Hulagirl

The photo posted isn't one of mine, but it is exactly the cabin. The couch thing on the left is what we had to use for our suitcases and the rest all fold out of the wall. The one down is normally up and looks like the others when you walk into the cabin.

Now the triple/quad cabins that are oceanview are not like this. They actually do have two twin beds on each side and then the bunks that fold out of the wall. Only the balcony cabins for 3 or 4 are like this.

Not sure what you can do since it is after final payment. That sort of binds your hands I would think. Truly, it won't be a very comfortable cabin, but your cruise won't be ruined. I can speak from experience on that one!! It is just a small cabin and I think they should offer these at a discount.

Sadly this is your only balcony choice unless you go to a mini suite on these ships. So glad a picture was found for you. I will look though when I'm home and see if I can find you a picture that has all the fold out beds up. I truly thought they had made a mistake and put us in a storage room when we walked in. At least you are aware of the cabin and it won't be a total surprise.

Oh my goodness, if you paid to upgrade to this cabin I can tell you that you will be sorry. I so hate to tell you this, but the cabin almost ended us with cruising with Princess for the 3 of us.

I will tell you, when we opened up the cabin door I really thought they had given us a closet and it wasn't the right room. There is no storage in the cabin either, which was a pain. The couch thing they have, which serves as the 4th person bed, was covered with our suitcases since there is no bed to put them underneath. It was the biggest disappointment for a cabin we have had.

Now we did do a one day cruise on the Dawn and had a triple/quad ocean view on the plaza deck and what a difference. The cabin was definitely bigger and there was two twin beds and then two that folded out, like a normal stateroom.

Are the 3 or 4 of you in this cabin? We paid a fortune for it for the Panama Canal cruise and we had a good time, but the cabin was miserable. When I get home in a couple of days I will see if my husband has these pictures on his computer and see if we can post them for you. Really, that is why we took the cabin for a one night another time so we could get pictures. Nobody can really believe what it looks until you see the pictures.

We used to have pictures of the Sun/Dawn Princess cabins posted on one of the online photo sites, but it has changed and I don't think they are there anymore. That may be the pictures you found.

I think my husband may have the pictures on his computer at home and I will see if we can find them and post a picture here. I won't be home for a few days, but will try when I get there.

Can tell you we were in one of these cabins on the Sun Princess back in 1999 for Panama Canal transit and then we did take one as an "upgrade" on the Dawn for a one night cruise. Only took that cabin then just to be able to take the pictures of it to show how awful, and I do mean that, these cabins are. With only beds that fold out of the wall it was truly just not a cabin for any type of comfort, at least for us.

Will try to find a picture when I can for you.

I just had to write and tell you how much I enjoyed reading your review and looking at your pictures. What a wonderful trip you had. We did an Avalon river cruise a couple years ago of the Rhine and enjoyed it quite a bit. I love the fact that you can just walk off the boat and be in town at most of the stops.

The food looks delicious. Avalon was decent, but the food lacked at times. Uniworld looks like they did a much better job.

All this did was make me want to book another trip soon. Thank you for all your work here with the posts. It was so much fun to read.

Love reading your report on the cruise. Thank you for posting it. Since we are going next year I can't wait to read more.

Included every bit of information I could, including e-mail address, home phone number, circled the stock information on the brokerage statements sent so they wouldn't have to look for it and all other pertinent info for the cruise. It is frustrating how it's so different for each of us that sends in the information at the same time. Last year it too sending it over and over as well as my TA calling several times. When Liza was there it was so easy and taken care of quickly. Was hoping they would restore my faith in the people that take care of this, but right now I'm not so sure of this.

Interesting! I faxed mine this past Wednesday and received nothing from them. I will have to call to make sure they received it.

Jamie:

I'm so glad it all worked out for you. Having to deal with this the day of embarkation is not a fun thing to have had to look forward to. Now you can have a nice and fun first day on the ship. Wish we were sailing with the 3 of you.

Hope you make the most traveled luncheon again.

Will e-mail you back.

Susan

Hi Jamie:

Didn't realize you were cruising again this October. Hopefully all works out with the dining times.

Send me an e-mail when you get a chance. For some reason I can't get your address to work on my end. Have no idea why.

Susan

You can definitely get 2 setups for Suite and Elite, but we have had to call for the Elite one. Boarding day they deliver the Suite setup and then we called the next day for the Elite one.

Thank you so very much. That isn't a bad price then for the entire week of wifi. There are some hotels that charge that much per day. Appreciate the information. Glad to know I can use it in the room with our wifi device. Makes it easier to stay in contact.

Susan

Mario: Sounds like that is all you can do at this point in time. At least you are prepared for what could happen. Hopefully all will be well and good. Luckily for you, shuttles aren't something you have to deal with too often there, which is good. Prime Time was just so frustrating to us. I didn't get what I paid for with them, and there was just a shrug from the driver. He didn't care. So frustrating. My advice is, don't ever book with this outfit again. I also avoid Supper Shuttle also. They will drive around the airport several times just to load their van.

Question about the wifi. Is if a one time fee for the entire trip of 15 Euros for unlimited access? Or is this a fee for a certain amount of minutes like the cruiselines have?

The information on this thread is priceless for me. I'm so appreciative of everyone and the information that has been posted.

Susan

Bobbie: Prime Time Shuttle is horrible. I will never, ever book with them again. Have found another shuttle company that I book with all the time in LA and will send your their information. I just can't say enough how bad Prime is except remember our fiasco in Galveston? This reminds me of them. Just below par service. Will write you tomorrow with the other company's information.

YLTraveler: No, that wasn't more than I wanted to know at all. In fact, it was exactly what I wanted! Wasn't quite sure as to how to tackle all that and now I have an itinerary. I'd looked at train schedules from the aiport/Zurich/Lucerne, but wasn't sure about the rest. Thank you so very much for your detailed description.

Now your comment about the tips was interesting. So you can put the tips on a credit card? Now that would be very helpful. Did you go to a desk onboard and tell them what you wanted for each person, though I know they have guidelines like the other cruiselines have. I have 2 credit cards that don't charge a foreign transaction fee, so that does help. Did you need a pin to be able to charge the tips on the ship for your cc cards? Sorry for all the questions, but this is definitely new for us traveling on a river cruise.

Ohio Lady: Thank you for the information on the tram and getting the tickets at the hotel. That will certainly make it easier. We do like to go out on our own. It is nice to take the tour and hear the history, but then I like to set out on our own for a while. Makes it nice. Glad they have both speeds for tours.

Thank you both for all the information.

Susan

For the tram pass into Zurich, do you know if they took credit cards? I'm trying to decide how much cash to bring with us. So they did take Euro's? I was thinking we would need Swiss Francs.

The tours: Is there always a slow and quicker tour offered each time. Hope that makes sense. I just don't want to be on the slow one. When you said all cities had some free time, but not a lot, does that mean you just didn't have much time at each of the stops? Is the only longer day the one where they offered the dinner in Rudesheim? I guess I was thinking that they boat would be at some of the stops for a full day.

Another question about the boat docking area. Have read in the past that sometimes these boats dock and then have to move during the day and people have come back not to find their boat easily. Was that ever a factor?

YLVTraveler:

We have been to Zurich and Lucerne before and I was actually considering taking a day trip to Lucerne again. It was such a pretty town. So the tour you set up at the train station was all on your own? Did you go to the information desk to help you? Quite interested in this.

Thank you for all the information. We are flying directly home from Amsterdam this time.

Susan

I want to thank you for the response to the questions. That helps a lot. Heading out the door now, but will ask a couple more later. You have really helped a lot already. It is so nice to be able to ask and get the answers that are so up-to-date! It is appreciated. I really do feel quite out of it with knowledge on this river cruise.

Thanks again.

Will ask more later.

Susan

Thank you Ohio Lady! We will be on this same cruise/trip in October on the Felicity. I have several questions, but right now can only think of a couple.

The tours from the boat, where they in the morning or the afternoon? Also how long do you think they were? I love spending time on my own in a town, but also do want to go on their tours too.

Were the tours they offered pretty slow going or where they at a decent pace? I know sometimes walking tours can be so slow and then we were on one that I felt like we almost had to run. That was the exception though.

The optional tour you did in Rudesheim, can you tell me what the cost of that was. We won't get any documentation for a couple more months and I'm just curious.

We are looking forward to this as it will be our first river cruise. Only been on the larger cruise lines, so this is so different. Other than the one night of the Captain's dinner, I take it clothing is pretty informal in the dining room. That will be nice for a change. Not so much to pack.

Also, I want to bring my iPad to keep in touch at home, did the boat have wireless or was there any internet offered. I know we can pick up wifi in the towns, but curious while on the river.

Appreciate any information you can give me. I also had the same questions Sandy asked, so glad she asked before me. We are staying 3 nights at the hotel before the trip. Love Zurich and look forward to going back.

Thank you,

Susan

The washers and dryers on the Sapphire Princess are so much nicer now. We were on the ship in December and I had to wash some things (won't send out laundry, even though we can have it done for free). They had new washer's and dryers that are the stack version. These aren't the agitator versions anymore, but like my Whirpool Duet's that don't beat up the clothes. I want to say there was 8 sets now in the laundry room, so it was much nicer.

I've brought quarters from home, just because we had them, but there also was a change machine in the laundry room. Was only $1.00 for each load wash or dry. We were just on the Crown, and it was the older machines. They did take so much longer to dry.

The Owner's Suite is basically the same with the curtain separation between the bed area and the living area. I've found a link to pictures that were taken by Coral, here on the boards of an OS on the Golden Princess.

http://homepage.mac.com/tlassek/PhotoAlbum21.html

If you scroll down she has a VS Suite pictures and then there are some of the OS on that ship. It will be basically the same. The dining table that is put in there looks like it was just plopped in the area and really takes up a lot of room. Yes, the cabin is bigger somewhat, but not considerably. At least this will give you an idea.

If you need a table, then the OS would be the way to go. I know we have used the one in the Grand Suite several times, but that is a completely different cabin and not on the Emerald.

The location of the OS on the Emerald would be what might push me towards it. As much as I love being in the middle of the ships, the Riviera deck just had quite a bit of noise from above in those PH cabins. The balcony was so shallow that so much of the furniture out there was unusable.

Just some thoughts.

The Emerald Princess has 2 Owners Suites on the Aloha deck. What these ships don't have is a Grand Suite. After the Diamond and the Sapphire, they didn't put the Grand Suites on these newer ships.

The Owner's Suites are very similar to the PH suites, except they do have a dining room type of table in them. It isn't a large table, but there is a table in the cabin. In the PH Suites, there is no table like this, but the rest of the cabin is basically the same. Usually I would say that the Owner's Suite isn't worth going for because the balcony is so shallow. But on the Emerald, with the PH Suites being on the Riviera Deck, those balcony's are extremely shallow. I was disappointed with the balcony and also the noise from above on the Emerald. We tired for an Owner's Suite for our cruise that time, but they were booked immediately and we lost out.

Just remember the aft of the Grand Princess is not exactly the same as the aft of the Star or the Golden Princess. The Grand has 2 Grand Suites on the Lido deck and 2 Owner Suites on the Baja Deck. On the Star and the Golden there is just 1 Grand Suite and 1 Owner Suite on the aft of the Baja Deck. They did change that layout of the Star and the Golden.

I also want to say thank you for the pictures. That did take a lot of work and I really appreciate your effort here. I'm like Toto and am a very visual person. Was really curious about the beam on some of the cabins, and now I don't have to wonder anymore.

You are correct about the Grand Suite being different on the other ships. Also the Grand Princess is even different yet. The Grand Suites on that ship are on the side of the ship on the upper deck, I want to say it was the Lido deck. We have stayed in that Grand Suite as well as others at the Aft of the ships. They are truly very nice and have no beams on the long balcony's.

Thanks for you hard work!