Last night, after an exciting night going through the Panama Canal under intense incandescent lights, and experiencing first hand an important part of human modern history. After sailing under the Bridge of the Americas, we reached Pedro Miguel and Miraflores locks, where we were elevated 85 feet above sea level, to sail now on fresh water through infamous Culebra Cut and the Gamboa dredging division. By midnight National Geographic Sea Lion dropped anchor and spent a restful quiet night on the man-made Gatun Lake, just in front of our destination for tomorrow, the famous Smithsonian Barro Colorado research station or “BCI”.
BCI Island, was before the construction of the Panama Canal and Gatun Dam, the top of a hill. Scientist at that time had the foresight to see the convenience of establishing a research facility here, to follow up the evolution of the tropical rainforest after it became isolated from mainland.
When the sun started to come out over the mountains, it found the National Geographic Sea Lion ready for our activities at BCI. It was a beautiful and contrasting scene: lush green forested islands, full of sounds of howler monkeys and many forest birds, interrupted sporadically, by gigantic ships that appeared suddenly, seemingly coming out of nowhere.
Before beginning our visit, we were welcomed by Doctor Egbert Leigh, one of the prominent scientists of BCI.
During our activities in and around the island we had the opportunity to learn about the tropical forest and the studies taking place here, while at the same time seeing a lot of its wildlife: howler and spider monkeys, crocodiles, agouties, long nosed coatis, among other species.
And for the evening the grand finale- the last set of locks at Gatun, descending down to the Caribbean Sea at the busy port of Colon to celebrate a great week together.
