SuzieQ521

19 minutes ago, trinitygirl said:

On embarkation day, there will be (or there has been previously) a special where you get 10%, 20%, 30% off your 1st, 2nd and subsequent treatments.  That discount is never available online.  I love massages so I budget for these, taking the discount into account and go book them directly at the spa on embarkation.   I have previously enjoyed mani/pedis but have now realised how very overpriced they are and get this done off ship.  I’ve also enjoyed having my hair done on board.  The only downside other than expense is that the treatment staff will try relentlessly to sell you products and other treatments.  I find this stressful, so always request a silent treatment in advance.  One more tip: the counter people are very convincing when they tell you that the only available times are really undesirable…. Be prepared to politely explain that only X times suit you and walk away rather than change your plans - the times you want always seem to free up in the end.

 

ps: the Enclave, if it is on your ship, is awesome and I book a cruise pass online as soon as I book.  

Regarding the Enclave, do you know if it's less expensive online now than in person? It says it's $149 for the week for our Royal Princess Alaska cruise in May.

thanks~

Hello:

Looking to rent a stroller wagon for my very tall 4 year old (who won't fit in a regular stroller) in case he gets tired of walking--we need it for our Alaska cruise out of Seattle in May. It will likely mostly be used walking around in Juneau. 

I came across Cloud of Goods...anyone have any experience with them? How does it work? Do you pick up the wagon at the Seattle port (Port 91), keep it the whole cruise, and then do they pick it up upon returning back to Seattle?

Any input about them or other options for wagons/bigger strollers would be appreciated. Thanks!

Hello:

I plan to post this as well in the Family forum but was wondering if anyone knew the answer specifically to Alaska--likely just Juneau but possibly Ketchikan as well.

My son is a very tall 4 year old who does not fit in the traditional light weight strollers that one can easily travel with. He does tire after a certain distance and usually asks one of us to carry him which we obviously cannot do for a long time.

I was wondering if there was a place we could rent a stroller, or more like a wagon to fit him, to allow us to walk around Mendenhall Glacier walking paths/downtown Juneau (at least). I did find one baby company but they required a 3 day minimum rental for strollers. With Princess cruises, I could only find companies that rented wheelchairs/scooters, not child gear.

Thanks!

On 3/19/2023 at 9:21 AM, david,Mississauga said:

 

If you check the schedules to see how many ships are expected on the day you plan to be there and the berth assignment, you may know if the odds are in your favour.

 

https://claalaska.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/SKG-Skagway-2023.pdf

 

If there are three or fewer ships you may feel better about it. (My wife and I are taking a cruise on the Queen Elizabeth and the rail excursion is the only excursion we have booked, so I am following the situation closely.) 

 

If your ship is assigned to the Broadway or Ore docks that is good. If your ship is assigned to  "Railroad Dock Aft" that is almost as re-assuring. It is planned to take passengers by shuttle bus to/from the ship at that berth. If that is not possible, tendering is a possibility. If your ship is assigned to "Railroad Dock forward" I would be worried.

 

Of course, berth assignments can change. But we have done three cruises to Alaska in the past seven years and the information given in the aforementioned site has been accurate for all ports.

May I ask why RR forward is problematic? There’s three ships in Port for our day in May and ours (Royal Princess) says RRF.

thanks

Thanks everyone. It is the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend so I didn't even think about how Pike Place area is going to be even more crowded than usual.

It may be worth it to do the Seattle Express tour after all...

Hello:

We are disembarking off our Alaska cruise on a Saturday in late May. I know the latest that Princess will let us get off the ship is 10 am if we are lucky.

Part of our group of 9 has a 5:30 pm flight and the others are not until 7:30 p.m.

I looked at the sightseeing tour that Seattle Express offers but that's more (about $90pp) than anyone wants to pay, especially after the costly Alaska excursions. 

The problem is that a couple in our group are mobility-challenged and we also will have a small child...

Are there any other reasonably priced shuttle buses or tours that could pick us up from Pier 91 to go sightsee around Pike Place and then possibly drive us to the airport? Or is our best bet trying to take Uber/Lyft from Pier 91 to Pike Place, and then another ride share to the airport? We plan to utilize the Port of valet service for our bigger luggage. 

Thanks!

3 minutes ago, dcsam said:

Any thoughts about purchasing a transfer wheelchair?  They’re not terribly expensive and could be useable on the ship as well. 

Thank you. We will look into it. It's going to be hard to convince her to use a scooter so hopefully she will even use the wheelchair.

I just looked at the costs of portable scooters and they are pretty expensive, so a transfer wheelchair might be the way to go.

Hello:

We are traveling with someone who has limited mobility and at the very least, will need a scooter to get around the various Alaskan Ports. She could possibly get by without a scooter on a ship and she's in a regular balcony stateroom so it would be difficult to keep the scooter in there anyway.

Does anyone know of any companies who would just have a scooter ready at the Ports--or at least some of them? (Juneau, Skagway, Ketchikan, Victoria) or would this be something that Princess could do? We depart out of Seattle.

Thanks! 

Do these companies also work out of Seattle for Alaska cruises?

We have someone who will need a scooter, both on the ship and at the Ports, in May. Thanks!

We are sailing the Royal to Alaska this May but just booked a Thanksgiving cruise with lots of family on the Crown... so very dismayed to read this! 😞 

Hopefully things get better by November!

Hello:

We have a couple people in our group who will be spending the majority of their time in the casino but I thought I read somewhere that the casinos are not open as long as the ship is about 12 miles from any Port. Is that true? How does that work given that the Alaskan Ports are so close to each other?

We are doing Seattle-Juneau-Skagway-Glacier Bay-Ketchikan-Victoria-Seattle on the Royal Princess.

Would the casino also be closed all Glacier Bay day? We also don't arrive in Victoria until 7 p.m. so would the casino be open any of that day?

Thanks!

10 minutes ago, wolfie11 said:

Princess offers the Mendenhall Glacier and Wildlife Quest, although you don't get a long time at the glacier (about an hour).  It may not be offered if you have a weird port time.  Be aware that if you have anyone with limited mobility you have to walk from the ship to the tram parking lot to get to Juneau Whale Watching and then from the parking lot at Auke Bay down to the docks. All the whale watching companies in Juneau are reputable with the possible exception of some of the smaller 6 passenger boats.

Thank you. Yes, I didn't see that combo tour with Princess (maybe because our ship arrives at Noon). EDIT: I do see it now but it seems significantly more expensive than the private company.

Thank you for that information. We do have a couple people with limited mobility so that will be a factor.

Hello:

Initially we had planned a combo Glacier Gardens/Mendenhall glacier Princess tour but I read that Glacier Gardens would not be worth it in May. I was then looking at the salmon bake/Mendenhall tour as well but now am thinking about whale watching and Mendenhall.

Princess doesn't offer a combo whale watching/Mendenhall tour so was looking for some reputable private companies. I did see 

https://www.juneauwhalewatch.com/  and was wondering if anyone had any experience with them?

Thanks!

Hello:

Did you ever find an answer here?

We were considering doing Princess's combo Mendenhall Glacier and Salmon bake excursion.

Thanks!

Hello:

We have our cruise at the end of May and wanted family we are traveling with (which include an elderly person, someone with limited mobility, and a child, among others) to get a taste of Juneau. My husband and I are the only ones who have done this same cruise before.

We booked with Princess's tour which is a combo of Glacier Gardens and Mendenhall Glacier (90 min there). But I was just reading that Glacier Gardens might not be in full bloom at that time of the season. 

Anyone been to Glacier Gardens that time of year...is it worth it? Any other recommendations?

Thanks!

On 3/2/2023 at 4:55 AM, Jemnibabe said:

Looking for the best and most convenient transportation from Long Beach airport to Crowne Plaza EXCLUDING UBER.  Need transportation for 4 people, some mobility-challenged, which can be very convenient to get to.  Taxi, shuttle, limo?  Which would you suggest (and who?)  Thanks for all replies.

We just did this route in January-Crowne Plaza San Pedro? We did Lyft which was less than $30 (I believe about $26)  on a Saturday late afternoon; you could request the Lyft XL if you need more space, which would be a few dollars more. Not sure how much a Taxi would charge.

LGB is a very small airport. Right when you walk outside, the ride share area will be there.

How do formal nights work? Is it just for the main dining room? Would children still be allowed to dine in the MDRs on formal nights? Our Alaska cruise has 2.

Thanks!

Sorry to hijack this thread but I haven't been able to pinpoint an answer to this:

Even if we have the Plus or Premier package, will we still be charged taxes on the full price of the drink (soda, coffee, alcohol etc.) when embarked in a Port that charges taxes? 

We are sailing to Alaska in May and am wondering if we are going to be taxed at every Alaskan city we are visiting (3 of them). I know San Pedro-CA charges taxes and I thought I heard Alaska as well.

Thanks!

Oh that's interesting!

What was the cut off date between the old package and the new? We just purchased our cruise with the plus package a couple weeks ago for a May sailing.

Thanks

Someone on one of the recent Royal ships posed a menu which looks really good.

It's near the International Cafe and has a variety of various juice mixtures, like you would see at high end juice/smoothie bar.

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I did read this as we are doing an Alaska cruise in May and I read that some Alaskan ports also charge sales tax, even when you already paid for the drink package. (We did a NCL cruise out of San Pedro in January and were charged tax on Starbucks drinks even though we had the package, so it's not just alcohol). 

Anyone have any more information about this?

Are you both able to walk a moderate amount?

I would say most certainly Ketchikan and Victoria you can walk on your own or take local transportation. Creek Street is very walkable from the Port and my husband and I even found a local hike that gave us the most gorgeous bird's eye view.

Is your Victoria stop just an evening one like most cruises to Alaska? If so there should still be enough daylight to be able to walk to the inner harbour, see the parliament buildings, empress hotel etc. (also beautiful with all the lights at night).

We also did Mendenhall Glacier on our own a few years ago on the roundtrip blue shuttle and then walked around town. Compare the costs with your cruise sponsored excursion. (Juneau).

We also booked independent excursion in Skagway with Chikloot tours and did one way train to White Pass and one way bus back. The cruise line also has this so compare prices. We then just walked around the town before heading back to the Port.

Thank you all. So just to confirm:

1) Download Medallion App now to input information (I see I can do this on the Princess website too when I log in); 

2) Request the Medallion device which "supposedly" should be free shipping with my cruise promo; 

3) Select boarding time 45 or 30 days out?

Thanks!

Our cruise departs on May 20th; what is the earliest date we can do online check in (where they assign the boarding group on embarkation day)?

We have the Plus package and as part of the promo, our Medallion is supposed to be mailed to us... When does that typically happen?

We haven't cruised Princess since they started the Medallion stuff so I'm a little confused as to how online check in works.

Thanks!

42 minutes ago, iamtrustworthy said:

Hi SuzyQ521,

 

You can't get the 75% CFAR because you are using Future Travel Credits. All the plans I know well, and a lot of the many companies I don’t offer, define your Initial Trip Deposit Date as the date you originally bought the trip that later something happened and caused the Travel Credits as the first payment.

 

I know one company that has a 50% CFAR that you can get.

 

Steve Dasseos

 

Thank you Steve...I appreciate it. Would you be able to share who the 50% CFAR company is?

It was just interesting to me: this old Southwest airline travel credit ($25 worth) is completely unrelated to our current cruise (a cruise that we 100% paid for last week on February 17th) that I would not expect it to affect any CFAR policy but I guess it does.