Cristobal excursions if we stay on the Ship...

We are planning a partial transit on the Coral, and we might be travelling with my elderly parents as well as our own 3 children. Because we want to maximize our enjoyment of the partial transit itself, we might just stay on the ship in Gatun Lake, and view the locks again as we return to sea (we are thinking about ferry excursion as well, but that might be a bit too long for my parents and youngest son, especially if it is hot...).

My question is -- when we dock at Cristobal pier in the afternoon, are there any excursions we could still take that the 3 kids would enjoy (ages at time of cruise 7, 12, and 15). My parents will probably stay on the ship and rest, but my kids would really enjoy seeing monkeys/rainforest, or doing something fun and active, if we have time. We are not especially interested in shopping....

It sounds like there are many opportunities from Gatun Lake, but we really want to stay on the ship to maximize our transit experience as well, so will we still find things to do at Cristobal Pier?

Thanks!

iYou do not will have enough time to do any tour or activity for your kids from Cristobal.

iYou do not will have enough time to do any tour or activity for your kids from Cristobal.

Sorry :( , Colon downtown is ugly despite the place is safe and the people is friendly you will feel unsafe all the time.

Hi , just back from Panama Canal full transit, we stopped at Cristobal on our way out and in my opinion you don't have time for an excursion with your family. You can get off the ship and go into the secure port area, they have folk dancing , shops and when we were there, The indians were there selling the baskets and hand work that they do also. This is a safe area , secured by the port authority. I would not take your children out of the secure port area. We enjoyed our brief time there, it has some great shopping opportunities as well. Enjoy your cruise.

Cori

We just got back from Panama Canal yesterday, we took the ocean to ocean with Coral Princess. It was a long hot day, but it was interesting.

When we returned back from our excursion into Cristobal we stayed in the little area in the port.(few shops anf a couple bars)

Only to find out once we were aboard the ship that there had been some political uprising in cristobal and know one was allowed to go down to the town, including the ( free zone) and i have also heard that they netted off the lower part of our ship while in port, for security.

This area does not look to be very safe,

I would take an excursion with the ship and you need to get off in the lake to do that, by taking the ship tour I felt very safe.

Just make sure you get up early to watch the ship go thru the locks on the way in,You will have 3 sets of locks to go thru,