08.54.0000 N  79.31.0000 W

We are through the Panama Canal!! Wooooohooooo!!! Very exciting times!! 
We had a smooth transit thanks to our fantastic line handling team. On board we had Nicks Dad Steve, our friend Wyatt who we met in Hawaii and a friend of his who lives in Panama called Louis/Lou. 
We started off in the afternoon from Shelter bay marina. We headed over to an area called the flats to await the arrival of our advisor. To transit through you must have an advisor who works for the Panama canal. We waited and waited..... and waited and waited...... eventually the pilot boat came and dropped off our guy – Roy. After one false start and another 2 hour wait the ship which was going to be in the locks with us arrived and we made our way to the first set of 3 locks (the Gatun locks). As it had taken so long we were now doing this all in the dark. We rafted up with some friends of ours on a catamaran called ‘So What’. They are a lovely couple called Greg and Jenni and they have 2 kids. 
It was tense times for the first lock as everyone figured out their various roles and the gates closed in behind us. The water started rushing in and gradually we were on our way up! As we were doing this the advisor informed me that he would like his dinner now please.... this was not the ideal time as Lou and I were working hard on the stern line. Anyway Lou (being the legend that he is) easily took over and I went down below to prepare dinner for 1 (we were way to busy for ours so that had to wait until about midnight when we were finally sorted). 
We made it through the 3 locks with no problem. Fantastic communication between everyone – especially Greg and Nick (who were on the helm of our two boats in the raft). We then headed out to a large buoy in the lake where we would spend the night. On approach we saw a large catamaran who unexpectedly was on the buoy, we had to then raft up to them. They started yelling and very aggressively shouted at us – some instructions some insults – none of which helped the situation. As you can imagine this made the rafting up really tricky and Nick did amazingly well to stay calm in such a stressful situation. Our advisor told the guy to be quiet and after being ignored on a number of occasions requesting that he just leave Nick and the advisor to work it out – I yelled out ‘shut your mouth’ haha not my finest work but it did shut him up for a few seconds...... Anyway we spent a slightly awkward night rafted up to these guys and Nick was very polite to them while the rest of us were still grumbling about how the whole thing went down. 
The new advisor Oscar came aboard the next morning while we were having breakfast. We then had a 5hr motor through lake Gatun before getting closer to the last 3 locks. Along the way naps were had, coffee and cake was consumed and crocodiles were spotted. It was about lunch time by the time we made it to the first of the 3 locks which start taking you back ‘down hill’. We rafted up with ‘So What’ again and also Korrigan (a French boat which we had become friends with). The three boats headed into the locks and all went smoothly. We then made our way to the Miraflores locks which are the last ones before the Pacific. Again all went well. We spent some time trying to wave and make gestures at family and friends who might be trying to watch us on the web cam which I think confused many people at the visitors centre who were watching.
Finally the last lock gates opened and we motored our way into the Pacific ocean. What a feeling! The champagne (fizzy wine) flowed and we made our way to la Playita where we anchored up amongst a whole load of boats who we have become friends with. What a welcome it was. Many more drinks were had and we farewelled Lou who was off on a ‘hot date’ with a ‘honey’. Haha good times.