bassmk

It was a CVP. I didn't use a travel agent, and I didn't even use a CVP to book it, but I made sure to book my next cruise with the CVP who helped me with that.

I rebooked last year after I had paid the final payment and I got a $700 refund back to my card. This year I called about a 2024 cruise and they rebooked for the lower price and I saved $1600.

I don’t know, I think it’s still a really great value for my travel dollars. Nothing costs what it used to, and we’re being nickel and dimed by everyone.

On the Princess site in my booking information, it itemizes all of the things included with my Premier package. It's possible I'm overlooking something, but I feel like it's 100% worth the cost. I'm open to someone showing me what I'm overlooking. I fully understand Princess is trying to make as much money as possible, so I know I'm not getting anything "for free." I added up every item that I will use with the cost they listed and it adds up to $1332.38pp value. I excluded the cost of: free medallion shipping, photo package, fitness classes, Princess prizes, but including those things, the total becomes $1650.67pp. That also doesn't include not having to pay the extra fees that are now charged all over the ship if you don't purchase a Plus or Premier package. The price difference right now between Princess Standard and Princess Premier for that sailing is $580. Again, I truly am open to learning if I'm wrong or not taking something into consideration. To me, it seems like a good deal, but I certainly don't want to spend extra money if I don't want to. I just don't feel like I am based on my math.

LOL I hear ya! My dad is always having me try things but I just can't get into it. It's not my bag, but to be fair, my palate is NOT sophisticated. I miss out on most of the nuance that beer people (and wine people) pick up that makes it so enjoyable. It all kind of tastes the same to me.

I mean...HARD AGREE...but my dad is firmly in the beer camp.

Hello there all beer connoisseurs! I just booked a cruise with my parents, and my dad is a beer guy. I think he likes IPAs, but drinks other stuff as well. (I'm not exactly sure of all of his particulars.) What are your thoughts on the beer offerings on Enchanted? I've looked up bar menus and such but I don't know anything about beer.

I think you'll find lots of people won't stick to the white and gold theme. Think of the folks who never check their email or that email goes to the junk folder. You're good...wear the purple dress. 😄

Here's the thing...I'm not old and I like Princess bc I have outgrown the more active and family-oriented cruise lines. Of course I understand it's a small area of the ship, I'm not a dunce, and I won't be flouncing to another company, but it's a little bit of a disappointment. It seems a little like desperation and pandering. A little bit of reinventing the wheel. Fixing what isn't broken.

Absolutely not. No thank you! Take that s*** back to Carnival and Royal.

One last thing about the elevators that I just remembered... Bob and I decided on the best "fix" for them. 🤣 Instead of pressing the floor button as many times as people in your party, first you tap the screen to turn it on. Then it asks you "How many in your party?" and THEN you select the floor. That seems way more logical to us. But they never asked us, so...

I've done FTTF several times now and I like it. I like using the priority lines at embarkation mostly, and pre-Covid I liked being able to get into my room as soon as I was onboard. (Now you can drop your things off with FTTF, but you can't hang out in the cabin until all the rooms are ready.) You also get to wait with the Plat/Diamonds at debarkation, which was also nice because they're first off the ship if you do self-assist. I think if you don't haul your own luggage off, you get an early group, but that I'm not sure about. Using the Plat/Diamond line at Guest Services came in handy twice on this cruise. (When Bob's luggage wasn't delivered and when he lost his Sail and Sign card.) I think I paid $129 this time for it. I balked a bit bc I remember paying something like $89 pre-Covid. I'm on the fence about whether it's worth the extra cost, which may be dependent on which port you sail from? I'm not sure. Anyway, skipping the crazy long lines for embarkation was the biggest benefit this time. When I checked in online before the cruise, I still had to choose an arrival time, but with FTTF you can show up as early as you like and get right on.

We've done 2 on Princess (Royal and Enchanted) with 2 more coming up (Caribbean and Enchanted again)! We love it. I know the Medallion can be controversial bc it doesn't always work as intended, but we've never had trouble and we love it. We've also done Holland and enjoyed that for times when you might like a smaller ship.

It took FOREVER for luggage distribution this time! And I remember elevators being shut down for it on every other cruise I've taken, but it's not usually the midship main elevators, AND I've never seen them do the sorting right there in the elevator lobby on each floor!

Summary and Thoughts: We truly enjoyed ourselves on this cruise. There were lots of things we did NOT enjoy, but nothing was enough to ruin our trip. We were able to relax, disconnect, unwind, and spend some real quality time hanging out with each other. Bob and I didn’t really love the layout of the ship. We felt it was a bit choppier than other ships we’ve sailed on (him – 9, me – 14), and we missed the big atrium with the glass elevators. (Obviously we still enjoyed the atrium on this ship, but it definitely didn’t feel as “grand” as the other ships I’ve been on.) We were on the Mardi Gras in 2021, and we really loved it. It was huge, but we felt like everything had its place and the flow made sense. Horizon felt small and cramped somehow. There was no flow, in my opinion. Embarkation was not fun. The actual, physical stepping onto the ship part of embarkation, that is. I don’t know if it’s just the port of Miami, or if they had issues of some kind…we got off the bridge onto the first or second floor. There were cabins all around and we got on just normal passenger elevators to go upstairs to the lobby/atrium. I know that’s nitpicky, but part of the excitement for me is walking into that big lobby with the music playing and passengers walking around…it was super anti-climactic and frankly, pretty chaotic this time. And let’s talk about those ELEVATORS. I know it’s a topic that’s probably been beat to death on the board, but holy crap these damn elevators. I had read about them here, and I had a friend sail on Horizon last year, so I had a heads up that they were funky. I HAAAAAAAAAAAATED these elevators. I guess I understand the thought behind them, but the designers gave people at large too much credit. I don’t think enough people noticed or read the directions on the TVs mounted above the call buttons, and if they did, they decided none of it applied to them. I saw the majority of people press the button once and that was that, no matter how many people were in their party. Then they’d jump on whatever elevator arrived. This was all week, too. There were many times that would happen and one person was in a wheelchair or using a scooter, which compounds the problem even more. This is terrible and I noticed that the Mardi Gras doesn’t have this system, so maybe it was just a failed experiment. Something I tried this cruise that I never had before…Alchemy Bar! Bob doesn’t drink, and I never wanted to make him sit around while I did, so it was never a priority for me to try it. On our last cruise, we had a bartender make some delicious seltzer-based mocktails for him, and my mind was blown…both by the mocktails and by the fact that something so obvious never occurred to me. We had so much fun trying all kinds of different drinks. Bob’s mocktails were always so amazing-looking, and he said they were delicious. We’ll definitely be trying to recreate some of them this summer with Topo Chico. I know itinerary and time of year makes all the difference when you talk about who is on any ship, but after sailing a couple other lines (Holland and Princess), we have noticed a stark difference in clientele and atmosphere. We came to the conclusion that we may have “aged out” of Carnival. Yes, I know older people sail Carnival as well as young people, but as I mentioned, we are BORING. My vacations now are about relaxing and zoning out, and Carnival is too much for me I think. I don't want to participate in all of the high-energy activities, but I still get this weird sense of FOMO, kinda like, "Am I getting my money's worth if I don't do the ropes course/rollercoaster/deck party/etc?" I am no longer in the “Fun Ship” demographic…I prefer the cruises where I bring down the average age by a lot. That’s not to say I will never sail Carnival again (never say never!) but unless it’s a bargain I can’t pass up, or if travel companions would rather sail Carnival, I believe this may have been our last one, at least for a good long while. That’s my review! I’m realizing now that if I want to do these for future cruises, I need to make notes along the way. I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope you can find it helpful if you’re sailing or thinking about sailing Horizon soon. If you were on this cruise with us, let me know your thoughts!

Busy weekend! Sorry for the delay in posting the rest of the review. Debarkation: We made it to Reflections by 7:00 like our information card said to. I always leave a cash tip for the cabin steward before we leave, and I used the back of that notice to write a thank you note to Heri to leave with the tip. We got down to level 3 and they gave me so much pushback about where I was supposed to wait. Plats/Diamonds were to wait in Reflections, but also FTTF, which I had. They wanted me to go back to the cabin to get the notice. I just walked away and went to Reflections. No one even asked me to verify once I got there and I was not about to wait 20+ more minutes for an elevator back to the cabin to ruin my thank you note. Debarkation is always so stressful to me. I’m sad vacation is over, I just want to be home since there’s no more vacationing to be done, everyone is in my way, no one knows where to be or what to do…I hate it. We didn’t have any breakfast so my stomach was upset, I hadn’t had coffee yet…nightmare situation. LOL But yes, I realize these are first world problems and I am lucky to be annoyed by them. We were off the ship by 8:00 and got to the airport by 8:30. We went up to Centurion Lounge after checking our bags to wait for our afternoon flight. I’m always nervous to schedule flights at noon or before, but the last 4-5 times I’ve cruised I’ve been off the ship and at the airport before 9:00am. I might take a risk next time and schedule something a little bit earlier. We have TSA Pre-Check so security never takes us very long. We’ll see if my anxiety allows that when the time comes. We were home and snuggling our old, blind pup by 4:30!

It really did completely change how I cruise. I wish everyone would read it!

That might be why I like it so much. 🙈

OH! Also I lost all fuzzy feelings when she snapped off a rude comment to a colleague. ETA: They all run their asses off in the MDR and I give them all the props! I wish Miguel could be given a different job where could thrive, though.

That’s what was so weird, there were only about 2 people in front of me, plus the employees already waiting. It wasn’t horribly busy but they couldn’t get it together.

We always say something has a “wang” when we can’t out our finger on what’s wrong! I think all fat free bottled ranch dressing has a wang. 🤣

I love this! Next time. We love the ABC itineraries, too. We did them on our Honeymoon on Royal Princess.

Last Sea Day: Bob woke up SUPER early, and we both decided we didn’t want to waste a minute of our last day on the ship. We got coffee as soon as it opened and sat on the promenade just outside the coffee shop. After an hour or so, we went down to the buffet for breakfast. We did more trivia and did more sunning by the pool. By this point, the water was way murkier than I care for, so I didn’t get in. We had lunch at the Mongolian wok inside JiJi’s and it was good. Everything is pre-made, it’s not like the pasta bar where you choose what you’d like in it. There are 4 choices (chicken, steak, combo shrimp/chicken/steak, and vegetarian I believe) and you pick one of those. What sounded good to me was the combo but without the shrimp, so I asked if that was possible, and she said they would have to make it fresh. I didn’t want to make extra work, so I just got it with shrimp. We enjoyed it. After lunch Bob wanted some cookies from the coffee shop, so we did that, and then we saw the space/earth movie at the IMAX theater. That was neat. We weren’t interested in Fast X or Super Mario Brothers, so our choices were a glacier documentary or the space/earth thing filmed from the International Space Station. I wasn’t disappointed at all, it was a cool documentary and I had a good time. We left the movie and went back to the cabin and stared out at the water for a little bit. We started to hear water trickling…very strange. I look over and one floor down and about 3-4 cabins over I see A MAN PISSING OFF HIS BALCONY. Yes…I’m positive that’s what it was. Let’s just say there’s no question as to the source of the stream that we saw. I was completely appalled. It takes a lot to shock me anymore, but my mind was blown that someone would do that. Our balconies were over the roof of the Bonsai Sushi restaurant, and the promenade was just beyond that. The VERY SAME promenade that Bob and I had our quiet and pleasant morning coffee just hours earlier. I swear, people are f****** nasty. Having been thoroughly grossed out, we chose Guy’s Pig and Anchor as our final dinner. Service was slow, but it was also pretty packed in there. We didn’t mind…we were in no hurry to be anywhere! I had the prime rib (even though it’s only served medium and medium well, and in my book, that’s BURNT...it was still good, though) with fries and Bob had the ribs. We shared the trash can nachos and both really liked everything. We needed to pack up, so we went back to the cabin to get ready to head out in the morning. We always take our own bags off with us, so we had an early meet-up time in Reflections. I always laugh at myself bc packing before the trip and packing to go home are polar opposites. When I left home, that bag was ORGANIZED. Packing cubes were perfectly arranged, toiletries in their places, shoes lined up efficiently…it was a sight to behold. Packing to come home took 15 minutes. LOL I stuffed all our dirty clothes into the suitcases, the toiletries were either all used up or sacrificed in the name of not having to deal with it, shoes crammed wherever they would go. I was just ready to be home at that point. I always am at the end of vacation. I know it’s over, I’m ready to be teleported home now, please.

Amber Cove: We slept in just a bit (8:30!) and had breakfast yet again in the MDR. More of the same…hanging by the pool, wandering around watching the goings-on, generally just relaxing and enjoying each other’s company. Lunch today was more pizza while hanging out by the Tides Pool. I was a little surprised by the number of kids back there. I thought it was adults-only. Not 21+ like Serenity, but no kids. Maybe back in the day when they debuted Serenity they relaxed the rules about the aft pool areas. I don’t know, but there was lots of hollering and splashing. I wasn’t too bothered, it was just something I noticed that I wasn’t thrilled about. It didn’t ruin anything for me, just an observation. We got way too much sun and decided to get a quick rest in before cleaning up for dinner. We decided to do Cucina del Capitano again since we enjoyed it so much before! I originally had reservations at the steakhouse, but we didn’t think our bodies would hold up to another round of that. LOL I had the burrata appetizer again, and Bob got the arancini and shared with me. I got the veal scaloppini again and he got the Capitano’s Signature Dish, which is different on every ship, but I can’t recall exactly what it was on Horizon. It was long noodles (maybe papardelle?) with red sauce, but that’s all I can remember. For dessert he got the polenta cake again and I just got a dish of the lemon sorbet they serve with the polenta cake. I didn’t want to feel overstuffed again! After dinner we sat in the atrium again, this time for 3 entire hours. Never bored, not even once. We got to bed late for us, about 11:00. Who are we? LOL

La Romana: When I say Bob and I are boring? I mean it. LOL Up early and in the MDR for breakfast again. Again, we didn’t get off the ship in favor of some less-crowded relax time by the pools. We had lunch at the pasta station in Cucina del Capitano and it was really, really good. We enjoyed it a lot. More trivia and naps were had before we cleaned up for dinner. We decided to try JiJi’s tonight. I was on the fence since the menu didn’t look very exciting to me. BOY WAS I WRONG ON THAT. We had the pork belly and the duck appetizers, braised short rib and Chairman Mao’s Master Stock Pig for entrees, wide noodles and Chinese broccoli as sides, and rose crème brulee and caramelized crepes for dessert. Everything is served family-style, so you order for the table. Not a single bad bite among everything. Amazing. Fantastic. Delicious. Again, all of the food adjectives. Yet again we ate way too much, but we weren’t dying like after the steakhouse. More sitting in the atrium before bed. This genuinely was my favorite activity of the cruise. I’m easily entertained, and I’m fascinated by the things people do. The musicians were always pretty good, and we enjoyed that on top of the people watching. Made it to bed around 10:00 or so.