geoherb

On 10/9/2022 at 8:47 PM, PurpleHays said:

Go Canes!?!

 

We just finished a TA and the WiFi was easily my major complaint. I managed without it, but my poor DH went through TikTok withdrawal. Five *whole* days without it crossing the Atlantic. I'm hoping April in the Caribbean is better, but I'm not holding my breath. It is what it is and I plan ahead for such events.

Did they reimburse people who had purchased internet? I do have my Kindle loaded with lots of books to read and a few videos loaded on my laptop.

Go Canes!

There's definitely something that happened this past spring. I did three cruises after the restart that did not have any internet problems. My last cruise in August did. It was so bad that they automatically credited everyone who purchased the internet for 10 days (out of 16), including those who had booked Plus and Premiere. 

I'm sailing on a Panama Canal partial on the Caribbean after Thanksgiving. I'm hoping the internet will be as good as it was last December. My hockey team will be playing road games, and I want to watch them on my laptop. If the internet is not good enough to stream, though, it's not as if I'm missing work. But I will ask for a refund for the days it doesn't live up to the Princess promise: "Access the internet everywhere on board so you can text, post photos, video chat and stream your favorite shows, movies, music and sports with ease."

We got to eat in Club Class once when booked in a full suite. They had an extra menu item or two each meal. We ordered a few of them. I don't remember what they were. We had to wait once for a table when joining four others for dinner. Club Class isn't great if you like to share a table with others. You have to make arrangements to show up at the same time, and there are not a lot of large tables in it.

My last few cruises have been solo, and I try to do a lot of activities. My cruise in August was 16 days long (to Canada and Greenland). We had a lot of sea days. They had cruise-long trivia and a cruise-long athletic activity (mini Olympics) every sea day. It was a great way to meet people. I also went to the evening game shows in the Explorers Lounge. They were a lot of silly fun.

I don't remember seeing flounder on my recent cruises. There's always at least one seafood main course on the menu. There was a salmon dish also on the always available menu. Other items on the always available side of the menu are Caesar salad, fettuccini Alfredo, shrimp cocktail, French onion soup, and chicken breast. You can also order from the children's menu: chicken nuggets, hamburger, hot dog, mac and cheese.

The bidding process is so new that Princess probably hasn't worked out all the kinks yet. Before it started, Princess would send upsell notifications occasionally. We only took advantage of them once--moving from a balcony to a full suite for a great price. The emails had a contact number to call. A Princess rep called me back to go over the details of the upsell we took.

On my cruise on the Caribbean in August, they had dispensers for body wash and shampoo/conditioner combo in the shower and dispensers for liquid soap and lotion by the sink. My cabin steward said they had stopped giving out bars of soap but that he could look to see if he could find one for me. I told him not to bother.

I suspect the product in the hand soap and body wash were the same. They were labeled eucalyptus and sea salt, but the scent was more like gardenias. 

I took my own bar of soap and conditioner. 

In Brooklyn in August, a rep tried to direct me to a long line of people waiting to check in. After waiting five and a half hours in the airport for the shuttle bus, I did not want to stand in that long line. I asked her if there was a separate line for priority. She directed me to one that had three people ahead of me. I was checked in and on board the ship in less than 15 minutes. 

Tipping porters is optional. I don't think any porter is going to risk his job by sabotaging the luggage of someone who doesn't tip. It's not as if they're alone with the luggage. They load them into the containers, and then forklift drivers come to take the containers to the ship. 

Before the restart, traditional dining was so popular that they had to add a second dining room to accommodate passengers wanting early traditional dining. 

8 hours ago, bob4cruise said:

how are the hills to get to citadel in mobility scooter from the pier..  I mem walking 8 or more yrs ago and walking up hill..  just don't mem how bad hills where

 

There are quite a few steep hills in Halifax. The Citadel is on a huge hill and is about 70 meters (230 feet) above the waterfront area. The website for the Citadel says, "The site is wheelchair accessible, including the ramparts, the Army Museum, most ground-level exhibits and the washrooms."

1 hour ago, 1965 said:

Looks like our cabin on the Enchanted sleeps 4. We only need 2. I've read that on the new ships the upper berths pull down out of the ceiling so are not in the way like those that fold up against the walls. Any idea how to learn which kind is in our cabin? Thanks.

A friend of mine is on the Enchanted this week. He's in an inside cabin with the berths that jut out from the walls. 

When the person at the X-ray machine at one of the ports on my cruise last month noticed a bottle in my backpack, he asked if it was wine. He let me take the bottle back to my cabin. They had a table set up to keep bottles of liquor, to be delivered the last night of the cruise.

I had a great time on the Caribbean Princess last month on my cruise to Greenland. We missed Nuuk due to rough seas. I'd consider taking this cruise again. My advice is to get up early on the days the ship is tendering to ports if you have not purchased a shore excursion through Princess. The wait for tenders for passengers who did not have priority tendering was up to three hours. The towns don't have the infrastructure to allow them to tender more efficiently. 

I thought the food on the ship was very good to excellent. I loved all the days at sea, and the Caribbean Princess is great for them because it has a walkable outside Promenade Deck. Entertainment wasn't that great. One of the problems was that missing Nuuk meant that we kept on the same guest entertainers on board until we got to Nanortalik. They improvised with a variety show that featured three of them doing shortened sets. 

Supply chain issues and the explosion of popularity in Princess Plus have made the insulated tumblers hit and miss. I received one on my Regal Princess cruise in February. It was waiting in my cabin. I never used it. 

I was hoping that Princess and the on-shore folks and shuttle bus folks would have things worked out by now. I was on the Caribbean's first cruise of the season out of Brooklyn--August 15-31. The worst for me was my five and a half hour wait at LaGuardia to get to the ship. Disembarkation on our cruise ran behind. I was lucky to get off an hour after scheduled and to have a bus waiting for me. There was long wait for the people who disembarked later in the morning. Apparently the buses waiting when I disembarked were it. Some people missed their flights.

I usually eat in one of the dining rooms or International Cafe (for breakfast and lunch). But I made it up to the buffet three times in August on the Caribbean Princess--once each for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I was lucky to go on sushi night. There's always something that they're carving at dinner. It was leg of lamb the night I went. I wish they had more vegetables.

Another option is room service. There are lots of free options. I lived off room service for three days when quarantined back in 2019.

The Caribbean Princess had a limited number of bars open when the ship was docked in Brooklyn. Here's the sign at one of them.

 

They had the pub lunch in the dining room on a port day last month on the Caribbean Princess. I had the chicken curry. It was pretty good. 

I received the email offering to allow me to bid for my 10-day partial Panama Canal cruise on November 28 on the Caribbean. I'm booked as a solo in a Cat. IB (inside cabin). I was already upgraded from my guarantee Cat. IF. At the time I booked, moving to an obstructed view was around $150. The minimum bid for me was $50 ($25 x 2 since I'm solo). Other minimum bids were $220 for unobstructed ocean view, $600 for standard balcony, and $850 for premium balcony. (Those are all double the single occupancy minimum bids.) I was not offered the opportunity to bid on a mini suite or suite even though they're showing up as still available.

The slide bidding tool was interesting. For instance, it would allow me to bid from $110 to $520 (x 2) for an ocean view. If I wanted to spend an extra $1,040, I would have booked a premium balcony cabin to start with.

I ended up placing the minimum bid for an obstructed view. I'm willing to pay $50 if Princess accepts my bid to get a window, mainly because I have liked sailing in Emerald Deck cabins before. The four Cat. OZ cabins on the Lido Deck are not currently available. But I guess there's always the possibility of someone canceling their cruise or being upgraded from one of them and my getting assigned to one of them. If so, I'll still have a great cruise.

11 hours ago, JimmyVWine said:

I’m surprised that your original purchase price for Plus came out to be more than $50 per person per day more than the basic fare. I have never priced out a cruise where that has been true. 

As dreaminofcruisin mentioned, the price can vary after the final payment date. On my cruise last month, it was going to be $56.25 per day for me to add Plus. I decided it was not worth it for 16 days and I turned out to be right. I spent around $80 for alcoholic drinks. I managed with my minibar (all the alcohols traded for beers), two bottles of wine, and free drinks whenever they were serving them: champagne waterfall, Captain's Circle party, and martini demo.

I've seen Plus cost as much as $125 per day. It would be less expensive to book the beverage package separately if you wanted it and then buy the internet and pay the gratuities.

Don't expect an answer anytime soon. I have not heard back from the letter I mailed in January and followed up on in May.

9 hours ago, dog said:

I have wanted to do the same, as I never see club class in the cruises I want to book.

 

Had my March ‘23 booking marked “no upgrade”

 

just got free upgrade from aft balcony to midship balcony right across from the elevators.

 

sealed the deal. Holland America wins my business.

Did you try to get your aft balcony cabin back or did you cancel the cruise because of the move?

21 hours ago, DavidsNana said:

My son and I were on the Caribbean Princess in late Feb/early March in a mini suite and had no toilet problems but the ship was only 1/2 full.  I have two balcony cabins (C618 and C 622 they are next to each other, don't ask me where C620 went) reserved on the April 1st sailing and I sure hope that there are no toilet problems then.  This will be my 28th Princess cruise and only had an issue once and called GS, plumber came right down and fixed it immediately.  These toilet issues are beginning to worry me.

C620 is an inside across the hall from your cabins.

I did not hear any complaints about the toilets not working last month on the Caribbean. I was on the Riviera Deck, but I had friends on various other decks around the ship. If you go to guest services, ask for Bradley. He seems to be more in tune with assuaging passengers than some of the other pursers.