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We left Buffalo in cold weather and landed in Fort. L. with a nice warm breeze. We stayed at the Embassy Suites which turned out to be an expnesive disappointment.
The cruise was great! We ate almost all meals in the dining room. We had anytime and never waited to get in. The food and service was wonderful. We got the 7 bottle wine package as the $29 deal had one we really liked. We had a few drinks at the bars while enjoying the piano player in the Atrim.
Our mini-suite was perfect and since the weather was sunny and warm, we used our balcony as well as the Caribe aft viewing area with the lounges a lot. I loved the serenity of the covered pool. The pools were closed 3 days because of high seas and I took one of my Bonine pills every day to prevent sea sickness.
The Panama Canal was all DH hoped for. He was on the front viewing area on deck 10 at 5:30am. I joined him about 6:30 and then we went to the back viewing area about 7. We took the Panama RR to the Pacific in the Dome car which was nice.
We did the Cartengena Princess tour to the Fortress and Old Town and the Costa Rica tour of the banana plantation (very interesting), river cruise and train. We did see a few monkeys and many birds.
The only problems we had was the way Island handled getting off the ship for excursions. At one stop, one gangway was broken so we were delayed an hour in leaving the ship.For Panama, they did not have enough tenders lowered so that we waited over 2 hours to get to the train trip. We didn't leave the ship until 10:30 and then only because they finally lowered another tender for our 50 going in the Dome car. There is no excuse for this as Princess knew exactly how mnay would be tendering as they sold all the tickets at that port.
The entertainment was mixed. The comedians were all good as was the piano and violin players and the female vocalist. The Production Shows were poor. I think their day is over.
We did self-embarkation and took a taxi to the airport. We were through customs and checked in at the airport by 8:15.
All and all it was a great cruise. Very relaxing and fun.
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