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12 hours ago, scottca075 said:

 

Thanks for sharing, very nice little vid.

 

We are doing the Star in Feb. Did you do any shipboard vids?

Thanks, and yes there are another couple of parts to the video with some shots around the ship.

12 hours ago, scottca075 said:

 

Thanks for sharing, very nice little vid.

 

We are doing the Star in Feb. Did you do any shipboard vids?

14 hours ago, Tutone56 said:

We're staying at the Outrigger Reef Beach Resort pre cruise.  I called them today asking about the best way to get to PH.  The concierge said the bus is the cheapest but it can take 1 1/2 hours because of all the stops.  She said Uber or Lyft is only about 30 minutes or so.  Can the bus really take that long?

We were on the bus on a Tuesday just before 5pm so it was 'rush hour'. It took about 45 minutes to get from PH to the ship. Waikiki is a couple of miles further than the ship so I'd say you could be looking at about an hour.

11 hours ago, Huck said:

Do you know if the had the Crab Shack set up in the Horizon Court a few nights? Also did the do the Pub lunches in the bar? Thank you

 I didn't see anything about the Crab Shack at all but MixerDave said it was offered once. I remember seeing the pub lunches offered when we were on the Star back in May but don't think I saw it on this cruise. Although I wasn't particularly looking for it so I could be wrong.

16 hours ago, ColoradoMom!! said:

Sorry for another question  (Quoting Columbo - "just one more thing....")

 

Any surprises on the "all aboard" times?

 

This is what is listed on our itinerary :

 

HILO - 9 -6pm

Honolulu 7 - 11pm

Kauai 8 - 5pm

Maui 7 - 6pm

 

I have heard that the tenders back to the ship in Maui have really long lines toward the end of the day.

We pretty much left on time everywhere except Maui. The captain said there was a tour that was late getting back and we had to wait for them (so it must have been a Princess tour). I think we were about 2 hours late leaving on that day.

4 hours ago, bandtaxi said:

Was the snorkeling at Carlsmith Beach with a guide or on your own?

 

On our own. It's a very easy place to snorkel.

19 hours ago, funcrusier said:

Thanks for the short review. It is helpful as we are doing the same cruise on Feb27. 
if possible could you let us know what evenings are formal nights. 
We know there are 3 but wanting to make some specialty restaurant reservations. 
 

Thanks

Formal nights were the 2nd night, the first full sea day after leaving the islands and the night before Ensenada.

On 1/4/2020 at 12:38 PM, Luv2bcruising56 said:

Enjoyed the video, thanks for sharing.  Who did you use for the whale watch?

We booked directly through PacWhale as it was a lower cost than booking through Princess.

17 hours ago, ram1977 said:

We do this cruise in a few weeks so was happy to see this post. Your videos are fun and you have some great photos. We also have a whale watching trip booked thru pacwhale. You say that if you did a whale watching trip like this again you'd want to do it on a smaller ship. what is the reason for this? as it looks like you had some really fantastic whale photos too.

Yes we did manage to get some good photos on the whale watching trip but I just felt there were too many people on board, and when a whale was spotted everyone rushed to that side of the boat. It was ok for myself but the kids were unable to see much. It was still a good trip I just think next time we'll go on a smaller boat (or at least one with less people).

1 hour ago, existentialtraveler said:

Nice video! Just to be clear, you WALKED to Carlsmith beach from the ship? It looks to be further than just a 20 minute walk. Was there a lot of traffic on the road there? We will be there in March and are considering Carlsmith.

Thanks, and yes we walked to Carlsmith. Maybe 20/30 minutes but I guess it depends how fast you walk! It was probably a little further than we thought and we did pass 3 (I think) other beaches on the way. We did take a taxi back to the ship. Also there was a sidewalk and traffic was moderate. Hope you have a good trip.

Did the Star Princess 15 day cruise to Hawaii in December and it was great. Had done the same cruise the previous December and done all Princess excursions, but this time just explored on our own. Have to recommend Carlsmith Beach Park in Hilo if you like swimming / snorkelling. It was about a 20 minute walk from the port but worth it. Also found it really easy to get to Pearl harbor on the bus so that can save you a lot of money. Just had a beach day on Kauai and did a whale watching trip on Maui. Had great weather every day and sunsets were amazing. 

If anyone is interested then please take a look at the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXLAuEaZIhg

48 minutes ago, ColoradoMom!! said:

Thank you for your review !

 

I watched all your videos as well.  We leave in a few weeks on the same cruise!

 

I have 2 quick questions.  In Kauai, where were you able to rent those kayaks?

Also, how do you locate the spray paint artist in Ensenada?

 

Thanks!

The beach in Kauai has a shop front right there where you can hire chairs/umbrellas, surf boards, 1 and 2 seater kayaks and even full surfing lessons. I thought they were reasonably priced too, I think it was $20 an hour for the kayaks or $40 for all day.

The shuttle from the port takes you to downtown Ensenada. I think it was $4 per person for a round trip. Where they drop you off is a small courtyard with a few traders. If you just tell the guys at the port who run the shuttle you want to go see Fernando the Spray Painter, they'll make sure you go on the right shuttle. Most of the shuttles go there anyway but they said sometimes they go to McDonalds instead. Fernando is from Tijuana but he travels down to Ensenada any day a cruise ship is in port. I promise you'll be glad if you go to see him - what he does is amazing.

If you need any more info about anything, let me know.

1 hour ago, wallyj said:

I was on the Star Dec 4 sailing too. I am Elite but was traveling with my friend who is Ruby,  this cruise was his 5th so he is now Platinum. I will assume you are also Gold/Ruby as those are the only welcome back parties that at the end a drink voucher is given. You failed to indicate at this party, drinks were supplied at the party by waiters on trays. Yes , they are watered down and unlike the Platinum and Elite party, you were not allowed to order anything NOT on the tray, unless you were willing to pay for it.

 

They did not 'raffle' any prizes like 'elite benefits for the cruise' or a boutiques voucher or coffee pkg as I have seen in the past. No paper invites were made as the party was listed in the patter. Was told these 'raffle' prizes now only given at the 'blue' first time with Princess event.

 

I asked the circle host about the party afterwards and she said Princess was reviewing the program and because the feedback has been poor, may just eliminate a Gold/Ruby welcome back party.

Thanks for reminding me - I forgot about the fact that they didn't raffle any prizes at that party. Also, I did see waiters around but had no idea they were giving away free drinks. We certainly didn't get any nor were we offered any! No big deal as I'm not a big drinker anyway but it would have been nice to have known!

We did this cruise last year in early december on the Emerald and loved it, so tried it again this time on the Star. Last year we did all Princess excursions on the islands which we thought were extremely expensive, so this time we arranged to do things on our own. Overall we had a great time, but there were a few things that were a little disappointing.

I'll start with the good. We drove to L.A. a couple of days before the cruise so we could take the kids to Universal Studios.  Stayed in the Pasadena area and drove down to San Pedro on the 4th Dec which was a very stormy day. Traffic conditions were terrible because of the rain and we saw accidents, but were able to arrive safely at the port by about 11.30. Embarkation was really quick and easy. The sea days out to the islands were fun with lots of activities to do on board. The food was good, in the buffet and the main dining room (Amalfi).

In Hilo, we walked to Carlsmith Beach Park and went swimming and snorkelling with huge Hawaiian green sea turtles. In Honolulu we visited Pearl Harbor and the Arizona memorial (had reserved tickets online a few weeks before). Bus #42 only cost about $2 and runs pretty close to the ship. In Kauai we walked 10 minutes to the beach and spent the day there. And finally in Maui we had booked a whale watching trip directly with Pac Whale which turned out to be pretty good (although in the future if we do another whale watching trip we will pay more and choose a smaller boat).  In Ensenada we just took the shuttle into town and met up with Fernando the spray paint artist as we did last year. If you're ever in Ensenada you should go check this guy out - what he does with spray paint is amazing!

The staff on board were really great. Cruise Director 'Micca' was probably the best one we have had so far. We also got to visit the bridge and meet the captain. That was very interesting and he seemed to be very nice although Captain Tuvo was our last captain and he is a very hard act to follow! We enjoyed the shows on board, saw 'British Invasion' and 'Born to Dance', along with 3 comedians and an acrobatic act. Dismembarkation was a breeze too - from the time we were called from the Vista Lounge, we were in the car within 30 minutes!

Now for the disappointing parts - We were on the Star about 6 months ago in Alaska and on that trip the ship seemed to be in great condtion. This time however, there were a number of places where water was dripping from the ceiling. In a few places there were buckets out to catch the water but we did notice several areas with brown rings on the ceilings and a couple of places with mold on the carpets! We spoke to a few people who said they had drips in their staterooms too. Don't get me wrong, I still really like the Star, it was just a surprise to see. Also Princess didn't give out free drinks tickets at the 'welcome back party' - A pretty minor thing I know but that seemed a little bit cheap! And I know this is not a new thing but the constant bombardment of Effy advertising is really annoying!

Also my wife and son took the Ukulele class and last year on the Emerald when the performance was done at the end of the cruise, the ukulele players were up on risers at the back of the stage. This year they were not, so for most of the performance, all you could see was the hula dancers. Again no big deal, but at the end of the performance they have a big group picture taken with the Hawaiian Ambassadors where all of the ukulele players can't be seen - plus they were trying to charge $25 for the picture. And they didn't include the 'Ukulele and Hula' performance on the $40 reflections dvd! No, you had to buy a separate dvd for that, which was another 30 bucks. Finally, we take our kids with us to game shows and comedians unless there's a warning in the patter about adult content - for example the 'Marriage Match' gameshow. Now as a rule we have usually found that with the comedians, if you go to the early evening show then it's generally ok, maybe pg13 but nothing too bad! where as in their late show they tend to get a little more adult. That wasn't the case this time for one of the comedians. We had the kids with us at the early show and there was no warning in the patter, but the show was extremely R rated. I understand that there weren't that many kids on board but it shouldn't be that difficult to include a warning in the patter or even at the start of the show!

Nothing really major in the disappointments, just a few surprises! Overall we had a really good time and would do this cruise again. Definitely glad that we arranged our own excursions this time though and will do that again in the future. If anyone is interested you can check out the pictures / video. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZXUO2pq_7Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXLAuEaZIhg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIrXu8IplTQ

We're on the Star to Hawaii in a few weeks so will definitely be interested in this thread. I know it's not guaranteed to be the same for us but wouuld like to know who the Cruise Director is, and who the current entertainment staff are, when you get aboard. Thanks 😉

My kids went on their first cruise when they were 7 and 4. We've been on Cunard, Carnival and Princess ships. The Princess kids clubs were by far the best they've experienced. They are now 13 and 10 and love Princess. They spend most of their time in the clubs, but do come to do some of the game shows and other entertainment events on board too. They are looking forward to our next cruise in December.

10 hours ago, Liberal_Baggie said:

Ah Odemwingie what a great player! He got a club cap recently as all ex players are now  and a great reception from the crowd he has retired from football now though its a very short time at top.We have slipped back down the league a bit!.2012 was my first time on QM2 we went and found our sister town in New England and all the other new old towns great trip. Looks like you had a great time except for your car damage still a memorable trip and that storm how did Mary handle it?  Thanks to your Son for putting that together.

We live by the side of the canal near the glass cone which you may remember is just about the last glass cone standing in England.Stourbridge glass should be on the QM2 really its been manufactured here for 400 years maybe we should start a campaign? Im back on board on the 14th for the super transatlantic via Iceland cant wait... thanks again for the film David Sheppard

Been in the US for 15 years now, and one of the biggest things I miss is being at Baggies games, home and away! 2012 was the first time my kids were on the QM2 but I'd done a transatlantic on her back in 2004, and a r/t transatlantic on the QE2 in 2003.  I know the glass cone well! Right by the Vine pub (not sure if its still there). Remember watching the Eng v Ger world cup semi final there in 1990. I used to live on Marine Cres, opposite the Chemix tyre place (not sure if that's still there either).  And before that I lived in Bracken Park Gardens which is close to the glass cone too (just off brierley hill road on the site of the old steel works). Just before I moved to the US I lived in Amblecote, not far from Corbett hospital. 2012 was the last time I was back in England, probably time to book another trip on the QM2 😉 Hope you have a good trip on your transatlantic via Iceland 👍

7 minutes ago, Liberal_Baggie said:

Wow so what’s the connection to the The Black Country I’m from Stourbridge so was amazed to see your video of Some of our local tourism hot spots.Also I’m s big baggies fan so impressed that you took in a game at the Hawthorns. Boing Boing baggies all the best👍😀🚢

I'm from Stourbridge originally although live near Las Vegas now. At the time of that trip we lived in Ohio so was about an 8 hour drive to New York. Took the kids to their first baggies game, it was a monday night game vs Southampton and was a 2-0 win with Odemwingie getting both goals! 

Hi,

My 13 year old son is into making travel videos for Youtube. He has done videos from the recent cruises we have done to Hawaii and Alaska and has also just put this one together from our 2012 trip on the QM2. The 'cruise' left Brooklyn, New York in late October 2012, the day before Hurricane Sandy hit. Watching it brought back memories to me of a great time aboard and our time in England. The return journey across the atlantic was less dramatic and we returned to Manhatten because Sandy had closed the Brooklyn terminal.

If anyone is interested, please take a look.

Thanks

28 minutes ago, tawlaw1526 said:

I don't believe we did meet but I recognized your 2 boys from the video you put together.   I had seen them in Explorers/Vista and around the ship.   Like you and your family, we had a wonderful cruise on Star.  I agree with you that Captain Tuvo was wonderful.   

Ok cool, I wondered if you'd recognize the boys as your profile says you are from Cleveland. We used to live in Ohio so the boys were sometimes wearing Browns and Indians hats - as well as their Golden Knights shirts!

On 5/27/2019 at 1:26 AM, tawlaw1526 said:

Thoroughly enjoying your review.   

Thanks, did we meet you onboard? I know we talked to a lot of nice people on the cruise!

We had it on our recent Alaska cruise on the Star. Although it wasn't of much interest to me, a lot of people on the ship did seem to take part. I do think it was the first time it had been done by this particular staff though as there did seem to be a few 'glitches'. I do like that Princess are trying out new things like this. Here is the part of my review that was about the High Seas heist :-

They had a new event on board which lasted for about 5 days that was called "High Seas Heist". It was like a mystery type event where you had to solve various clues and work out who was 'guilty'. It seems like Princess has teamed up with Joe Kenda and this is going to be a regular thing on some ships as Joe appeared in many of the video clues.  It was a popular event as a lot of people took part but there are definitely some things about it that need to be fine-tuned by Princess if it is going to become a regular thing. The day before it started was a port day and the majority of passengers were off the ship. However there were a few of us on-board including myself and my oldest son who were sitting near the explorers lounge around lunchtime. There were a few other passengers there too. The entertainment staff did a rehearsal for the High Seas Heist event in the explorers lounge and went through all of the clues, eventually giving out the final answer. I hope this was because it was such a new event and they won't do this on every future cruise in a public area.  My son and I had no intention of taking part so we were not too bothered about it. However, to cut a very long story short, when the event ended only 1 team had the correct answer. It just so happened to be a couple who were sitting by my son and I when the rehearsal was happening so they knew the answer before it even started. A lot of people invested a lot of time into the game and were very angry at the outcome. I talked to a few of them and they said that it was impossible to work out the answer from the clues that they were given. The 'winning' couple had told these people that they didn't do any of the work on the clues and that they just guessed the answer! Obviously we know that it wasn't a guess as they'd seen the answer given out at the rehearsal.  As I said earlier there were a LOT of people upset about this game so if Princess are going to continue with it there are some things that need to be done better - including not giving out the answer in a rehearsal that's being done in a public area!

Review continued -

Disembarkation - You are supposed to be out of your room by 8am. We left just after 8 and headed to our waiting area which was one of our favorite places - the explorers lounge. Our time for leaving was supposed to be 9.15am which suited us as we had to drive through LA, so by that time, most of the rush hour traffic would be gone. They actually called us about half an hour early and the disembarkation process went really quickly. We were through in about 10 minutes and had the long walk across the parking lot towards the Iowa. When we got to the car Ethan realized that the shark tooth necklace he had made in the kids club had fallen off him somewhere on the walk across! So we spent the next 20 minutes searching a huge area for something less than an inch long! Luckily we did find it and were on the road at about 9.30. Traffic actually wasn't too bad and were home in just under 4 hours!

Summary - We really enjoyed the Star Princess. It pretty much had all the things on-board that we enjoyed on the Emerald. The bonus was that were were about 1000 fewer passengers than the Emerald and that really made it feel a lot less crowded. I know the Star is an older ship and we're not cruise experts, but out of the few ships we've been on (including the QM2), the Star was our favorite. Also Captian Tuvo was by far the best Captain we've ever had. Hopefully we'll get to see him again one day and travel on the Star again before it leaves Princess in 2021.

Review continued - 

Entertainment - We didn't get to see any of the production shows so can't comment on those, but I believe one of them was 'British Invasion'. The comedian on board was Steve Caouette, and we'd seen him before on the Emerald last year. He is very good and we made sure we went to see both of his shows. The first was in the Princess Theater and the other was in the Vista Lounge. Both shows were really good, we'd seen some of his material before but he's very good at interacting with the crowd and making the show from the information he gets from each individual audience. He's definitely worth seeing if he is on your cruise in the future. The magician was Alex Ramon and he was excellent too. He did two regular magic shows, plus a show where he showed the audience how to do some of his tricks. He also had his puppy MJ on board and did a dog training class in the piazza. Both Steve and Alex were very friendly and stopped to chat and take photos with passengers around the ship.

We enjoyed the game shows in the Explorers lounge that were done by the regular entertainment staff. We even got our oldest to volunteer for the 'Hollywould I' game along with his brother (who volunteers for everything).  There were probably 5 or 6 different gameshows over the 12 day cruise including the 'Marriage Match' show was is advertised as Pg16 in the patter, so we made sure the kids were at the kids club that night. The kids did spend some time in the kids club pretty much everyday but came along with us to various events too. There are 3 kids clubs aboard with separate rooms and age related activities and equipment in each. The staff are very good and the clubs are very well run. We always enjoy the Trivia contests and there were normally about 3 a day. The first 2 being General Knowledge and the evening one having a theme that was usually music related. We did ok at most of them but there was one team there at most of the trivias that had a very 'interesting' tactic! I'll leave it at that but if anyone was on this cruise and went to the trivias, they'll know what I mean. 

There were some guest speakers / entertainers that came on board from the Alaskan ports and those were quite good. One of them was Libby Riddles, the first woman to win the Idatarod Sled dog race. She bought one of her dogs aboard and did a presentation in the theatre that was interesting. There was a singer that performed in the Explorers lounge and sang about the history of Alaska which was fun too. 

I think there were about 4 Karaoke sessions over the 12 days that lasted about an hour each. Lots of different singing styles and levels of ability on show but everyone seemed to have fun and support each other. Ethan our 10 year old wanted to sing everytime so we were always there. There was an organized choir too for passengers which had a few practices and performed in the Piazza on the last day. They asked Ethan to join but when he gets on stage he does his own thing and wouldn't be very good at following co-ordinated dance moves so he decided against it. We went to the final of the 'Voice of the Ocean' which was well attended in the Theater. We'd never seen the tv show so weren't sure how it actually worked but we got a chance to vote for the best singer. A lady from San Diego that sang a Whitney Houston song won and she was definitely the best one there. There was also a guy called Darius who did really well singing a Bruno Mars song and I thought he was the 2nd best but he didn't get voted into the final. It was a fun event to watch though.

They had a new event on board which lasted for about 5 days that was called "High Seas Heist". It was like a mystery type event where you had to solve various clues and work out who was 'guilty'. It seems like Princess has teamed up with Joe Kenda and this is going to be a regular thing on some ships as Joe appeared in many of the video clues.  It was a popular event as a lot of people took part but there are definitely some things about it that need to be fine-tuned by Princess if it is going to become a regular thing. The day before it started was a port day and the majority of passengers were off the ship. However there were a few of us on-board including myself and my oldest son who were sitting near the explorers lounge around lunchtime. There were a few other passengers there too. The entertainment staff did a rehearsal for the High Seas Heist event in the explorers lounge and went through all of the clues, eventually giving out the final answer. I hope this was because it was such a new event and they won't do this on every future cruise in a public area.  My son and I had no intention of taking part so we were not too bothered about it. However, to cut a very long story short, when the event ended only 1 team had the correct answer. It just so happened to be a couple who were sitting by my son and I when the rehearsal was happening so they knew the answer before it even started. A lot of people invested a lot of time into the game and were very angry at the outcome. I talked to a few of them and they said that it was impossible to work out the answer from the clues that they were given. The 'winning' couple had told these people that they didn't do any of the work on the clues and that they just guessed the answer! Obviously we know that it wasn't a guess as they'd seen the answer given out at the rehearsal.  As I said earlier there were a LOT of people upset about this game so if Princess are going to continue with it there are some things that need to be done better - including not giving out the answer in a rehearsal that's being done in a public area!

There were lots of other entertainment options on the ship too, including various singers, the ship band, musicians, bingo events etc plus the library where there were also lots of board games available. Overall, there's so much entertainment on board in various forms that there's always something to do.

2 hours ago, mpizza said:

Thank you!  My husband and I are even more excited about our July sailing on the Star to Alaska!

 

Maria

Hope you have a great trip and it's probably too early to know for sure yet, but I hope you get Captain Tuvo and Cruise Director Fernando. Those two really were outstanding!