PescadoAmarillo

I am gobsmacked by the number of us who have “many friends who work on ships”. I am also surprised that so many of us apparently feel totally comfortable asking our friends how much and how they get paid.

Thank you for this information, and also your info on the other current tipping thread. Since we’ve been booking Plus packages for shorter cruises, it really doesn’t affect us at the present time, but it’s good to know for the future (and to have what you were told backed up by others). I won’t ask or confirm, but appreciate when others who do share the info here. My heart will be with you on the Sapphire, but I’ll feel confident for the rest of my life that cancelling was the right choice. Family definitely comes first. I hope you have a wonderful time!

On our 2006 Australia trip, we stayed down in The Rocks area for a week pre-cruise. While police certainly had the area cleared of any drunk people by the next morning, we got used to seeing drunk seagulls stumbling about.

@Steelers36, not that it matters to this post, but you’ve just brought back some great memories for me. Thank you! I looked through my blog posts for these pics I knew I’d posted there. These were of Darko almost ten years ago, from those wonderful halcyon winters on the Emerald Princess in the Caribbean.

No. “My” Darko was promoted, to Dining Room Supervisor, before COVID, but has not returned to ships since.

The menus I’ve posted are from a 12-night cruise, and tonight, on Day 8, they are beginning to repeat. It would make sense that they have 7 different vegan menus geared to 7-night cruises. If I see any new menus, I’ll post them here, and hopefully others will as well.

My understanding is that the OP was delayed in boarding the ship because it couldn’t make it into the disembarkation port on the usual turnaround day. I think this just happened in Auckland. They incurred extra charges related to the delay, and missed one day of their cruise. This is not the usual “missing a port due to bad weather” scenario.

Except for the sandwich, this whole menu looks good to me. I love that they are not using a lot of “faux meat” type products (in fact, I don’t recall any). I’m not surprised, since they’re considerably more expensive than whole foods, but whole foods (do you know how hard it is to type that without autocorrect trying to change it to the store?) are much healthier.

But is it your understanding that the crew still gets to keep tips over and above the standard service charge? That’s all I really concern myself with. I trust that the crew believes their standard compensation to be fair, regardless of whether it comes from me or Princess; otherwise, they wouldn’t spend months away from their homes and families to work on ships. But I recently found out that crew mentions on the post cruise surveys submitted more than three days after the cruise ends are basically disregarded. I’m not sure I can withstand finding out that any extra tips we distribute don’t benefit the crew members they’re intended for too.

And you will notice a huge difference. I don’t think HAL ships are as pretty- certainly, their atrium is nothing like a Princess Piazza- but it’s calm and reasonably quiet. I didn’t realize it until I read your comment, but it is probably one of my favorite things about HAL, no over the top screaming and in your face entertainment. I don’t spend a lot of time in the Piazza, which is good, because there’s rarely enough seating to do so.

Really, the best of the best with those two itineraries and some extra days in Noumea. Have a wonderful trip and safe travels!

Then that really does a disservice to the crew members who get mentioned AND the guests who spend 30 minutes or more completing the surveys and carefully commenting on specific individuals. Not good, Princess. I can’t think of a single reason why names have to be overlooked. At the very least, Princess should make it clear to guests that the surveys should be competed within three days or don’t bother mentioning specific names.

I hope that’s not the case! Where did you hear that? I spend a lot of time mentioning people by name, but almost never within three days of the end of the cruise. I don’t want to think they never get credit for what they do.

Karen, I’m not on the ship. The broccoli salad and penne with red pepper pesto sound good. I *might* be getting a pic of the Mumbai Frankie Wraps, which…I can’t imagine. ETA: here’s the Frankie wraps. I think I’d pass on this one.

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I am starting to see some of the vegan menus that are being offered on the Regal Princess. If I get any different ones, I’ll post them in this thread.

Those pineapples brought on board in Papeete were most likely from Moorea. Run, don’t walk, to have some whenever you see them. No other pineapples compare. Hope the cruise continues to be wonderful. I would take a transpacific westbound cruise every year, but DH isn’t a fan of the flights home. I just love those ports.

Thanks for the update, and we hope YOU feel better soon. I’m glad you’re enjoying your cruise on the Sapphire so much. We thought the ship was very special, and it has become my favorite Princess ship, not least because of the excellent officers and crew.

We found the same on the Sapphire Princess in Alaska. When I look at the speeds compared to our at home internet (close to 1 GBP), I can’t imagine it will do anything, but when I tried video streaming a bit it did work fine. Of course, it also depends on other factors.

And someone on the current Sapphire live from is saying theirs is way too soft. It makes one wonder why people are willing to buy the Princess bed. Are the mattresses really that different or are people’s perceptions that varied? My back has been wrecked by bad Princess mattresses over the years, yet the one we had on the Sapphire was actually better than ours at home. Still, I would be unwilling to buy one based on the wide comfort range we’ve seen.

High praise indeed! 😉 We have recently discovered Long Beach as an alternative to LAX for cruises out of San Pedro. Do you recall how much the Uber cost? Enjoy your cruise! May softer pillows be in your future.