Living the Dream

This is what I posted on cruisecritic.com.

Notes on Island Princess, 1/19/17 - 2/3/17 Panama Canal Full Transit 

I wanted to transit the Canal since I was 12 years old. My mother had done it in the 1930s, and gave me Frederic Haskin's 1913 book about the Canal as a present. 

Cabin PR716 Promenade Deck (7) 

Embarkation, Ft Lauderdale. We arrived, and our luggage arrived (belatedly). But the embarkers got mixed with the disembarkers, and a fine muddle ensued. Very badly handled. 

Cabin. Queen bed very spacious, mattress firm, plenty of fluffy pillows. Very good storage space: use of packing cubes (Eagle Creek, Rick Steves) highly recommended. Plenty of hangers and large open closet space. Desk small but drawers useful. In-room refrigerator serviceable. Bathroom tiny but not cramped; we’re not small people, but we fit. Only bathroom downside is location of toilet roll; one has to flail around blindly to find it when most wanted. Plenty of towels and good hot water. Big downside: the 2015 refit in Trieste, which created our cabin, robbed us of the use of our balcony for the Canal transit, as the cables to the mules run through it. We were comped the Sanctuary stern hangout on Deck 15; plenty of water, and some snacks if you could snare the service team, who seemed to think they were playing a track team in a remake of Chariots of Fire. Bring sunscreen; it was brutal on deck out of the shade. 

I recommend Deck 7. Some nice bars and fancy restaurants are there, so less elevators and stairs. 

Aft cabins have lots of engine and propwash vibration and noise. Not a problem for city dwellers like us, but noise-sensitives should avoid after cabins. 

Gulf of Tehuantepec on the San Juan del Sur to Huatulco leg has ferocious nor’easters. We had winds of 87 knots (Beaufort 12, hurricane) and seas 12 feet and up during the night 1/28 - 1/29. Not for the faint-hearted. 

Shopping on board. Generally disappointing, although some nice Tommy Bahama wear. One fellow hadn’t packed a sport jacket, so I suggested he try the shop; they hadn’t any. Duty-free liquor selection inferior to Royal Caribbean. Is anyone really going to haul a bottle of Bailey’s in one’s checked bag to save five bucks? A lot of not-really-cheap goods, and some very expensive trophy whiskeys and cognacs, for a middle-market ship. Gems sold by New York firm at New York prices. Overpriced artwork. No real bargains. 

Restaurants. Horizon Court is buffet, much of a muchness. Attentive service of orange juice and coffee at breakfast. Included coffee is dreadful, probably to encourage purchase of higher grade at the patisserie. Usual coffee is like what Captain Hornblower got in 1810 a year out of England, in these same waters: “a decoction of burnt bread with the merest flavour of coffee.” Swirls soft-serve is a treat. Sabatini’s had marvelous manicotti fiorentino and the best tiramisù I ever had. Too bad the lobster three ways was a failure, the barley in thin lobster sauce hard and chewy, sort of Scotch Broth all’ Italiana. But Herself’s veal chop was a winner. Bayou Café did better with the frozen lobster, and the oysters Sieur de Bienville were excellent. Bordeaux dining room was good of its kind, good tilapia one night; duck à l’orange a failure, but arroz con pollo and (frozen) lobster tail Caribbean style were winners; commercial winelist, mark-up less than 250%, some good ones. But “anytime dining” is no-time dining. The lines at 5 p.m. reminded me of Army messhalls. Eat late, if you can, or make reservations by phone before 5 p.m. 

Bars. Variable, Crooners the most active and noisy. Bartending talents vary widely. 

Entertainment. Liked the string quartet; though not great musicians, they played a good selection, and come from a city fifteen kilometers from where my father was born in Belarus. Piano bar performers were poor. 

Ports. 

Aruba on a Sunday morning is funereal. I didn’t think much of the excursions, so wandered the town. It’s well-marked, good street maps on convenient lampposts, legible street signs, but it was dead. Fort Zoutman is a must, but it was shut up. So was the Protestant Church. As the time in port was barely four hours, not worth it. 

Cartagena. The pier is miles from nowhere, excursions a must as taxis are inaccessible without a battle th as taxis are inaccessible without a battle through a mob of importuning drivers. 

Canal transit. Worth the price of admission. Stilted narration, but useful. Would have done better to point out entrance to Galliard Cut (sorry, I’m a traditionalist and an ex-US Army engineer) before we were halfway through. Bring camera and binoculars; the binoculars in the shop are less good than what one can buy at home. High point of the cruise for me. 

Puntarenas. Interesting country. The Walk in the Clouds tour is only for those sound in limb and wind, with a fascination for moss, lichens, vines and forestry. I had real problems with the climbs. Only hummingbirds and butterflies to be seen. A very long (90 minute) drive to and from San Luis reserve, up and down some fearsome roads. Exhausting and disappointing. Much better was the river cruise, said Herself; better guide, great information, gigantic crocodile and plethora of birds. 

San Juan del Sur. The volcano, Catherine lagoon and Grenada tour was interesting, Granada least of all, a reconstruction of the burned-down Spanish colonial ex-capital. Catherine lagoon was worth some photographs, but overrun with tourists. The crater at Masaya volcano was well worth the trip, a look into a crater of an active volcano; watch it from the vantage point before it collapses. Lunch at Hotel Granada was excellent, a sampling of Central American food. A peek at Lake Nicaragua was so short there was only time for snapshots. A lot of bus travel. Note that SJdS is accessible by tender only. It can be a bumpy ride, jammed like a NYC subway. 

We skipped Huatulco. We saw nothing in the brochures that needed long detain the tourist, so I just wandered into the port area. Nothing much there. 

Puerta Vallarta. Elizabeth Taylor doesn’t live here any more. No romance, just condominiums and lots of tequila and horrendous traffic. 

Disembarkation. Smooth and seamless. We skipped the Long Beach excursion, and did well, as it was raining.