MINI day care.

 

Blouise! My MINI is going to be a new Rochesterite too! however it is coming via Buffalo.


I have to say there is a little bit of a sad pang in me today that our cars are not getting into the docs today as originally planned.

Y2K... Maybe you got a 50th Anniversary mural painted on yours. All that wait and it could be a collectors item!

 

Well, 8:00 am has come and gone and Porgy is nowhere to be seen in the two Gatun Lock webcams. Must be heavy traffic in the harbor - I counted over 50 ships waiting last night.

 

[quote=banannastand;2868966]Blouise! My MINI is going to be a new Rochesterite too! however it is coming via Buffalo.


Hey! It will be fun to see you tooling around town! I got such a better deal from the dealer in Albany that we chose to buy it there. Do you have a pick up date yet? Remind me: What does yours look like?

Mine will be buzzing around the South Wedge area. Yours?

 

All on the Elektra - In just a little over a week the real fun begins.

I'm not much help on roof racks.....we went with the sunroofs. Sunroof"s" (plural). That's just fun to tell people.

UAL Kingpin - Sadly we need to update Faust's arrival to the 21st. And Hurricane Fred better not get squirrelly with us out in the Atlantic. http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/grap...daynl#contents

 

OK - I can see the Porgy approaching the east end of the Gatun Locks now at 8:30. She shold be front and center in a couple minutes on the high-res camera.

 

[QUOTE=blouise;2868983]
I don't have a pickup date yet, my MA is off yesterday and today, so I will give me a call tomorrow. I ordered mine so late, that I was lucky that Buffalo still had the option for me to get it, so I am happy that I have a MINI coming at all!

I'm in the Park Ave area, so we will definitely be running into each other. It is going to be a Horizon Blue Cooper with black and black bonnet stripes!

I forget what yours looks like? [Ha! I forgot that its in your sig!!! Nevermind.... ]

 

Well, looky looky!!!

You can see the name!

 

Ooh.......cool!!!

 

I'm glad you got a picture posted, Y2K. I am taking a few screen dumps but am not smart enough to post them (I rely on my son to do things like that ). Anyway, Porgy is almost ready to leave the third lock and start the trip across Lake Gatun. I'll be watching at the Centennial Bridge (and at the Miraflores Locks later this evening).

 

And away she goes!!!!

RayRatt:
So, next viewing is the bridge? How long do you think that will take? Are you tracking her via AIS?

 

I am confused by the timestamps on the AIS tracking site (Vesseltracker.com). Either their clock is wrong, or it is corrected to another time zone. Right now (12:50 pm in Panama), the Porgy is shown as being across Lake Gatun (due east of the town La Treinticinco) and the timestamp is 4:40 am (that location map is supposed to be delayed 1 to 2 hours). Unfortunately, I did not think to check earlier to see what time it showed Porgy went thru the Gatun Locks.

The entire journey thru the canal can range from 8 to 12 hours. I think it will be closer to ten hours for the Porgy. The Centennial Bridge is about five miles "upstream" from the Miraflores Locks. The National Geographic Channel video mentioned the ships can only travel 9 mph thru the narrow portions of the canal, so I'm guessing Porgy might pass under the Centennial Bridge between 3:00 and 4:30 pm - maybe sooner, maybe later!

Porgy was the third ship in line this morning. There are two container ships ahead of Porgy - the Maersk Dartmouth (aqua blue) and the MSC Carouge (black with huge "MSC" on side). So, if you see any "big" ships going towards the Centennial Bridge other than those two (or Porgy), you are too late!

According to the schedule UAL found, Porgy is scheduled to pass thru the last Miraflores lock at 5:10 pm. She had been scheduled to enter the first Gatun lock at 8:00 am, so if that was the time she actually was supposed to "enter" the lock, she was 45 minutes late. But, if it means the time she entered the bay that leads to the Gatun Locks, she was probably right on time.

According to information on Wikipedia, traffic thru the Miraflores Locks only goes from the Pacific to the Atlantic from 6:00 am to 3:15 pm; from 3:45 pm to 11:00 pm, it only allows ships going from the Atlantic to the Pacific (two-way traffic allowed all other times). So, the earliest Porgy can go thru the Miraflores Locks is 3:45 pm - and since there are just two ships in line ahead of her, I think the 5:10 pm time UAL found is probably right.

The Expansion Program and Centennial Bridge webcams show the same stretch of the canal, so unless we are sitting at our computers watching, Porgy will probably slip by unnoticed. But, the same can be said about the Miraflores webcam - we won't have much of a window to see the Porgy.

Are we nuts or what? I never thought I would want to watch a ship cross the Isthmus like this!

 

How do you think *I* feel? It's not even my ship.

And I've got a couple work situations that need to be handled before I can leave today... At least now I don't have to worry about anything for the next several hours. Porgy is trudging through Panama, and as of 4-5 hours ago, Faust was off the AIS radar and out to sea!

 

I think we all feel like that - it is exciting watching the progress of each others ships.

 

My Wallenius Wilhelmensen contact sent another email this morning - Porgy will be berthing at the North Side Port at Port Hueneme (I think there are just a north and south berth - it is a small port). The estimated time of arrival is 6:00 am on September 18th. She is scheduled to leave at 6:00 pm that evening.

 

Clearly, after watching the Miraflores webcam, Wikipedia is wrong. There are ships heading to the Pacific using that set of locks right now (1:40 pm in Panama). So, who knows how many ships are ahead of Porgy? The two ships that I know were ahead of Porgy have now disappeared from the Vesseltracker map - you don't suppose they sank?

 

I wish work didn't bog me down so much. I just pseudo gave up on something and need to take a mental break before I overanalyze. Hopefully I can get into pickin gup the Porgy.

 

Wikipedia is wrong? no way! It's always the best source!

You never know what happened. I mean how long was Porgy sitting outside the canal waiting to start along with many many others. They may be making up for the lost time due to some mechanical issue or something. Things do break.

 

my MINI was on the Undine, unloaded in NY on 09/04. i'm in maryland. MA thinks they'll have the car friday

 

Now the Porgy has disappeared from the Vesseltracker map. This happened at the same place the Maersk Dartmouth and MSC Carouge disappeared. I guess the transmitters only broadcast a few miles?

The following info might help us guess when the Porgy will enter the Miraflores Locks - assuming Porgy shows up on Vesseltracker again.

At 1:45 pm Panama time, I saw the Zim California enter the Miraflores Lock on the real-time webcam. At the same time, the Vesseltracker map showed the Zim California was just above Las Cumbres (5:27 timestamp); at 5:51, she was at Paraiso (where the Centennial Bridge crosses the canal), at 6:01 she was near Pedro Miguel (the Expansion Project webcam is near there), which is close to where I think the locks are.

Thus, if we see Porgy on Vesseltracker anywhere near Las Cumbres (Gold Peak), she is probably actually in or near the Miraflores Locks.

If we see Porgy on the Centennial Bridge or Expansion Project webcams, she is probably about an hour away from the Miraflores Locks.

 

Within the past few days, y'all have brought me back to childhood holiday memories. My baby brother got to open his presents first and I:

A) was SO excited for him and wished that every present he opened was one on his "list" and lived vicariously through him with every rip of wrapping paper on his gifts
B) just could not wait until it was my turn

I am SO there with all of you who are on the edge of your seats either waiting for the call from your MA or watching your ship so close to arrival.

 

Wow! Things are moving fast.

I no more than posted my last message and Porgy reappeared on the Vesseltracker map - at Las Cumbres. So, I checked the Miraflores live webcam and I can see the Maersk Dartmouth (the aqua blue container ship) entering the lock. That means the MSC Carouge should be next, with Porgy right behind.

 

Did they put anything on the car at the VDC? I'm just another state away (VA) so I'm using you as a measuring stick for my own delivery angst. Where abouts in MD (to help me gauge timeframe)? Frederick?

 

So... past the bridge, and on it's way out in 6 hours????

No wai!

 

Are we looking at the same cam? I see the Maersk Sealand on the left side with another ship starting into the locks next to her.