Which Cruise Line

Trying to decide between Princess or Holland America for an 11 day Panama Canal trip from Ft. Lauderdale. Does anyone have any helpful advice? Thanks.

The Canal is the Canal no matter what cruise line you go on. One doesn't show you a different angle of the Canal.

What are the other ports? What are the fares? Do you have experience on one or the other? It looks like you have been on Princess. If you are happy with them, sail on them again.

My choice would be Princess on either Island or Coral. Those ships were especially built for going through the Canal. :)

LuLu

My choice would be Princess on either Island or Coral. Those ships were especially built for going through the Canal. :)

LuLu

The Holland America ships have as much open deck and bow space as any ships going through the Canal. In fact, some ships don't even open their bow.

I work for both and like them both, but ... usually Holland can, and will, open the foredeck for guests.

Regards, Richard

Trying to decide between Princess or Holland America for an 11 day Panama Canal trip from Ft. Lauderdale. Does anyone have any helpful advice? Thanks.

We have don both , they do a good job each one ..

Trying to decide between Princess or Holland America for an 11 day Panama Canal trip from Ft. Lauderdale. Does anyone have any helpful advice? Thanks.

I have this exact same question!

I like that the HAL 11 day includes Half Moon Cay (everybody raves about it) and Curacao (haven't been there yet). From what I'm seeing for fares, HAL is a bit less expensive.

BUT...

I do have FCC and the associated OBC with Princess. I'm glad that an itinerary with Grand Cayman is available, even though I've visited there a few times. Princess states their fees as an additional $325pp for this cruise, but I haven't come across the info for HAL yet?

DH and I enjoy Princess and like the idea that the Panama Canal ships are smaller.

Please don't be shy about what makes one better than the other in your view.

Thanks!

:D

Trying to decide between Princess or Holland America for an 11 day Panama Canal trip from Ft. Lauderdale. Does anyone have any helpful advice? Thanks.

I would recommend Holland America. Just returned end of March from this cruise. Holland America does their very best. They cannot screen their clients, so there were many obese people on board (tattoos and all!) and seemed to only be there to eat.

I would recommend Holland America. Just returned end of March from this cruise. Holland America does their very best. They cannot screen their clients, so there were many obese people on board (tattoos and all!) and seemed to only be there to eat.

I'm sorry but this doesn't make sense to me.

We took this cruise (partial transit) on Zuiderdam (which is, I presume, the ship you will be on?) three years ago and had a wonderful experience. We loved HAL for the quiet elegance, the friendly crew, the appealing layout and "nautical" feel of the ship (lots of exposure to the sea), the beautiful accommodations (cabin 6090, guarantee "superior veranda suite" -- but it was not a true "suite", and certainly not at a suite price --just a very large and lovely cabin with a fabulous bathroom! and a huge private balcony), the teak wraparound promenade deck, the tasteful and enjoyable musical entertainment scattered around the ship, the very good evening entertainment in the theater, the consistently delicious food in the MDR, the very nice room service breakfasts, the lack of children on board (sorry if this offends anyone but we cruise to get a break from children if we can), the elegant afternoon teas, the social (ballroom) dancing every night until midnight, the bow lounge, the invitation we received to the Captains' table (even though we were first time HAL cruisers and nobody of importance, I assure you)......there were so many things we loved about this cruise! We felt totally at home on Zuiderdam -- and felt like we were "cheating on" HAL when we chose another line for our most recent cruise!

Which brings me to Princess -- the line we "cheated" with :rolleyes:. Even though I was ready to simply revisit the very same Zuiderdam cruise we had taken before, in the end my husband and I chose Princess for our most recent cruise because we had long been given the impression that it might be able to compete with HAL. For us, it did not. We did not sail the Canal itinerary on Princess, but we did a Western Caribbean 7-night cruise on Caribbean Princess out of Houston. (Wonderful itinerary, BTW) We preferred our Z'dam cruise experience to our CP experience. We found Caribbean Princess to be crowded (in the public areas) and surprisingly noisy, the ship's layout was chopped up and confusing and the interior did not offer a lot of exposure to the sea (it felt more like a land hotel), MDR ("anytime dining") service was inconsistent, as was the quality and tastiness of the food (also in the buffet), afternoon tea was very nice but not as elegant or varied as on Z'dam (though the raisin scones with clotted cream on CP were to die for!) The social dancing was inferior on CP -- sometimes just recorded music, only an hour's dancing before dinner. The staff seemed sad, bored, and even disgruntled (by their own admission) on CP, and I got the feeling that the cultural differences among the crew resulted in less across-the-board harmony than we experienced on Zuiderdam, with her mostly Indonesian crew. On Princess (I think on all ships, but I don't know) the balcony cabins are tiny and don't even have the love seat or sofa which we have found to be normal for standard balcony cabins on other lines, so we had to pay extra for what Princess calls a mini-suite (but it isn't really a suite, either) which did not compare favorably with our Zuiderdam cabin. It did have a nice bathroom, but not as grand as that on Z'dam. The mini-suite balcony was disappointing: it was small (though not tiny) and completely uncovered, therefore not private and not very usable in rain or shine. Z'dam has under 2000 pax (we prefer this size), CP has over 3000, so Caribbean Princess' pools were more numerous than Zuiderdam's, and CP had a very nice outdoor no-extra-charge adults-only spa pool. Zuiderdam had a thalassotherapy pool in the spa, but at extra cost.

Long-time Princess cruisers as well as those whose first cruise experience is on Princess seem to love the line, and our Princess cruise was very nice. I doubt that you could go wrong with either line. But we are HAL fans -- that is where we feel at home, at least at the moment -- for the reasons given above.

Any comments about Celebrity for the Canal cruise?

Trying to decide between Princess or Holland America for an 11 day Panama Canal trip from Ft. Lauderdale. Does anyone have any helpful advice? Thanks.

We much prefer Celebrity to either HAL or Princess. The food is head and shoulders over Princess and we have found so many more smokers were on HAL. Celebrity and RCL BOTH prohibit smoking on balconies and this was our main problem with a balcony on Princess a few years ago having a cigar smoker on one side and cigarette smokers on the other and below! Miserable!! The Celebrity ship that sails the Panama Canal is the Infinity, which is their Millenium class and a great one. Trish

We much prefer Celebrity to either HAL or Princess. The food is head and shoulders over Princess and we have found so many more smokers were on HAL. Celebrity and RCL BOTH prohibit smoking on balconies and this was our main problem with a balcony on Princess a few years ago having a cigar smoker on one side and cigarette smokers on the other and below! Miserable!! The Celebrity ship that sails the Panama Canal is the Infinity, which is their Millenium class and a great one. Trish

Princess smoking rules have changed and smoking is no longer permitted on balconies.

I prefer Princess (Coral and Island) because of the viewing decks both fore and aft on several decks. These decks make it much easier to view the Canal without having to deal with the crowds that form on other ships.

We much prefer Celebrity to either HAL or Princess. The food is head and shoulders over Princess and we have found so many more smokers were on HAL. Celebrity and RCL BOTH prohibit smoking on balconies and this was our main problem with a balcony on Princess a few years ago having a cigar smoker on one side and cigarette smokers on the other and below! Miserable!! The Celebrity ship that sails the Panama Canal is the Infinity, which is their Millenium class and a great one. Trish

If you prefer to return to the same port, as we do, I have not found a Celebrity cruise that does this.