Trelawney

No way would I have the mental fortitude to be swimming in the locks when they start emptying them to descend. Visions of emptying the bath and the suction whirlpool

We could see the new locks being build a mile or so behind the current locks at Miraflores but its under construction so nothing to see yet. (they will put all three Pacific side locks in one section rather than having them split into the two Miraflores and one Pedro Migel locks - and then the ships will lock up directly into the Gaillard Cut/Gatun Lake level). Interesting...the excess rock that was excavated was then dumped into the sea off Balboa to form a causeway/breakwater to provide shelter for the canal entrance. It links the mainland with two offshore islands and is a great drive.

I hope you don't mind a long-time ghost reader of this forum sharing some photos of my visit yesterday to the Miraflores locks of the Panama Canal. As someone who loved taking canal holidays when I was younger, before exiling to USA/TX, the visit to the canal was a must-do when in Panama on business. We visited the Miraflores locks, which are on the pacific side of the canal. They are a two-level staircase lock that raises the ships between 47 to 82 ft (14.33 to 24.99 m) high, depending on the current state of the tide in the Pacific, and then connect on to the single Pedro Migel lock to raise the ships up to the transit level for Lake Gatun. 8-10 hours later they will decend the three-stage Gatun locks into the Caribbean. Crazy trivia - Although we think of the canal running East-West from Caribbean to Pacific, the "S" shape curves of Panama actually make the canal run almost North-South. Although even crazier, the Caribbean entrance in Colon is actually further west than the Pacific Entrance in Panama City. First view of the canal as we arrived at the visitor center at Miraflores. We had just missed seeing one ship exit the canal and were hoping there would be another transit to watch come through. We were in luck - a tug boat and a yacht were just moving from the upper chamber into the lower chamber ready to lower down into the Pacific ocean. And they were sharing the lock with Fjellanger, a 183m/29,500GRT Norwegian flagged chemical tanker. Also descending in the second set of locks, was the Panamanian containership MSC Pilar (294m/52,000GRT) which was entering the upper chamber from Lake Miraflores after a short transit from the Pedro Migel lock. Mules (small locomotives) run along the sides of the chambers to keep the ships straight and central in the locks. The ships provide the forward propulsion but the mules are used for positioning and stopping. They seemed to run 2 each side at the front (one fore and one spring) and the same at the stern. The mules have a very steep change in level between the upper/lower chambers. The canal just celebrated 100 years of operation from 1914 to 2014 The upper gates of each lock/chamber have double gates, spaced 70 feet/21m apart, incase of collision by a ship into the gates. The second gate provides protection from flooding/draining the system . And as the MSC Pilar moved on down into the final lower chamber of the Miraflores, the container ship MOL Efficiency(294m/53,800GRT) entered the upper chamber to start the process all over again. And the best part....the viewing center also has a bar/restaurant so all this was watched with an ice cold Balboa in my hand.

Is that why they give out the weather forecast Dogger Bank? I guess Fisher is understandable too, but what's happening with the German Bite?

Back onto the North / South divide. Growing up in Cornwall, I always thought that Birmingham was "up North". Then I went to College in Newcastle and realised that places like Macclesfield were a long way south and Birmingham was almost on the South Coast :-) As for London. Cornish peopl always go "Up to London", as do people from Wales even though from Wales its directly East and not North or South.

Maybe the £50 trolleys are made in Poland to one design, and the £1200 trolleys are bespoke trolleys.

HeHehe. You found that one? Probably a whole fleet of ships called Titan Mars and Titan Saturn etc, but it would have to be an overseas company that would name their ship Titan Uranus.

I stumbled across a website for a Marine Insurance Company (www.cargolaw.com) that documents shipping collisions and wrecks (as part of their suggestion for shippers to buy insurance). It's always been worth browsing, and worth and hour or so as you go "thank goodness I'm not responsible for that one" Came across this spectacular failure of a crane strap......This wide beam retails for about $1.4M, and was being shipped from its winter cruising in Dubai back to Florida for the summer season. Sister ship Before During After And now go back to the "During" photo and checkout the port transom for the two intrepid joy riders who later appeared in the "After" shot. Boat was a complete write off after the rear strap ripped off all the running gear during it's short but spectacular plunge. Thank goodness I'm not responsible for that one.

I think this is the perfect solution....... a marshmallow blaster. You load the "gun" with marshmallows, blast them at the little buggers (makes a nice popping noise as you shoot). And then the kids are too busy hunting down and eating the marshmallows to lob anything else in your direction.

Why not spring the stern off, by running a line from the bow T-Stud aft to the bank. A touch ahead will bring the bow in, and stern out, then go astern into channel.

Can't help with the technique but based on this my first thought was that a Carbon Monoxide detector might be a good idea.

Not only canal narrow boats, but a 39ft Pilot House motor Sailer designed to fit into a standard container and get shipped around the world instead of freighted as deck cargo. Container Yachts