Thrak

We always stay at Crowne Plaza. They have a shuttle to the port and, like Double Tree, have a package where you can leave your car there during your cruise. We did take advantage of that one time. You will likely get the most advice to stay at either Crowne Plaza or Doubletree.

Be aware that, if you want to do Hobbiton, you can not count on a Princess tour. We did Hobbiton last year and they stopped accepting cruise ship tours. During the pandemic they lost about a zillion dollars due to accepting a ton of reservations from cruise ship companies and then having the ship either not port or having other problems causing all of those reservations to go unused so they had no paying visitors. I booked way early and privately (even though Princess assured me their excursion was going to be okay) and was glad I did as Princess eventually dropped the excursion. If Princess does offer an excursion to Hobbiton don't trust them. Booking privately they will pick you up at the port and return you there in plenty of time for all aboard. EDIT: Forgot to mention that the tour company we booked with was only accepting 10 people from our cruise. That was it. Once they had 10 people booked they were done. It was also much less expensive than the original excursion listed by Princess.

It would be foolish to take a chance and find that you are unable to board. Why take that sort of risk? Start the renewal process now!

For self laundry we pick a time to do it and then select a movie to watch in the cabin. We queue up the movie and then go put in the wash. We set a timer, go back to the cabin, and watch the movie. (We set the timer a few minutes short of the time the wash will run.) When the timer goes off we pause the movie, go move the laundry to the dryer, set a timer, then go back to the cabin and continue the movie. When the timer goes off we pause the movie and deal with the laundry. It's pretty easy and stress free and setting the timer just short of the actual time needed assures that our laundry never sits unattended in a machine that has shut off. Heck, order some drinks and snacks to the cabin while watching the movie. Make it something other than a "chore" when doing the laundry.

According to multiple posts by @PescadoAmarillo her husband, G, attends them on many cruises so I have to assume that they are actually held frequently. I see them listed in the Patter all the time. (Being listed in the Patter doesn't mean things actually have anybody show up but I'm guessing that the veteran's meetings do indeed have attendees. I've heard that some meetings often have nobody show up and other meetings have a lot of people show up. On our last cruise we were in Take Five way early for the music and somebody asked why had so many people were there way in advance of the music and were told it was the LGBTQ meeting.) Sometimes a meeting (for whatever group) has a lot of people and sometimes nobody shows up. It depends on the cruise. I'm sure a Veteran's group meeting will be scheduled multiple times on the cruise but attendance can be hit or miss.

D'Oh! My bad. I know that Sea Princess was not an R Class ship. What a dork mistake. Sorry about that but many thanks for the correction. We never sailed on the R Class ships. We thought we might sail on Pacific Princess but Princess sold the ship before that happened. Thanks again for catching that and making the correction.

For a huge promenade one can't beat Sapphire. Our first cruise was on the old R Class Sea Princess. It too had an extra wide promenade and we thought that was how they would all be. Imagine our disappointment when we found that wasn't the norm. If I remember right Coral has an extra wide Promenade as well but, of course, it's not a Grand Class ship.

When we stayed a few days in Barcelona between cruises we also took a cab to the cruise port when leaving. It was easy and, if I remember correctly, it wasn't really very expensive.

I would sail Emerald Princess anytime. I love the large balconies on Caribe Deck. I love the quiet space of Adagio. I like the setup of the Piazza/Atrium far better than the setup on the Royal Class ships - which are much too loud for my taste. We have only sailed on two of the Royal Class ships - Royal Princess and Discovery Princess. Between those two I liked Discovery much better. I still prefer the older Grand Class ships though - even those such as Emerald Princess that have the extra passenger deck. I've never felt crowded.

I can't remember for sure but I "think" we had something like $89 refundable OBC left. Hopefully it will show up in the mail. We didn't get a copy of the folio either. I had intended to print it out at the kiosk the next to last day but forgot to do so. D'Oh!

We do the land tour first so we can unwind on the southbound cruise. Both times we started at the Fairbanks lodge. They provided breakfast the first day and we then went on included excursions. The attached document is a bunch of snips from our Travel Summary for a 15 day Connoisseur Escorted Tour. I did it in a hurry just now so hopefully didn't miss a day or double a day or something dorky like that. Lot's going on here at the moment so I did it in a hurry. However, even if I messed it up it should give you an idea of what is included. Also, I will attach a link to an old post by @caribill which is one of the factors that helped us decide on this type of tour in the first place. TRAVEL SUMMARY PORTIONS Travel Summary Snips.docx POST BY caribill EDIT: Be aware that the Tundra Wilderness Tour can't go the full distance at the moment as part of the mountain slid off and took the road with it. It will be quite some time before they can "replace" that portion of the road.

To me, the easiest way to find out where my muster station is so I can check in before heading to MDR for embarkation lunch - or up to my cabin - is to simply ask at any muster station. It's always simple to locate one and they will be able to tell you where your proper muster station is located. Quick and easy with no ambiguity.

We have never done a cruise tour to that area but have done two Connoisseur Cruise Tours to Alaska. We loved them and were pleased to have so much taken care of for us. If we ever do another Princess Cruise Tour we will almost certainly do another Connoisseur tour.

This is a huge peeve with me. I mention it on every survey. The DJs don't ever seem to realize that most older folks don't like the crap they play.