muchofamuchness

For our upcoming cruise on Sky Princess (27th April) the Princess app seems to have lots populated in the journey schedule but what really appears to be lacking is live music other than the big theatre or piazza events. There's nothing at all other than auctions/sales listed in Take Five, no 'melodies' or similar in the Piazza, no indication of piano or guitarist in any bars at all, and the Vista Lounge appears to be mostly comedians and the DJ. Indeed the DJ appears to be a very busy person judging by the cruise schedule. Have Princess dropped house bands, Take Five and individual musicians since we last cruised in 2022 (when there was loads of music around the ship)? Or are they just not always good at populating these things before the cruise?

Don't tip in dollars off the ship in Europe. Whilst it's widely accepted in the more touristy Caribbean islands it's not appropriate there. Nobody else will be doing it, so it'll just mean whoever you tip will need to bother to get it changed into Euros. If you're in a place where tipping is accepted, restaurants etc will sometimes add a 'service charge' or allow you to add it to the card payment and then they'll split it. Or sometimes rounding up the bill is fine. Alternatively, if you don't want to get change at a bank, go buy a cheap ice cream or something from a convenience store when you arrive in a port to break into a note. The US standard practice of passing every person you encounter in a service environment a couple of dollar bills is just not replicated here - probably one of the reasons why they don't make €1/£1 banknotes.

I wouldn't recommend Uber. It's 100 miles from London to Southampton, and once you factor in getting out of London we are probably talking about a 5 hour round trip for the driver with no paying fare on the return leg. It's not a given that one will accept the ride and you don't want to be stuck in London waiting for a driver. Too stressful and you can't really predict how much it'd cost. If you want to be driven there I highly recommend pre-booking car service as then you'll have a quoted fare and a guaranteed journey. Do you already have a hotel booked? If so which area are you staying in, how much luggage will you bring and how comfortable are you with walking/stairs? This might change what is the best option for you.

I mean, yes, it absolutely is a first world problem and then a subset of that. But pretty much every problem mentioned on this board is. But when even a cheap café has no problem putting a pack of butter on the side of your breakfast, a cruise line that charges hundreds of dollars a day shouldn't get away with economising on something so basic. Call me simple but I'd pick decent bread and decent butter over lobster every day of the week.

What the heck is that in that picture?!?! Does this vary depending on where the ship is based? I'm pretty sure when I last cruised out of Southampton (Sky, June 2022) that we had something resembling actual butter. I would have thought if you offered Brits fake butter* with bread rolls that we'd be up in arms almost as quickly as if there weren't a kettle and teabags in our cabins... but that's another thread! We're cruising out of Southampton in April and I shall be exercising my 'more than mildly inconvenienced' glare if this is what ends up on the table. You'd almost certainly get butter with a £5 breakfast at a greasy spoon café, so I don't think it's an unreasonable expectation when you're paying a four figure sum for a week away. * you might get away with a reasonable quality spreadable 'butter' e.g. Lurpak

Hi all Sorry if this has already been mentioned... On the Princess website there are two deck plans for Sky Princess, one before April 8th 2024 and one after. I can't work out what the difference is. Anyone have any idea what changes are coming? Thanks.

Hi all, Interesting dilemma here. We're in quarantine on Sky Princess at the moment. My partner started feeling ill on Monday night. By Tuesday morning he was feeling dreadful - new, continuous cough, blocked nose, etc., so we each did a COVID test (we'd brought some Flowflex tests with us): his came back positive, mine negative. So we stayed in our cabin and called the medical centre. They organised tests for the both of us, which both came back negative, but said we would be put into isolation for 24 hours and tested again the following day - if we then tested positive then we would have to quarantine for the remainder of the cruise. So we got escorted to quarantine. My partner's condition got worse (fever etc) during the night. I have also developed a cough. He was tested this morning (they didn't want to test me) and their test came back negative. Considering his symptoms, he did another Flowflex test and it came back clearly positive again. However, as the medical centre's test came up negative, we are free to go back to our cabin and continue the cruise. If we continue to isolate it would apparently be on a totally voluntary basis (with, presumably, no further FCC and no enhanced in-room dining). Much as I'd love to go out and enjoy our last three sea days, a) my partner is not well and b) with the combination of very clear symptoms and two positive tests using a recognised brand of antigen test, it feels morally wrong to go out into the ship almost certainly spreading COVID as we go. I spoke to Guest Services and they say they can't help because it's a medical matter. We have considered booking a doctor's appointment so they can tell us what it is if their COVID tests are saying it's negative, but since they discharged us we can't ring the medical centre - when we try and call them now it just says 'Access Denied' on the phone. Is there anyone you would recommend we speak to on this on board who can address our concerns or at least give us some reassurance?

Maybe, though out of personal preference I think I'd choose the single entertainer shows over the big revues any day. The cast and staging of the latter are invariably very good but to me the format feels a bit like something from a previous age. I'm on Sky Princess right now and there don't appear to have been any big revue shows.

This comes as no surprise, but it's still disappointing if they're focusing on elevating drinks prices beyond the Plus price cap rather than offering new, more premium choices for Premier customers. My cruise will be one of the first to start under the new pricing regime. I can't help thinking some kind of phased introduction would have been better. I think there will be a lot of disgruntled passengers if they step on board and find that very little is covered by their Plus package, particularly if a whole load of wines and cocktails are showing at just above the price cap. Yes, I know you can just pay the extra, but that's kind of not the point... I'd also feel cheated if I'd forked out the significant extra cost for Premier only still to be offered the wines that were previously included on Plus. I suppose we'll see on Saturday.

I have really enjoyed following this report - it's been a joy to check back every so often and read the next 'episode'. It's always interesting to see the view that someone coming from another country gets of places you think you know so well. Seems that you really 'did things properly' and I'm glad you had such a nice time.

I do wonder if a higher proportion of the passengers are from the UK than would have been normal on these itineraries pre-pandemic (trying to make up for lower bookings from the USA due to concerns over long haul travel, maybe?)...

Does that mean that there's now technically no way of getting to the forward staircase on this deck that doesn't take you through the casino?

Nice way to hide a considerable increase in the Princess Plus fare (probably enough of an increase to make it not worth it for us, to be honest). Who can foresee a lot of drinks magically drifting above the $12 threshold?

Might be worth having a look at the National Motor Museum at Beaulieu - it's pretty close to Southampton. I haven't been for years so maybe someone else can tell you more about it, but the collection looks pretty varied and interesting!

Thanks. If it helps others, I actually managed to resolve it by uninstalling the app and reinstalling it - maybe there was something in the cache that was stopping it...

How soon after final payment should we expect to be able to start looking at dining reservations through Dine My Way? Currently in the app, when you go to the Dine My Way option on the main screen, it says "Dine My Way is not available right now. Please check back later," which is what it's said when I've looked at it before. We paid the balance last week so I sort of assumed it would become available now...