clamar Posted November 4, 2017 #1 Share Posted November 4, 2017 I have booked a HAL 17 day Panama Canal cruise leaving April 17, 2018. I just today started to do some research on ports/excursions and realized that there are 9 sea days (2 of which are listed as "cruising". In addition, some of the ports indicate that there is not much to do in port. Am I missing something? I have heard nothing but good things about Panama Canal cruises but what the heck do you do with half of the cruise on the ship? (I know, I know, relax) Claire:o Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillB48 Posted November 4, 2017 #2 Share Posted November 4, 2017 Six sea days on a 17 day cruise doesn't seem too bad, you do have quite a bit of distance to cover. Outside of the two days in a row after leaving FLL, everything else is port followed by a sea day. That gives you time to rebound from a day ashore. The additional sea day that is "cruise" is really multiple entries for the single day of the Canal transit, although you are not in port there is a lot to attract your attention during the transit. Relax and enjoy!:D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GUT2407 Posted November 5, 2017 #3 Share Posted November 5, 2017 Wow 9 Sea days, heaven. I love Sea days. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cruizinfools Posted November 5, 2017 #4 Share Posted November 5, 2017 Wow 9 Sea days, heaven. I love Sea days. Agreed! Your itinerary sounds wonderful! :cool: 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CruiserBruce Posted November 5, 2017 #5 Share Posted November 5, 2017 Just completed 16 days SF-FLL on Eurodam. 6 stops. No problems at all. You can research the various ports on their port boards for activities to do. HAL had a fair number of excursions in each port. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare Keith1010 Posted November 6, 2017 #6 Share Posted November 6, 2017 CruiserBruce has it right. I too would visit the respective ports of call board for your stops to get ideas on what to do and to post with any questions . Keith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare Keith1010 Posted November 6, 2017 #7 Share Posted November 6, 2017 This link will take you to the Roll Call section of cruise critic: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&daysprune=-1&f=34 Keith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cb at sea Posted November 6, 2017 #8 Share Posted November 6, 2017 Also...hit your library for guidebooks! Lots and lots of info in a guidebook! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marysb Posted November 7, 2017 #9 Share Posted November 7, 2017 Hi Claire, We did a HAL 2 week Panama Canal cruise last April. We had lots of sea days too. We love them...it is what makes it a restful vacation. I copied this section from my blog regarding sea days .... but mind you, we usually have no problem entertaining ourselves. Before getting to Cabo we had another Sea Day On this cruise we had 7 sea days and 9 ports. We love sea days and are never bored. This is why we love sea days: you get to sleep in you get to eat at non-busy times (or just about anytime you want) you can lounge around or read with gorgeous views of the sea lots of ship activities (trivia, swimming, lectures, movies, entertainment, casino, etc etc) have dessert, ice cream, or a snack every time you pass the lido hang out at or in the pools visit with friends on deck or in one of the beautiful lounges stare at the sea and watch for flying fish and dolphins exercise (walk around the promenade deck, classes or the gym) you get to catch your breathe when you have a number of busy port days in a row or just be lazy ;-) As for the ports - we didn't have one port where there was nothing to do or see. We figure if it is different than home, there is something to check out and see. Just because some of these ports don't have a lots of touristy things to do, We love walking around seeing how real people live. He are some links to my blog and you can get an idea what is in the ports that we visited on the Eurodam. Part 1 | Aruba and Panama Canal http://maryandnormtravel.blogspot.ca...17-part-1.html Part 2 | Puntarenas and and Corinto http://maryandnormtravel.blogspot.ca...2-central.html Part 3 | Guatemala and Huatulco Mexico http://maryandnormtravel.blogspot.ca...ra-part-3.html Part 4 | Manzanillo, Cabo and San Diego http://maryandnormtravel.blogspot.ca...-4-mexico.html Enjoy! Mary Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. California Posted October 24, 2018 #10 Share Posted October 24, 2018 We love the sea days. There's a certain "calmness and restfulness" that sea days provide. Plenty of things to do, and plenty of reasons to do almost nothing on a sea day. We've done four transatlantics, just because of the high number of sea days, usually, 7-9 sea days out of 14-15. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rare shark&minnow Posted November 9, 2018 #11 Share Posted November 9, 2018 Thank you marysb for the great pictures from your trip! We go Nov. 30 and we are looking forward to 7 sea days! We did a port intensive 10 day Mediterranean cruise and it was tiring!! We loved it but we barely got to enjoy the beautiful ship. This Panama Canal trip sounds like a perfect balance of interesting ports and sea days. On our sea days we spend a lot of time at the pool with a tropical drink. We also bring the game, Quiddler, with us and sometimes we like to find a vacant area/lounge near a window and play. Hubby works long, hard hours so sea days are heaven for him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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