What s in it for a cruise passenger, well the views throughout the transit are spectacular, cutting

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One of the must do cruises for any cruise fanatic is a transit through the remarkable Panama Canal . A amazing feat of American engineering built over a ten year period starting in 1904. 5600 people died during its construction, family cruise vacations mainly from tropical diseases and construction accidents, so its worth a visit just to acknowledge that fact. The canal for a large part of its existence has been under the control of the American government highlighting the importance of the canal to the economy of the world. Since 1977 and up to 1991 the canal was under dual American and Panamanian control but in recent years since the stabilisation of Panama itself the canal has been controlled by the Panama Canal Authority, family cruise vacations a Panamanian government agency.
What s in it for a cruise passenger, well the views throughout the transit are spectacular, cutting through lust rain forest, giving family cruise vacations way to large lakes, the chance to view wildlife but most of all the chance to say I have been there . You will marvel at the size of the lock gates and at the sight of the electric mules that actually pull your ship through the locks, a balcony cabin is a must on a cruise like this. Many of the top cruise lines operate through the Canal during the winter months, Princess are pretty much the best , offering family cruise vacations full transits or their pioneering partial visits which I was lucky enough to be part of when the old Sky Princess started back in the early nineties. I have a loft full of picture taken through different transits, writing this blog reminds me I really have to sort some pictures out and post them up here with some good stories. One experience does come to mind. Those of you old enough will remember when Panama was controlled by the despot Manuel Noriega, during this period the land routes around the canal where controlled by different militia belonging family cruise vacations to Noriega and muggings here as Chief Photographer onboard NCL s old Southward had to get off the ship and follow its historic transit thought the canal , why historic? Well it was NCL s first venture out of the Caribbean, repositioning family cruise vacations over to the west coast, oh a long time ago, look at NCL now all over the place! Anyway back to the point, so here I was under the guidance of a local who looked like Indiana Jones, hat and all, following the ships transit by land, recording it on film, but along the way were randomly placed road blocks manned by machine gun toting, sun glasses wearing Central American militia, nobody had warned me that this was the way things are in this part of the world so you could imagine my thoughts as my guide got out of the old dodge he was driving and said stay in the car and don t move and don t take photographs, good advice I thought and strictly followed I may point out. My guide disappeared for a moment, no doubt to cross a few palms, reappeared and was calmly waved through the road block, this process was repeated several times along the route, family cruise vacations each time I had the vision of being carted family cruise vacations off to prison never to be heard of again, thankfully I am still here just, my guide on this same trip stopped me from making family cruise vacations the fatal mistake of swatting a bee that had been buzzing around my head as I snapped the Southward sail through the Celebra Cut. The bee he said was an African bee, the infamous killer bee and if I had made contact we would have had to make a fast exit or suffer family cruise vacations the wrath of its relatives.