Panama Canal

Here are two time-lapse movies of the Panama Canal. One is going east, the other is going west. The eastern one is not as good (although it is smaller and has different ships in it). I had to leave several times, and was cut off twice (including part of the end) for rain. The west one is bigger, but very complete.

If you watch closely on the sides of the ship, you can see the "mules" that are centering/pulling the ship. You can see the locks open and close. If you look closely right at the waterline (the bottom of the first lock gate) in the entrance when we are headed west, you can see the bridge that opens whenever the lock is closed. The cars have to wait for both locks to be closed before the bridge opens. Otherwise they have to drive to the other side of Panama to the high bridge if they want to cross the canal. When the third section is open, they plan to put in a high bridge across all three.

Canal crossing heading east (shorter), this is in "WMV" format for Windows. If you have a Mac, I'd suggest downloading the VLC player, if not then download the AVI version of the movie here.

Canal crossing heading west (better), this is in "WMV" format for Windows. Ditto above, if not then download the AVI version of the movie here. However, it is 204mb (instead of 12mb).