the Costa Rican national debt is less than $1000 per person, this was still a great waste of resources. And the land, being tropical soil, was not really that good for cattle, or anything else. Costa Rican have learned from their experience.)
The tour we took was advertised as an aerial car ride through the rainforest. This involved a 75 minute bus ride each way, hence the ability to get a two hour lecture from a graduate student on Costa Rican natural, social, political, and environmental history. And, there are reasons why this country, of all of Latin America, has been democratic for a long time, has no army, and is passionate about conservation. I won't bore you with them, but those of you who share my enthusiasm for experiential learning, I'd be glad to talk to you about this experience, and why I think Costa Rica might be a destination worth considering for a study tour!
After the bus ride (through a very varied countryside; dry forest, rainforest, and semi-desert, crossing some rivers with crocodiles visible) and the 1st half of the lecture, we arrived at the site of the aerial tram. This was built by a company, one on each coast of the country, as an educational tourism destination to teach about rainforest ecology and management. Some of the profits are reinvested to buy rainforest land for preservation, and for educational and research purposes (eg. research into medicinal uses of rainforest plants). The guides are mostly university students and graduates who work in eco-resource management; thus are very knowledgable. We took a one hour forest walk in small groups of twelve with a guide, viewing the plants, animals, birds, etc. with explanation. Some of this is scripted and prepared, some just happens. Thus our path was paralleled by thousands of leaf-cutter ants, carrying their leaves back to their nest, over distances that in human terms would be thousands of miles, with loads several times body weight. Where the ants crossed the path, temporary "ant-crossing" signs had been placed to protect them. So we got a lecture on the role of leaf-cutter ants in rainforest growth and health. And, they do have a vital place, allowing light to penetrate lower down into the canopy, which is good for the tree on which they are working (they do not take the entire leaf) and plants on the forest floor.We saw a species of snake (not a big hit with June!) that played a vital role in the evolution of hummingbirds. It is a bright yellow, and lives in trees, where it coils into a shape that looks like a flower, luring hummingbirds, which it then catches (or at least once did more than it does now). Originally, hummingbirds could fly in all directions except backwards. This snake provided the evolutionary pressure which selected for the ability to fly backwards within the hummingbird population, and over the many generations, hummingbirds evolved to fly backwards, to escape the snake. It still catches hummingbirds, but not nearly as many!
After the forest walk, we rode the aerial car. Each car holds 8 persons, two side by side, with a guide at the rear who does narration. The length of run is about 2000 feet up the side of a mountain, and then the return, the total ride being about 50 to 60 minutes. At the lower levels, varies species of toucan (or onecan if they are not in pairs - just quoting the local joke) can be seen, but as one gets higher up, very few bird and animal species can be seen. As our guide pointed out, most animals do not have the burning desire to be seen by humans, and the jungle is dense enough that in some places a pink elephant with bright blue spots could be fifty feet away, and totally invisible. But the plant life is plentiful in varied, and there is lots to see, not to mention the magnificent view out over the Pacific Ocean on the trip down. We passed by the tree that the leafcutter ant colony was working on, perhaps 500 feet up the hill from where we had seen them on the valley floor (consider 500 feet up a perhaps 50 degree cliffside in ant terms, and they were climbing a mountain higher than Everest, and then climbing a 70 foot tree when they got there, to cut out a perhaps 5mm by 5mm piece of leaf per ant, and then carry it home!). This ride was the best shore attraction we had experienced so far this trip. We had done a similar cable car ride in Australia, over a much longer distance of about 7 1/2 km, but that one was over the top of the rainforest canopy, whereas this one was through the canopy.
Afterwards, we had a typical Costa Rican lunch: green salad, rice and black beans, fried plantain, with chicken poached in a mildly spicy tomato sauce, also fresh papaya and water melon, and fresh mango juice. Then back to the bus, for the return to the ship, and the second half of our lecture on Costa Rica. Several factoids; Costa Rica has removed the restriction very common in Latin America against politicians being re-elected to office, especially higher office. With this, they have removed a large amount of the incentive for corruption, as politicians no longer have to secure their future over a relatively short working life. It also allows for good politicians to be re-elected, to continue doing good for the country, and not wasting experience and talent. Thus, the current president is a Nobel Peace laureate, who was first elected in the 1980s and was a major influence in negotiation a peace in the Nicarauguan war, was out of office for a bit, and has now been reelected several times on a what we would call a "green" platform, but green with a responsible development and conversation flavour.
Someone asked about the almost universal prevalence of window bars on the houses that we passed, and whether that meant a high crime rate. The crime rate is actually quite low, but the bars are a status symbol, indicating to the neighbors that you have something to protect. Max likened it to some of our people having the need to drive large off-road capable vehicles. When he first toured North America to visit national parks, he thought that we all were passionate about our nature preserves, and needed these vehicles to tour the wilderness. Then he discovered that most parks had better roads than cities and highways, and realized that our fascination with vehicles with capabilities we don't need is the same as the tico need to have window bars on a house that no one wants to break into.
After the end of the tour we walked around Putarenas for a while, mostly the artisan market. Lots of nice stuff, most of it quite non-commercial, but we have decided that we don't just want to buy stuff, and then have to carry it home, and find places for it, unless it really speaks to us. I was tempted by a "Pura Vita" t-shirt. Pura Vita is the universal tico answer to questions of the "Como esta" variety- how are you, how is it going, how is your life, are you doing ok, ... ? Pure life, life is good, is the standard answer.
After dinner we went to the top deck for the sail-out at 8 p.m., the time of slack tide. Pitch black night, with only the shore lights growing dimmer, but the ocean illuminated by a spectacular lightening storm to the north of us. We never got rain, but we did get a great light show.This morning we cruised the Golfo Dulce, a small body of water just north of the Panama border, probably the result of an earth quake along one of the many faults in the area. Maybe 20 or 30 miles long, it has several large rivers running into it, and is nearly fresh water, hence the name. It is isolated, and home to a variety of sea life. Normally the bow of the ship is off limits to passengers for safety and security reasons, but the captain allowed passengers onto the bow today, and again tomorrow for the Canal transit. We saw dolphins and whales, lots of sea birds (pelicans, cormorants, and some we couldn't identify) sea turtles, and one flying fish (probably lost). We also had a compulsory lifeboat drill, as we had gone beyond 11 days at sea, and thus needed reminding of emergency procedures.
Afterwards, on leaving Golfo Dulce, we sailed south-south-east, to get around the large part of Panama that sticks out into the Pacific, before turning north into the Gulf of Panama towards the Canal entrance. That turn happened sometime after we dressed for the 3rd formal dinner of the cruise, and had gone to the restaurant. But this ship sails so smoothly, that we didn't notice the change.
We will arrive at the Canal entrance sometime before 7 a.m. tomorrow morning, and will begin our transit sometime around 9 a.m. It will probably be a busy day, watching, and getting pictures. The batteries are charging and the SD cards (camera recording cards) are going to be emptied tonight, so that we are ready.I am going to send this still tonight, and try to upload some pictures, although the latter may not happen until tomorrorw night.
Hope all is well with all of you.
Gerry and June
On Board M/S Zuiderdam
Somewhere in the Gulf of Panama
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Nostalgia: e-Postcard from the Zuiderdam; 12 Oct 206
Cruise Day 13
We've visited two more ports-of-call plus a day at sea, so time to catch you up on our travels.
Monday, October 9 (Canadian Thanksgiving) we were in Acapulco. We arrived before sunrise, and because we had an early tour departure, had ordered a room service breakfast, which we ate on our veranda. Thus we got the full benefit of sailing into this beautiful harbour by moonlight. After sunrise we could see the northern half of the bay, including the older part of the city (now about 1 million people), which harks back to the small fishing village out of which this major tourist destination developed. Originally it was Mexicans from Mexico City who came here, when it was about an 8 hour drive from the capital to get to the ocean
Then of course came international tourism, and major development, and all the ills that come with that. Now it is only 4 hours by road from Mexico City, but we are told that smart Mexicans no longer come to Acapulco, because it is too crowded, and for that matter, too expensive, and there are other, more congenial destinations (which unfortunately are being "discovered" by foreign tourists, and developed, and so the cycle continues).
Once off the ship, we could see that the entire southern half of the bay is ringed by high-rise hotels and condominiums, with construction continuing beyond Acapulco Bay, intro other bays further south. It seems that as the very wealthy build their retreats in secluded places, others eventually follow, and build their more modest hotels. Eventually, a Wal-Mart, McDonalds, and Burger King get build just across the road from the very posh hotel, and the wealthy move on, further south, to more secluded places, etc. etc. etc. Thus, later that afternoon, as we sailed south, we could see many miles of shoreline with hotels, punctuated by empty spaces, then more hotels.
We took a bus tour south along the bay, and then beyond a mountain ridge into the next two bays along the coast, and it is one large city. One can tell that this is no longer a Mexican resort, and instead is an international destination, by the number of signs that are in Spanish and English, and sometimes other languages, and often signs that don't even bother with Spanish. Certainly, the beaches are still very beautiful, and the views from the hills are spectacular, but I don't think I'd want to spend a holiday here, because except for the odd palm tree, one might as well be in Atlantic City.
Later we went to see the famous cliff divers. The history of these is interesting, starting with the youth of 8 local fishing families competing to see who could dive from the highest cliffs (up to about 135 feet) into a shallow channel, about 9 to 18 feet deep. Then the owner of the near-by hotel began to advertise the divers, and pay them to put on shows - mostly in the evening during dinner - when they would dive off the cliff carrying torches. Today, there are 5 public shows each day, four of them at night, and the hotel still has the monopoly for the prime viewing area.
However, the divers have organized, and are doing quite well. They will put on "private" shows for cruise ship tours, at, we were told, US$500 per show, plus tips. They might put on 5 private shows a day, when a big ship is in harbour. There is a divers' union, and diving is restricted to members of the original 8 families. They have a medical doctor, with regular check-ups, and each diver is only permitted two dives a month for health reasons, because they hit the water with their heads at about 200 km/hour. They are trained from age 16 by retired divers, are fully qualified at about 20, and most retire from active diving at about 40. They then live on a full pension equal to their diving income, with full medical coverage, etc. By Mexican measures, and even by American measures, they do very well.
But others don't. After the organised tour, we left the ship to simply walk around the town. To do that, we had to run a gauntlet of people wanting to give us private tours, others offering to take us to the best silver shops, or the flea market, or to their relative's shop who would give us the best prices in town on anything we wanted, fully guaranteed (if you could ever find them again!). Once clear of that, we walked south along the Malecon (sea front promenade) for perhaps 3 km, and while it is very beautiful on the sea side, on the land side there are four lanes of traffic, and a constant stream of "private" taxis, often very decrepit cars, offering drives to anywhere. On the sea side are people pushing boat rides, and huckstering for restaurants, and there peddlers of chewing gum, and "genuine" silver, straight from the manufacturer in Taxco - right! It seems as if everyone in town is trying to live off tourists - and maybe that is indeed the only way to live in Acapulco, since there seems to be no other industry.We finally turned around, and walked back past the ship, and a few block to where we could turn inland at the Zocalo (town square). That was lovely, with far fewer huckster, probably because there seemed to be far fewer tourists, Here there were mostly Mexicans, in small cafes and outdoor bars, having coffee or a beer. Lot's of trees for shade, which was very welcome, since the temperature was again in the high 30s, and with humidity next to the ocean, felt like the 40s. The cathedral is just off the Zocalo, and although quite modern, is a Mexican-Byzantine combination of building style, and very attractive. Some of the side streets off the Zocalo too were populated by Mexicans who were simply out to do their own shopping, in small shops with a covered sidewalk in front of them, so no harassment of us Gringo tourists. We even shopped in the nearby Woolworth, the closes source for some drugstore product we needed, and here again people were friendly and helpful, even if we could hardly communicate over the loud, and I mean LOUD, mariachi music being piped into the store.Then back to the ship, through the gauntlet of offers to take us to places we had obviously missed, since we were not carrying silver and other souvenir goods. One can't help but think that much of Acapulco exists only to sell goods to tourists, either off cruise ships, or staying in the hundreds of hotels. We arrived absolutely sweat drenched from the heat and humidity, to be met by ship personnel at the gangplank with cold lemonade and frozen wet towels - talk about heaven!
We chilled out for the rest of the afternoon, and then joined much of the ship on the aft deck for the sail away party, this one fueled by unlimited pina coladas in hollowed out pineapples. (Watching them mix the drinks, there was no danger of anyone getting too much rum into them, no matter how much they tried, since their liquid capacity would prevent that, but the cold pineapple and coconut juice was very welcome to replenish our electrolytes - at least that was my reasoning.)
We sailed out of Acapulco Bay at 6 p.m. into the sunset, and continued south to our next stop the next morning, at the small resort village of Huatulco.
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Just a note on the on-board entertainment. Besides a plethora of daily diversions, from bingo, cooking demonstrations, various contests, etc., each evening there is a main show after dinner. None of the acts are what you would call "names" - at least we had never heard of any of them before, but they have all been first rate. Mostly they are entertainers from the resort circuit, or places like Vegas and Atlantic City, also the club circuit, and the cruise ship circuit. Our entertainment after we left Acapulco was a jazz pianist by the name of Judy Carmichael, who was very good. The next night we had a young British magician by the name of Paul Dabek, who again is relatively unknown, but was the 2003 Young Magician of the Year. He put on an absolutely dazzling show; not the big spectacular tricks, but sleight of hand and card tricks that left you breathless wondering just how he did that .
---------------------------------------------------------------
Santa Cruz de Huatulco is a stretch of coastline in Oxaca state with nine beautiful bays that form natural harbours, that became the destination for Mexicans for whom Acapulco had become too crowded and/or too foreign. About 12 hours by road from Mexico City, it now has an airport that is serviced by domestic flights from Mexico City and Oxaca, and has some international charters from Europe and, apparently, Canada, although we have never seen anything offered in Canada. The small town of Santa Cruz (La Crucecita) is the original settlement, and was a sleepy fishing village for centuries before being discovered in the 1990's., Most of the stores, marinas, guided tours, etc. are operated and staffed by local people. Very friendly and hospitable local people; here there is none of the commercialism of Acapulco, just warm welcome, and, if you want to buy something, that is a bonus.
The whole area is being developed by Fornatur, the Mexican tourism development corporation, who are keeping the look and feel of a seaside Mexican village, but developing to green standards. Thus, there are a number of water and sewage treatment plants that were built ahead of hotels, and the hotels themselves are low-rise buidlings that blend into the hillsides, rather than towering above them. However, as more people from abroad discover the beauty of this area, one can only hope that they continue this policy. The locals are quite proud that their resort area is the first in North America to be designated a "green" destination, and intend to keep it that way.
There is a Mexican naval base here, almost invisibly nestled into the hillside, which the locals are glad to have, since it adds stability to the local economy, which otherwise would be too seasonal, and also provides assistance in the case of disasters like hurricanes, which can and have hit this coast. Cynically, having a naval base here probably has nothing to do with this location being just north of Chiapas, and Oxaca itself, both of which had some local resistance movements that are a thorn in the side of the national government. Just as we were there, a months-long strike by teachers, who had totally occupied much of the centre of the city of Oxaca was settled in favour of the teachers, although the fate of the governor, whom the teachers want removed, is still up in the air. Thus, a military presence may not be entirely benign.
The very modern cruise ship pier here is only three years old; previously, ships had to anchor in the bay, and tender their passengers ashore. This limited the ships that could come here to those carrying their own tenders. Now, they can handle two large ships a day, although again bringing upwards of 4000 tourists into the area for a day would probably impact the character of the district quite negatively. Right now, few enough ships come into harbour, mostly during the spring and fall repositioning time that they are not a huge disturbance.
All of the organised shore activities are geared to an "eco" nature. We chose a bird-watching walk of about 3 miles through rainforest to an undeveloped seashore. Our guides were locals, an older woman who was very knowledgeable on local history, traditions, and flora and fauna, assisted by several young people, all of whom were quite serious birders. Our guide happened to spot a bird he had not previously seen, and you'd think he had won the lottery, from his excitement.
We saw several species of birds that are endemic to this part of the world, some quite spectacular, plus a lot of migratory species that are passing through southern Mexico on their annual trek south. Lots of ruby-throated humming birds, for example, also Baltimore orioles. Several species of sea birds that we don't get in Canada, including two kinds of herons. We also met some of the extended family of our guides. These eco trips are a family affair; the younger ones do the guiding, the older folks work on keeping the trails clear and from overgrowing, an ongoing task in the tropics.
After the birdwatching tour, we spent the rest of the afternoon on the ship, cooling off, We then went to an afternoon folklorico show, featuring a local high school band playing Mexican folk music, and a group of very competent folk dancers, showing us the dances of the region. They were so professional, that it was unbelievable when we were told that all the dancers were between 16 and 20 years old.
We left Huatulco at 6 p.m. with another demonstration of the capabilities of this ship, backing out of our dock and then backing out through the harbour entrance, a distance of perhaps two miles, through some very pointed looking rocks not far to either side, before turning and again sailing south towards out next port of call, San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. In between, we had a day at sea, which gave us a chance to sleep in, relax, and generally take a break from what has been a remarkably busy voyage, with the shore excurisons and other diversions.
Since Mexico keeps daylight saving time, along with the rest of North America, and Nicaragua and the rest of Central America do not, we also got to turn our clocks back an hour and sleep an hour more. Nicaragua is two hours behind Ontario, even though at this moment we are roughly directly south of Winnipeg. Of course, we will lose that hour again, plus another one as we get back onto Eastern Daylight Time before reaching Ft. Lauderdale.
Because of the time change, we woke up at 5:45 a.m. to bright sunlight, just as we sailed into the harbour at San Juan del Sur. There are no docks to handle this size ship here; San Juan is really only a smallish fishing port, and even the larger fishing vessels are moored off shore. Thus we anchored in the bay, and were taken ashore by tender in time for our tour of "Glimpses of Nicaragua's History and Culture" to depart. We drove about 45 minutes to the town of Rivas, where we had a chance to walk around and visit the local cathedral, then on to a lakeside hotel on Lake Nicaragua, where we had a great view of two of the 50 active volcanoes in the country. Then back by bus to San Juan, where we did a walk-around, then walked back along the beach in the water, finishing the final half mile or so in a bicycle cab.
Then back to ship, for a late lunch and beer, to re-hydrate after losing a lot of water in the still very hot climate, not helped by a light rain that just evaporated and raised the humidity.
Later in the afternoon we had a local folkloric show. The dancers again were local young people, all between 16 and 21. However, they are sponsored by the Tourism Ministry, and put on a magnificent show of dances from all across this country. High energy, skillful execution, and all obviously enthusiastic for their task of showing off their country. These shows of local dancers have been a real highlight of this cruise - not that the professional shows have been shabby, but these young people who are doing their best to show off their country and culture have an energy and enthusiasm that one just does not get from the paid talent.
Some impressions. This part of Nicaragua is trying very hard to attract tourists. A new port facility, which will allow cruise ships to dock, is being built. Rivas was an interesting mixture of old and new. Horse drawns wagons, modern trucks, pedi-cabs, scooters, bicycles, motorcycles, all combine to make traffic somewhat chaotic, probably not helped by the always present cops' habit of seemingly randomly whistling at someone in the traffic, pulling them over, and checking their papers. Not too much signage in English, yet, except for the ever present Coca Cola, followed closely by Pepsi, and push carts peddling icecream under the brand Eskimo! But a large banner in the Zocalo announces that English is not the future, but the present, and offering English classes, for a fee, to adults and children. The local craft market vendors in San Juan are not very aggressive, but a number of youth also work the market and the beach, and given a bit more practice, will soon be just as obnoxious as their counterparts in Acapulco. There are obvious mansions on the hillside overlooking the town, and large pleasure craft in the harbour, both probably belonging to foreigners, who are actively encouraged to buy land and build. No large hotels, yet! A Century 21 real estate business in the town doesn't even bother with Spanish on their signs, making it obvious who their customers are. Right now, this is still a relatively unspoiled part of the world to visit, we'd certainly like to spend some time here, but that may not be true in a few more years.
And that catches you up with us in the present. We are still anchored in San Juan harbour, Departure will be at 6 p.m. for Puntarena, Costa Rica, only a short sail away to the south. I will e-mail this later tonight, and am also hoping to post pictures on our website, http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com
The nest missive will follow in a few days.
Greetings to all! In harbour at San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua P.S.
Just a bit more ship trivia. Earlier I wrote that we have been at anchor here in the harbour at San Juan del Sur. Just a little while ago I learned that the sea bottom here is such that this ship cannot get in close enough to anchor, and remains in deep water. Thus all day we have been keeping station, with a GPS system working the bow and stern thrusters to keep the ship positioned to within a foot or two. Just one more example of the amazing technology of these modern vessels.
We've visited two more ports-of-call plus a day at sea, so time to catch you up on our travels.
Monday, October 9 (Canadian Thanksgiving) we were in Acapulco. We arrived before sunrise, and because we had an early tour departure, had ordered a room service breakfast, which we ate on our veranda. Thus we got the full benefit of sailing into this beautiful harbour by moonlight. After sunrise we could see the northern half of the bay, including the older part of the city (now about 1 million people), which harks back to the small fishing village out of which this major tourist destination developed. Originally it was Mexicans from Mexico City who came here, when it was about an 8 hour drive from the capital to get to the ocean
Then of course came international tourism, and major development, and all the ills that come with that. Now it is only 4 hours by road from Mexico City, but we are told that smart Mexicans no longer come to Acapulco, because it is too crowded, and for that matter, too expensive, and there are other, more congenial destinations (which unfortunately are being "discovered" by foreign tourists, and developed, and so the cycle continues).
Once off the ship, we could see that the entire southern half of the bay is ringed by high-rise hotels and condominiums, with construction continuing beyond Acapulco Bay, intro other bays further south. It seems that as the very wealthy build their retreats in secluded places, others eventually follow, and build their more modest hotels. Eventually, a Wal-Mart, McDonalds, and Burger King get build just across the road from the very posh hotel, and the wealthy move on, further south, to more secluded places, etc. etc. etc. Thus, later that afternoon, as we sailed south, we could see many miles of shoreline with hotels, punctuated by empty spaces, then more hotels.
We took a bus tour south along the bay, and then beyond a mountain ridge into the next two bays along the coast, and it is one large city. One can tell that this is no longer a Mexican resort, and instead is an international destination, by the number of signs that are in Spanish and English, and sometimes other languages, and often signs that don't even bother with Spanish. Certainly, the beaches are still very beautiful, and the views from the hills are spectacular, but I don't think I'd want to spend a holiday here, because except for the odd palm tree, one might as well be in Atlantic City.
Later we went to see the famous cliff divers. The history of these is interesting, starting with the youth of 8 local fishing families competing to see who could dive from the highest cliffs (up to about 135 feet) into a shallow channel, about 9 to 18 feet deep. Then the owner of the near-by hotel began to advertise the divers, and pay them to put on shows - mostly in the evening during dinner - when they would dive off the cliff carrying torches. Today, there are 5 public shows each day, four of them at night, and the hotel still has the monopoly for the prime viewing area.
However, the divers have organized, and are doing quite well. They will put on "private" shows for cruise ship tours, at, we were told, US$500 per show, plus tips. They might put on 5 private shows a day, when a big ship is in harbour. There is a divers' union, and diving is restricted to members of the original 8 families. They have a medical doctor, with regular check-ups, and each diver is only permitted two dives a month for health reasons, because they hit the water with their heads at about 200 km/hour. They are trained from age 16 by retired divers, are fully qualified at about 20, and most retire from active diving at about 40. They then live on a full pension equal to their diving income, with full medical coverage, etc. By Mexican measures, and even by American measures, they do very well.
But others don't. After the organised tour, we left the ship to simply walk around the town. To do that, we had to run a gauntlet of people wanting to give us private tours, others offering to take us to the best silver shops, or the flea market, or to their relative's shop who would give us the best prices in town on anything we wanted, fully guaranteed (if you could ever find them again!). Once clear of that, we walked south along the Malecon (sea front promenade) for perhaps 3 km, and while it is very beautiful on the sea side, on the land side there are four lanes of traffic, and a constant stream of "private" taxis, often very decrepit cars, offering drives to anywhere. On the sea side are people pushing boat rides, and huckstering for restaurants, and there peddlers of chewing gum, and "genuine" silver, straight from the manufacturer in Taxco - right! It seems as if everyone in town is trying to live off tourists - and maybe that is indeed the only way to live in Acapulco, since there seems to be no other industry.We finally turned around, and walked back past the ship, and a few block to where we could turn inland at the Zocalo (town square). That was lovely, with far fewer huckster, probably because there seemed to be far fewer tourists, Here there were mostly Mexicans, in small cafes and outdoor bars, having coffee or a beer. Lot's of trees for shade, which was very welcome, since the temperature was again in the high 30s, and with humidity next to the ocean, felt like the 40s. The cathedral is just off the Zocalo, and although quite modern, is a Mexican-Byzantine combination of building style, and very attractive. Some of the side streets off the Zocalo too were populated by Mexicans who were simply out to do their own shopping, in small shops with a covered sidewalk in front of them, so no harassment of us Gringo tourists. We even shopped in the nearby Woolworth, the closes source for some drugstore product we needed, and here again people were friendly and helpful, even if we could hardly communicate over the loud, and I mean LOUD, mariachi music being piped into the store.Then back to the ship, through the gauntlet of offers to take us to places we had obviously missed, since we were not carrying silver and other souvenir goods. One can't help but think that much of Acapulco exists only to sell goods to tourists, either off cruise ships, or staying in the hundreds of hotels. We arrived absolutely sweat drenched from the heat and humidity, to be met by ship personnel at the gangplank with cold lemonade and frozen wet towels - talk about heaven!
We chilled out for the rest of the afternoon, and then joined much of the ship on the aft deck for the sail away party, this one fueled by unlimited pina coladas in hollowed out pineapples. (Watching them mix the drinks, there was no danger of anyone getting too much rum into them, no matter how much they tried, since their liquid capacity would prevent that, but the cold pineapple and coconut juice was very welcome to replenish our electrolytes - at least that was my reasoning.)
We sailed out of Acapulco Bay at 6 p.m. into the sunset, and continued south to our next stop the next morning, at the small resort village of Huatulco.
--------------------------------
Just a note on the on-board entertainment. Besides a plethora of daily diversions, from bingo, cooking demonstrations, various contests, etc., each evening there is a main show after dinner. None of the acts are what you would call "names" - at least we had never heard of any of them before, but they have all been first rate. Mostly they are entertainers from the resort circuit, or places like Vegas and Atlantic City, also the club circuit, and the cruise ship circuit. Our entertainment after we left Acapulco was a jazz pianist by the name of Judy Carmichael, who was very good. The next night we had a young British magician by the name of Paul Dabek, who again is relatively unknown, but was the 2003 Young Magician of the Year. He put on an absolutely dazzling show; not the big spectacular tricks, but sleight of hand and card tricks that left you breathless wondering just how he did that .
---------------------------------------------------------------
Santa Cruz de Huatulco is a stretch of coastline in Oxaca state with nine beautiful bays that form natural harbours, that became the destination for Mexicans for whom Acapulco had become too crowded and/or too foreign. About 12 hours by road from Mexico City, it now has an airport that is serviced by domestic flights from Mexico City and Oxaca, and has some international charters from Europe and, apparently, Canada, although we have never seen anything offered in Canada. The small town of Santa Cruz (La Crucecita) is the original settlement, and was a sleepy fishing village for centuries before being discovered in the 1990's., Most of the stores, marinas, guided tours, etc. are operated and staffed by local people. Very friendly and hospitable local people; here there is none of the commercialism of Acapulco, just warm welcome, and, if you want to buy something, that is a bonus.
The whole area is being developed by Fornatur, the Mexican tourism development corporation, who are keeping the look and feel of a seaside Mexican village, but developing to green standards. Thus, there are a number of water and sewage treatment plants that were built ahead of hotels, and the hotels themselves are low-rise buidlings that blend into the hillsides, rather than towering above them. However, as more people from abroad discover the beauty of this area, one can only hope that they continue this policy. The locals are quite proud that their resort area is the first in North America to be designated a "green" destination, and intend to keep it that way.
There is a Mexican naval base here, almost invisibly nestled into the hillside, which the locals are glad to have, since it adds stability to the local economy, which otherwise would be too seasonal, and also provides assistance in the case of disasters like hurricanes, which can and have hit this coast. Cynically, having a naval base here probably has nothing to do with this location being just north of Chiapas, and Oxaca itself, both of which had some local resistance movements that are a thorn in the side of the national government. Just as we were there, a months-long strike by teachers, who had totally occupied much of the centre of the city of Oxaca was settled in favour of the teachers, although the fate of the governor, whom the teachers want removed, is still up in the air. Thus, a military presence may not be entirely benign.
The very modern cruise ship pier here is only three years old; previously, ships had to anchor in the bay, and tender their passengers ashore. This limited the ships that could come here to those carrying their own tenders. Now, they can handle two large ships a day, although again bringing upwards of 4000 tourists into the area for a day would probably impact the character of the district quite negatively. Right now, few enough ships come into harbour, mostly during the spring and fall repositioning time that they are not a huge disturbance.
All of the organised shore activities are geared to an "eco" nature. We chose a bird-watching walk of about 3 miles through rainforest to an undeveloped seashore. Our guides were locals, an older woman who was very knowledgeable on local history, traditions, and flora and fauna, assisted by several young people, all of whom were quite serious birders. Our guide happened to spot a bird he had not previously seen, and you'd think he had won the lottery, from his excitement.
We saw several species of birds that are endemic to this part of the world, some quite spectacular, plus a lot of migratory species that are passing through southern Mexico on their annual trek south. Lots of ruby-throated humming birds, for example, also Baltimore orioles. Several species of sea birds that we don't get in Canada, including two kinds of herons. We also met some of the extended family of our guides. These eco trips are a family affair; the younger ones do the guiding, the older folks work on keeping the trails clear and from overgrowing, an ongoing task in the tropics.
After the birdwatching tour, we spent the rest of the afternoon on the ship, cooling off, We then went to an afternoon folklorico show, featuring a local high school band playing Mexican folk music, and a group of very competent folk dancers, showing us the dances of the region. They were so professional, that it was unbelievable when we were told that all the dancers were between 16 and 20 years old.
We left Huatulco at 6 p.m. with another demonstration of the capabilities of this ship, backing out of our dock and then backing out through the harbour entrance, a distance of perhaps two miles, through some very pointed looking rocks not far to either side, before turning and again sailing south towards out next port of call, San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. In between, we had a day at sea, which gave us a chance to sleep in, relax, and generally take a break from what has been a remarkably busy voyage, with the shore excurisons and other diversions.
Since Mexico keeps daylight saving time, along with the rest of North America, and Nicaragua and the rest of Central America do not, we also got to turn our clocks back an hour and sleep an hour more. Nicaragua is two hours behind Ontario, even though at this moment we are roughly directly south of Winnipeg. Of course, we will lose that hour again, plus another one as we get back onto Eastern Daylight Time before reaching Ft. Lauderdale.
Because of the time change, we woke up at 5:45 a.m. to bright sunlight, just as we sailed into the harbour at San Juan del Sur. There are no docks to handle this size ship here; San Juan is really only a smallish fishing port, and even the larger fishing vessels are moored off shore. Thus we anchored in the bay, and were taken ashore by tender in time for our tour of "Glimpses of Nicaragua's History and Culture" to depart. We drove about 45 minutes to the town of Rivas, where we had a chance to walk around and visit the local cathedral, then on to a lakeside hotel on Lake Nicaragua, where we had a great view of two of the 50 active volcanoes in the country. Then back by bus to San Juan, where we did a walk-around, then walked back along the beach in the water, finishing the final half mile or so in a bicycle cab.
Then back to ship, for a late lunch and beer, to re-hydrate after losing a lot of water in the still very hot climate, not helped by a light rain that just evaporated and raised the humidity.
Later in the afternoon we had a local folkloric show. The dancers again were local young people, all between 16 and 21. However, they are sponsored by the Tourism Ministry, and put on a magnificent show of dances from all across this country. High energy, skillful execution, and all obviously enthusiastic for their task of showing off their country. These shows of local dancers have been a real highlight of this cruise - not that the professional shows have been shabby, but these young people who are doing their best to show off their country and culture have an energy and enthusiasm that one just does not get from the paid talent.
Some impressions. This part of Nicaragua is trying very hard to attract tourists. A new port facility, which will allow cruise ships to dock, is being built. Rivas was an interesting mixture of old and new. Horse drawns wagons, modern trucks, pedi-cabs, scooters, bicycles, motorcycles, all combine to make traffic somewhat chaotic, probably not helped by the always present cops' habit of seemingly randomly whistling at someone in the traffic, pulling them over, and checking their papers. Not too much signage in English, yet, except for the ever present Coca Cola, followed closely by Pepsi, and push carts peddling icecream under the brand Eskimo! But a large banner in the Zocalo announces that English is not the future, but the present, and offering English classes, for a fee, to adults and children. The local craft market vendors in San Juan are not very aggressive, but a number of youth also work the market and the beach, and given a bit more practice, will soon be just as obnoxious as their counterparts in Acapulco. There are obvious mansions on the hillside overlooking the town, and large pleasure craft in the harbour, both probably belonging to foreigners, who are actively encouraged to buy land and build. No large hotels, yet! A Century 21 real estate business in the town doesn't even bother with Spanish on their signs, making it obvious who their customers are. Right now, this is still a relatively unspoiled part of the world to visit, we'd certainly like to spend some time here, but that may not be true in a few more years.
And that catches you up with us in the present. We are still anchored in San Juan harbour, Departure will be at 6 p.m. for Puntarena, Costa Rica, only a short sail away to the south. I will e-mail this later tonight, and am also hoping to post pictures on our website, http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com
The nest missive will follow in a few days.
Greetings to all! In harbour at San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua P.S.
Just a bit more ship trivia. Earlier I wrote that we have been at anchor here in the harbour at San Juan del Sur. Just a little while ago I learned that the sea bottom here is such that this ship cannot get in close enough to anchor, and remains in deep water. Thus all day we have been keeping station, with a GPS system working the bow and stern thrusters to keep the ship positioned to within a foot or two. Just one more example of the amazing technology of these modern vessels.
Sunday, October 8, 2006
Nostalgia: e-Postcard from the Zuiderdam; 08 Oct 2006
Cruise Day 9
I am writing this sitting in a deck chair, looking out at the Pacific, somewhere between Puerto Vallarta and Acapulco, which will be our next port-of-call, tomorrow, Canadian Thanksgiving.
After we left San Francisco the ship headed south, for two days at sea before we were to reach Cabo San Lucas, at the southern-most tip of Baja California, on Friday morning. The weather remained cold until we crossed into the tropics south of LA, and then suddenly the temperature and humidity went through the roof. It was not too bad while we were at sea, because the ship's motion produces a breeze even when there is little wind, but the land temperatures have been almost beyond toleration, particularly in the afternoon - both in Cabo and in Puerto Vallarta it has been 37 degrees, and the humidity high enough that it feels like the low 40's. After a few hours in that, stepping into the ship, which is kept at a very comfortable 22 degrees, is like stepping into a refrigerator. Conversely, after a few hours in the ship, stepping out feels like jumping into the sauna, and glasses, binoculars, camera lenses, instantly fog over.
October 5, the 2nd of our at sea days, was the first formal night of the cruise, so all decked out in evening dress and tuxedo we enjoyed the Captain's welcome champagne reception, a great dinner, and then a great show in the very large and completely equipped theatre. Then we stopped for a dance and drink in the Crow's Nest Lounge above the bridge plus another drink in a lovely little lounge that has a classical trio playing every evening. Then I thought I had better check for e-mail, as I had a few small outstanding items to which I expected replies.
As most, but not all, of you know by know, it was then that an e-mail from my son Scott reached me that my mother had died Thursday morning. At that time we were out of cell phone reach, so after sending out some e-mail (and having a stiff cognac) we tried to sleep for the rest of the night, with limited success. Thus, we were awake and on the veranda when we entered the harbour at Cabo San Lucas with the full moon (harvest moon sized on the horizon) just setting behind the mountains. Even at that hour, the harbour rim was alight with the light from various hotels, and inside the harbour the Carnival Pride, which had sailed in ahead of us, was a blaze of light.
We waited until sunrise at about 5:45, and then I called Scott on my cellphone (while there is no service at sea, I am able to connect to whichever cell service is local using my GSM quad-band world phone; when I first decided I wanted that level of connectivity I thought that perhaps I was overdoing it, but in an emergency it definitely pays for itself!). Scott had already started the plan we had discussed for this eventuality, and thus we were able to just touch base on some of the details. (Maria will be cremated, which was her wish in any case, we will continue the cruise, since getting back to Canada would be difficult and costly, and we will have a funeral service at her church in Midland after our return-it leaves me with a curious feeling of not quite accepting that she is dead, with some unreality about the whole thing, but under the circumstances the best we can do.)
We had booked an afternoon excursion by boat followed by a scenic drive, so after all that activity we caught a couple of hours more sleep, and then took the ship's tender to shore (Cabo does not have piers large enough to handle cruise ships, so they anchor in the bay. Zuiderdam has her own tenders, which are also lifeboats, and so we were ferried ashore, about 120 at a time.) We then went onto a modest-sized but modern boat that took us around Land's End into the Pacific, with a trip up the Pacific side of the peninsula. Lot's of fun, after a ship that hardly moves, this boat was definitely bouncy! There was a good breeze blowing, which kept us tolerably cool, but also allowed the sun to beat down on us without warning.
There were lot's of photo ops along this very rugged coast, above which the houses of some very fortunate folks are located (see our pictures). The scenic ride wasn't much, but it took us to a restaurant from which one could see the entire bay, with our ship and the Pride at anchor, once again allowing us to see just how enormous this vessel is - 950 feet long at the waterline, 120 feet at the beam, and 12 usable decks above the waterline, thus at a guess about 150 feet high, not counting the superstructure and funnels. The restaurant also supplied good Mexican beer, which by that time was very, very welcome! Then back to the pier through the town (which might as well be in California, as it has everything in the way of American fast food joints, except for Taco Bell!) and the tender ride back to the ship. After a quick cool shower, we went back up to the Lido Deck on Deck 10, for margaritas and the sail-away party. Diner, the usual show, and so to bed, followed.
Next morning we woke up just as we were coming down Bahia de Banderas (Bay of Flags), towards the harbour in Puerto Vallarta. We had previously visited here, about 3 1/2 years ago, just before we met up with the Mexico Travel Seminar group in Mexico City prior to going to Cuernavaca. Then we had stayed at a resort to the north, in Nuevo Vallarta, which is actually in a different state (Nayarid) from the town proper (Jalisco) and more oddly, in a different time zone! This has to be one of the only urban areas in the world where the population in its daily affairs needs to ask whomever they are dealing with what time zone they are operating in. Our tour guide had that problem; he was from the north, and hence one hour behind us, as ship's time had been set to local time in Puerto Vallarta the night before.
After breakfast, we went ashore for our tour.
(Actually, we waited to go ashore with a lot of others, because Mexican customs and immigration were taking their own sweet time clearing the ship. A make-work project, since we had left a Mexican port the night before, and sailed in Mexican waters all night, and they would have had the ship's manifest as soon as we left San Francisco.That make-work continued later that day, when we returned to the ship - Mexican authorities checked our ship's id and photo id, fair enough, but then we were made to empty our pockets into trays, and put anything we carried onto a table. Then all this was pushed to the other side of a gate, through which we walked, to pick up our stuff, which had not gone through anything, nor had it been looked at. Then you go up the gang-plank, and ship's security does the full routine; scan your ship's id, which pops up your picture on the screen and all your stuff goes through x-ray, and you go through a magnetometer gate and a search if necessary.)
When we got ashore, we found our tour - we had signed up for something called "Town, Country, and Tequila" which turned out to be not as advertised. The guide did give us a few facts about the Mexican economy, by contrasting some of the very wealthy homes in town to the poor farms of the country, and asking people to wonder why McDonald's in Mexico charge about the peso equivalent of their US$ price for a hamburger, but only pay their staff Mexican minimum wage, about $10 daily. But this was pretty minimal stuff compared to what we do when we take students to Mexico.
The tequila part turned out to be a visit to an alleged tequila factory, but which bore as much resemblance to a real operation as Cinderella's Castle at Disney World has to real housing! The operation was basic tourist trap, overpriced tequila, and the usual tacky gift items, at prices four and five times what the local market in ordinary towns would charge, prices that would drop dramatically by a factor of two when you walked away.
Then it was off to a street which had nothing but silver and emerald shops on it, for more shopping opportunities; again, at very suspect prices if one had any idea about what things in Mexico usually cost. Also, very pushy salespeople. Finally, a walk around the old town of Puerto Vallarta, architecturally very much the same as before Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor had come along in 1962 to screw it up. Architecturally; unfortunately what used to be homes, and small shops and businesses, now are tourist traps, tattoo parlours, upscale clothing stores, and either fancy restaurants, or American fast food, including Hooters!
The cathedral is lovely, and there was wedding that it would have been nice to just quietly observe, but the effect was spoiled by various tourist groups simply wandering in and gawking while talking about how quaint it all was. (A number of men, who would never enter their own church with a hat on, just walked around with their baseball caps on, loudly muttering about how weird these catholics were. I must say the priest was more Christian about it than I would have been, just ignoring the lot and getting on with the wedding and the Mass. Made me grateful that I never had a church that tourists would want to visit.)
I would have liked to take more time around the town, unfortunately, by this time it was mid-afternoon, and the sun was becoming dangerously hot. We ventured out onto the malecon briefly; it is a lovely seafront promenade, with the mountains as a backdrop to the city, but it was like being on a grill. Thus, back to ship, some lunch, and to get our electrolytes back into order with an infusion of Heineken.
Before supper, we were able to watch a gorgeous Pacific sunset from our verandah (we remembered how beautiful the sunsets were there from our visit before) and then to supper. Because the ship wasn't sailing until 10 p.m., the entertainment at night was a local folk dance group, which presented typical dances from a number of the western Mexican states. They were beautiful to watch, because they were dancing something which was meaningful to them, and because they hadn't been spoiled by too much professionalism.
Then there was a very late show, at 10:30 p.m. put on by the Philippinos in the crew, of song and dance - very well done, and again, because they were doing this to show us something of their own country and culture, it had the beauty of sincerity.
(Aside; most of the hotel side crew on the ship is either from the Philippines, or from Indonesia, mostly Bali and Java. Wonderfully friendly, and very accommodating. And you have to admire them, their contract is for a year at sea, followed by 4 months holiday, after which they can renew their contract for another year. So they are away from home and family and friends for 12 months at a time. Our waiter, who is Balinese, told us that at least now they have Internet available on the ship, so they can keep in touch by e-mail, and if the time zones align, by instant messaging. Also, phone calls from Canadian and American ports, using phone cards that are inexpensive, relatively. But still a hard life, even if the working conditions and benefits are much better than for other migrant labour - as seafarers, they have a union that takes good care of their rights.)
As I've said, today is a day at sea, so we slept in, had an early brunch/lunch, and sat on the deck until it got too hot. Just before I came inside a few minutes ago, a school of dolphins came along side and performed for us - but of course my camera was back in the cabin. We are not in a hurry to get into Acapulco, so the ship is sailing slowly at around 13 knots, and the dolphins were easily able to match that, as they jumped the waves, and some of them even did 360 degree flips. Showoffs!
Tonight is a "black and white" formal night, the dining room and the theatre have been redecorated to that colour scheme, and "gentlemen" have been asked to wear actual black tie, rather than the multi-colour indulgences that seem to be the fashion. Don't know what the show is going to be, but we expect a similar, 30's 40's theme. We'll let you know in the next of these missives, which will probably be in about 3 days, when we next have another day at sea.
I am going to get some photos from the last two days ready for uploading, and will do that at the same time I send this e-mail. So keep looking for those at (2008 note: they have been re-upoaded, after fixing the mess that happened uploading them from my laptop during the cruise) http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/
Until then, greetings, and a happy Canadian Thanksgiving!
I am writing this sitting in a deck chair, looking out at the Pacific, somewhere between Puerto Vallarta and Acapulco, which will be our next port-of-call, tomorrow, Canadian Thanksgiving.
After we left San Francisco the ship headed south, for two days at sea before we were to reach Cabo San Lucas, at the southern-most tip of Baja California, on Friday morning. The weather remained cold until we crossed into the tropics south of LA, and then suddenly the temperature and humidity went through the roof. It was not too bad while we were at sea, because the ship's motion produces a breeze even when there is little wind, but the land temperatures have been almost beyond toleration, particularly in the afternoon - both in Cabo and in Puerto Vallarta it has been 37 degrees, and the humidity high enough that it feels like the low 40's. After a few hours in that, stepping into the ship, which is kept at a very comfortable 22 degrees, is like stepping into a refrigerator. Conversely, after a few hours in the ship, stepping out feels like jumping into the sauna, and glasses, binoculars, camera lenses, instantly fog over.
October 5, the 2nd of our at sea days, was the first formal night of the cruise, so all decked out in evening dress and tuxedo we enjoyed the Captain's welcome champagne reception, a great dinner, and then a great show in the very large and completely equipped theatre. Then we stopped for a dance and drink in the Crow's Nest Lounge above the bridge plus another drink in a lovely little lounge that has a classical trio playing every evening. Then I thought I had better check for e-mail, as I had a few small outstanding items to which I expected replies.
As most, but not all, of you know by know, it was then that an e-mail from my son Scott reached me that my mother had died Thursday morning. At that time we were out of cell phone reach, so after sending out some e-mail (and having a stiff cognac) we tried to sleep for the rest of the night, with limited success. Thus, we were awake and on the veranda when we entered the harbour at Cabo San Lucas with the full moon (harvest moon sized on the horizon) just setting behind the mountains. Even at that hour, the harbour rim was alight with the light from various hotels, and inside the harbour the Carnival Pride, which had sailed in ahead of us, was a blaze of light.
We waited until sunrise at about 5:45, and then I called Scott on my cellphone (while there is no service at sea, I am able to connect to whichever cell service is local using my GSM quad-band world phone; when I first decided I wanted that level of connectivity I thought that perhaps I was overdoing it, but in an emergency it definitely pays for itself!). Scott had already started the plan we had discussed for this eventuality, and thus we were able to just touch base on some of the details. (Maria will be cremated, which was her wish in any case, we will continue the cruise, since getting back to Canada would be difficult and costly, and we will have a funeral service at her church in Midland after our return-it leaves me with a curious feeling of not quite accepting that she is dead, with some unreality about the whole thing, but under the circumstances the best we can do.)
We had booked an afternoon excursion by boat followed by a scenic drive, so after all that activity we caught a couple of hours more sleep, and then took the ship's tender to shore (Cabo does not have piers large enough to handle cruise ships, so they anchor in the bay. Zuiderdam has her own tenders, which are also lifeboats, and so we were ferried ashore, about 120 at a time.) We then went onto a modest-sized but modern boat that took us around Land's End into the Pacific, with a trip up the Pacific side of the peninsula. Lot's of fun, after a ship that hardly moves, this boat was definitely bouncy! There was a good breeze blowing, which kept us tolerably cool, but also allowed the sun to beat down on us without warning.
There were lot's of photo ops along this very rugged coast, above which the houses of some very fortunate folks are located (see our pictures). The scenic ride wasn't much, but it took us to a restaurant from which one could see the entire bay, with our ship and the Pride at anchor, once again allowing us to see just how enormous this vessel is - 950 feet long at the waterline, 120 feet at the beam, and 12 usable decks above the waterline, thus at a guess about 150 feet high, not counting the superstructure and funnels. The restaurant also supplied good Mexican beer, which by that time was very, very welcome! Then back to the pier through the town (which might as well be in California, as it has everything in the way of American fast food joints, except for Taco Bell!) and the tender ride back to the ship. After a quick cool shower, we went back up to the Lido Deck on Deck 10, for margaritas and the sail-away party. Diner, the usual show, and so to bed, followed.
Next morning we woke up just as we were coming down Bahia de Banderas (Bay of Flags), towards the harbour in Puerto Vallarta. We had previously visited here, about 3 1/2 years ago, just before we met up with the Mexico Travel Seminar group in Mexico City prior to going to Cuernavaca. Then we had stayed at a resort to the north, in Nuevo Vallarta, which is actually in a different state (Nayarid) from the town proper (Jalisco) and more oddly, in a different time zone! This has to be one of the only urban areas in the world where the population in its daily affairs needs to ask whomever they are dealing with what time zone they are operating in. Our tour guide had that problem; he was from the north, and hence one hour behind us, as ship's time had been set to local time in Puerto Vallarta the night before.
After breakfast, we went ashore for our tour.
(Actually, we waited to go ashore with a lot of others, because Mexican customs and immigration were taking their own sweet time clearing the ship. A make-work project, since we had left a Mexican port the night before, and sailed in Mexican waters all night, and they would have had the ship's manifest as soon as we left San Francisco.That make-work continued later that day, when we returned to the ship - Mexican authorities checked our ship's id and photo id, fair enough, but then we were made to empty our pockets into trays, and put anything we carried onto a table. Then all this was pushed to the other side of a gate, through which we walked, to pick up our stuff, which had not gone through anything, nor had it been looked at. Then you go up the gang-plank, and ship's security does the full routine; scan your ship's id, which pops up your picture on the screen and all your stuff goes through x-ray, and you go through a magnetometer gate and a search if necessary.)
When we got ashore, we found our tour - we had signed up for something called "Town, Country, and Tequila" which turned out to be not as advertised. The guide did give us a few facts about the Mexican economy, by contrasting some of the very wealthy homes in town to the poor farms of the country, and asking people to wonder why McDonald's in Mexico charge about the peso equivalent of their US$ price for a hamburger, but only pay their staff Mexican minimum wage, about $10 daily. But this was pretty minimal stuff compared to what we do when we take students to Mexico.
The tequila part turned out to be a visit to an alleged tequila factory, but which bore as much resemblance to a real operation as Cinderella's Castle at Disney World has to real housing! The operation was basic tourist trap, overpriced tequila, and the usual tacky gift items, at prices four and five times what the local market in ordinary towns would charge, prices that would drop dramatically by a factor of two when you walked away.
Then it was off to a street which had nothing but silver and emerald shops on it, for more shopping opportunities; again, at very suspect prices if one had any idea about what things in Mexico usually cost. Also, very pushy salespeople. Finally, a walk around the old town of Puerto Vallarta, architecturally very much the same as before Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor had come along in 1962 to screw it up. Architecturally; unfortunately what used to be homes, and small shops and businesses, now are tourist traps, tattoo parlours, upscale clothing stores, and either fancy restaurants, or American fast food, including Hooters!
The cathedral is lovely, and there was wedding that it would have been nice to just quietly observe, but the effect was spoiled by various tourist groups simply wandering in and gawking while talking about how quaint it all was. (A number of men, who would never enter their own church with a hat on, just walked around with their baseball caps on, loudly muttering about how weird these catholics were. I must say the priest was more Christian about it than I would have been, just ignoring the lot and getting on with the wedding and the Mass. Made me grateful that I never had a church that tourists would want to visit.)
I would have liked to take more time around the town, unfortunately, by this time it was mid-afternoon, and the sun was becoming dangerously hot. We ventured out onto the malecon briefly; it is a lovely seafront promenade, with the mountains as a backdrop to the city, but it was like being on a grill. Thus, back to ship, some lunch, and to get our electrolytes back into order with an infusion of Heineken.
Before supper, we were able to watch a gorgeous Pacific sunset from our verandah (we remembered how beautiful the sunsets were there from our visit before) and then to supper. Because the ship wasn't sailing until 10 p.m., the entertainment at night was a local folk dance group, which presented typical dances from a number of the western Mexican states. They were beautiful to watch, because they were dancing something which was meaningful to them, and because they hadn't been spoiled by too much professionalism.
Then there was a very late show, at 10:30 p.m. put on by the Philippinos in the crew, of song and dance - very well done, and again, because they were doing this to show us something of their own country and culture, it had the beauty of sincerity.
(Aside; most of the hotel side crew on the ship is either from the Philippines, or from Indonesia, mostly Bali and Java. Wonderfully friendly, and very accommodating. And you have to admire them, their contract is for a year at sea, followed by 4 months holiday, after which they can renew their contract for another year. So they are away from home and family and friends for 12 months at a time. Our waiter, who is Balinese, told us that at least now they have Internet available on the ship, so they can keep in touch by e-mail, and if the time zones align, by instant messaging. Also, phone calls from Canadian and American ports, using phone cards that are inexpensive, relatively. But still a hard life, even if the working conditions and benefits are much better than for other migrant labour - as seafarers, they have a union that takes good care of their rights.)
As I've said, today is a day at sea, so we slept in, had an early brunch/lunch, and sat on the deck until it got too hot. Just before I came inside a few minutes ago, a school of dolphins came along side and performed for us - but of course my camera was back in the cabin. We are not in a hurry to get into Acapulco, so the ship is sailing slowly at around 13 knots, and the dolphins were easily able to match that, as they jumped the waves, and some of them even did 360 degree flips. Showoffs!
Tonight is a "black and white" formal night, the dining room and the theatre have been redecorated to that colour scheme, and "gentlemen" have been asked to wear actual black tie, rather than the multi-colour indulgences that seem to be the fashion. Don't know what the show is going to be, but we expect a similar, 30's 40's theme. We'll let you know in the next of these missives, which will probably be in about 3 days, when we next have another day at sea.
I am going to get some photos from the last two days ready for uploading, and will do that at the same time I send this e-mail. So keep looking for those at (2008 note: they have been re-upoaded, after fixing the mess that happened uploading them from my laptop during the cruise) http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/
Until then, greetings, and a happy Canadian Thanksgiving!
Tuesday, October 3, 2006
Nostalgia: e-postcard from the Zuiderdam; 03 Oct 2006
As I promised (threatened?) below, I am posting to this blog e-mail that I sent from our trans-Panama Canal cruise in October 2006 to a small number of family and firends.
Not un-edited; I had to remove irrelevancies, but no revisonism!
There may be references to pictures uploaded to our photo website - I was editing and uploading pictures as I created these postings. That was not an happy event, as the site and its organizational program I use does not play nicely with multiple computers. However, having corrected everything later, the weblinks still work.
---------------------------
This is the first of what I hope will be some once-in-a-while notes from our cruise on the MS Zuiderdam, Vancouver to Ft. Lauderdale, Sep 30 to Oct 21, 2006.
Unlike a real postcard, in order to save upload costs, this one has no picture. However, eventually I will upload some representative pictures to our photo website at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/; so click on the link to see those. (You may have to scroll down to the "Panama Canal Cruise" heading on the left -depends on your screen resolution.)
A note on upload costs: the Zuiderdam has a satellite based digital data link to the Internet, which is distributed to public areas on the ship via wireless network, but at low speed. The cost depends on how many minutes you buy, and for 250 minutes works out to about 37 cents per minute of connect time, and the more people that are connected, the slower the download/upload speed, because the sattelite pipe to the Internet is limited in capacity.
It's a great business model for the provider; since most people don't want to connect to the Internet for a certain amount of time, but rather want to receive and transmit a certain amount of data; however, the lousier the speed, the more money the ship can charge for a given amount of data moved! And there is no other game in town - I suspect only the on-board casino is more sure to make money for the company.
Note from more recent travel: In 2008, in Germany, many hotels advertise Internet access; what that meant in some was that they had allowed German Telekom to install a T-Mobile Hotspot in the hotel, with coverage only in the lobby area, or some public rooms, certainly not guest rooms. In order to connect, you had to purchase an account on T-Mobile, at Euro$8 per hour, or an "all-you-can-eat" for a month account at somewhere about Euro$25 for the month - a no-brainer you say, until you dig down into the very fine fine print, ande discover that you have to sign up for a 6 month minimum., All of this points to the very profitable-for the providers-idiocy of charging by connect time, whereas what most of us want, and what the providers mostly incur costs for, is transferring some amount of data. My Blackberry plan charges me for the amount of data I transfer, my home Internet provider offers me the option of having unlimited data, or some number of Gigabytes of data - connect time is so last century; get with it T-Mobile and others of your ilk, and you might just get my business.
Enough complaining!
We flew to Vancouver on the 28th (Sep 2008), uneventfully, except for the more than 2 hours it took to get to the airport because of an accident that closed all but one lane of Hwy 401 just before the ramp to the collectors at Dixie. No great problem, but because of potential problems getting our bags onto our original flight with the late check-in, we transferred to the next flight.
Arrived in Vancouver on time, and took the Airporter to the Hotel Vancouver, where we had reservations (thank you Eugene Chan!). (2008 added note: Eugene was a student at Renison College, and the musician at St. Bede's Chapel, in my time as Chaplain. By the time of writing these e-mails, Eugene had gone to work for the Fairmont group of hotels, and offered us accomodation in Vancouver at the employee rate.) The weather was warm and sunny - shirt-sleeve weather. A quick brush-up, then lunch at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Then a walk-about, beginning with the observation tower at the Harbour Centre, with a great 360 degree view of the city and harbour (and a great espresso/cappuccino bar).
After that we walked along the sea wall to Stanley Park, and back to the hotel along West Georgia Street. Lamenting (!) as we went at the chance Toronto keeps missing to have a decent water front, replacing it instead with dreary condo after condo. Vancouver has condos, but they are set back, there is not Gardiner Expressway equivalent to keep you away, and architecture is very imaginative. Supper was in Gastown, with another visit to the observation tower to get the nighttime panorama.
Friday was spent at UBC (after a long skytrain and bus ride) visiting the botanical gardens, and a wonderfully tranquil Japanese garden. Bus back downtown, and then supper at the Steamworks brewpub on the edge of Gastown - great patio, great beer, great food.
Saturday the weather had shifted to dull, dreary and drissly, but we really had no need to go outside. After re-packing, we took a taxi to the cruise ship terminal, with both getting in and getting out happening under cover. Given the number of people (close to 2000) being boarded, check-in was remarkably efficient, the whole process probably taking less than 45 minutes from our arrival until we were having lunch on board. Our cabin was ready by 3 p.m. with half our luggage already in it, the rest arriving over the next half hour, so we were able to unpack and settle in before the 4:30 lifeboat drill.
At first stowing everything seemed like an impossible task, since the cabin is about 250 ft square, including the bathroom. And yet, there is a place for everything, and in the end we don't feel at all crowded. We have a balcony with a couple of easy chairs, and inside an ottoman, and a table, for quiet sitting and watching the world go by - although so far it has been cool enough that sitting gets uncomfortable quickly.
Food so far has lived up to expectation, although our dinner companions were all rather odd. But that has changed, as people find other arrangements. The second night we were alone, and tonight a new couple joined us who were quite interesting and fun. Tomorrow we get two more, as about half the ship gets off at San Francisco, and then about the same number get on.
Sunday was spent in Astoria, Oregon, at the mouth of the Columbia river. A perfect Fall day, sunny, dry, and just warm enough that one could walk around in light clothing. Astoria has just begun to have cruise ships come in, in fact we were the first Holland America ship to go there, and this town of about 10,000 went all out to make sure we felt welcome. $5 gave access to shuttle buses into town, and there one could get onto any other transport, and into most museums etc. with the "Honoured Visitor" tag that came with the $5 fee. There were volunteers wearing "Cruise Ship Guide" vests all over town, ready to answer questions, give directions, or just chat about their town. They were having their weekly Sunday market, with mostly crafts and produce and fruit vendors, but also a whole lot full of various kinds of food stands - fried oysters, crab, salmon in various forms, but having had nothing but sea food up until then, we opted for that great north-western cuisine speciality, a pulled pork barbecue sandwich! One sandwich being enough for the two of us, they were so generous, and for a remarkably low price.
Altogether, the day was a wonderful experience of small town America at its finest.
We left Astoria at 5 p.m., (amazed at an 82,000 ton ship that can move sideways away from the pier, into mid-channel, then rotate gracefully on it's own axis through 180 degrees, and then move out, with no assistance from tugs, etc.) We have been sailing south ever since, expecting to go under the Golden Gate Bridge at about 5 a.m. tomorrow (Wednesday, Oct 3) morning. We are going to get up for that, and then either get off the ship and walk around downtown, or go back to bed, whichever seems more sensible. So I'll cut this off right now (although by the time I actually will send this it will probably be Wednesday afternoon).
Keep an eye out for further notes from us as we head south tomorrow evening for Cabo St. Lucas at the bottom of Baja California, and points further south in Mexico.
Late addition: It is now actually Wednesday morning, so I'll add some words about San Francisco before uploading all this.
We got up at about 4:15 a.m. to be on deck as we sailed through the Golden Gate at about 5:00 a.m., along with a few other hardy souls, accompanied by much coffee. Even at that hour of the morning, one can see traffic on the hills of San Francisco and the city is waking up. We watched the docking, and again were amazed at how 82,000 tons can just pull up to a pier as if it were an outboard boat. (I guess technically it is, with propellers at the rear that can push in any direction, and bow thrusters that can do the same.) We'd ordered a light breakfast in our cabin, after which we went back to bed, and tried to sleep, but at about 8:00 a.m. the dis-embarkation announcements (for passengers leaving the cruise in San Francisco) got to be too annoying, so we got up, had another breakfast, and walked off the ship into the city.
After a quick look around Pier 39, a major tourist trap, we walked the other way along the Embarcadero, and eventually up California Street to take the cable car up Nob Hill. We got off at Grace (Anglican) Cathedral, a beautiful church, and had a great walk-around, and a nice chat with the guide lady, whose son-in-law turns out to be the Rector of the Garrison Church in Sidney, Australia, where we had been two years ago - small world, small church!. Grace Cathedral is of course the home of the renewed labyrinth movement, and they have a large carpet labyrinth at the back of the nave. Also a great gift shop, where I could have gone broke buying Alan Jones' (the Dean's) books, and lots of great CDs by the Grace choirs.
We then took the cable car in the direction of Fisherman's Wharf, got off about half-way, and walked down the steep hills, admiring the architecture. Fisherman's Wharf is an odd combination of maritime shops, and cheap tourist traps. Great place to walk, and people watch. We worked our way back to the ship slowly, and got on in time for a late lunch, before the sail-away party at 4:30. Then out through the Golden Gate, in a bitterly cold northerly breeze I might add, then south towards Mexico.
Today and tomorrow (Thursday, Oct 5) we are at sea, hitting Cabo San Lucas at the bottom-most tip of Baja California on Friday morning. Tonight is the first formal night, with the Captain's welcome reception and dinner. Then a do nothing day tomorrow, except if you are a Type A personality; there is so much on offer every hour on this ship that you could be busier than working! We are trying to be selective!
We'll keep you posted!
June Longworth & Gerry Mueller
Aboard MS Zuiderdam
Somewhere in the North Pacific Ocean South of Los Angeles
Not un-edited; I had to remove irrelevancies, but no revisonism!
There may be references to pictures uploaded to our photo website - I was editing and uploading pictures as I created these postings. That was not an happy event, as the site and its organizational program I use does not play nicely with multiple computers. However, having corrected everything later, the weblinks still work.
---------------------------
This is the first of what I hope will be some once-in-a-while notes from our cruise on the MS Zuiderdam, Vancouver to Ft. Lauderdale, Sep 30 to Oct 21, 2006.
Unlike a real postcard, in order to save upload costs, this one has no picture. However, eventually I will upload some representative pictures to our photo website at http://longworth_mueller.fototime.com/; so click on the link to see those. (You may have to scroll down to the "Panama Canal Cruise" heading on the left -depends on your screen resolution.)
A note on upload costs: the Zuiderdam has a satellite based digital data link to the Internet, which is distributed to public areas on the ship via wireless network, but at low speed. The cost depends on how many minutes you buy, and for 250 minutes works out to about 37 cents per minute of connect time, and the more people that are connected, the slower the download/upload speed, because the sattelite pipe to the Internet is limited in capacity.
It's a great business model for the provider; since most people don't want to connect to the Internet for a certain amount of time, but rather want to receive and transmit a certain amount of data; however, the lousier the speed, the more money the ship can charge for a given amount of data moved! And there is no other game in town - I suspect only the on-board casino is more sure to make money for the company.
Note from more recent travel: In 2008, in Germany, many hotels advertise Internet access; what that meant in some was that they had allowed German Telekom to install a T-Mobile Hotspot in the hotel, with coverage only in the lobby area, or some public rooms, certainly not guest rooms. In order to connect, you had to purchase an account on T-Mobile, at Euro$8 per hour, or an "all-you-can-eat" for a month account at somewhere about Euro$25 for the month - a no-brainer you say, until you dig down into the very fine fine print, ande discover that you have to sign up for a 6 month minimum., All of this points to the very profitable-for the providers-idiocy of charging by connect time, whereas what most of us want, and what the providers mostly incur costs for, is transferring some amount of data. My Blackberry plan charges me for the amount of data I transfer, my home Internet provider offers me the option of having unlimited data, or some number of Gigabytes of data - connect time is so last century; get with it T-Mobile and others of your ilk, and you might just get my business.
Enough complaining!
We flew to Vancouver on the 28th (Sep 2008), uneventfully, except for the more than 2 hours it took to get to the airport because of an accident that closed all but one lane of Hwy 401 just before the ramp to the collectors at Dixie. No great problem, but because of potential problems getting our bags onto our original flight with the late check-in, we transferred to the next flight.
Arrived in Vancouver on time, and took the Airporter to the Hotel Vancouver, where we had reservations (thank you Eugene Chan!). (2008 added note: Eugene was a student at Renison College, and the musician at St. Bede's Chapel, in my time as Chaplain. By the time of writing these e-mails, Eugene had gone to work for the Fairmont group of hotels, and offered us accomodation in Vancouver at the employee rate.) The weather was warm and sunny - shirt-sleeve weather. A quick brush-up, then lunch at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Then a walk-about, beginning with the observation tower at the Harbour Centre, with a great 360 degree view of the city and harbour (and a great espresso/cappuccino bar).
After that we walked along the sea wall to Stanley Park, and back to the hotel along West Georgia Street. Lamenting (!) as we went at the chance Toronto keeps missing to have a decent water front, replacing it instead with dreary condo after condo. Vancouver has condos, but they are set back, there is not Gardiner Expressway equivalent to keep you away, and architecture is very imaginative. Supper was in Gastown, with another visit to the observation tower to get the nighttime panorama.
Friday was spent at UBC (after a long skytrain and bus ride) visiting the botanical gardens, and a wonderfully tranquil Japanese garden. Bus back downtown, and then supper at the Steamworks brewpub on the edge of Gastown - great patio, great beer, great food.
Saturday the weather had shifted to dull, dreary and drissly, but we really had no need to go outside. After re-packing, we took a taxi to the cruise ship terminal, with both getting in and getting out happening under cover. Given the number of people (close to 2000) being boarded, check-in was remarkably efficient, the whole process probably taking less than 45 minutes from our arrival until we were having lunch on board. Our cabin was ready by 3 p.m. with half our luggage already in it, the rest arriving over the next half hour, so we were able to unpack and settle in before the 4:30 lifeboat drill.
At first stowing everything seemed like an impossible task, since the cabin is about 250 ft square, including the bathroom. And yet, there is a place for everything, and in the end we don't feel at all crowded. We have a balcony with a couple of easy chairs, and inside an ottoman, and a table, for quiet sitting and watching the world go by - although so far it has been cool enough that sitting gets uncomfortable quickly.
Food so far has lived up to expectation, although our dinner companions were all rather odd. But that has changed, as people find other arrangements. The second night we were alone, and tonight a new couple joined us who were quite interesting and fun. Tomorrow we get two more, as about half the ship gets off at San Francisco, and then about the same number get on.
Sunday was spent in Astoria, Oregon, at the mouth of the Columbia river. A perfect Fall day, sunny, dry, and just warm enough that one could walk around in light clothing. Astoria has just begun to have cruise ships come in, in fact we were the first Holland America ship to go there, and this town of about 10,000 went all out to make sure we felt welcome. $5 gave access to shuttle buses into town, and there one could get onto any other transport, and into most museums etc. with the "Honoured Visitor" tag that came with the $5 fee. There were volunteers wearing "Cruise Ship Guide" vests all over town, ready to answer questions, give directions, or just chat about their town. They were having their weekly Sunday market, with mostly crafts and produce and fruit vendors, but also a whole lot full of various kinds of food stands - fried oysters, crab, salmon in various forms, but having had nothing but sea food up until then, we opted for that great north-western cuisine speciality, a pulled pork barbecue sandwich! One sandwich being enough for the two of us, they were so generous, and for a remarkably low price.
Altogether, the day was a wonderful experience of small town America at its finest.
We left Astoria at 5 p.m., (amazed at an 82,000 ton ship that can move sideways away from the pier, into mid-channel, then rotate gracefully on it's own axis through 180 degrees, and then move out, with no assistance from tugs, etc.) We have been sailing south ever since, expecting to go under the Golden Gate Bridge at about 5 a.m. tomorrow (Wednesday, Oct 3) morning. We are going to get up for that, and then either get off the ship and walk around downtown, or go back to bed, whichever seems more sensible. So I'll cut this off right now (although by the time I actually will send this it will probably be Wednesday afternoon).
Keep an eye out for further notes from us as we head south tomorrow evening for Cabo St. Lucas at the bottom of Baja California, and points further south in Mexico.
Late addition: It is now actually Wednesday morning, so I'll add some words about San Francisco before uploading all this.
We got up at about 4:15 a.m. to be on deck as we sailed through the Golden Gate at about 5:00 a.m., along with a few other hardy souls, accompanied by much coffee. Even at that hour of the morning, one can see traffic on the hills of San Francisco and the city is waking up. We watched the docking, and again were amazed at how 82,000 tons can just pull up to a pier as if it were an outboard boat. (I guess technically it is, with propellers at the rear that can push in any direction, and bow thrusters that can do the same.) We'd ordered a light breakfast in our cabin, after which we went back to bed, and tried to sleep, but at about 8:00 a.m. the dis-embarkation announcements (for passengers leaving the cruise in San Francisco) got to be too annoying, so we got up, had another breakfast, and walked off the ship into the city.
After a quick look around Pier 39, a major tourist trap, we walked the other way along the Embarcadero, and eventually up California Street to take the cable car up Nob Hill. We got off at Grace (Anglican) Cathedral, a beautiful church, and had a great walk-around, and a nice chat with the guide lady, whose son-in-law turns out to be the Rector of the Garrison Church in Sidney, Australia, where we had been two years ago - small world, small church!. Grace Cathedral is of course the home of the renewed labyrinth movement, and they have a large carpet labyrinth at the back of the nave. Also a great gift shop, where I could have gone broke buying Alan Jones' (the Dean's) books, and lots of great CDs by the Grace choirs.
We then took the cable car in the direction of Fisherman's Wharf, got off about half-way, and walked down the steep hills, admiring the architecture. Fisherman's Wharf is an odd combination of maritime shops, and cheap tourist traps. Great place to walk, and people watch. We worked our way back to the ship slowly, and got on in time for a late lunch, before the sail-away party at 4:30. Then out through the Golden Gate, in a bitterly cold northerly breeze I might add, then south towards Mexico.
Today and tomorrow (Thursday, Oct 5) we are at sea, hitting Cabo San Lucas at the bottom-most tip of Baja California on Friday morning. Tonight is the first formal night, with the Captain's welcome reception and dinner. Then a do nothing day tomorrow, except if you are a Type A personality; there is so much on offer every hour on this ship that you could be busier than working! We are trying to be selective!
We'll keep you posted!
June Longworth & Gerry Mueller
Aboard MS Zuiderdam
Somewhere in the North Pacific Ocean South of Los Angeles
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