History and Nature of the Emblematic Panama Canal

Trace the Canal’s story where history meets living nature.

Begin at the neoclassical Administration Building, the historic headquarters that frames the Canal’s story. Then cruise the open waters of Gatún Lake, where rainforest meets shipping lanes and freighters glide past while you watch for monkeys, toucans, and crocodiles along green shorelines. Pause for lunch at Gamboa, and finish at Miraflores, where your guide brings the engineering to life from the viewing terraces. (VIP access is also available).

Note: museum exhibitions at Miraflores are currently unavailable.

The Panama Canal isn’t just a shortcut between oceans—it’s a living corridor where engineering, geography, and wildlife converge.

The Panama Canal is a living corridor where engineering and wild nature share the same horizon. Your day opens at the stately Administration Building, inaugurated in 1914 and long the Canal’s historic headquarters. From its hilltop colonnades, the narrative shifts from plans and people to water and rainforest.

On Gatún Lake—the vast reservoir formed by the Chagres River—you board a comfortable boat and slip into the Canal’s everyday rhythm. Out in the lake, away from the locks, ships glide by along the transit routes while, closer in, the shoreline comes alive: howler calls in the canopy, bright birds cutting across the sky, and the quiet stillness of hidden coves. With a bit of luck, capuchin monkeys, sloths, herons, or a basking crocodile make an appearance.

Come ashore for lunch at Gamboa, a relaxed break in the rainforest setting. Then continue to Miraflores, where your guide ties it all together—how rainfall feeds the lake, how the locks use that water, and why this 50-mile passage still shapes global trade. From the viewing terraces (VIP access is also available), you can watch the choreography up close as ships rise and descend through the chambers, tugs assisting and gates sliding with precise calm. 

By day’s end, you’ve seen the Canal from every angle: conceived in stone, powered by a lake, performed in steel—history and nature telling the same remarkable story.