Judy in Texas

:thtray:    :usa:

Welcome. If you don't want to haul your tents, The Fort has tents for rent. Staying at The Fort is all about being social and enjoying the amenities; however, keep in mind that most of the sites around you will have families with kids so anything "not child appropriate" will have to be kept to a minimum. As long as the boistress-ness is before quiet hours, you should be OK.
Good luck with the races!
PS: here is the link to the tent rental information:
http://www.fortfiends.net/_/rental-information/renting-a-tent-from-disney-r329

I just asked Jessica and she said Rachel and her got their autographs there. You might need to go more than one night if you want to get both. Chip walks through the seats on one side and Dale on the other.

I'm just glad that the basketball and hockey seasons are over and that the real sports of football and baseball can dominate the sports scene.
 
And I don't want to hear about the World Cup. Only two groups of people like soccer, foreigners and the little kids, because even they can play it.

FYI.
I just now changed our Dinosaur FP+ to the new FOTLK show on Wednesday at 2:30!!!
It's good to be ray!!!
Woot! Woot!

The big day finally arrives and the question is:

 
 Here is our anticipated schedule.
 
Arriving Gatun Locks                                  approx  7:30 am
Departing Gatun Locks                              approx   9:45 am
Passing Gamboa                                          approx 12:30 pm
Arriving Pedro Miguel Locks                     approx   2:00 pm
Departing Pedro Miguel Locks                  approx   2:45 pm
Arriving Miraflores Locks                           approx   3:15 pm
Departing Miraflores Locks                       approx    5:00 pm
Passing under the bridge of America       approx    5:15 pm  
 
As we made our way through Capt. Puckett's wife did a wonderful narration of the various stages of the crossing. 
 
Naturally many are lined up on the top decks towards the front in anticipation of what's to come. I did go up to snap some pictures, but why sit in the hot sun all day when we could also enjoy it all from our verandah which did allow for some shade.

 
From now until we exit into the Pacific we are no longer the DISNEY WONDER, we are now S14Z. S southbound,  14 14th ship of the day and Z we paid the priority fee.
 
As we make our approach you can see some of the constuction that is going on for the new canal which will be wider and when finished will allow both the Dream and Fantasy along with the other larger freighters and tankers use the canal.

 
Off to the right you can see the original channel that the French started when they had orginally planned on building the canal.

 
Here are some of the new gates which will be used on the new locks as well as more of the construction.
.
 
We make our approach and a tug sits in the ready to help get us lined up. 

 
You can see the mules (trains) waiting for us to get into the lock, contrary to popular belief they do not pull the ships through they only keep us centered so we don't hit the side. As we first approached we did make one bump and Capt. Puckett had mentioned in his presentation that it would probably happen once or twice. 

 
Also notice the guys in the row boats at the end of the center island. Believe it or not after trying just about every method possible to get the lines from the ships to the mules having a quy in a row boat turned out to be the tried and true method. Also as you can there is a smaller black gate directly in front of us that is to prevent a ship from ramming the actual lock gates. That is the larger white area behind the ship in front of us
 
The ship that was in front of us has moved on, the water level has come back down and the gates open to let us in.

 
Here is a picture of the ship in front of us in the chamber as well as the ship in the lock next to us..

 
We finally get into position, the rear mule is keeping us steady and the gates start to close.

 
Even some of the chefs come out to watch the adventure

 
If you look closely you can see the cars are also starting to cross. There is a one-way vehicle bridge that allows the locals to get back and forth. 

 
The water starts in and up-up up we go.

 
There is a ship in the lock next to us getting ready to head in and you can get a good picture of the line handlers in their little boats.

 
We repeat these same steps two more times as we go up 85' to reach the lake.

 
Here we are approaching the visitors center and observation deck.


 
Here is a picture of what the mechanism looks like that opens and closes the gates. As I said earlier they were originally operated by a 25 hp motor, but it has now been increased to 40 hp.

 
Here is a better picture of  the control house for the Gatun locks.

 
This was our view as we depart and head across the lake.

 
As I look around on the verandah I see we picked up a stow away.  Glad he didn't stay around long, not sure if those are eyes or just antennae. 

 
Next up the scenery as we cross the lake.

Sorry these are so large - don't have time to mess with resizing, gotta get back to work.
 
This was from our seats, early in the game, Josh on the mound:
 

 
Obligatory food & bev shot:
 

 
Obviously I had to take this one:
 

 
End of the game, all the Dodgers running out to the mound:
 

 
Look to the far left, here comes the Gatorade:
 

 
Final score showing 0 hits:
 

 
Me and my sons with the Philly skyline in the background:
 

 
Pat's King of Steaks, right across the street from Geno's:
 

 
Note the lines at both places.  Geno's:
 

 
And….the reward for waiting in that line:
 

 
I should have opened up the bun…..but you can imagine, it was soooo good!

Would I be allowed to park it on the 1500 loop?  It looks like the top pops up, so it's a pop-up, right?
 
TCD

As we are now 4 days and counting to the Fort, I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who has been such a great help on this forum. This is a wonderful resource for us Fort rookies and has made planning my families trip so much easier, so thanks again Fiends!

I volunteered at City Hall.  Joyce and I took her Father to City Hall in February right after Rope Drop and volunteered him.  The CM was very specific in asking him if he really wanted to do it or if he was doing it because we were pushing him to do so.  It was moving to participate and even more moving to have complete strangers come up afterwards and thank me for my service. 

I want to give Judy an up arrow but I'm on my phone

:smartass:
 
(Don't say that, don't say that, don't say that... :raspberry: )

There are instructions for posting pictures from Photobucket here:
 
http://www.fortfiends.net/forum/topic/12525-photobucket/page-1#entry354300

Nice job posting the webcam pics of the ship going through the locks, Judy.
 
Here's a selfie and another pic of the locks from their verandah.
 
 

 

And thanks for sharing, Judy!

Vegetable protein? Oh boy

...and it doesn't seem to matter which side of Soarin' you ride...that big piece of lint is there. Wouldn't you think someone would take the initiative to clean it or is initiative a bad word at WDW?

Me?? Call Lou, Magic Bus, the Grand Poobah of this site a schmuckface? It does not trip easily off the tongue.
(schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface...)

Me?? Call Lou, Magic Bus, the Grand Poobah of this site a schmuckface? It does not trip easily off the tongue.
(schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface...)

Me?? Call Lou, Magic Bus, the Grand Poobah of this site a schmuckface? It does not trip easily off the tongue.
(schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface...)

Me?? Call Lou, Magic Bus, the Grand Poobah of this site a schmuckface? It does not trip easily off the tongue.
(schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface, schmuckface...)

Lou, I especially like the Disney parks when I visit on my own because I feel safe, I can step off the airplane and immediately start enjoying the Disney experience at MCO with Magic Express. I can act like a kid when riding the rides like Buzz and Toy Story Mania. There is always something that makes me say "WOW" and there's normally no one to puke on my fun.

Lou, I especially like the Disney parks when I visit on my own because I feel safe, I can step off the airplane and immediately start enjoying the Disney experience at MCO with Magic Express. I can act like a kid when riding the rides like Buzz and Toy Story Mania. There is always something that makes me say "WOW" and there's normally no one to puke on my fun.

Lou, I especially like the Disney parks when I visit on my own because I feel safe, I can step off the airplane and immediately start enjoying the Disney experience at MCO with Magic Express. I can act like a kid when riding the rides like Buzz and Toy Story Mania. There is always something that makes me say "WOW" and there's normally no one to puke on my fun.