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How to pick a cruise line to go all the way through panama canal


rlgilchrist
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My husband and I want to cruise through the Panama Canal in Jan 2020. We have only gone on Carnival and they don't have a full through. We are in our early 60's, can someone recommend a good cruise line

 

A quick search online and you will find Princess, Holland America and Norwegian all have full transit cruises in Jan 2020. Any of those should be comparable to Carnival.

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Hi,

We have also cruised a lot on Carnival and are a little older than you guys.

We are trying Princess for the full transit of the canal in December.

They have some very good deals on through the year with free gratuities,+OBC etc. Look around and see what you can find.

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Having sailed the Canal 4 times on 2 different cruise lines, and not making a recommendation based on cruise line loyalty, I need to say the Canal is the Canal, and cruise line doesn't change that. So you have to look at other things.

 

First, schedule and other ports. What works for you in terms of when you can go, and how long you can go. Hard to do a full transit in less than 14 days. Does that figure into your limitations?

 

Interesting things like...is the bow open during the transit? The bow is a very unique place to view at least one of the lock transits.

 

Don't get into "This cruise line is the best for the Canal", or "that ship was built for Canal transits". That is more hype that reality.

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Choose a ship that has a full wrap around promenade deck. Although many feel a balcony is a must, spending the transit on your balcony limits what you can see. You want to be able to move around as the scene changes. EM

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Welcome to Cruise Critic:D! As if you did not already have enough things to try and sort through in trying to find the "best" cruise line, let me add one more thing. Which locks do you want to use when you go on your full transit cruise? That is another factor in deciding which cruise line you select. Many of the cruise lines do not have all of their ships committed yet for 2020 and beyond, so there may be more to select from as 2020 approaches. I would recommend you select a full transit using the old locks for your first Canal cruise and then at a later date take a cruise using the new locks.

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We cruised on the Windstar cruise line for our full transit of the Panama Canal. It was breathtaking and everything I had hoped for! Being on a small ship allowed us to wander all over from bow to stern, port to starboard with always a place to watch the action. I agree with CruiseBruce when he says it’s also about other ports and length of the cruise. I’m not sure Windstar has all of their 2020 cruises set yet but you can look at 2019 to get an idea of what they offer. We love Windstar and head out on our Mediterranean back2back2back on Wind Surf next month!

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We cruised on the Windstar cruise line for our full transit of the Panama Canal. It was breathtaking and everything I had hoped for! Being on a small ship allowed us to wander all over from bow to stern, port to starboard with always a place to watch the action. I agree with CruiseBruce when he says it’s also about other ports and length of the cruise. I’m not sure Windstar has all of their 2020 cruises set yet but you can look at 2019 to get an idea of what they offer. We love Windstar and head out on our Mediterranean back2back2back on Wind Surf next month!

 

We've selected one of the Windstar Panama Canal and Costa Rica cruises for a full transit next January. There itineraries in Panama are quite different from the mainstream lines as most of them run between Panama (Colon) and Costa Rica (Puerto Caldera). There are multiple port days in Costa Rica and Panama. Some of the cruises start or end in a Caribbean port as they shift a ship from the Caribbean to Panama/Costa Rica sailings.

 

The early 2020 Wind Star Panama Canal and Costa Rica sailings are on the schedule now. Wind Star is a ~140 passenger ship. In recent years, they have also done some Panama and Costa Rica cruises with Star Breeze which is a somewhat larger ~210 passenger ship. There is transit in Star Legend (sister ship to Star Breeze) in October 2019 as part of repositioning from Alaska to the Caribbean. If she goes back to Alaska in 2020, there could be transits in 2020.

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My husband and I want to cruise through the Panama Canal in Jan 2020. We have only gone on Carnival and they don't have a full through. We are in our early 60's, can someone recommend a good cruise line

 

Carnival has a Panama Canal full transit in February 2020

 

https://www.carnival.com/itinerary/13-day-panama-canal-cruise/san-diego/miracle/13-days/jp1

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We have booked HAL Rotterdam for February 2020, Ft Lauderdale to San Diego. We chose this based on the promenade deck, which we really liked to be out on during both Alaska cruises, and the ports of call offered. Also, since we travel with a wheelchair, this itinerary only has one tendered port (the HAL private island). We also have never been to San Diego, so decided that would be a great place to spend a few days post-cruise.

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  • 2 weeks later...
We have booked HAL Rotterdam for February 2020, Ft Lauderdale to San Diego. We chose this based on the promenade deck, which we really liked to be out on during both Alaska cruises, and the ports of call offered. Also, since we travel with a wheelchair, this itinerary only has one tendered port (the HAL private island). We also have never been to San Diego, so decided that would be a great place to spend a few days post-cruise.

 

Great choice to stay in San Diego for a few days. So much to see and do. Enjoy.

 

We picked the Carnival Legend for our PC cruise. October 2019. LA to Tampa. It will be nice to disembark and be home in 20 minutes. Very excited. Just 14 months to go.

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