nattie

I think your question was answered already in terms of what is available (4tpax cabin will have a pullman bed vs just sofa). We were on Discovery last year and had a mini on Riviera with pullman bed. It was NOT a Reserve Class mini. Please remember that mini suites on Royal class ships generally have miniscule balconies with rare exceptions.

Is the lack of seating an early show thing? We are Elite and have been on several cruises since restart. I have NEVER had an issue with no seating available. Granted, we prefer to seat in the back closer to the exits and we always go to late shows. Usually get there about 20 min before, no issues.

Thank you everyone for your insights! It is too late to cancel/reschedule my August 5th cruise, so we are going, heat be damned :). I have pre-booked all the tickets I could think of and private tours where I could with an air conditioned vehicle (Ephesus, Pompeii), so worst case scenario DH will have a chance to sit in the car. 🤞 the heat wave will subside some, but I am not very hopeful. Wish us luck!

Thank you so much! I have my eye on. 🤞 Dept date Ship Voyage Tour # # of nights Cruisetour Itinerary 1 13-Dec-24 Majestic 8501` 2F 21 Lima (1), Sacred Valley (2), Machu Picchu (1), Cusco (1), Santiago (1), 15-day Cape Horn & Strait of Magellan Cruise

Really depends on what cabin you have booked and how you have booked the cruise. I have personally added 3rd pax only once and it was not hard, ie all the work was done by the PVP. If the cabin you have booked can accommodate 3rd pax, it should not be a problem. Current deal for first 2 passengers would not be affected either, however I suspect 3rd pax will have to pay full price for Princess Plus as an add on. We almost always sail as 3 pax and even if I book Princess Plus fare upfront, that fare applies only to first 2 passengers, ie I still have to either pay gratuities/drinks/wifi for my son or by a PLUS package for him separately.

I am so glad you loved you first post-COVID cruise! And that you enjoyed Enchanted Princess! There have been so much negativity lately, good to hear positive reports from seasoned cruisers. We will be sailing on her from Rome to Athens (I know, only 7 days 😞 unfortunately). Istanbul is a highlight for me too. We have booked excursions with Ephesus Shuttle in both Kusadasi and Istanbul and customer service team there is absolutely outstanding. I am please to hear that actual experiences on tour are also positive.

+1 Part of the appeal of cruising in general and on Princess in particular to me is not carrying wads of cash around for extra tips and not having to sign papers for every drink I get. Given that, we absolutely do tip extra at the end of the cruise, but that would be for people who provided above and beyond service to us and it is not required at all. There have been cruises where we did not tip extra (not Princess) because we were not happy with service levels. To answer your question, based on the reaction we get from crew the extra tipping is not common. Additionally, there are other ways to thank a crew member for outstanding service. You can fill out comment cards (available at guest services) with your compliments. From what I have been told, such mentions count for non-monetary rewards (days off etc.) Just read the last post before mine, CrewChat is great alternative to comment cards! Thank you @charliedarlymple!

Is there a noise issue in Owners Suites due to them being over Vista Lounge? I am trying to decide whether to bid for one on Enchanted. Hate the balcony size though.

The upcoming Enchanted cruise will be our first in Reserve Class. In the regular dining room we normally settle on the waiter team we like buy the second night and ask to be seated with them nightly. Subsequently at the end we give additional tips to the waiter, assistant, host/hostess and Manager (the team we interact with on daily/consistent basis). Looks like Reserve class is done differently? The idea of giving one large tip to the Manager sounds good. Is that what is customary?

Club will be operating, ie your teen can go there BUT they might not find anyone else there. I would say mid-August is still school holiday time, at least in US, so the chances are good. My suggestion would be to have them go on the first night to the "mixer" event teen club normally does to make connections. In our experience teen club is always open for teens to drop by, but unless they have made connections with other teens to hang out with, it is quite useless. I dont know if regular agents on the phone will be able to tell you how many teens will be on the sailing. Probably not.

We have recently (after restart) cruised with Princess, NCL, Carnival (not our choice) and have a cruise booked on MSC. Princess.com wins hands down. I know a lot of people hate on it and on the app, BUT comparing to other sites and apps princess.com is very straightforward and actually informative. The app is growing on me too, I think I am getting used to it 🙂 Also tried to book a Celebrity cruise and had to call and talk to someone to figure out why I couldnt proceed. Turned out that the ship simply did not have any 3/4 pax cabins. Why would it even let me go past "choose your cruise" stage with 3 pax?

I do! I have a small "travel" stapler that is stashed with all my other travel things (portable luggage scale, various extension cords/converters, travel fan and sound machine, etc). Lately I am loving the new collapsible hampers I just tested out on last 2 cruises. As an odd thing, we usually bring a roll of DH "preferred" TP... Dont ask, by it saved me a lot of complaints during travels.

From my PVP: All Post-Cruise Issues or Feedbacks are forwarded to our Onboard Experience Department (customerrelations@princesscruises.com). Please make sure to include your booking number(s) attention to Onboard Experience Department subject Post Cruise Issue. Please allow them some time to respond. My case took 2 weeks, but was successfully resolved. I have also received a follow up phone call from US based representative.

That might be the ship, not the suite perks per se. We were on Regal recently and had Perrirer in our Elite set up (same as Suite one I believe)

Thank you so much! We have prearranged for the guide (not sure if they will be with us at pick up or we will meet in Pompeii) and tix to Vesuvio are included in our custom excursion. I am just bummed to waste time when we are on the clock. I'll ask my tour provider about possibly going to a different entrance. Our ship docks at 7 am, should we ask for even earlier pick up (right now 8 am) to be as close to the beginning of the line in Pompeii as possible? Our tour provider said that there shouldnt be too many people when Pompeii first opens at 9 am. Not sure if thats true in August though.

Unfortunately for us we are docked in Naples on first Sunday of the month when admission to Pompeii is free. The unfortunate part will be the crowds since "skip the line" tix are not available for that day. We are planning to be off the ship and on the road no later than 8:30 am (hopefully earlier). From people that have been there (hopefully on free Sundays), how bad should I expect the crowds to be? Ie how long would the line be to get in? The date is August 6, 2023 and I think we are the only ship in Naples that day (Enchanted Princess). We have private transportation booked and the plan is to head to Pompeii first to avoid the crowds as much as possible and than had to Vesuvio and winery for lunch.

On our last cruise we took a buddy for my 14 yo, so we had 14 and 15 yo in Caribbean in April. One of the best cruises! Teens had a TON of fun and we actually got so much R&R. They spent a lot of time in teen lounge just hanging with friends they made and the rest of the time was divided between pool, sports court and various food joints.

I am so bummed there are only burgers and no traditional Irish "toasties" available. But I am excited to try it all!

My DS went through all the levels of Princess's Camp Discovery (and whatever it was named before) from about 3 in earliest years to being in the teen lounge on our last 2 sailings. I was ALWAYS impressed by the stuff, activities and level of care kids received at the Club. When DS was very young (2) and couldnt go to the club yet I remember chatting with some counselors in the Princess Cays club facility (you can use the facility with kiddy pool and playstructure as long as you stay with your kid) and they said that Princess hired only people with degrees in early childhood education to work in the kids club. Not sure if this is true 12 years later, but our experience with Camp Discovery and it predecessor has always been great.

I will totally agree to that! I am assuming Ally (Alexandra) is still there from April 23? She is awesome and her helpers were too! Also, Martin (Entertainment director) promised to bring the Rock Opera back? Not sure if that happened yet?

We were on Regal in Caribbean this April. Regal used to be my favorite ship. We have sailed her several times in different regions and always had an outstanding experience. Our most recent cruise was very good, but I felt that crew was not up to par in some areas. It was not the restart thing, as we have sailed Regal after restart (Jan 22) and had a wonderful experience. My issues were specifically with gym staff (rude, however they are not technically crew, but independent contractors), lucklaster service in one of the MDRs (rectified by amazing service in the other MDR for the rest of the cruise) and shops stuff (might be just Elite thing with constantly having to verify if they applied my discount). Aside form these somewhat nitpicky issues we had a very good cruise and would not hesitate to sail on Regal again, but the banner of favorite ship has passed to Discovery for now (she had old Regal's captain, hotel manager and several other senior officers when we sailed her and it showed in the feel of the ship for us).

We are trying Suite for the first time on Enchanted this Aug, very excited! We are Elite, so already get laundry and LOVE that perk. As Elite we also get some of the Suite perks already, but not Sabatini breakfast. Our cruise will be very port intensive, so not sure how many time we can take advantage of that. What really made me splurge for Suite was Suite Lounge on Riviera deck (I think these are only on Royal class ships) and extra balcony space.

Thats very interesting, my DS (14, Elite on Princess, now Diamond on MSC) could care less about butler/YC perks but very much cares about his Elite/Diamond status. He did not love the Haven either and said that regular Princess in Royal class was better than NCL Haven with all the bells and whistles of larger ship. Go figure... I wish we could do 7 day to try MSC out since everyone above is absolutely correct about different demographics of shorter that 7 day cruises, but our friends cant do more that 6 days off at a time, so hoping for the best on a 4 day.

Well, we took the plunge. I have booked the short 4 day cruise out of Port Canaveral for next Spring Break to try MSC out. My friend got the last Deluxe Grand quad in YC on 16, so we ended up with deck 19 (not my first choice). I was originally planning on getting the two level suite, but I dont like the all the way forward location. I didnt realize that the only ones of those are all the way forward. I can report that website was not as horrible as everyone said and I have received my status match to black (diamond?) the next day. Very easy online form to fill in. Thank you for anyone giving their opinions! Very helpful.

Very helpful, thank you! We don’t go to the Casino, so may be that’s why we have no issues with smoke on Princess 😀.