Princess Cruises over Christmas and New Year's

[DRPWDunIL]

I have read the Princess descriptions of what the holidays are like onboard, but does anyone have any insight into being in port on Christmas, Boxing Day, or New Year's Day. Do any of the Princess shore excursions still run? Do the businesses tend to be open at all on national holidays? Is it a mistake to cruise when holidays fall on port days? Any insight would be appreciated.

[JF - retired RRT]

I have read the Princess descriptions of what the holidays are like onboard, but does anyone have any insight into being in port on Christmas, Boxing Day, or New Year's Day. Do any of the Princess shore excursions still run? Do the businesses tend to be open at all on national holidays? Is it a mistake to cruise when holidays fall on port days? Any insight would be appreciated.

We were in Honolulu on Christmas or Thanksgiving (can't remember which).

Excursions - yes

Stores open - the money grubbers - same as anywhere else.

[RSF Cruiser]

We were in Cartegena Dec 24 - everything was open, the Panama Canal Christmas Day - the only problem was some of the Christmas festivities like Santa interfered with being outside during the canal passage. We chose the canal passage over Santa... It was really festive being on the ship over the holidays. Other than the increased price, I'd always sail over the holidays!!!

[mlparksoi]

We have done five cruises over Christmas on Princess and thoroughly enjoyed each one. Some ports are partially closed for the holiday, but enough is open for limited shopping and sightseeing has always been available. Christmas Eve in Barbados a few years back was so busy that we returned to the ship and just enjoyed the holiday atmosphere there.

[capriccio]

We were in Punta Arenas, Chile this past Christmas. The private tour company was open (boat ride to Magdalena Island and the Magellanic penguins) but the town was closed. The souvenir stores at the pier were open. We were in Montevideo, Uruguay on New Year's Day. It was difficult to find a private excursion but we finally convinced an excursion company that we could fill a small bus from folks on our roll call. In fact I think we filled two small busses. It was great - we were the only vehicles out and about at 9 am!

[Cruisin' Chick]

It might also depend on how religious a country you're going to.

 

Even though our three holiday time cruises were the Hawaii RT, we checked out the websites for any places we were interested in going to in port to make sure they would be open that day, even if not Christmas (I've found a few places that would be closed a specific day of the week all year round so I continued this practice even when we were doing some land trips in California last year).

 

Our last cruise was going to include a port day in Hawaii and about a month or so before the cruise, Princess switched ports, maybe to have the port day in Honolulu to be a few days later (it was originally going to be on 12/25) as many passengers like to go to Pearl Harbor which is closed on Christmas. Instead we were on Maui, and we wanted to go to Whalers' Village. I contacted the shopping center as its website didn't give holiday hours, and got the reply that it will be open. Most of the stores were (and the food court and one of the restaurants; but not the Whaling Museum) so we had a fun day there, including walking along the beach, which, of course, was open.

[DRPWDunIL]

Thanks for the quick and useful replies. I think we are going to choose a cruise over Christmas. Just finalizing our plans.