Fuerte Amador/Panama City, Panama

Welcome to Panama! More specifically, Fuerte Amador. 

A view of Panama City from the dock

In the past when we’ve arrived here we needed to use the ship's tenders to get ashore but not today. They are building a new terminal but it’s not complete, so all we can do is dock and take busses out. No passengers could walk anywhere in the area as it's all a construction zone. 

Coming soon

Can’t use the nice new gangways yet

All the way at the other end of the ship at the farthest spot away from the new terminal (at the back of the last bus) is where disembarkation occurred for tours and those wanting to do their own thing.

Like an obstacle course

As we’ve taken tours here before, I was just going to go and eat some local food. I searched out a place with a nice menu, but then started questioning whether I really wanted to go or not. Several factors pushed me to stay onboard.

1. It was laundry day. The free-to-Elites laundry perk is taking up to 72 hours this voyage. Even though there is no laundry room on this deck I did some exploring to find an available one. $3 to wash and $3 to dry and I’ve got enough clean clothes to last me until Fort Lauderdale.

Deck 5 laundry

2. I watched the busses loading and unloading passengers and saw the struggle some folks with walkers and canes had taking the big first step onto the bus. I know from climbing in and out of the pool every day my quads are getting stronger, but it’s going down big steps that give me trouble. Not sure I wanted to risk it with how unstable my feet are right now.

3. Watching the busses drive by packed full with people shoulder-to-shoulder was not something I wanted to participate in. Over the past few days there has been a big increase in the number of terrible sounding coughs around the ship. One lady in the pool yesterday said she thought she was getting a cold but it was probably just the humid weather. And then she proceeded to cough and cough and cough. Yeah, definitely not a “humidity” cough. On a related note, I went to the open space on back of Deck 8 to take pictures and…ran into the Covid wing. The tell tale sign? Small tables piled with dirty dishes outside cabin doors.

4. Since Scooter can’t do rain, the deciding factor wound up being the weather. It was sunny when we arrived but clouds quickly moved in and the forecast went to 100% chance of rain. The percentage held true just as I was folding my laundry.

Too late now

Looks like ship food instead of Panamanian food

3”-5” of rain expected today

Boy, did it rain hard. It ranged from rain to downpours to torrential downpours. It may have briefly stopped but I wouldn’t have known it because I wound up taking a nice afternoon nap in my nice comfortable bed with the door open, listening to nature’s own sound machine. 

We’ll drop anchor close by tonight and hang out until our scheduled transit time tomorrow morning. Yep, it’ll be a bucket list moment for many on the ship - traveling through the Panama Canal.

Time zone changes: We set clocks ahead again a couple days back so we’re now at 3 so far.

Puntarenas, Costa Rica

Hello from Costa Rica! 

Thanks to me leaving my curtains open at night and an early sunrise today I was up long before my typical 6 AM. 

4:46 AM

While I wish I could have gone back to sleep, I chose to sit on the balcony and watch our approach. Good thing I sleep in a nightgown and not my birthday suit or the tugboat captain who pulled right alongside me would have gotten an eyeful.

Puntarenas is on the west coast of Costa Rica and unfortunately is not in the area where you’ll find their white sand beaches. Here they are brown and can be dirty and have trash on them.

I did see quite a bit of garbage in the water as we got closer to port and even by the ship when we were docked.

Some people do, but I’d pass
on swimming near the port area.

The cruise port here has a very long pier. Thankfully for guests on Princess tours the coaches drive down towards the ship. But not just drive - they back up the entire way! It’s quite an interesting process to watch. When the bus is ready it then pulls on out of line.

Such skillful drivers

If you don’t have a tour you’ll need to take the long hot walk along the left side of the pier to get to town.

You know it’s hot when the Captain puts up
the window shades to keep his car ship dashboard cool!

Otherwise you can wait until the pier is clear of the tours and then a little train is available to give you a ride.

No room for Scooter on the train
so we rolled ourselves down the pier

I had one big task today. Last time we were here coffee-lover Ed took a coffee plantation tour and rated it as one of his all-time top tours, up there with Normandy. While I don’t drink coffee, I can shop coffee so that’s what I did. He had a list of brands and types of roasts but no matter where I went I struck out again and again. I called an audible (how’s that for a sports term?!) and bought a whole variety of brands and roasts from a variety of vendors. I had brought a shipping box from home and it’s now filled to the gills and ready to send off at the post office when we get to Fort Lauderdale.

After my must-do for the day, I wheeled down the waterfront to get a photo of the Puntarenas sign and of the ship.

Not a bus in sight now

By then I was steamy hot and needed a refreshment. The granizados looked like something I wanted to try. A shave ice/snow cone with ice cream? Yes, please. But the Spanish I used so confidently and competently in Huatulco didn’t help me today. The popular “Churchill” I ordered had sweetened condensed milk on the side, ice cream on top, and shave ice. But all the white inside the glass was leche pinito. And there was my misstep.

Leche pinito? Powdered milk.

I really tried to like it, but the texture and the flavor of the powdered milk just wasn’t doing it for me. I could only get so far before I had to call it quits.

I’m not as adventurous as I’d hoped.

But I did navigate the vendors and haggle over prices and cross the streets while dodging the crazy Puntarenas drivers in hot, steamy weather. By myself. On a scooter. So maybe I was a little adventurous after all. 

But not adventurous enough to get anywhere near these end-of-the-day masked performers. 

They kind of creeped me out

Early sunset, too. 5:48 PM

Up tomorrow is a sea day and then Panama City on Sunday.