Lake Gatun

“ At Gatun, the canal which has been carried through the artificial lake made by damming the Chagres River, turns sharply away from that water course on the way to the new port of Balboa. The six or eight miles of the tropical river which we are to traverse have been untouched by the activities of the canal builders. The sluggish stream flows between walls of dense green jungle, as silent as though behind their barrier only a mile or two away there were not men by the thousands making great flights of aquatic steps to lift the world’s ocean carriers over the hills. ”

“ At Gatun a dam one and one-half miles long and 115 feet high will impound the waters of the Chagres river in a lake, the normal level of which will be 85 feet above mean sea-level, A flight of three twin locks, each 1,000 feet long, 110 feet wide, and allowing for 411⁄3 feet of water over the sills, will raise vessels from sea-level to the lake, or lower them from the lake to the sea-level channel. From Gatun navigation will be through the lake in a channel from 1,000 feet to 500 feet wide for a distance of 23.59 miles to Bas Obispo where Culebra cut begins. ”

“ It is absolutely certain that there can be no deficiency of water for any conceivable traffic demands. Since the foregoing estimates were made it has been found that the Gatun Lake will have a surface area of about 164 square miles, instead of 110, as assumed. The lock dimensions have also been increased, as explained, and more water will be required for each transit through the canal. ”

“ The Pacific side is always calm, so that no difficulty of approach or exit is to be anticipated there on account of either winds, waves, or currents.
Our vessel, having been locked up to the broad surface of Lake Gatun, proceeds under her own steam and at a fair rate of speed across that lake, slowing down to about 4-1/2 miles per hour for the 9 miles of Culebra Cut, which will thus occupy two of the 8 or 10 hours in which it is hoped to accomplish the whole transit. ”

“ Any weakness in the Gatun Dam would ruin the whole project. You can see, of course, why this is so, because the water in that Gatun Lake will be relied upon to fill the locks which will raise vessels up or down.”
[179]
“But suppose the Chagres River cuts up ugly, as you said it does sometimes?” asked Merritt.
“Well,” said Rob, “I heard Mr. Mainwaring say that the great lake will be so big that a flood would affect its level no more than a cup of water poured into a bath tub. The river will merely serve to keep the lake filled and supply the water needed to work the locks.” ”

“ This, then, was the biggest problem peculiar to the high-level scheme, for the cutting through the "continental divide," though an even more titanic labour, would have had to be accomplished whatever type of canal had been adopted.
No feature of the construction has been subject to so much criticism and anxious solicitude as this Gatun dyke. On it depends the maintenance of Gatun Lake and the supply of water for the canal. If the dam fails, everything fails. The real cause of the difficulty was the foundation upon which this big artificial hill had to be laid. ”

“ The under-water and sea-level sections at either entrance will be five hundred feet wide, and through the greater part of the Gatun Lake, a ship will steam at full speed down a magnificent channel one thousand feet broad, with no more danger of washing the banks than if she were in the middle of the lower Amazon. ”

“ The spillway through which the surplus waters of Gatun Lake will be let down to the sea level, is a large semicircular concrete dam structure with the outside curve upstream and the inside curve downstream. Projecting above the dam are 13 piers and 2 abutments, which divide it into 14 openings, each of them 45 feet wide. These openings are closed by huge steel gates, 45 feet wide, 20 feet high, and weighing 42 tons each. They are mounted on roller bearings, suspended from above, and are operated by electricity. They work in huge frames just as a window slides up and down in its frame. ”

“ I could say no more, for my heart failed me, and I sat down till the wagons came up; when, pointing to the dry river-bed, I told Galton that he saw the lake before him. "Nonsense!" he replied; "it is only the end or tail of it which you see there."
After having descended into the bed, we continued to travel, at a rapid pace, about a mile in a westerly direction, when, at a bend, we discovered a large patch of green reeds. At this sight a momentary ray of hope brightened up every countenance ”

“ THE ADMINISTRATION BUILDING AT CULEBRA
Colonel Goethals’s office is in this building.
THE ANCON BASE-BALL PARK
From a photograph taken on July 4, 1912.
You must not think of the Gatun Dam as an ordinary dam, a high, thin wall holding back a body of water, but as an artificial continuation of the gently sloping hills it joins together. In cross-section it resembles the most obtuse of triangles. A cow could walk over it anywhere, and find fairly good pasturage by the way; for coarse, thick-stemmed grass springs up wherever the surface is left undisturbed for a few days. ”

“ This diagonality may result from the compound incline produced by the northern counterslope of the mountains of Karagwah and the south-westward depression necessary to form and to supply the lake. The Katonga is a sluggish and almost stagnant body of considerable breadth, and when swollen it arrests the progress of caravans. Some portions of the river are crossed, according to the Arabs, over a thick growth of aquatic vegetation, which forms a kind of matwork, capable of [188] supporting a man’s weight, and cattle are towed over in the more open parts by cords attached to their horns. ”

“ This was the Lagoon, or Etang, of Thau, a salt-water lake about a dozen of miles long, and opening up by a narrow channel—on both banks of which rises the flourishing town of Cette—into the Mediterranean. For the greater part of its length, only a strip of sand and shingle interposes between the lake and the sea, and as the steamer to which we were transferred, at the end of the canal, paddled its way to Cette, we could see every moment the surf of the open ocean rising beyond the barrier. ”

“ Double sets of locks have been built at Gatum to raise ships up from the canal, a height of eighty-five feet. Vessels of one thousand feet in length and one hundred feet beam have been anticipated, and there will be accommodation for such boats when they shall be built and present themselves for entrance to the canal. The navigation channel through the great Gatum Lake will have a depth of at least forty-five feet and a width at bottom of one thousand feet until the Culebra cutting is reached, where the width will be diminished to two hundred feet. ”

“ The man who loves the breath of the storm and the glow of excitement will loose his boat from Tallac when the clouds swing down the canyon and speed forth borne, as it were, on the wings of the waves toward the distant foot of the Lake—past the black water wall where the waves of Emerald Bay sweep into Tahoe, through the frothy waters where the wind shifts and whips around Rubicon Point, over the white caps of Meek's Bay until by skillful maneuvering the jutting cape is weathered and quieter water is found in McKinney Bay. ”

“ For the Viking and the near Viking; for the man and the woman who, for the very exhilaration of it, seek the bracing air and the snow-clad forests, Lake Tahoe is as charming in winter as in summer, and far grander. There is the same water—in morning placid, in afternoon foam-flecked, on days of storm tempestuous. The Lake never freezes; not even a film of ice fringes its edge. Sunny skies and warm noons and the Lake's own restlessness prevent. Emerald Bay alone is sometimes closed with ice, but more often it is as open as the outer Lake. ”

“ They do eat whomsoever they assault, and he that catches anybody of another tribe, kills him and eats him, as the game eaten. The situation of these lakes is from 50-56° longitude from the springs of the river, and from 6-7° latitude on the south of the equator. The Oriental lake is called Kúkû and Tamim es-Sudanese, and the occidental Damâdim and Galjûr and Hajami. ”

“ In the woods there are almonds of various kinds and superior quality. Towards the east there is another small lake called Puaja, whose waters (united with those of Rogoaguado and Yapacha) form the river Yatachico, or Black river, which is a confluent of the Mamoré. I presume the Yata Grande is only an arm of the Beni from the clearness of its waters, from the declivity of the land towards the Mamoré, and because its sources are not found in the Steppes, (Llanos) there only arising from the Black river of the Lake Rogagua of Reyes, which is a confluent of the Beni. ”

“ On the contrary, the deep-blue, pure waters of Lake Tahoe, rivaling in purity and blueness the sky itself; its clear, bright emerald shore-waters, breaking snow-white on its clean rock and gravel shores; the Lake basin, not on a plain, with mountain scenery in the distance, but counter-sunk in the mountain's top itself,—these produce a never-ceasing and ever-increasing sense of joy, which naturally grows into love. ”

“ Down into this trench we look, and opposite upon the eastern wall and crests, as we ride out to the eastern edge of the western summit. In a stretch of forty miles the chasm of it bursts into view at once, half of which is a plain sprinkled with groves of pine, and the other half an expanse of level blue that mocks the azure into which its guardian towers soar. This is Lake Tahoe, an Indian name which signifies "High Water." We descend steadily by the winding mountain-road, more than three miles to the plain, by which we drive to the shore of the Lake ”

“ It extends from a little above the town of San-tarem up to the confines of Peru, a distance of about seventeen hundred miles; and varies in width from one to twenty miles: so that the country when inundated assumes in many places the appearance of an extensive lake with forest trees growing out of the water; and travellers may proceed many hundreds of miles in their canoes without once entering the main stream of the river. At this time the natives become almost aquatic animals. Several tribes of Indians inhabit the Gapo ”

“ After some weeks of travel and inquiry, I arrived on the south side of Lake Ferran Vaz, in the territory of the Nkami tribe. The lake is about thirty miles long, by ten or twelve miles wide, and is interspersed with a few islands of various sizes, covered with a dense growth of tropical vegetation. The country about the lake is mostly low and marshy, traversed by creeks, lagoons, and rivers. Most of the land is covered by a deep and dreary jungle, intersected at intervals by small, sandy plains, covered with a thin growth of long, tough grass. ”

“ In the troughs between them the salt-dust driven by the wind collects, and lends to the ice-field a curious appearance like watered silk. All the eastern half of the lake is concealed by the rocky promontories near which our camp, No. 99, is pitched. We penetrate more deeply into the southern bay. Yaks graze on the slopes, and towards evening are driven down by a man. To the south also we catch sight of tents, yaks, and groups of kiangs. From our low point of view they seem to be moving in the midst of the lake; the acuteness of the angle of elevation deceives us. ”

“ The water is salt, though an abundance of fish live in it, and it often remains frozen for three months together in winter. The surface is at times subject to considerable variations of level. The lake is entered on the west by the river Buhain-gol. The nomads who dwell round its shores are Tanguts. ”

“ The lake is two miles long and a mile broad, and according to native accounts very deep. To the east extended a succession of swamps, hidden under a luxuriant growth of high grass; careful search discovered no springs or streams as sources of supply, although doubtless the former exist, as there is a constant outflowing of water. It is probably also a reservoir, filled annually by the overflow of the Tapeng, which during the rainy season frequently floods the level plain to a depth of two feet for some days at a time, the flood suddenly rising and as suddenly subsiding. ”

“ Concerted action is with them impossible. Thirty or forty villages are built around the lake. They are so thickly grouped, however, that one might as well regard them all as one metropolis. The mountains form a background for the lake, which is located on a high plateau. The climate here is more suggestive of a temperate zone than of a place within four hundred miles of the equator, [266] and the nights are often disagreeably cold. To become a datto it is only necessary to possess a few slaves, wives, and carabao. ”

“ Many other peaks and domes with eternal snow rise over this sea of tumbled waves, but, after all, the finest sight is the lake itself, which charms and fascinates the spectator by its intense ultramarine hue, a couple of shades deeper and stronger than turquoise. When one first comes to the saddle of the pass and this wealth of colouring strikes the retina, one can scarcely restrain an exclamation of astonishment and admiration. We look down straight on the lake, and its southern shore is just below us. ”