Island Princess Panama

[lkrcanada]

Help from others who have cruised on this ship before?

Any independent ideas on how to see the canal instead of the Princess tour?

Also any tour group names for Cartagena and Puerto Limon?

We have only cruised one other time on RCI and loved it and are very excited about this adventure.

Many Thanks

[tmitchell82]

Help from others who have cruised on this ship before?

Any independent ideas on how to see the canal instead of the Princess tour?

Also any tour group names for Cartagena and Puerto Limon?

We have only cruised one other time on RCI and loved it and are very excited about this adventure.

Many Thanks

 

I assume you are doing the round trip from FLL. At Panama, you can only get off the ship after you enter the canal if you are on a Princess sponsored tour. Otherwise, you have to wait till you dock in Cristobal.

 

As for Cartagena, we did a tour through Lee Miles. Was a great tour and saw so much of the city. I was very impressed with the tour. I would definitely recommend his tours. Had a guide and a van with 8 of us, so it was very nice.

 

We did a ships tour in Limon, so no idea about independent tour groups. I will say one thing, and that is that there is not much at the port area. You really need to go further into the country to see it.

 

Enjoy the cruise.

 

Tim

[Loonbeam]

As noted Princess is your only option for doing tours in the Canal.

 

I did a detailed review of excursions here from our trip in October...

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1508966

 

To me, Lee Miles is a no-brainer decision in Cartagena and we were very happy with JJ in Limon...

[2little time]

Help from others who have cruised on this ship before?

Any independent ideas on how to see the canal instead of the Princess tour?

Also any tour group names for Cartagena and Puerto Limon?

We have only cruised one other time on RCI and loved it and are very excited about this adventure.

Many Thanks

 

Lucky you! The Island is a wonderful ship.

[lkrcanada]

Thank you so much for the information and especially on the locks tour. May stay on the ship or take a tour to the village. Many many thanks.

[Sham21]

Island Princess:D

just returned fron the Island Princess new years cruise and all I can say is you will LOVE it.The ship the staff everything was wonderful.We think the size is perfect for cruising.Ship was fully booked but still did not seem crowded.Not enough minor issues to even discuss (things happen)

We arranged tours on the dock and had great service,price and value for the money.

Try Try Try to do the Chefs table (was a highlite for us) and while Sabbattini's has dropped in quality the Bayou more than made up for it to us.

Go with a open mind and enjoy it was one of the best cruises we have been on.

[lkrcanada]

Thanks!! Talked to a couple who just returned and they recommended highly the train to Panama City. Any thoughts. Also thinking of ship tour.

[silverjoe]

Hi:

 

We took this cruise last year on the Coral Princess. We used Dora in Cartegena and she was great. Easy to find her on Google, and she did our tour. In Puerto Limon, we used Your lucky tours. We had originally booked with Okey Dokey tours but read a lot of negative reviews so we switched to YLT. Eduardo from YLT was very good with his communication, and he was up front with the fact that he was not going to be our tour guide as he was tied up with a large ship tour. We were to have a tour guide and a driver, but when we showed up our tour guide was our driver as well. Our driver also did arrive a little late, but he was fine and we felt we had a very good tour. We did the rain forest sanctuary as well as the canals tour and enjoyed each. Ask your guide to bring you to the supermarket in downtown Puerto Limon before returning to the ship. We were able to purchase local coffee for a lower price than at the open market by the cruise port. Just remember that you will get back local currency as change, so try to pay as close to exact as possible.

 

Two words of caution though about Puerto Limon. After leaving the ship you go through a fence to the tour guides. There will be a number of tour companies there and some will try to convince you to go with them. Only go with the tour guide that has the sign with your name on it. The second thing is make sure you confirm who your tour guide is. Our's was very good, but another group from our ship had a young girl as a tour guide and her English was not good and she really didn't do a very good job speaking about her country. No matter what, Costa Rica is a beautiful country and you will enjoy your time there.

 

Someone asked about the ships tour in the Panama Canal. As our cruise was a partial transit, we did enjoy the ferry trip through to the Pacific side. We felt that you experienced the canal much closer and personal then on the ship. We enjoyed the day, and the tour guide who brought us back to the ship by bus was a hoot.

[apeller]

We also were on the Island over New Years and we booked independent tours everywhere we could. We used the same places as Silverjoe. In Cartagena we used "Dora the Explorer" from www.cartagenatour.com and she was great. In Limon, Costa Rica we toured with Eduardo from Lucky Tours yourluckytour@gmail.com.

We did the Gatun Lake and Locks Cruise & Embera Indians tour with the ship in Panama. It was a fabulous trip and we enjoyed all the tours.