Day 81 31st March 2011

It is another hot (i.e. 28c) calm day with lots of animal activity around the ship. Two pods of dolphins swam past this morning on the starboard side, many dozens of individual animals in each group. The ship has been followed all day by several different types of birds – possibly frigate birds, skuas and sooty terns but not always easy to tell. You can hear the birds calling to each other as they fly alongside the ship occasional diving to catch fish. It is obviously a busy area for shipping since we have seen a continuous stream of container ships and other vessels all day.

We went to hear a briefing on the Panama Canal which we reach early tomorrow morning. It apparently costs over $300,000 toll for the Aurora to pass through the canal. It is based on a fee per full bed and a slightly lower one for empty beds. We have about 2800 beds so the unit cost is over $300. The briefing explained that the transit would take about 9 hours and involves being raised over 300 feet above sea level to then be lower back down to sea level at the end of the journey. The pilot comes aboard at 4.30am in the morning and we go under the All America Bridge which carries the Pan-American Highway at about 6am and then join the canal shortly after that. We are going to spend a lot of tomorrow watching and photographing what goes on. They are apparently widening the canal to take vessels twice as large so we should see a lot of civil engineering work.

It is probably going to be an early night if we want to get up in the morning.