Barro Colorado Island
We witnessed an engineering marvel right after embarking and clearing customs: The Panama Canal. By dinner we were already reaching the Gatun Locks, the northern gate of our transisthmian journey.
Despite the fact that the canal is always updated with new technology, the linesmen still use rowboats. Until now no machine has proven to be a better, more reliable resource.
Once our ship had been elevated 85 feet from the Caribbean into the Gatun fresh water lake, we dropped anchor to wait for our next days activities. Before sunrise the Sea Voyager was repositioned to the Barro Colorado Island (BCI). The Smithsonian Institute has a tropical research center that uses the top of a hill that remained exposed when the lake was flooded. The water left a convenient isolated piece of land with a wonderful rainforest that turned into the grounds of some of the most important research in the neotropics.
Scientists have unveiled the most amazing and entangled relationships between different organisms of the area. They have helped develop scientific research procedures and produce a great wealth of information.
The island is a temple for biologists and today it was open to us. Lindblad’s Sea Voyager is the only vessel that may interrupt its Canal Transit to visit the home of animals and researchers.
The station’s guides introduced us to their backyard and their laboratory: the Panamanian rainforest. We saw howler monkeys, agoutis, bats, river otters and a wide variety of birds and insects, but most important, we had a wonderful chance to enjoy and learn from Mother Nature.
We witnessed an engineering marvel right after embarking and clearing customs: The Panama Canal. By dinner we were already reaching the Gatun Locks, the northern gate of our transisthmian journey.
Despite the fact that the canal is always updated with new technology, the linesmen still use rowboats. Until now no machine has proven to be a better, more reliable resource.
Once our ship had been elevated 85 feet from the Caribbean into the Gatun fresh water lake, we dropped anchor to wait for our next days activities. Before sunrise the Sea Voyager was repositioned to the Barro Colorado Island (BCI). The Smithsonian Institute has a tropical research center that uses the top of a hill that remained exposed when the lake was flooded. The water left a convenient isolated piece of land with a wonderful rainforest that turned into the grounds of some of the most important research in the neotropics.
Scientists have unveiled the most amazing and entangled relationships between different organisms of the area. They have helped develop scientific research procedures and produce a great wealth of information.
The island is a temple for biologists and today it was open to us. Lindblad’s Sea Voyager is the only vessel that may interrupt its Canal Transit to visit the home of animals and researchers.
The station’s guides introduced us to their backyard and their laboratory: the Panamanian rainforest. We saw howler monkeys, agoutis, bats, river otters and a wide variety of birds and insects, but most important, we had a wonderful chance to enjoy and learn from Mother Nature.
