MTAK

3 minutes ago, MissP22 said:

Just a thought, but if you were consistently late for the show, why not arrive a little earlier so you can get a decent seat. 

We had a reservation each night in the MDR at 5:40 but I suppose we could have tried showing up to dine earlier. Not sure how they handle that.

On 1/27/2024 at 6:51 PM, DennisNV said:

We still had a wonderful vacation, but were disappointed that the dining venues we love were so frustratingly slow!! All the food we had on the cruise in all venues was very good otherwise. 

 

Anyone else experience this sort of thing?

Yes. We were on Discovery January 13-20 and MDR service was very slow. We had a table for 2 at 5:40 in Ketchikan. The first night was 1h 50 minutes which caused us to miss the first show, but we assumed this was the 'first night chaos'. The next nights were at least 1h 30 minutes. One night we tried ordering dessert with the other courses thinking it would help speed things up, only to have the waiter return with menus after the main course asking us about ordering dessert (this must have thrown off his routine). The last night in the MDR we were out in just over 60 minutes but we skipped dessert to ensure we'd have time to grab drinks and get decent seats for the show.

We used a credit at the Gastropub one evening and the service was very slow there also, to the point that pax were verbally complaining. I would have been very unhappy if we paid for that.  We had good service at Gigi's for lunch on the last day.

Other than occasionally refilling water glasses, drink service while dining was non-existent. We each bring a starter cocktail or glass of wine, but no one ever offered to refresh them. My wife ordered coffee with desert one night and it did not show up until well after we were finished eating.

They seemed to be understaffed and frustrated. We agree the food on this cruise was very good though, which helped make up for the slow service. We are new to Princess and liked everything else about the cruise.

On 1/23/2024 at 10:32 AM, suekel said:

On January 11, 24 hours before my flight, United canceled one leg of my flight to LA.  I called the EZ Air department and they were able to switch me to American on the way to LA, keeping the flight home.  Call them.  

We had the same thing happen on January 11, 24 hours before departure. Delta canceled our direct flight to LAX and automatically rebooked us on the next day, which meant we would arrive at 2:30 pm on embarkation day. My wife chatted with Delta and their only other solution was a later flight connecting through Minneapolis, which didn't arrive in LAX until after 11 pm. I called EZ Air and they rebooked us on a direct flight on American that got us to LAX within a couple hours of our original flight arrival.

This was our first time on Princess and using EZ Air and I was very happy with the outcome.

On 1/17/2024 at 1:49 AM, mattR said:

Do the "guests" have to give permission for you to track them?  Just thinking some of our group won't be using the app themselves?

Yes, when you send a request to Shipmates they can allow permission to be located, and you also can provide them permission to locate you.

I am on Discovery right now an have not been able to find the water bottle fill station, maybe it was removed?

On 1/12/2024 at 8:43 AM, Cruise Raider said:

...

2) being able to view all the ship’s deck plans, not just the one you are on 

 

As of yesterday morning, they’ve stopped playing the music outside on deck 7, port side.  
My DH sent them praise and thanks over crew chat!  

We are staying on deck 8 in the same area and the music is very faint - I can barely hear it from our balcony. So thanks to your DH for apparently solving that issue! I am a light sleeper and wouldn't appreciate loud music.

You can see any deck plan in the app. There is a little drop down menu in the upper right-hand corner where you can change decks. It's not obvious so I can see how it would be missed.

I agree about the room service specialty coffee. I ordered an Americano this morning and it tastes like regular coffee. We have the Plus package so it's not a big deal, but I would not be happy if I had to pay for it.

I am on this cruise also. We arrived at 10:30 and dropped our carry-on bags in the room by 11:00. The security line was long, but it kept moving. There were signs for blue and green lane after going through security. We were green lane and didn't have to wait. The blue lane was quite long. I did not see any priority lanes.

I am on the same cruise and so far my dining reservations are the same (Table for 2 in Skagway each night).

20 minutes ago, mtnesterz said:

Do you remember where you read/heard about this?

It was in one of the Adam Savage episodes when he was getting a tour of the MDR section of the ship.

In this episode starting at 45:50. The whole dining room discussion starts at 40:00.

On 1/4/2024 at 6:16 PM, Teechur said:

I've often wondered why Princess doesn't designate one dining room for all of the people who like to dress up?

Apparently that will be happening on the new Sun Princess - 3 different levels of formality for MDR dining.

8 minutes ago, Daniel A said:

How soon is your sailing?  I haven't gotten anything and usually, both an e-mail comes directly to me and another copy goes to my TA for forwarding.   Crickets....🦗

Sorry, I should have mentioned I sail January 13, so maybe Princess is rolling the emails out based on sail dates.

2 hours ago, Daniel A said:

One would think Princess would send out e-mails to booked cruisers giving out some information instead of waiting until one logs into the Medallion Class App.  I'm not interested in taking any chances by installing a new app which is apparently still somewhat wonky.  DW & I are Green Lane for our next cruise which is last week of February and first week of March.  It would be nice if Princess would let me know if my current app will still work on my sailing.  I just don't want the new app to screw up our green lane status.

I received an email from Princess today notifying me about the new app. They say I can continue to use the existing app until February 1.

I was able to get the FR credit after booking my 2022 cruise but their terms may have changed since then. They now clearly state the promo is only for new cruises. Also, I don't think you can get both, as the promo code is ZH and only one is allowed per stateroom.

https://www.hollandamerica.com/en/us/cruise-deals/community-appreciation-cruise-offers/healthcare-firstresponder-appreciation-offer

You might want to go ahead and submit a verification and see what happens. Back when I did it, the OBC automatically showed up after the verification was submitted - I did not have to contact anyone.

On 11/21/2023 at 10:35 AM, *Miss G* said:

 

I did go ahead and complete the survey on the cruise I did sail on.  It was a series of what-if questions designed to narrow down the importance of different offers and price points based on sailing date.  When you chose an option it opened the sub-question asking whether you would have booked it or not.

Based on your post, I went back and completed mine for April 2022 (now realizing it is not a survey for that particular voyage). Oddly enough, they claim we paid over $1,800/pp for that cruise, but my records show we only paid $1,195/pp. They must be counting retail price of the cruise plus the value of all package items we received, which at the time was similar to the HIA they now offer. If they are somehow trying to correlate that cruise price with the theoretical options presented, they are waayy off.

I still don't know why I received a survey for 9/10/23. I went back and tried to complete that one also but it said I already did. Even though my name was on the email, it was obviously someone else's cruise.

This is getting stranger. On Wednesday I received a post-cruise email survey for our last cruise that we did take in April 2022. Anyone else getting these?

This past Monday I received a post-cruise survey email for an Alaska cruise on 9/10/23. Except I was not on that cruise. 🙄

Anyone who was actually on that cruise want me to fill out a survey for them? 🤣

I went through this same issue. I finally got it fixed by contacting the Captains Circle at the number in this post:

4 hours ago, Cruise-mom said:

Following 😀 Thanks for posting the events/patter and menus etc. We will be doing this route in January.

X2. It is especially helpful for us as we will be first time Princess cruisers.  We were supposed to be on this Nov. 11 sailing but had to reschedule for January.

31 minutes ago, Sitka2024 said:

Thanks all, very helpful. I can see the PCC as being helpful in some situations or future needs, and I might keep the booking as is. I was considering transferring to a big box but my questions directed to their agents did not instill much confidence. The transfer would be to get a card rebate after the cruise.   

I have a great PCC and she matched the box store rebate with OBC on a prior cruise, so it might be worth checking with your PCC first.

She also informed me about the gift card and early pay bonuses in effect at that time, which I was not aware of, and we ended up saving quite a bit as a result. I think it was 10% off the fare and a couple hundred OBC if I remember correctly. That sold me on using a PCC, but I realize some have not had as good of experience.

BTW she was assigned by booking a prior-prior cruise direct online. At that point I started getting email offers from her.

12 minutes ago, scottca075 said:

 

I'd guess closer to 40 minutes.

Seems like that might be a better use of our time rather than sitting at an Airport hotel. Any particular reason you mentioned getting a Cab versus using Uber, etc.?

8 minutes ago, scottca075 said:

 

If you want to go to Redondo, and not be frustrated by gridlock traffic, I pay for a cab to go down Coast Highway. It may not be much faster, but it would be more enjoyable.

This appears to be the more direct route to the hotels near the harbor @Redondo, specifically the hotel we are looking at, and I assumed we would go that way. When you say "not much faster" can you give me an idea of time? Google claims 27 mins. but I realize that may be optomistic.

8 hours ago, scottca075 said:

 

The new flight time puts you in the worst traffic LA has to offer. I'd stay at LAX.

I was afraid that would be your response. It seems there really isn't a good time to arrive on a Friday. I was hoping to at least get to the Redondo Beach Hotel for an enjoyable evening.

On 7/6/2023 at 10:34 AM, scottca075 said:

 

Assuming you have checked luggage and you are going to get a cab or Uber, by the time you leave the airport it could 7:15PM to 7:30PM and I think traffic should have died down by then and you are looking at 40-45 minutes to the port and $38-50 for Uber.

 

These are all under usual circumstances, one accident can change everything.

As a follow-up, our flight changed to a 2:40 PM LAX arrival on Friday for a Saturday cruise departure. We travel with carry-on bags. Our preference would be to get to the Crowne Plaza in San Pedro, but if this is going to be a big headache then we can consider other options. I'm also looking at the Redondo Beach Hotel. Staying near LAX would of course be least desirable.

4 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

Should be the same as discussed in this very recent thread:

 

 

Except the Eurodam will not have the Grand Dutch. We went to Explorations every morning, and I don't recall any other option for specialty coffee (in 2018 anyway).

I had this happen, where an entire deck was shown as sold out in the category I wanted. Someone mentioned in another thread that you can call Princess to get an assigned room. Rather than bother with that, I ended up booking through an online TA which showed plenty of rooms available. Have you checked other sites?