Reading the Royal Caribbean website, I saw something about taking a partial cruise - either to or from your city only.

Had anybody ever taken a partial cruise? And I don't mean when you had to interrupt due to an emergency situation, but pre-paying for a part of the cruise only.

I'm not an expert on the law behind it, but this is not allowed. If you attempted to leave the ship before the cruise is complete there are penalties to pay. Someone else might be able to quote the requirements that forbid this for all but emergencies.

What you may have read about is a "partial transit" of the Panama Canal. This means that you take a complete cruise from start to end, but you only go through a part of the canal "Thus partial".

If you can be more specific about what you saw, perhaps we can help more.

Maybe this is what I saw! Panama cruise.

I was only curious how it works, so if I see it, I'll copy in here or post the URL.

This depends on cruise line policy. Some cruise lines like Regent (Radisson) let you disambark early and even charge you lower pro-rated price. Celebrity (and I guess RCI as well) also allows early disembarkation but don't reduce the price. In both cases, prior notification and cruise line approval required.

I was checking "FAQs" on Royal Caribbean

http://www.royalcaribbean.com/custom...YX:10kohi76p#0

and found this: Yes! Partial cruises allow you to enjoy part of your cruise vacation in the event that you are unable to meet the ship in the scheduled boarding port, or would like to end your cruise earlier than the scheduled departure date.

And a lengthy explanation of laws follows...