The first stop on our cruise through the Panama Canal will be Cartagena, Colombia, on January 25, 2024. You should plan your day based on your interests and your current physical stamina. Lots of fun things to do are available as you will see on www.princess.com. More details will appear on your Princess page once you have made your reservations. While you can choose your tours on the ship the night before or the morning of your planned adventure, we usually buy our tours ahead of time. That way, when we pack, we bring the right kind of shoes and clothes. We also will have a good idea of what the tour will require of us physically and prepare appropriately.
Princess contracted tours...and actually most tour operators…will indicate whether you’ll be jumping out of helicopter or be squired around town in a air-conditioned bus. The average temperature in Cartagena in January for a typical day ranges from a high of 88°F (31°C) to a low of 78°F (25°C). Expect it to be breezy.
Some folks like to get off the ship and wander around each stop and/or bar on their own. If you are a newbie to cruising, I don’t recommend that for several reasons.
1. Princess contracts with known and trusted tour guides who charge appropriately and make sure that all passengers get the services they pay for, and are returned safely to the ship at the appropriate time.
2. Most importantly, if a Princess contracted tour is delayed getting back to the dock for some reason, Princess will wait for you.
3. However, say you get off the ship and decide to tour on your own and you get on the wrong bus and said bus runs into a parked jeep on a mountain road somewhere and you end up having to walk through the jungle in the rain, and you get washed down the side of a hill into a creek and that makes you late, the ship won’t wait for you.
Hopefully, that won’t happen to any of us, but regardless, pack practical clothes and shoes.