Panama & Suez Canal 2005

Mira Flores Locks , Panama Canal

Due to the Panama Canal having a lot of heavy security along its length, the best views are at a few designated places. This is one of them; Mira Flores locks. Tourists arrive by the coach load, but rarely stay longer than an hour, because the scene could get a bit repetitive, one big tanker after another.

I was most impressed by the use of the water its self, raising and dropping tankers weighing thousands of tons in less than 10 minutes. This is the reason why I have paid special attention to the colour of the water to give it more importance.

It cost this tanker $170 thousand dollars for passage through the canal and still it was going to make a saving. She is of a Panamex design, built especially to pass through the Panama Canal, with barely a foot to spare on either side.

Acrylic on canvas, 90 / 70 cm
by Simon Bird £300

View from The colonel Hotel, Santa Maria, Panama city

Beneath the Hotel you can see the once upmarket area of town, which is now badly run down. In the distance the ships can be seen entering and leaving the Canal as a never ending stream of bright and polished tankers.

From the year 2004 The United States have handed back full running and economic control of the Canal to the Government of Panama. The public, however, says that the huge revenue generated by the Canal is not being spent on developing the country as a whole.

Acrylic on canvas, 90 / 70 cm
by Simon Bird £250

Port Said, Suez canal, Egypt.

I spent the first 2 hours waiting for a ship to come along then when one did I found I hadn’t left enough room on the picture to fit it all in.

Ink & watercolour on paper, 75/55 cm
by Simon Bird £200