trabeler

Are any ships still doing three show times? On the Emerald last November, the production shows and guest entertainers had shows at 7 pm, 8:15 pm, and 10:15 pm each evening. This significantly reduced the overcrowding of the early show when there are only ~8 pm and ~10 pm shows. We were told that this was a trial of a new schedule to help reduce overcrowding and spread out the crowd to allow attending other activities in the 8-9 pm timeframe.

We were on the Star a few weeks ago and they only had two shows each evening, but the first show was always standing room only and all seats were typically filled at least 15-20 minutes prior to showtime.

I would plug one in at the desk, and I think there is a double outlet behind the TV. EM

That's correct. We're just off the Star and there was a double outlet behind the TV. The TV was plugged into one outlet but the other was open.

I'm on the Star Princess now and they have the card readers in the laundry rooms. Swipe your card and get a special coin to feed the machine. $3 wash and $3 dry.

Recently off of the Star, yes the 50th anniversary menu, Seawitch IPA, souvenirs, etc. were all available onboard.

Thanks so much! We're looking forward to the new items...

The latest loyalty magazine highlights a lot of interesting 50th anniversary activities, special menus, etc and says it will be rolled out in "early 2015".

Has anyone seen a rollout schedule or know if this has already been rolled out across the fleet? I searched around here and on the Princess site and haven't been able to find any info.

We'll be on Star Princess in a couple weeks and were wondering if these items were already in place. Would be nice to have a few different things on our next sailing...

Princess shows the total fare for both of as as: $8,598. and the taxes, fees and port charges as $286.80 . However, the Travel Agency's invoice shows the total fare as $7898 ($700 less than Princess) and the taxes, fees, port charges as $986.80 ($700 more than Princess). The bottom line total cost of the cruise to me on both invoices is the same.

This is pretty typical in my experience. Usually the TA invoices have the taxes/fees at 2-3x the taxes/fees you'll see directly via the cruiseline. The exact multiplier depends on the itinerary (higher for caribbean and lower for panama canal and other high port fee cruises).

What I normally do to determine a good TA discount is to take the cruiseline taxes/fees, multiply by 3, and then subtract that from the total fare. I look for a discount of at least 5% of the remainder.

Since you already have the TA's figures, $7898 - $987 = $6911. 5% of that is around $350. I'd shop around and target that as a minimum for a discount. Sometimes I've gotten up to 10% reduction, but usually that is when the TA has group space on the sailing.

My method doesn't always work as it depends on the sailing, but it has been pretty reliable over 20+ cruises.

We decided to stay at the Marriott Fishermans Wharf and take BART from the airport. Got a good rate through AAA and gives us a chance to walk around town the day prior and not be rushed getting to the pier.

We're thinking of doing the same thing, however it looks like the closest BART station is at Embarcadero. From there, it's a bit far to walk with baggage to Fisherman's Wharf. Does anyone know if it is relatively easy to catch a cab at the BART station exit? This would be around 9 pm on a Friday...

We've had the same initial resistance to putting the beds together on several cruises but safety was never the objection. We've always been told that the issue is that they can't make the upper bunk without standing on the lower bed.

After we tell the steward that it is perfectly fine for him to stand on the lower bed, they've put them together without problem. They usually say they have to inform their supervisor, however. I've always offered to speak to their supervisor if necessary and have never needed to do so...

I keep reading about the servers in the Horizon Court not being prompt at delivering water/coffee. On Carnival you serve yourself. Is it not that way on the Emerald Princess? Just curious for our future cruise.

On Princess, servers provide drinks to the tables. You can usually also get your own coffee or water if you don't want to wait for a server. But if you want lemonade, OJ at breakfast, skim milk, etc... you'll need to get it from a server.

We didn't have much problem getting drinks on Emerald over Thanksgiving week. There were some peak times where it might take a few minutes for someone to stop by, but I don't remember ever waiting too long.

I'm sure someone on here knows so hopefully I'll get an answer to my question, "when is Spring Break in 2016" for most of Texas?

The week of March 16 is the main one for the Houston area, although depending on the school, it could be a week later.

We had a balcony on our last Med cruise and didn't use it enough to justify the extra cost. It was nice for the Venice sail in and sail out, however I ended up on deck anyways for most of it so I could get a wider view and move around.

MY husband is a bit weary of a bunch of HS kids being onboard, but I'm thinking Princess will be a lot more subdued than Carnival out of Galveston that same week. Thoughts?

If both cruises you're considering are the same length, I'd definitely expect Princess to be a bit calmer than Carnival. We have sailed over Thanksgiving the past 5 years - Carnival Magic from Galveston, Emerald & Caribbean Princess from Bayport, Carnival Splendor from Long Beach, and the Celebrity Mercury from Baltimore.

Celebrity had the least kids, followed by Princess. Carnival was an order of magnitude more than Princess. Emerald this year had 600 kids while the Carnival Magic had around 1200! While there were a lot of kids on Princess, they were fairly well behaved. I cannot say the same about Carnival.

We did one Princess sailing over spring break and could only compare it to Celebrity sailings at spring break, but I'd expect that our Thanksgiving experiences on Carnival should be similar during spring break.

Last week we booked through Island Marketing for their spa experience package. In the past, they used Baan Suerte and the writeup on their website looks almost identical to the spa's website.

They have now changed to using the Ixora Spa at Anthony's Key Resort.

Overall, we enjoyed the spa treatment and the use of the pool at the resort. It was pretty good value for price paid, especially compared to equivalent treatment packages at home.

Was on the Emerald last week from Bayport and didn't have any issues carrying on two bottles of wine in our carry-on. This was within the allowable limit, however, so I can't say if they would want to collect if you had more.

They did not open the bag to inspect the bottles to verify contents.

So what's the attitude of the porters at Bayport/Houston cruise terminal? Are they as obnoxious and aggressive as the Miami porters? Do they demand a tip, threatening to not load your luggage if you don't give them what they demand?

Have sailed out of Bayport twice, most recently last week on the Emerald.

I've only experienced two porters, so my data set may be limited, however neither was pushy or solicited tips. Last week, I had to stop our porter from running off with the bags in order to give him a tip.

The porters load multiple cars worth of bags on their cart and then wheel it into the terminal. If you are concerned that your bags might not make it to the terminal, you can also walk your bags to the porter entrance and give them straight to the guys working at a counter that has extra luggage tags, etc on it.

Last week, we dropped off our bags outside the terminal around 12:15 and were on the ship a little after 12:45. All bags were delivered by around 4:30 pm. Emerald had also arrived over an hour late into Houston that morning, so we were surprised at how quickly check-in and embarkation went for us.

Just back from the 11/23 Emerald sailing from Houston. The future cruise consultant announced that Princess will be modifying several 2016 itineraries from Houston to finally do something different than the same old 7 day Roatan/Belize/Cozumel that they have been doing since they returned to Texas.

She gave me printouts of four modified sailings that she says will be loaded on the website by mid December.

Changes for the Caribbean Princess from Houston will be:

21 Feb 2016 - 7 days - Key West / Freeport / Princess Cays

6 Mar 2016 - 7 days - Key West / Freeport / Princess Cays

20 Mar 2016 - 10 days - Montego Bay / Grand Cayman / Roatan / Belize / Costa Maya / Cozumel

30 Mar 2016 - 11 days - Cartagena / Colon / Limon / Grand Cayman / Cozumel

From 11/11 5 night cruise:

MUTS at night (movies may change at end of November)

Guardians of the Galaxy

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

NFL game on Thursday night

The Fault is in our Stars

There were some differences on the 11/23 Emerald sailing. Football occupied Sunday, Monday, and Thursday nights. So that only left Tuesday (Maleficent at 6 pm and Dawn of Planet of Apes at 8:15 and 10:30 pm), Wednesday (Edge of Tomorrow for all three showings), Friday (The Fault in Our Stars), and Saturday Guardians of the Galaxy).

Thanks for the review. We leave next week. Can you tell me, was Sea day 1 or 2 the quietest as of daytime activities. I am trying to find a good time to organize a slot pull for our roll call.

I don't recall a significant difference in the two afternoons. Both seemed to have some dead time between 2 and 4:30 each afternoon.

Thanks for posting your review. We were also on the same sailing with you, but were with a group of 8 and had early fixed dining in the Botticelli dining room. Service was on the better side from our prior experience, although on the 2nd formal night (Thanksgiving) the food was extremely slow... our waiter said that there was a huge backup in the kitchen due to too many orders for turkey.

Overall, we had a good trip, even though the weather was bad for a couple of days and we missed Belize. We were on the Thanksgiving week sailing last year from Houston and that week we left a day late and missed both Roatan and Belize, so this year was an improvement!

The ship did seem a little overrun by kids, however. We were told there were over 600 on board! We didn't run into any serious behavior issues, however.

On the way between Hobby airport and Galveston you could stop at Space Center Houston... could easily occupy an afternoon there if the 8 yo is into space stuff.

Otherwise, you could check out either Moody Gardens or Schlitterbahn (water park) in Galveston.

Sorry but haven't heard of cool tours before, since I've never needed a tour company here (lived in Houston for 20+ years)...

Apparently there is a flat easy cycle path all the way to the falls and it only takes about an hour to get there.

 

We are going to rent bikes from cyclo services who are close to the train station/place de la gare.

Not sure how 'flat' it is since the train station is at river level and the falls are at a pretty good elevation. I remember that the bus was going slightly uphill the entire time. It's a relatively gradual slope, but it didn't look flat.

Ok - I have to ask -- you were on the Maasdam and had an 'unscheduled' overnigfht in QC?????

 

 

 

I'd love to know what happened to cause the over night? We will be on the Maasdam as well.... would actually love to overnight there - -but not at the expense of a missed port elsewhere.....

Yes... We had the unscheduled overnight. The issue from what we were told was that they needed an extended stay to allow divers to replace a propeller seal. Supposedly it had been damaged the previous cruise due to getting some lobster pot ropes tangled on the propellers.

It was unfortunate that we missed out on Charlottetown, however the extra day in QC was a lot better than just an extra sea day.

Forgot to mention that the dry sauna on the M class is far superior to the S class. The M class sauna in the changing area is at least twice the size as the S class and also has a huge exterior window. The S class is just a dark room in a corner of the shower area.

I assume the ladies sauna also has a window on the M class, but have never had the opportunity to confirm.

We were in Quebec overnight last month and took the #800 bus to the falls. It was an unscheduled overnight on the Maasdam so we were berthed at the far away dock (near the farmer's market and train station). Picking up the #800 near the train station was easy and the falls were at the end of the bus route.

I think you could easily catch the bus a little closer to the old city, assuming you'll be docked at the normal place.

There is no signage where the bus route ends to find the falls, however. The bus driver told us to walk through a gate in a fence (to the right of the bus stop) and then follow the trail to the top of the falls. There are some trails and you can take stairs to the bottom of the falls, plus a bridge across the falls.

We maybe spent a couple hours there and then took the bus back.

Both the M and S class spas have a dry sauna in the individual changing rooms. Clothing is optional in those saunas.

In the persian gardens, which is the only place to find a steam room, swimsuits are required.