jamesbauer

Hope you have time and inclination to keep posting. We will board the ship on 19 May.  Manay thanks for your perspectives.

We haven't cruised with Princess out of San Pedro for a year or so.

I noticed that, on our next cruise, they were listing 'blue' or 'green' boarding stations.

Have they discontinued a boarding station for platinum/elite class guests?

In anticipation of your knowledgeable answer...........thank you.

Disembarked early May and received final statement by email today.

I am wondering if anyone else is getting as frustrated as I am, trying to use the Princess website. For starters, logons are rejected multiple consecutive times, supposedly for logon ID or password problems, when the logon ID and password are correct. Then it says, if they are correct, it might be a technical difficulty, try again later. What kind of response is that? And I have been experiencing this for four days. Note: I was a manager in the computer industry and I would have been fired if I could not do better than that.

Once you are fortunate enough to break through (after many, many attempts, I might add) you run into a situation where the system kicks you off after a certain period of time. This is most frustrating when attempting to learn about, and book excursions for an upcoming cruise.

How can a company expect to stay in business if it makes it so difficult for its' customers to purchase the product?

Perhaps Princess wants to do away with the website and make users use the 'buggy' Medallion app?

I am a long-time Princess customer (Elite category) but I am very frustrated with their approach to customer service (yes, an operational website is customer service - if you don't believe me, check out Amazon.com).  There are many other excellent cruise lines; I need to find one that does not make me work so hard to purchase their product.

We are soon to embark on a Princess cruise on which my wife is platinum class (one cruise shy of elite) and I am elite class (first cruise after reaching elite).

Assuming that the free laundry perk will still be available next month, does anyone know if my wife will also get free laundry service?

Thank you.

So what happens when the Enchanted arrives in N.Y. a day early. Does Princess put people up in NYC for a day so they can catch their regularly scheduled flights.  

Or do the passengers stay on the ship until the cruise would have ended.

My cruise line (Princess) is offering a choice of three different airports (JFK, Newark, LaGuardia) to fly into and out of for a cruise leaving from, and returning to New York City.

Any suggestions as to which would be the best choice?

Thank you.

Some thoughts/experiences with Princess EZ-Air:

I had two recent bookings with EZ-Air, one for a Mediterranean cruise and one for Alaska. I found that, until a stated number of days before the trip (45, I think), I was able to use EZ-Air to check for price changes and better flights after I made my original selection. This was great as it saved me a considerable amount of money while allowing me to get better flights. I also found EZ-Air to have much better prices than individual airlines. Possibly a travel agent can get these better rates also.

My Alaska flight was from L.A. to Seattle, leaving LAX at 09:30 on cruise day. We allowed for 2.5 hours at the airport and 1.5 hours to get to the airport. So we got up at 5 a.m. only to find a 4 a.m. text from Delta saying the flight would be delayed, not departing until 1 p.m.  This flight would not reach Seattle in time for us to be aboard for a 3 p.m. sailing.  I got on the phone to Princess EZ-Air (800-545-0008) at 5:15 and was on hold until 6 a.m. when an operator came on line, only to be having trouble with her headset. My wife was also calling on another line and got an operator about 6:10 a.m. Meanwhile, I was unsuccessfully using various flight booking services (e.g. Kayak & Southwest) in an effort to find any possibilities for a flight. No luck. Within about 10-15 minutes the EZ-Air operator had found and booked two seats on United, leaving LAX just after 10 and getting into Seattle about 1:30 p.m. At no extra cost to us, we were booked business class, which was a pleasant way to travel. Another benefit was that United tagged our bags as 'priority' and they were the first to come out of the luggage carousel. Anyway, we caught the last two seats on the last Princess bus from the Seattle airport and made the cruise on time.

Long and the short of it - EZ-Air seems to have a lot of plusses to consider.

Have cruised on Regal, Majestic and Discovery in the last 8 months and offer some comparisons for your consideration:

Staterooms

Regal & Majestic have pillow-top-like mattress; Discovery is firmer.

Balcony stateroom space in each of the three ships is not discernably different.

Regal & Majestic have individual cakes of soap & tubes of lotion; Discovery has soap and lotion bottles in the bathrooms.

Some other differences

Living area passageways on the Discovery are drab; the carpeting is very neutral, rather than providing a brighter, contrasting color.

Stateroom doors and door trim in the living areas on Discovery are nicely finished in a wood pattern.

Hand-washing monitors at entrance to the buffet were seldom stationed on the Discovery.

No library on the Discovery.

Sanctuary on Discovery is fee-based; Majestic was not.

General comments

WiFi on Regal was a constant source of complaint due to slowness.

Had complimentary specialty restaurant coupons on Discovery and was unable to get a booking for Crown Grill even though we tried, beginning with first day of cruise.

Does anyone know what the Italian Government requirement for COVID testing is for anyone coming  by air from the U.S.?

Many thanks.

16 hours ago, Jemnibabe said:

That seems very strange indeed.  Just got off the Regal, 28 days, and the entire time, port side of Dolphin deck was the quaranteed area.  Why would they suddenly move all those cabins to Emerald deck unless it has just expanded?  I was on starboard side of Dolphin deck and it began as quaranteed from midship to front on port side but before we got off, the entire port side of Dolphin was locked off.

Took a couple of Princess cruises in the fall and at that time, they were using the quarantined area for living quarters for newly-reported staff who have to be in quarantine for a couple of weeks (I believe) when reporting for duty on the ship.

We cruised with Royal for the first time earlier this month on a Navigator three-day cruise out of San Pedro (11 Feb. sailing)

and enjoyed the weekend get-away experience very much.

Our three primary areas of interest on these three-day cruises are relaxation, entertainment and dining. Relaxation and dining onboard the Navigator have many varying opportunities. However, we are wondering if the entertainment will be varied.  Specifically, is 'Showgirls' the only production show which will be offered? Is the wonderful ice show 'Reach for the Stars' offer a variety of shows? How often are the headliner entertainers rotated?

We were considering another trip in April (April 1 sailing) but would like so see some different entertainment.

Would appreciate hearing from anyone with some insight to the entertainment area on the Navigator.

Many thanks

Many thanks for your kind offer. Someone just returned from a Christmas cruise on the Crown and picked up a magnet for me.

Really appreciate your kind offer.

Have a great cruise and a Happy New Year.

Jim Bauer

Hello fellow cruisers:

After taking four cruises with Princess Cruise Lines, my wife decided that she would like to start a collection of silhouette cruise ship refrigerator magnets of the type sold on board Princess ships. So we now have collection of four but missed the first four.

I thought it would be easy to acquire the ones that we had missed, either by contacting Princess direct (they said they had no way to sell them) or through the Internet (e.g. Ebay, etc.). No luck whatsoever.

So, I find myself appealing to anyone who might be planning a cruise on any of these Princess ships (RUBY, REGAL, CROWN, SAPPHIRE) for help.

If you would consider purchasing a silhouette refrigerator magnet during your cruise on any of those four ships and mailing it to me, I would greatly appreciate it. I would reimburse you for the cost of the magnet, the mailing expense, and provide a gratuity for your efforts.

If you would consider helping with this project, please contact me privately at LoveCruisingWithPrincess@gmail.com

Many, many thanks for your consideration.

James Bauer