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I discuss and share my Cruising the Panama Canal Cruise Tips on how to make it your best cruising trip ever. I have transited and visited the iconic and famous Panama canal in different ways a number of times in recent years. In my tips for cruising the Panama Canal, I look at the 4 options you have to cruise the Panama canal and pulled together my top tips and tricks for making the most of the experience. This could be the best cruising trip ever
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Gary Bembridge's Tips For Travellers aims to help you make more of your precious travel time and money on land and when cruising the oceans or rivers of the world. To help you, in every video I draw on my first-hand tips and advice from travelling every month for over 20 years and 77 cruises at time of making this video.
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0:00
I'm Gary beverage this is another of my
0:02
cruising tips for travelers I want to
0:04
talk today about the most remarkable
0:06
cruising experience that you will
0:08
probably experience and that is cruising
0:10
the Panama Canal first of all what
0:13
exactly is the Panama Canal the Panama
0:15
Canal was built in a 50-mile stretch
0:17
which basically connects North America
0:20
and South America so it's one of the
0:22
narrowest parts of that whole continent
0:25
between North and South America before
0:27
the canal was built you basically hack
0:30
your way through a railway was
0:31
eventually built but it was a very
0:32
treacherous and difficult thing to do so
0:34
eventually the canal was built to speed
0:37
up that whole process and to save an
0:39
enormous amount of time there are
0:42
actually now two Panama canal's the
0:44
original which opened in 1914 and a much
0:47
wider bigger one to take bigger cruise
0:49
ships would also probably more
0:51
importantly bigger cargo ships which was
0:53
opened in 2016 one of the big miss Nome
0:56
is about the Panama Canal was it's
0:58
actually not just one big long canal
1:00
it's a series of locks on the east side
1:02
a big lake in the middle and a series of
1:04
locks on the west side so if you hit it
1:06
in from the Caribbean side you go
1:07
initially through the gatun locks these
1:09
are a series of three chambers which
1:11
take you up roughly 28 feet each time
1:14
you then head into the gatun lake which
1:15
is a massive big lake which was man-made
1:18
which is also a way of collecting and
1:20
getting all the water that's needed in
1:22
the lock you then pass through the
1:23
Galliard cut which is a very long narrow
1:26
pathway which was built in the kind of
1:29
the rock and the land and you then head
1:31
down to the other side through another
1:33
series of locks first of those is the
1:36
one chamber Pedro Miguel locks and then
1:39
you go through the two chamber
1:40
miraflores locks before heading out to
1:43
the Pacific Ocean around 14,000 ships
1:47
pass through the Panama Canal every year
1:49
and that's around about 250 cruise ships
1:52
every year go through there so what are
1:54
your options for transiting and
1:56
experience in the Panama Canal there's
1:58
probably four key ones that you can do
2:00
the first of those and the most
2:02
magnificent of those is a full transit
2:04
and this is when ships pass from one
2:07
side right the way through to the other
2:08
side so you go through all the locks
2:10
through the lake and through the other
2:10
locks on the other side now these tend
2:13
to be on longer crew
2:14
so they do put a lot of people off so
2:16
they could be part of a world cruise so
2:17
you'll find a lot of the ships that go
2:18
on world cruises they will pass through
2:20
the Panama Canal you'll find often if
2:22
you're going on a cruise with just
2:23
circumnavigating the South America
2:26
continent includes that you'll also find
2:28
you sometimes have cruises which go from
2:30
the West Coast the Pacific side to the
2:32
East Coast the Caribbean side you might
2:35
go from San Francisco Los Angeles to
2:37
Miami or Fort Lauderdale that will pass
2:39
through there as well so those tend to
2:41
be the main options for full transits
2:43
these are best for people who want the
2:45
whole experience people like me who are
2:46
guilty about it and you want the whole
2:48
total experience and experience every
2:51
single last minute and all the locks so
2:53
that's your one option the second option
2:56
which is also a great option though is a
2:58
partial transit and this is easier
3:00
because you often find those cruises
3:02
might be seven days ten days long out of
3:04
Miami or Fort Lauderdale normally that
3:07
includes some of the Caribbean islands
3:08
now the partial transit I often go to
3:10
Costa Rica and then head back the
3:13
partial transit takes you from the
3:14
Caribbean side up through the gatun
3:17
locks those three locks into the lake
3:19
turns around and heads back now what's
3:21
great about partial transit is once you
3:23
get into the lake you then are given the
3:27
choice of either just staying on the
3:28
ship and heading back or doing a number
3:29
of different excursions one of the great
3:32
excursions to do if you want to
3:33
experience the whole thing is you then
3:34
get off the ship and you join a ferry
3:36
which then takes you through the
3:38
Galliard cut and through the other locks
3:40
down to the other side and you basically
3:42
bus back and meet the ship at the start
3:45
of the canal near :
3:46
another excursion if you want to see the
3:48
Panama Canal but you want to do it a
3:49
slightly different way is to go on the
3:51
railway so the railway line is really
3:52
the original railway reconstructed and
3:55
rebuilt that was built before the canal
3:57
and these are really beautiful
4:00
refurbished carriages lots of scenic
4:02
windows where you can basically then
4:04
travel down to Panama City if going
4:08
through the first set of canals is
4:09
enough use a couple of other great
4:10
excursions so for example one of the
4:12
things that we did the one time is you
4:13
can go to the Gamboa rainforest and you
4:16
can go out on various excursions go on
4:18
little carriage units that take you up
4:20
right into the rainforest right above
4:24
the trees or you can go on other
4:25
different
4:26
and look at butterflies and orchids and
4:28
really experience the rainforest or what
4:31
other people like to do is they want to
4:33
get the perspective of actually watching
4:35
ship's go through the canal and through
4:37
the locks rather than being on the ship
4:39
so the 4th excursion that people do is
4:41
they go to the Visitor Center which is
4:43
normally down by the middle floors and
4:45
the Pedro Miguel locks the third option
4:49
you have for transiting the Panama Canal
4:51
is you'll find on much smaller ships
4:54
they normally combine a land and a small
4:58
ship experience so it's they can be
5:00
seven to fourteen days you'll spend some
5:02
time on land and you'll go through the
5:03
actual canal on a much smaller ship so
5:05
that tends to be a much more land
5:07
focused excursion and sometimes they
5:09
actually break up passing through the
5:10
canal into different parts you might do
5:13
some of the locks so you might do the
5:15
cat unlocks first you might spend some
5:17
time on land in the rainforest get back
5:19
experience the other parts of the lock
5:20
if you do want to see the canal but you
5:24
don't have enough time to do the full
5:25
try on set it's worth taking a look at a
5:27
cruise that goes perhaps the 7i cruise
5:29
that is going to curl on because they'll
5:31
spend a long day there and you can get
5:32
to see the canal in those different
5:34
forms as well when is the best time to
5:36
go on at Panama Canal well the real peak
5:39
time for cruising the Panama Canal is
5:41
really from about October to April
5:43
that's really the peak time that's when
5:46
most the cruises are likely to be going
5:48
so it's sort of before the Carribean
5:50
season ends and it's when the world
5:52
cruises are going and it's really the
5:54
peak time and where you're gonna have
5:56
your most options another key thing to
5:59
consider in that time period is the
6:01
rainy season really ends in November
6:02
being a rainforest it does rain an
6:04
enormous amount in this area which is
6:06
why that's also the peak season November
6:08
is sort of when the rainy season tells
6:10
off so it's worth considering going
6:11
after that so how do you make the most
6:14
of your actual transit I have a couple
6:16
of absolutely key things that you really
6:19
need to think about if you are going
6:20
through a Panama Canal first of which is
6:22
prepare prepare prepare there are
6:24
incredible stories lots of documentaries
6:26
about the Panama Canal and some of the
6:28
scary statistics like over 20,000 people
6:30
died building the canal and you'll
6:33
discover all the stories behind why that
6:35
was the failed attempts so really learn
6:38
a lot so you can do that obviously
6:39
before you go
6:40
but sitting on the ship you'll find that
6:41
often show documentaries that have talks
6:43
and have stuff on the interactive
6:45
television I would really strongly
6:46
recommend you listen to this because
6:48
appreciating the Canal and complexity of
6:50
the canal does make the journey so much
6:52
more interesting the second critical
6:54
thing is get up early you're likely to
6:56
head into the canal from about Hoppus
6:58
five six o'clock in the morning so you
7:00
need to be up early and watch that whole
7:02
experience so it is a very long day
7:04
because going to take up to eight hours
7:06
if you're doing the full transit to get
7:08
through the whole experience so you need
7:09
to sort of pace yourself a bit but you
7:10
do need to get up really early and be
7:12
absolutely ready and raring to go third
7:15
critical tip is you've got to find the
7:17
best spot most of the cruise ships will
7:18
open the bow of the ship so you can head
7:20
out onto the bow and people will get
7:22
there as early as they possibly can but
7:23
you do need to find a good spot what I
7:26
also recommend you do is think about the
7:27
different perspectives you might want to
7:29
take the plan to spend some time on the
7:30
bow of the ship perhaps go to the rear
7:32
of the ship and you also then see
7:33
everything closing behind you and look
7:35
behind you often the ship behind you you
7:38
want to go to the side sometimes to be
7:39
right down onto the promenade deck you
7:41
can get really close and see the Mules
7:43
pulling you along so choose a couple of
7:46
spots and sort of plan where you want to
7:48
go but I would strongly recommend for
7:49
the first part of the trials that get
7:51
onto the bow of the ship and get really
7:53
up close because you remember there's a
7:54
couple of feet other side of these ships
7:56
so you're gonna get a real sense of the
7:58
Magnificent and the amazing things that
8:01
they do to get these ships through my
8:04
fourth tip is get your sunscreen on it's
8:06
like to be very hot so wear a hat get
8:09
lots of sunscreen around on my last
8:10
excursion I put sunscreen on but forgot
8:13
to put it on my upper arms got really
8:15
really burnt really make sure you put on
8:17
cuz gonna be outside for a really long
8:18
time and it's gonna be hot so keep
8:20
hydrating and really be prepared to be
8:22
outside when it's hot sunny and pretty
8:25
sticky of course you're gonna want to
8:28
take a gazillion pictures or videos so
8:31
make sure your phone's charged your
8:33
cameras charge you've got extra SD cards
8:35
I mean we're not been through that I've
8:36
taken hundreds and hundreds of pictures
8:38
and you're going to want to do that so
8:39
make sure you're ready and raring to go
8:41
from that perspective the Panama Canal
8:44
is without a shadow doubt one of the
8:45
most amazing experiences as I've
8:47
mentioned you I've had opportunity
8:49
experience three times I want to do it
8:51
again and again and again it every time
8:52
you go it
8:53
different experience it's a magnificent
8:55
experience I have loads more videos of
8:57
cruising tips different cruise lines
9:00
different experiences so why don't you
9:01
watch another one of those right now
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