MamaStang

So after much thought we are going to take advantage of the reduced casino upgrade price and move up to a suite and avoid the pool/sea walk dilemma. Thanks for all your input and happy cruising everybody.

My husband has a casino offer that we may go ahead and use in a couple of months. Alaska on the Discovery Princess. All that is available in the mini suites, which is what he gets, is M324, M328 and R409. Considered R409 because it has an extended balcony, but then saw it is right under the Sea Walk. The Marina cabins are under the pool area. Has anyone stayed in a cabin under the pool area on an Alaska cruise? Wondering if it would be less noisy than say a Caribbean cruise would be.

Yep. We took advantage of that also. Cancelled our previous package purchase and saved hundreds. That was definitely the best price I have seen.

Hoping you also have the answer to this Wallis. We just earned Platinum after our last cruise and will be sailing again in the fall. Definitely want to book specialty restaurants as soon as they are available to us. I'll do a chat with Princess I guess but no harm in asking - do you know how far out Platinum is able to book?

We got an email from a regular Princess CVP (not an India casino rep) and talked to him about a casino offer we had. He was able to book it - correctly - with all of our perks. Give it a try. He was not from the outsource center and was a pleasure to deal with. I am fed up with the clueless casino reps.

We enjoyed the Chef's Table on the Enchanted last October. We decided from that point on we would ALWAYS try to get in on every cruise. It is expensive, and you have to be willing to try things that you might not normally order, as the menu is set. You won't know what it is until you sit down. I had one item that was not to my liking, simply because I don't like goat's cheese, but my husband was more than eager to eat some of it for me. The service is beyond compare and the food was better than a lot of Michelin star restaurants that we have been to. We experienced lots of time with the chef and Maitre'd during our dinner. Back on the Enchanted in a few weeks and hoping to get a seat again.

We are booked for Catch by Rudi in a few weeks. Looking forward to it. Will post a menu pic when we get home.

Easy to walk to from the ship on your own. King crab legs were great. They are usually busy but it was one of the highlights of our trip. The sampler platter with crab legs, crab cakes and chowder was delicious.

We generally tip $10 to the porter for our 2 bags. I just feel it is a little insurance policy that my bag will actually get onto the ship with all of its tags intact.

There is word that Canada may not continue the covid test requirement after the current ruling ends at the end of September. I have an October cruise so hoping for the best.

We got our email yesterday asking for our suit preference and asking how we were coming in. Appears they will reach out to make the car arrangements as they didn't take any information on the form we had to return.

We are also on the 10/22 sailing on the Prestige offer. Thanks for sharing.

We were in the cabin next to Dar & Bob (D423) and we could hear the loud banging in our cabin also, just not as badly as in theirs. Definitely was not a balcony divider and it happened in a very regular cycle. You could time it.

We just got this offer via email. Offered us a minisuite, Princess Plus and $1500 fp. It also appears to include some places that we have not received before (more Europe and some Australia cruises show up when I do a search). Waiting for the casino line to open so I can check it out as we are currently booked on an Australia cruise this winter and will certainly change if so.

They had a couple of inches of water that remained along the far side of the balcony floor the entire cruise. Would soak their shoes if they stood on it.

We were also on the Grand with Dar & Bob. I agree the Piazza musicians were dull and repetitive, and the magician was awful. The nature speaker was okay. Guy playing in Crooners really played up his audience and gave us some laughs. Food was hit or miss in restaurants and really poor/limited in the buffet. They only had a small section of the buffet even open. The Beef Wellington on formal night in dining room was very good. The veal in the steakhouse was good, though my tablemates were less enthused about the lamb chops. The Grand does lack dining choices. We missed having sushi/Asian options and Alfredos was severely limited in choices as opposed to the Regal. It was pizza or...pizza. None of the other dishes or antipastos. Our service in dining room and cabin were great and all but one bartender was extremely friendly and did all they could for us. Ronnie in Vines was fantastic. The ship was worn looking, but not as bad as I expected other than the cabin. The couch was hard and lacking any pillows and the bathroom is old and tired looking. We also found the narrow hallway going into the cabin odd. Our friends' balcony was underwater most of the time. I did appreciate that our cabin steward opened the balcony doors between our cabins so we could go back and forth. The trip was all about Alaska and we were willing to accept a smaller, older ship in order to get a more intimate viewing of the state, but would not take the Grand again. We've got a trip on the Enchanted scheduled for October and looking forward to a new ship with more dining and entertainment choices.

My husband plays blackjack maybe every other day. Plays anywhere from $500 to 2 thousand each time. He then gets casino offers constantly, at balcony or mini suite level.