I don't recommend Princess Rainforest Tram Escursion, Panama Canal cruise

[lhall85917]

We just returned from a wonderful 14-day Panama Canal cruise, Jan. 17-31, LA to Florida. We had arranged private tours in all ports except Costa Rich (Puntarnas). There, we did with Princess excursion that had a tree top ride in a gondola over the tops of the rain forest. This was pretty much a waste of time. Although the forest is pretty, we saw zero animals or birds. That was a big disappointment to us. Then, back at the base, we had a guide take us on a walk to look at snakes in glass containers. They were all curled up and difficult to see. Not at all interesting. The food offered for lunch was good, and then we went to the best part of the tour. We went on a jungle cruise and our excellent guide, who is a birder, spotted and pointed out birds to us. He also took us over to watch the "crocodile man" feed a chick to a crock on the shore. Then, he took us into a mangrove. Very very nice!!

 

However, overall, this tour was not worth the $179 per person that we paid. It would have been much, much better to make private arrangements with someone who could have taken us to see monkeys in the wild, and then the river birds.

 

Hope this helps those of you planning future excusions in Puntarnas.

 

Sue

I feel like I could have written this - we had exactly the same experience last year on an identical tour from Limon. The gondola over the rain forest was pretty neat, but we didn't see one animal from the gondolas. In fact, during our hike to see animals, our guide stopped us and told us to be "very quiet", we all stopped and looked and he was pointing out a brown squirrel that had shown up! LOL We laugh about this all the time, making the Elmer Fudd sound and telling everyone to be vewwwy quiet! I think we saw some ants and not much else. The second part on the river was very nice and we did see quite a few animals, but certainly nothing like we expected. I have some pictures included from our tour here -

[mgcarnut]

Yes Zip Lining over the Costa Rican Rain Forest is well worth the money. We have done it twice and would do it again in a heart beat.

 

Please consider something else to do in the Costa Rican rainforest. The OP complained they did not see any animals on their tram tour, well we had the same experience during the Monteverde rainforest walk we took in 2010 on Celebrity. Except for an abundance of hummingbirds and bees near the lodge, the only fauna we saw on the walk were a few butterflies. I contend the problem is due to those zipline tours that create loud noises in the forest! During our walk I was wishing they could have somehow confined the ziplining to some other area.

 

I will say that even without animals in the rainforest proper (we did see howler monkeys and cows from the bus), the whole experience was incredible. After the walk we had a great lunch and a tour through an insect museum. And our tourguide David recommended a brand of Costa Rican coffee sold at the obligatory gift shop stop that was wonderful - Tres Generaciones Peaberry AA, from Doka Estates. We are still ordering that coffee every year and drinking it with pleasure.

 

Cheers,

mgcarnut

[Loonbeam]

Hard to tell. The issue is there are a few different tram rides operating. The one we did with JJ was out of the same location as the Original Canopy Tour and was only about 10 mins long, more of a way of accessing the river for a walk than a tram ride. There's another one which supposedly takes about an hour plus from a different location, I think that's the one the poster means. They are both billed as Veragua tours...

 

We're booked on the Veragua Rainforest Tour out of Limon. Is this the same tour that's getting the negative reviews? :confused:

 

Thanks ...