We got all our paperwork completed yesterday for Intermezzo's transit of the Panama Canal. We are scheduled to enter the canal on April 23rd. It is possible that we might go earlier. I'm sure it's also possible we could be delayed, too. But next Tuesday is the date we are planning on.
Intermezzo is anchored out in La Playita. It is a pleasant enough anchorage, though we are occasionally rolled by canal work boat wakes and the odd intermittent swell. We paid $55 to use the dinghy dock at Marina Playita for a week. We ferry to and from the boat a couple times a day.
We've eaten dinner out, done laundry, the crew has gone partying (while the boring captain read a book on the boat), we went grocery shopping, I found some needed engine parts, ...we need to fill up five more days of waiting.
Panama City has everything a big cosmopolitan city has to offer. I find it a bit dirty, a bit rude especially compared to Mexico, and the Spanish a bit harder to understand, consonants not articulated, endings of words dropped off. Nice neighborhoods and dangerous ghettos are sometimes separated by one or two streets. I'll be glad to move on, though, Colon, at the other end of the canal is considered to be one of the most dangerous cities in the world.
Still trying to find an internet connection fast enough to post pictures.
