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Panama Canal & Costa Rica January 18, 2019
It appears to me that this will be the second trip for Tauck on the new boat, Le Champlain. We have done a trip to the area on Windstar independently, but have never been through the canal. We poked our nose in on a big ship once, but never made a transit. I don’t expect to get any feedback on the new boat before our voyage. We are Mike and Eloise from San Anselmo, CA.
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We crossed while Tauck was using a Windstar ship. Maybe Tauck changes ships every year since I recall asking about the Windstar as an accommodation a year earlier after I had first booked the tour. The Tauck tour directors, naturalists, and other handlers will claim that the "perfect" canal partner does not yet exist (and Tauck does not yet own a vessel for Canal transit). In the case of Windstar, the ship was selling its own excursions and maybe Tauck's passengers were delayed for some land tours. Everything was pretty much OK for me.
If you are crossing in a sailboat, as we did, the vessel attracts lots of attention--especially if it "spreads its wings" and creates photo opportunities when it puts out full sails while anchored. The lecture during the engine room tour explained why some of the sails actually impede speed and waste fuel. It's all for show.
One of the most delightful parts of our trip was waiting in the San Jose airport in January while fellow Tauck travelers were rounded up and watching the excited vacationers pour out of planes and immigration. January kicks off the "high" season in Costa Rica and the excitement runs high.
I looked at that trip and having the BBC aboard was an attraction, but I wanted to go Eastbound. And we need time to get the ‘tree’ down. (;-). The Jan. 11 trip is also their first trip on this ship. I wanted to give them some time to ‘practice’. (;-) Easiest trip I ever booked. We have the air, hotels, and everything all lined up. I think I did the whole thing in about three days.
I hate being ‘right’ all the time. It appears that the inaugural cruise is not until October 25, so she must still be going through the ‘fitting out’ process.
I have just checked on line and the ship is currently about or leave Malta for a cruise, it is not the first one.
It just occured to me that I saw in several places that this was to be Ponant’s first ship of this class, and it was not.
Hope you had the mussels in Honfleur. Have never found mussels that even come close to those in Honfleur served with amazing pomme frittes.
Yup. Made our selections yesterday. Actually, I had to call them cuz the system kept giving us the aierial tram ride when we were selecting the boat trip.
And for the other party, the boat is in Honfleur not us. I have had a lot of great mussels in Brussels.
Actually, today it is going from Honfleur to Honfleur.
While it is not the "Horse lattitudes" it looks like they are taking the shorter southern route to avoid the last of the tropical storms?
https://www.cruisemapper.com/?imo=9814038
It looks like the Isabela II is in the crater on Genovesa in the Galapagos and the MS Grace is still in Antwerp. What a great little website.
Sorry, can’t help with that, but I will ask (nap time for Mom). With 5 & 8 yr. old grandkids, we don’t get downtown or anywhere beyond the house for meals with the possible exception of the mall, McDonalds or Pizza Hut! ????. To see how far we are from downtown locate the US Embassy on Google Maps and go another 1/2 mi. away from town.
As I mentioned, Panama City is a large city with modern city center and many new, very tall buildings. I would post a photo I took from Ancon Hill that really illustrates that but don’t have access to my webhosting site. There are plenty of restaurants downtown, both local, international, and US - I noticed a Hard Rock Cafe on the ride from the airport this time, and there is TGI Fridays, Hooters, and other gourmet US restaurants.????
As far as sightseing- not much other than city itself w/in walking distance from downtown. Parque Urraco, a small park decorated with some really beautiful XMAS lights, etc. is only 2 blocks from the Hilton, but the decorations will probably be gone when you get here. Other city sights are Panama Viejo, the ruins of the old city, which was burned by Morgan the Pirate, and Casco Viejo. Further away are the BioMuseo and the Punta Culebra Nature Center both located on the causeway that extends from the Amador area and runs along the city side of the approaches to the canal. We saw “wild” (un-caged) sloths and iguanas among other critters there. I’m sure both places appear on the Tauck App- but are a long taxi ride from the Hilton. For indoor activities, there is a casino next door to the Hilton.
You will be only a block away from the park that runs along the waterfront. Among the more recent “cultural/historical” sites is a building that used to be named for a certain celebrity/politician until his name was unceremoniously torn off. I haven’t looked at your itinerary but they have a nice canal interpretive center overlooking the Miraflores Locks. You can also book a day cruise on the canal with Capt’n Carl- cruise to monkey island, across part of Lake Gatun, stop for lunch at a floating restaurant, kayak up a tributary and swim in the cool waters that feed the lake (we also got to see and hold a boa- took 4 of us to hold it!)
Re grandchildren, yes also busy with ours but so lucky to have them near although another recent game of me piggy backing my soon to be five year old granddaughter while on all fours around the floor was great fun at the time but the next day, ouch????
Also, when I booked I asked specifically if the boat was “all Tauck” and was assured it was. Now it looks like only half are Tauck. Anyone know about that?
Thanks
We were emailed by Tauck weeks ago to make our tour choices. So I suggest you call Tauck and ask about it. We always book directly with Tauck, so if you use a travel agent I guess you should ask them. I find the people who have these type of mis communications have usually gone through a travel agent. I am suspecting that this is not all a Tauck ship so we are assuming there will be French passengers. We usually do land tours with Tauck, but this summer we were on the new sister ship to the Le Champlain in Iceland and it was an all Tauck tour. We are not anticipating any problems if it is not all Tauck passengers. It’s very hard to get to know many of your fellow passengers from our experience on the Iceland Tour because with everyone taking different tours and no seat rotation it’s hard to meet up with the same people.
The Pope is visiting during World Youth Day and Panama City is expected to be a zoo! 500,000 local and foreign attendees have formally registered and as many as another hundred thousand or more unregistered attendees may show up from Panama and surrounding countries for the WYD events, Pope’s two major sermons and services by other church leaders at numerous churches and sites around the city including the re-consecration of the second oldest church in the Western Hemisphere. The infrastructure- roads, taxis, public transportation, police, medical facilities, etc., etc. are not expected to be able to handle this influx- they can barely handle normal routine (trust me, I have been stuck in traffic numerous times for the most minor traffic incidents) and planning for the event and contingencies hasn’t been the best. Numerous road closures can be expected. Due to a shortage of staff (day off to attend WYD events and religious services)- wait staff at restaurants and attractions, etc. may be impacted. The Pope and his entourage have reportedly reserved the entire Hilton. He departs on the 27th but not sure when all his staff leave.
Thanks for the info on pre booking tours. We usually book Tauck through an agent even if I call Tauck for info. If agent messed us up on tour choices, I won’t be happy. I’ll call Tauck in the morning.
I assume you are in the Philly area. We are in Malvern recently moving from Devon. We are Diana and Carl. Hope to catch up with you
We come in on AA 4496 that arrives at 2-10pm from Miami. I'm looking at that flight on our Tauck reservation page. I can't see our first flight on that and Mr B does the booking anyway. We leave Philly at 5am. It wasn't that early originally but the flight kept getting changed from when we originally booked, but that was almost a year ago when flights first opened up.
Wow, there is hardly anyone that even comes from Pennsylvania on any Tauck tour we have been on! We live a few miles from you. I shop at the Trader Joe's at the ValleyForge shopping center now and again. But I am always going on 202 or the back way, 23 and 52.
I never divulge my real identity here, I'm too controversial, but I have met Sealord. He and his wife are now Africa crazy like us. I will look out for you on the tour, but who knows if our paths will cross. Our only other small ship cruise, there are so many people it's just not the same. At the Welcome dinner on our Iceland tour, we dined at the Captain's table, which I am still starry eyed from, he was so handsome!