Port to Locks by Cab? Safe or Not? Doable?

[nicsdad]

My husband, daughter and I are going to Panama in April. None of the shore excursions offered by the cruiseline (Carnival) really interest us, and going with a private operator kinda freaks me out because of some of the horror stories I have read about here. Between being afraid of missing the ship and picking a bad operator, we don't know what to do.

 

So, my question is this: Would it be possible and safe to get off of the ship, take a cab to the locks have a look around and then take a cab directly back to the ship, nothing else. We have ziplines, boats and beach tours lined up in our other ports, so we really just want to just show our daughter the Panama Canal. My husband and I have already sailed through them.

 

Can anyone offer any advice?

 

Thank you in advance.

[rubeus]

I'd also like to know if anyone has done this or has an opinion.

[wwinfl91]

IMHO I would not take a taxi to go anywhere in Colon if that is where your ship docks. We did the train across Panama a few years ago on a Celebrity cruise that stopped there. There were two jeeps with machine guns and several other jeeps with armed soldiers to guard our buses as we went and came back from the train.

 

Colon is evidently a very rough city that is NOT tourist or American friendly. Either try to find a reputable tour operator or do a ship's tour in this port. It is the same way we are going to be treating our stop in Columbia in April.

 

Better safe than sorry in certain ports and Colon is definitely one of those ports if you read the state department warnings and the posts on this board and others.

 

Good luck in finding something you can do and enjoy and have a great next cruise.

[lil john]

We stopped at Colon while onboard the Celebrity Zenith in 2005. We took a cab to the locks and he also took us to Portebello and to an old church. In between there was a little shopping, probably his friends selling souveniers. Then he even took us to a shopping mall. He watched the time and made sure he had us back to the ship. We did not feel unsafe one minute of the time.