Panama Canal on Island Princess 10/17-11/1 Photo Review

[RRFPresident]

Going up!

 

This was on the Hong Kong ship and everyone was joking that it looked like the rescue craft from the Captain Phillips movie:

 

We decided to visit the buffet while here for a snack and I found what looked like a cross between a doughnut and a cinnamon bun. Found a table to enjoy our snack and people watch.

 

Entering the Pedro Miguel Locks:

 

They wanted to make sure we felt "welcome"

 

Centennial Bridge:

[RRFPresident]

Been noticing several times throughout this voyage that the lights will flicker in various places around the ship including our cabin. With a lighter Patter schedule, we didn't have much to rush around for this day and returned to our cabin to relax.

 

The Panama Canal's own waterfall:

 

 

I thought it was funny that the sign they put with lox and bagel in the buffet just said "public health advisory." Was the public being advised that it was lox and bagel or that it was healthy or what? This concludes your moment of randomness for this post:

 

A few more where are we now updated pictures from the balcony led me to discover the most likely only other under 45 passengers on this sailing. Our balcony neighbors, judging solely by looks as any attempt at friendliness got simply dirty looks in return, seemed to be in their 20s and had decided that their way of seeing such an engineering wonder of the world was to affix several film and recording devices to their balcony and its railing. These devices jutted out from the side of the ship and partially blocked the view looking forward. Every once in a while, they'd bother to return to the balcony to check batteries or move the cameras to a different angle.

 

Is it wrong that I was tempted to reach out and relieve them of their toys:

[RRFPresident]

One of the tricks we used while in our cabin is to tune our TV to the bridge cam. While the commentary wasn't broadcast to our balconies directly, we could see and hear when Bill Keene pointed out something as it passed the front of our ship and then go out to the balcony to see it by the time our half of the ship passed it. Spent the next hour or so alternating between watching the cabin TV and viewing from our balcony.

 

I had stepped back into the cabin to make some notes and left the sliding door open to go back and forth as we passed new picture worthy sights. As I sat on our couch, I heard our balcony neighbors (at the time I wasn't sure it was the same people until later) doing what sounded like emptying a whole can of some sort of aerosol spray. The sound lasted for several minutes. A short while later, I had the unfortunate pleasure of the wind shifting and was overcome with the smell of whatever they'd been spraying.

 

Once we had entered Gatun Lake, Dad and I decided to head down to the dining room for a more relaxing lunch. We shared a full table with several other couples but this time the wait staff waited until everyone had arrived to take orders or at least start delivering food. When the waiter asked for our orders, I thought he had asked if we really didn't want anything from the soup list so I said no. As we were finishing up our meal, I watched as the waiter brought a few of our tablemates their desserts. Several of us asked why we hadn't been offered dessert too and another tablemate explained that when the waiter had taken our orders, he'd actually asked “No sweet?” when I thought he'd said soup! We quickly were given dessert menus and served our choices though Dad spent the rest of the cruise wishing he could have tried the walnut cake when he saw what it looked like.

 

The one “sea day” offering they still had scheduled was the Bridge Players Get Together so Dad went to go play after lunch and I returned to the little alcove as we had just approached Gatun Locks. That idea was soon thwarted though as a rainstorm moved in and my little clear window find became more of a view into what it would look like through a submerged submarine window.

 

I returned to the cabin and did my best to take pictures on our balcony in between rain bursts. At one point, the skies cleared for a while only to have another rain cell move up from the back of the ship.

 

One of the perks of a Caribe deck half covered/half uncovered balcony:

 

This picture reminded me of the show Battlebots:

 

Ladies and gentleman - your Panamanian synchronized mule team:

 

A good representation of the different compartments:

[RRFPresident]

I also may have a slight obsession with lighthouses

 

Now in Gatun Locks:

 

I did admit I had an obsession (the backside once we passed the lighthouse):

[RRFPresident]

I noticed that the side of the Hong Kong ship had measurements on the side so here is my pictorial representation of their ship being lowered in the lock:

 

Oh you thought there'd be a post without a lighthouse photo? Hah!

 

Oh those Battlebots are at it again:

[RRFPresident]

Nearing the end of Gatun Locks:

 

A small bridge for car traffic across the locks themselves:

 

The end of the line, a.k.a. mule parking lot:

[RRFPresident]

It was almost funny to be watching the dark clouds and rain from our balcony and hearing Bill all the way forward say “I'm being told that there's a rainstorm coming up from the aft section of the boat so be prepared for that everyone up here!” When the rain started to get heavier for a while, I decided to take a break from picture taking, put on my hooded raincoat, and just stood out there on the balcony watching and enjoying the experience despite getting soaked to the core. Depending on the places we visit and activities we do, I can come home with anywhere from 2,000 to 8,000 pictures so it was nice to have an excuse to just be in the moment.

 

After Dad was done with bridge, we met back up to play afternoon trivia. Once again we had to split up our new friends into two teams. This time we beat the other team but didn't win the game itself. Headed over to the Elite etc cocktail hour and ended up running into Tim and his wife from our roll call who'd had to change to this cruise at the last minute after the Pacific Princess got damaged and canceled their upcoming sailings. As we chatted while waiting for our drinks, the lights in the lounge went out. The colored spotlights for the nearby stage were still lit so we knew it wasn't a bigger power issue. Dad joked that he doesn't need lights as long as the blender still works. I added that this is why Princess gives out those little flashlight keychains as prizes. The lights did come back on about 10 minutes later but then soon dimmed again.

 

By now, we had finished going through the locks themselves and enjoyed the view from our balcony as Bill pointed out the cut where the French first tried digging their canal.

 

Goodbye Panama Canal, you were certainly a sight to see:

 

After a quick change for dinner, we returned to the dining room for our favorite table 69 with Berin and Pedro. For dessert, Dad chose the “Create your own sundae” option and asked for chocolate ice cream, chocolate syrup, and whipped cream. When Berin repeated it to be sure he had it right, I joked that it was too bad there isn't chocolate whipped cream or he'd choose that too. I ordered the french vanilla crème brulee; that plus the always available cheesecake or ice cream were frequently my dessert choices as most of the themed desserts had ingredients I didn't like. I did go for the Love Boat Dream once or twice on this voyage. As Berin walked away, he kept reciting Dad's sundae combination over and over and it turns out that he thought we both wanted sundaes. A little extra dessert never hurt anyone, right?

 

The sun sets on another successful canal passage:

[RRFPresident]

On our Grand Med cruise, we attended Princess' version of Ye Olde Pub Night and found it delightful so we were glad to see it again on this cruise. We smartly decided to join our trivia friends for Name that tune British themed not only for the fun but because it meant we already had a seat come time for the pub night show. While the premise was mostly the same, save poor Emma who had to do redo her entrance as this was her first time doing the show, it was still funny to watch. The dancers sang and performed a routine with the cruise staff and Cruise Director Mike shared hosting duties with Matt.

 

 

Cruise Director Mike:

 

DJ Delite, Neesa, and Armando:

 

I guess Armando didn't like the next joke:

 

They featured the bit where Matt tries to tell a story and gets constantly interrupted by cruise staff who want to tell jokes.

 

Matt isn't happy to be interrupted by Chad:

 

Or Armando:

[RRFPresident]

Does Neesa fare better?

 

Not sure DJ even found his own joke funny:

 

Emma gets to tell her first joke during her first Pub Night:

 

And Armando told another to close out the comedic portion:

 

Passengers were then enlisted to compete against each other in various physical challenges winning themselves each a water bottle. Little song book brochures were passed out to the audience and we were led in singalongs that included physical actions.

 

DJ Delite played the part of the rotund bobby cop who comes to break up the festivities.

 

A quick trip to the Horizon Court for some late night munchies and off to our cabin for the night after a very early morning and long day.

[RRFPresident]

lol I wonder what the public advisory was supposed to be...

 

My only guess is that it was a seafood allergy warning because not everyone would see the word lox and know that it's salmon.

[RRFPresident]

We have a pattern of planning something for every port when we cruise only to be burned out by the end and decide to cancel our excursion or tour. This time the victim port was Cartagena where we decided a couple days before we were to dock here that our private tour scheduled with Dora the Explorer for $160 per person just wasn't worth it. We re-read the description provided for our arranged tour and our tired bodies were turned off by the idea of just seeing more old churches and lots of walking. Since none of these tours we booked privately required any money up front, our only consideration was letting the company know enough in advance that we wanted to cancel. Another nice perk use with our given internet minutes. This was also our shortest time in port, 8AM -1:30PM so it would have been a day of rushing around.

 

Our view from the balcony:

 

Looks like there were plans for a catamaran tour or two:

 

Off to Sabatinnis for breakfast – quick food delivery but never saw water refilled. Went off to morning trivia with Armando where only three teams worth of passengers showed up to play. Won another carabeener.

 

After playing trivia with Sue and our Battle of the Sexes original scribe Lorrie, the four of us decided to head over to the Wheelhouse Bar and play Win Lose Or Draw. It was a riot watching Sue try to follow us on the slowest scooter in town. I stopped halfway down the corridor before realizing she wasn't behind us and gave her the chance to catch up. Once we reached Wheelhouse, we were the only ones who showed up to play. DJ Delite ran the game and we split into two teams, Lorrie and I and Sue and Dad. No prizes offered for this game but it was nice to chat more intimately with DJ and our small group as we played. DJ kept trying to entice us to join him at Champagne Hoopla (ring toss over the bottle is how he described it). Here is where the term “champoo” started because DJ told us the staff calls the champagne they give away “champoo” because it only costs them 10 cents. As we were chatting, a fellow passenger we'd seen during other games came through the bar letting everyone know that the ship had been scraped against the sides of the canal when we went through. They had been heading out to enjoy the port and passed by crew members having to repaint the side of the ship.

 

We stuck around for Scattegories hosted by Armando and our team was rounded out by a young man who said he plays the game on his tablet all the time. This time, we had several people show up to play so it was our team, another team of a couple ladies, and this big team of at least 6 ladies. Dad kept getting mixed up while playing because he'd give great answers to the categories but they didn't fit the starting letter we had to use. It became a running joke when we'd reveal answers as the larger group of ladies always seemed to have 1 or 2 that didn't seem to be paying attention. Everyone would give their answers and 30 seconds to 1 minute later, one of them would ask what our team had given for an answer as if Armando had forgotten to ask us. I think being the youngest team playing we had our share of crass answers like a**hole for things that smell but we got Armando laughing so hard he couldn't talk when we used his name for “things in this room.” No prize offered for this game either.

 

Headed out to the promenade deck for some port pictures but they had the outside blocked off partly for refueling and the inside blocked off for a crew drill:

 

Oh look, no one cares about the sun deck anymore now that we've left the canal:

[RRFPresident]

The top decks provided a much more tropical view of the port. Is that a tiny lighthouse I see?

 

Just a little ocean front property:

 

This grey ship was such a stark contrast to the white buildings:

 

This is the little wading pool on the top deck. The water was so clear I had to stick my hand in and slosh it around to be sure there was really water inside:

 

I feel like this should be a question on the old inkblot test. If you look at this picture and see the profile of a lady with flowing hair, I officially diagnose you as being on a Princess cruise! (Logo on the bottom of the main pool):

[bettty45]

Can you tell me how the wifi is on the ship and what it cost?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[RRFPresident]

Princess' partnership with Discovery has resulted in a very literal meaning - doesn't everyone tune to Discovery At Sea on the big MUTS screen to "discover a sea?"

 

Dad and I headed up for a quick lunch at the grill where they were offering a “3-cheese” cheeseburger as the theme dish on the menu. I ordered a 3-cheese cheeseburger and a hot dog so it was really confusing when the sweet lady working the grill kept trying to give me plate after plate of cheeseburger. I repeated my request for the hot dog which she started cooking but she still couldn't understand why I wasn't taking the cheeseburger plates. Finally she said “but you asked for 3 cheeseburgers” and I realized she'd misunderstood and pointed out the wording on the menu sign. The other lady working the grill offered to add the other two cheeses to my already cooked burger and then my hot dog was added to the plate. Probably would have been better had my other cheeses been able to melt on the cooking burger taste wise but still satisfying our main goal of hunger relief.

 

Dad decided to skip bridge playing today in favor of getting his chance to swim but the Lotus spa pool was a lot more crowded today than it had been when I swam. His swim time turned into more of a stand against the wall and tread water time. Meanwhile I headed down to Goofy Golf Putting Challenge with Armando. It turned out to be a cup taped to the floor on its side that Armando stood over while we tried putting a golf ball into the cup. I warned Armando that he may not want to stand there straddling the cup given how I nearly took away DJ's livelihood earlier this cruise. A handful of fellow mini-olympic players showed up to participate and even so it took us 2 rounds to get someone to even make it into the cup. Dave, our fellow crocodile boat rider in Costa Rica, finally sunk his putt into the cup and won the bottle of champagne. He gave the bottle to fellow players Amanda and Sue. We chatted for a little bit afterwards as a group and one of the other men playing asked if I was heading up to bingo now because he always sees me there. Hmm, more like I'm always standing there waiting for bingo to finish so I can get in to play trivia!

 

On a funny note, prior to this cruise I had been chatting with a couple people on a Facebook group dedicated to our sailing about meeting up on board. Unfortunately, we never made firm plans for a sail-away meetup and I rested my way through sail-away anyway. Wasn't until we returned home and I was posting to the main group page about a future cruise plan that the same ladies posted again to comment about how unfortunate it was that we didn't get to meet. However, once I saw their pictures on Facebook, I realized that they were the Amanda and Sue we'd played mini-Olympics games and carpet bowling with all voyage long! We'd actually spent loads of time together and didn't even realize it!

 

Met back up with Dad for our usual afternoon trivia, also run by Armando. I joked that at this point I was just spending my day following Armando around and he laughed perhaps a little too nervously.

 

Took in the early showtime billed as the “comedy and music” of Duncan Tuck. I think at one point he even poked fun at the reference to comedy in the Patter's description of his show because at most he told a few funny stories in between song performances. Duncan was very talented on the various instruments he used during the show.

 

Discovered a nice surprise left in our cabin mailbox - guess we're now all official and stuff:

 

A quick change back in the cabin as tonight was formal night for dinner. We returned to our usual table of 69 with Berin and Pedro. After turning down the nightly basket of bread offering due to it being the hard and crusty style rolls for most of the voyage, I finally took the initiative to ask if any other rolls were available and Berin was gracious enough to seek out a basket full of the soft rolls from the buffet. He promised to always have these soft rolls for our table for the rest of the cruise. I'm not sure if my hips thank him but my taste buds sure did! Also this night I asked for the lobster and prawn entree to be just two lobster tails and there was no issue whatsoever. Another night, Dad didn't like the vegetable side dish that came with the prime rib so he ordered two pieces of prime rib with no resistance. This kind of service on a cruise is really appreciated and I wish it was always this nice and accommodating!

 

After dinner we joined our new trivia friends in the Explorer's lounge for Movie Theme Name That Tune Trivia with Mr. “It's a classic” himself, Armando. We had so many people in our group show up to play that Rhonda and Rich turned being the extra two players into a joke of having to pantomime the answers if they wanted to contribute.

 

Our Progressive Trivia teammate Bonnie had told us that she spotted a nice close up picture of me in the photo gallery but when we stopped after trivia to look for it, we could only find the few standard shots that were taken when I got roped into posing by a bored photographer. We took the stack up to the photo counter and they were able to use the code on the back of the print to look up the exact folder and file from that photographer's session so we could all see that there were no more photos of me from that evening. Dad suggested that Bonnie must have just thought it was a close up because my face was the only part of the picture visible above the shelf line in the display. Being a photographer myself and perhaps a little super OCD in organization, I was impressed with the system the ship's photography department uses.

 

Another snack run before returning to the cabin again for the night. We also had to turn our clocks forward another hour before bed.

[RRFPresident]

Can you tell me how the wifi is on the ship and what it cost?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Wifi was actually pretty good. We brought a tablet and a smartphone and only once or twice did I have trouble connecting in the cabin. I get a lot of email daily (most of it requiring no response) so after a while I switched to routine sessions at the Internet Café just to clear out my inbox. The Café computers worked very well and I never had any connectivity issues there.

 

We had 500 minutes between the two of us as an Elite perk and never went over that but here's the breakdown in plans based on how many minutes you want (sorry for the slight blurriness):

[bettty45]

Thanks for that quick response and info!! Overall would you say you had a good time and found the ship to be in good repair? How were the mattresses and pillows? Any noise issues in your room?

 

 

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[RRFPresident]

Thanks for that quick response and info!! Overall would you say you had a good time and found the ship to be in good repair? How were the mattresses and pillows? Any noise issues in your room?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Yes, overall I would say that I had a good time, both onboard and in ports. I've had cruises where the ship was less than memorable but the ports were amazing. The ship itself did seem in good repair give or take the lighting issues I already mentioned and the door handle. The door handle was fixed within a day. There were some dips in the floor you could feel as you walked but the floor and the carpet itself was completely fine. That may have been more noticeable to me since we made the route of aft elevators to Sabatinnis to Explorer's Lounge over and over so I would anticipate having to walk over each dip.

 

The mattresses and pillows were just fine. I don't know if we had this new bedding that's been rolling out but the only issue I had with our beds was the sheets not covering. Could really have used a top sheet in between the one covering the mattress and the top duvet sheet thing. As far as noise issues in our room, the only thing I recall is the crew closet being across the hall so when the stewards stood in the hallway to get their carts ready it sounded like they were about to knock at our cabin door. Once I got used to that noise (especially when it occurred during their usual expected cabin cleaning times), it didn't make me jump up as much.

[bettty45]

Yes, overall I would say that I had a good time, both onboard and in ports. I've had cruises where the ship was less than memorable but the ports were amazing. The ship itself did seem in good repair give or take the lighting issues I already mentioned and the door handle. The door handle was fixed within a day. There were some dips in the floor you could feel as you walked but the floor and the carpet itself was completely fine. That may have been more noticeable to me since we made the route of aft elevators to Sabatinnis to Explorer's Lounge over and over so I would anticipate having to walk over each dip.

 

 

 

The mattresses and pillows were just fine. I don't know if we had this new bedding that's been rolling out but the only issue I had with our beds was the sheets not covering. Could really have used a top sheet in between the one covering the mattress and the top duvet sheet thing. As far as noise issues in our room, the only thing I recall is the crew closet being across the hall so when the stewards stood in the hallway to get their carts ready it sounded like they were about to knock at our cabin door. Once I got used to that noise (especially when it occurred during their usual expected cabin cleaning times), it didn't make me jump up as much.

 

 

 

Thank you again. I love reading your posts.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jonj]

Followin

 

 

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[Woobstr112G]

Wifi was actually pretty good. We brought a tablet and a smartphone and only once or twice did I have trouble connecting in the cabin. I get a lot of email daily (most of it requiring no response) so after a while I switched to routine sessions at the Internet Café just to clear out my inbox. The Café computers worked very well and I never had any connectivity issues there.

 

We had 500 minutes between the two of us as an Elite perk and never went over that but here's the breakdown in plans based on how many minutes you want (sorry for the slight blurriness):

 

Did they offer bonus minutes for each package on embarkation day?

 

Bob

[delidan]

Gee a photo of the new canal would have been nice.

[BillB48]

Gee a photo of the new canal would have been nice.

 

 

Go to this post... http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showpost.php?p=51642653&postcount=118

 

About the 5th picture down is a ship in the new Cocoli Locks. Actually there is very little changed that you see with the "new" Canal... the only real difference would be in which locks you used. The route of the Canal remains largely unchanged.:)

[RRFPresident]

Did they offer bonus minutes for each package on embarkation day?

 

Bob

 

Yes, here's what the Embarkation Day Patter reads:

 

Embarkation Special

Purchase an Internet Time Plan today and receive up to 40 additional minutes FREE!*

40 minutes free with Time Plan 1, 30 minutes free with Time Plan 2, 20 minutes free with Time Plan 3, 10 minutes free with Time Plan 4.

*Not valid in conjunction with other promotions or benefits.

[RRFPresident]

Gee a photo of the new canal would have been nice.

 

Here's a couple more photos of the new canal in addition to the ones I included in the previous post:

 

More to follow...

[RRFPresident]

Gee a photo of the new canal would have been nice.