Need input on 3 ship tour choices while at Panama Canal

We are taking the "Pacific Panama Canal" Princess cruise, Los Angeles to Los Angeles. We'll be at the Panama Canal overnight (I would assume the Gatun Lake) then turn around and go back through again.

There are 3 interesting tours we could book: Panama Canal Railway (we'd try for the dome car), Panama Canal by boat (we have one person in our party that has walking problems and would stay on the ship if embarkation is difficult), and lastly, Highlights of Panama.

I would really appreciate hearing from anyone that has done one of the above tours. Thanks in advance. I don't know how we ever traveled without cruisecritic information!

Sandy

Sandy:

Surprised you are not getting any input. We did the Panama Canal last April and our choice was the Ferry. It was interesting, but also very long. I don't think your shipmate who has a walking problem would have any problem with this tour. However, I don't know just how big the problem is.

Some in our crowd did the Dome Car. Some loved it, and others didn't. Am sure these comments really help you. LOL :confused:

Rick

Hi Sandy, This is Patty from Durango. We are doing a caribbean tour and will only be in Colon but I have heard from people that the railroad is good. ;)

We were just on a partial transit on the Coral Princess, and elected to take the "Panama canal by boat" excursion. The ship will arrive at the canal early in the morning, giving you the chance to experience the Gatun locks from the open decks. After transiting the Gatun locks, you can either stay on board, and watch again as the ship exits the canal and then proceeds to the Cristobal pier; alternatively, and ONLY if you have a princess excursion, you can tender off the ship in Gatun lake, go on your excursion, and then re-join the ship at cristobal pier.

We took the panama canal by boat excursion, which was long but wonderful. This involves boarding a motorcoach for a 1.5 hour ride to a yacht harbor on the other side of gatun lake. You then travel by small boat through the rest of the canal, including the other 2 sets of locks. Although it was amazing to transit the Gatun locks on the coral princess, it was an equally wonderful but very different experience being in the smaller ferry for the second two sets of locks (we could actually touch the walls of the lock chamber and feel the temperature difference as the water level dropped). It really was the best of both worlds!

After leaving the small boat in Panama City, there was another 1.5 hour motorcoach ride back to the Cristobal Pier in Colon. There is shopping at the pier...we especially loved the Embera Indian baskets and tagua nut carvings which can be found just before you reboard the ship. There are also dancers, including both natives, and traditional Panamanian, and both were great.

edit: Just noticed that you are on a Pacific Panama Canal cruise, so your tour might be quite different!

Hi Patty, how are you? Hope you're keeping warm! Perhaps one day, we'll all cross paths again.

Thanks to all for the tour advice. I finally spoke to Princess about Panama tours since the Princess website said Panama tours "for Coral Princess only" and we'll be on the Island. What I found out is... for our L.A. to L.A. cruise, no Panama tours will be offered since we arrive in Gatun Lake late in the afternoon and leave the Lake early in the a.m. next day.

We'll be seeing the locks from the ship which is not terrible given we make port stops at Nicaragua, Guatemala and Costa Rica. I figure that's not a bad trade-off!

Sandy