Panama Canal Cruise Advice

[jdb in AZ]

Holy Cow! We leave in 7 days for the EBPC cruise. I should get a suitcase out...

Just curious about timing on canal day. Headed east, when do the locks start happening? How many are there (for different picture taking opportunities)? Once in the locks, how long does that process take?

Thanks - we'll see some of you very soon!

DCL pays extra to go through the locks during the day (instead of overnight. The Canal is busy 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.) It basically takes all day for a ship to make it from one side to the other. The DCL Navigator will tell you exactly what time to expect to start watching, but IIRC we started about 8 a.m.

At one point the ship passes a restaurant along-side the Canal, and patrons flock outside to wave at the ship. It's like all the passengers are "on stage."

PP is right about Panama being hot and humid! Good excuse to spend part of the day inside with a pina colada smoothie. The ship will have a huge barbeque/picnic up on deck during the crossing. The food was really good.

I'm not big on attending dry lectures during a cruise, but found the presentation about the Canal fascinating. Felt stoopid for not knowing all that stuff before hand, so it's nice DCL had the lecturer -- former Canal pilot -- onboard. There weren't many kids onboard, but the students were busy taking notes for reports.

The Wonder and her sister the Magic are the largest cruise ships to ever pass through the Canal, and it's a tight(!) squeeze. Even with 8 locomotives holding the ship in place, and being guided by several pilots onboard, we scraped. The crew had to repaint part of the hull at the next port, and a chunk of concrete from the Canal was found on the outside of a porthole.

 

[BethC1952]

This was my favorite out of 15 Disney cruises so far. We cruised last December, and are just two older adults. We were NEVER bored. We spent some time each day at the pool, and never had a problem finding a seat. We attended all the talks by Captain Puckett, so we understood what was going on as we went through the Canal. We had both also read "The Path Between The Seas". It's not light reading, but it was fascinating.

Our dinners were great. We linked our dining with three other DIS'ers, one of whom we had cruised with before, and a couple that we had never met, but who were close to our ages, and it was terrific. Just by chance, our other tablemates were a family of five who were DIS'ers too!

We had some planned group activities, always had someone to talk to, and enjoyed all of the activities we attended.

We enjoyed our ports, particularly Cartagena. It's a beautiful city!

Links to a lot of the pictures from that cruise (I took more than 2000, didn't post them all) are in my signature.

Beth

 

[jrabbit]

going from Pacific to Atlantic

the first set of locks is 2 "steps" up (Miraflores Locks)
though a small lake
one lock step up (Pedro Miguel Lock)
though the "cut" (continental divide)
pass Gamboa
Into Lake Gantun
then to Gantun Locks - 3 steps down (your ship and 26,000,000 gallons of water (that much water was used on the Pacific side to lift you up too.)

 

[bobyetman]

Wow, thanks for all of the great information and advice from everyone!!

It sounds as if this is a cruise we should be seriously considering and will not be bored.

Question: If we do decide to book, it will probably be a verandah room so is there a "better" side to be on i.e., starboard or port?

Thanks again!

On the EBPC, the port side will face land the 4 days down the coast to the canal, and the starboard side will face the sea. All depends on what you want to see. During the canal, both sides are equally good.

 

[MinnesotaMouseketeers]

My wife and I did the 15 night WB Wonder cruise. Once upon a time I was the one saying that too many sea days would be very boring. It was fantastic!

Never got bored once, agree with other posters that you should go to the presentations put on by a former Panama Canal pilot. It was very informative and interesting. I actually like the sailings with multiple sea days. We had a verandah and it was really nice being able to get away from the crowds once in a while. And found plenty to keep us busy in the Navigator each day, sometimes had some conflicts with other events where you had to pick and choose which sounded more fun.

 

[TexDis]

Thanks for all the information! With my EBPC just 7 days away reading all of this gets me really excited. (as if I needed any other reason to be excited)

 

[KevieKev05]

DO IT!

To tag on to what others have said...

The longer cruises have a certain "specialness" to them. I find they do things on the longer cruises that aren't typically done on the "standard" ones. For instance: special merchandise offerings, special gifts, a "late night dessert buffet", lots of themed buffets, special shows/entertainment offerings, etc.

Hard to believe 4 months ago today the Wonder was sailing out of Miami for my Panama Canal cruise! My how time flies! Didn't get bored ONCE on that cruise!

 

[jrabbit]

Thanks for all the information! With my EBPC just 7 days away reading all of this gets me really excited. (as if I needed any other reason to be excited)

Just to amp up your excitement a little bit ....

Remember - I was on the West Bound cruise so the pictures are "backwards" or at least the ship is pointing the "wrong way" for your cruise - and this first picture is pointed the wrong way for my cruise.

In the continental divide (Culebra Cut)

Heading out to the Pacific

In the Miraflores Locks

Miraflores Locks

Miraflores Locks

Approaching the Pedro Miguel Locks

Pedro Miguel Lock

Gantun Locks

Approaching the Gantun Locks

 

[healeylvr]

We have been on two Panama cruises and loved it both times first was E/b with family and then W/B by ourselves never bored on sea days allways plenty to do. on last trip we were at a table with 3 couples same age and similar backgound as us and had a great time with them (pixie dust ?) couldn't have been better. i highly recomend this cruise 15 days seems alot but it's over too fast the wives in our group on the last trip were crying when we finally had to leave the ship.

 

[EastYorkDisneyFan]

DCL pays extra to go through the locks during the day (instead of overnight. The Canal is busy 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.) It basically takes all day for a ship to make it from one side to the other. The DCL Navigator will tell you exactly what time to expect to start watching, but IIRC we started about 8 a.m.

Actually they pay more to get priority over cargo ships. The Panama canal authority tries to have all Panamax vessels (cruise ships and cargo ships) out of Gatun lake and the gaillard cut by dark as navigating them at night isn't really feasible as they don't have any lights there.

 

[jdb in AZ]

Just did a web search and there's lots of pictures of ships navigating the Canal at night. This was my favorite: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kM2DEoyH1BY

 

[EastYorkDisneyFan]

Just did a web search and there's lots of pictures of ships navigating the Canal at night. This was my favorite: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kM2DEoyH1BY

The Locks themselves are a bit different I was actually talking about the man made lake and the tighter passages through the canal.

 

[bobyetman]

If you want to see what its like to go through the canal, there is always their webcams:

http://www.pancanal.com/eng/photo/camera-java.html?cam=GatunHi

 

[jrabbit]

...and then W/B by ourselves never bored on sea days allways plenty to do. on last trip we were at a table with 3 couples same age and similar backgound as us and had a great time with them (pixie dust ?) couldn't have been better. ...

Same with our Table!! Were we seated together? - nope, looked at your sig and none of us are from New York.

 

[scottishwee35]

Oh it was so awesome, we never got the boring, as there were so many things to do.

We went on May 2008, it was fab times...

I don't think I ever forgot it as best life time holiday for our family.

I still keep photo which show the bottom.

I hope we will do it again someday.....

Go for it as it was so amazing...

Scottishwee35

 

[timbonz]

We are off on the sept 2014 Panama Cruise, the info on here has been great thanks.

Tim

 

[Jsingh1812]

We are off on the sept 2014 Panama Cruise, the info on here has been great thanks. Tim

Us too! And thanks for the advice all!