amanda384

5 minutes ago, Ombud said:

On another thread (July 27 roll call) there's a post that CB has lost power?? What's going on?

I just finished dinner in the Palm Dining Room. The lights went up and down a couple of times but that's it. Everything seems to be running normally here.

2 hours ago, cruiserdru said:

Do they offer whiskey flights on the Caribbean Princess in any of the bars?

 

That would certainly bring a smile to DH's face.

Hmmm I'm not sure! Haven't seen it so far but I will keep an eye open.

5 hours ago, Jeter02 said:

@amanda384 any thoughts if you'll be trying steamers this week? 

Most likely not. My husband does not like shellfish so it would not be appreciated enough.

Good morning from somewhere near Roatan, Honduras! I'm sipping an Americano from Coffee and Cones and watching the sea roll by from my balcony.

Last night was a lazy day after returning from Grand Cayman. We went to Slice for lunch and I tried the stromboli.  A+!  It was so good I forgot to take a picture of it!

We went to the Captain's Circle Welcome Party... meh, it was okay. The drinks were plentiful but the canapes were very lackluster and the presentation was basically a sales pitch. The Captain himself couldn't make it. Oh well, free champagne!

The ship was a little rocky last night which put a damper on things for me, but I took a nap and that usually helps.  We skipped the main dining room because I wasn't really feeling any of the menu options and we went to Planks. There were very few tables occupied and I wonder if Planks/Steamers are perhaps not as big of a draw as anticipated.  The food was very good though and the service was excessively attentive.

On our way out we walked through the World Fresh Marketplace.  I was very surprised to see that only half of the buffet is open for dinner! Is this standard practice? On the Regal and Royal the full buffet was open for dinner and it was always filled with guests. Here it was almost deserted and the whole right side of the buffet was out of service.

After a quick break we went down to see the Motown Music performance in the theater.  The singer was Dwight Blake and he had a phenomenal voice. He concluded the show with Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" and I was skeptical because that is a tough song but WOW could he hit those notes!

Today we are in Roatan and we got a clamshell on the beach. Like I said, we are beach bums. I will check in later!

31 minutes ago, MJSailors said:

Hello amanda384-

   Interesting blog of the Caribbean Princess Cruise.

My DH and I have sailed on her twice. Good to hear that the ship has been maintained and that you are enjoying the cruise.

    Not a cruise question per se,but I would like to know your impression of the Ft.Lauderdale Marina Hilton. Although your stay there was brief,could you tell me your impression of the hotel,please ?

We have a pre cruise stay there in early March,next year. We will be in a tower,water view room.

I have read a number of negative reviews of the hotel,and am concerned mostly about the cleanliness of the hotel.

Thank you for any info and I hope you continue to enjoy the cruise !

I thought it was beautiful. Extremely convenient to the port, spotlessly clean, friendly staff. The bed was comfortable.  I would definitely stay again if I were going to be there for more than 8 hours!

8 minutes ago, senior lady said:

which tour did you book for Grand Cayman?  

We booked the Seven Mile Beach Getaway through Shore Excursioneer.

19 minutes ago, PMGS247 said:

Thanks so much for doing 

Also - I grew up in Fox Mill and just a few years ago lived right next to the Harris Teeter on Sunrise Valley Dr.!  In Pittsburgh now and miss a lot from NoVA but you can keep the traffic 🤣

I live in Fox Mill!  Great place to have kids.

Yeah the traffic is out of control and will only get worse with Amazon coming in!

29 minutes ago, Ombud said:

Please tell me this is NOT their version of  baked potato soup!

I wish I could tell you otherwise. I do not recommend.

Hello from Grand Cayman! It has been a perfect day at Seven Mile Beach and we are having a drink at Calico Jack's while we wait for our shuttle back to the port. I'm exhausted from the sun and can't wait for Lido deck pizza and a nap in the a/c! We did a very early dinner in the MDR so I'm getting a tiny bit hungry after all the swimming!

Hi everyone! I'm up in the room chilling and watching the Love Boat on demand while my husband plays blackjack! Dinner tonight was amazing. I am really enjoying getting to know our dinner companions! They are not on Cruise Critic but I told them about my live blog and they volunteered to share pictures of their meals as well. I don't know Princess's formula for finding seatmates but they struck gold for us.

Honestly, this is an incredibly friendly sailing. We had pre-dinner cocktails at Crooners and ended up chatting with a fantastic older couple from Georgia. Every place we have interacted with other guests has been a pleasure.

Tonight was formal night and I found that about 80 percent of people were formal by any reasonable definition and no one was completely casual. Lots of guys in kilts, which I always think is cool.

The Broadway Ballroom show was packed and we took too long at dinner so we ended up missing it.  😞

Tomorrow we are in Grand Cayman. We are beach bums so we booked an independent excursion to Seven Mile Beach. I know we could just take a cab and wing it but my husband is very type A and wants a ticket in his hand guaranteeing us a spot on a shuttle of some kind.  Princess didnt have any beach-only excursions so we booked through Shore Excursioneer which we have used before and been happy with. Attached are menu and food pics! I tend to photograph food and beaches and not much else so if you have any photo requests feel free to ask away!

For lunch we went to the World Fresh Marketplace buffet.  It was interesting. I'll try to address some of the complaints I have seen about it.

First of all, I have seen complaints that the food is either cold or lukewarm. That was NOT our experience.  All the food was an appropriate temperature for what it was. I have also seen complaints about seating.  Compared to the royal class ships the seating does seem minimal, but I think you just have to walk further for more seating options. It seemed like there was plenty of room back by Steamers and Planks but fewer tables right alongside the food than on some other ships.

The premade sandwiches were good, and lighter than they looked. The bread is light, so having two different sandwiches doesn't make you feel stuffed.

There were some standard options like carved turkey breast, mashed potatoes, pasta with marinara, salad and fish. But there were a wider variety of "exotic" dishes than you find at the Horizon Court.  I put exotic in quotes because it is not like the ingredients are unrecognizable. They are just in different combinations than perhaps many people (myself included) were used to. I would find myself looking at descriptions and thinking that it all sounded good except for one ingredient that was off-putting. So I stuck to sandwiches and some mashed potatoes with gravy, which I always get at buffets. The roasted red pepper and arugula sandwich with basil pesto was good. It had a lot of goat cheese. If you like goat cheese you will never go hungry on Princess. So far it has been on sandwiches, on the menu and in the tapas at Vines.  I do like goat cheese so I don't mind but there was more on this sandwich than I expected.

I went to the Essence skincare talk and raffle. Didnt win the raffle but everyone who went got a $10 voucher, which was nice because I forgot my favorite lipstick and tonight is formal night!

The weather is gorgeous so far! Much nicer than in the DC area.  I will not be happy to return to that, but that is many days away!

3 hours ago, Ombud said:

Torn between anytime & TD. Where's ATD? 

ATD is in the Coral from 5-9, and in the Island from 7:30-9. I like traditional dining myself, now that the late seating us 7:30 instead of 8:15 or 8:30. That was a bit late even for me.

51 minutes ago, Jeter02 said:

@amanda384 As a heads up, if you look the back of the princess patter where the dinning info is located daily under the Planks / Steamers it will tell you the lunch special they have for the day starting around 11:30 or noon. Daily they switch it up create your own and they'll cook it for you between Ramen Noodle bar. Mongolian Beef Station (Stir Fry). It's a very nice concept. Something to check out. It is where the omlette station is in the morning.

Good point! Today is ramen, which is not a favorite of ours, but I loon forward to the Mongolian beef!

Good morning all! Yes, it was the chili. It was good but almost more like a beef stew. Not very spicy.

Today we went to the Coral dining room for breakfast. It was good. Husband likes the dining room for breakfast but I am more into the buffet.  Then we went to the Lido deck for the pool which was gorgeous. But then they started playing a sad movie about a dog on the big screen and we just put one of our dogs down a few days before we left so I had to go. Can't do dog movies right now.  😞

On the way back to the room I stopped at Coffee and Cones. FYI they do not have drip coffee there, only specialty coffees. Of course there is free coffee at the buffet. I have the coffee card so it was no big deal, but something to be aware of if you frequent the Lido.

It seems like a very relaxed sea day today. We will probably play some trivia later and have a drink at Vines. Tonight is formal night, so that should be fun. The show tonight is Broadway Ballroom and I hope to check that out. Pics of breakfast and the menu below!

8 hours ago, Ombud said:

Which dining room had the embarkation day luncheon? (I get on as you get off)

Coral, and it opened at 11:30.

We are in for the night! A little early but we had a very late night last night. 

Dinner was in the Palm Dining Room and it was very good.  Pictures of the menus and some items below.  We are seated with two other couples, random seatmates. That could have gone either way but they seem really fun so far and we have a good deal in common to chat about.  The 9:30 show was comedian Troy Thirdgill. It was a cute show, very benign humor and certainly appropriate for kids. I'm posting a picture of the theater at 9:27 pm, 3 minutes before show time.  As you can see there was still plenty of empty space.

The internet, as Jeter said (Go Yanks, btw!) is insanely fast and always available. Good for me because I like being able to do things like follow the baseball scores, play my little games, etc. And of course, live blog!

We got an invite to the Captain's Circle cocktail reception. We are ruby and I think that is usually just platinum and elite but there are a TON of blue medallions on this sailing so I guess they had to go deeper into the well.

So far no noticeable vibrations and the a/c in our Lido balcony room is great. It was a little warm when we arrived but good now, and I tend to prefer things on the colder side.

Will check in tomorrow during my sea day!

5 minutes ago, pompeii said:

Amanda, can you let us know what the traditional dining times are?  For my sailing on August 19, the options are 5:00 and 7:15.  We chose the late seating, and I'm curious what time that will actually turn out to be on the ship.  Thanks!

The patter says 5:15 and 7:30. We are also doing late traditional.

The souffle was amazing. I really love Princess souffles even though I know some people are less than impressed. I wasn't wild about the aioli sauce on the shrimp, but the chateaubriand was delicious!

Okay, my husband is unpacking and I am reclining on the bed. Medallion net is outstanding for me so far, although he has had some service issues.

We had lunch at the MDR. It was fairly crowded for an embarkation day. On the Regal and Royal I found that they really try to push people toward the buffet upon boarding, whereas here they gave us a card with all available dining options when we checked in.

Menu and food pics posted!

And just like that, we are on board! First stop, coffee at the international cafe and then lunch in the MDR. Medallion boarding is a breeze. We arrived at about 10:40 and were on the ship having coffee at 11:05.  No lines!

1 minute ago, voljeep said:

you got in after 2 a.m. and are now packing to leave ??

 

we stayed at the Hilton Marina for 2 nights in May ... yes, a little pricey ... but can't imagine us staying there just to sleep for a couple of hours, shower, then leave ...

 

 Normally I wouldn't but I had a ton of Hilton Honors points and wanted to be close to the terminal! 🙂

Good morning everyone! I am here at the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Marina getting ready to head out to Port Everglades for a 7 day western caribbean cruise.  Our first cruise was on the CB in the same exact stateroom (L309) so that is kind of cool. It is our first cruise (and first trip) alone since we adopted our two kiddos from foster care in 2015. God bless grandparents!

I will be happy to try to answer questions. For some reason I got free Medallion Net for 4 devices, compliments of Princess. I'm Ruby so I don't know why...

We have late traditional dining and a res at the Crown Grill for Thursday.  In the meanwhile, enjoy some pictures of the view from my balcony and of our room. It is a convenient if pricey hotel with a comfortable bed. And don't mind the messy suitcase. Chronic overpacker here. There is also one of my delirious husband as we waited at baggage claim at FLL at 1:30 AM this morning.

Glad there is interest!  My flight gets to FLL at 1 AM today so I will start tomorrow.  🙂

4 hours ago, voljeep said:

decent perk ... from your TA ?

Actually, I don't use a TA.  This was totally out of the blue from Princess.  I booked using a future cruise credit.  It just says "complimentary gift."

Good morning all!

I know there have been several Caribbean Princess reviews lately.  Is there any interest in a live blog?  We got free medallion net as a perk so I figured I would take advantage of the "free" internet if anyone is interested.  We leave tonight and set sail tomorrow!