JimmyVWine

CAVEAT: I don’t know all the laws of all the places the ships go. With that said, ports do use drug sniffing dogs at boarding areas and luggage loading areas. Not all the time, but it is done. I would guess that if the substance is illegal, dogs are trained to sniff it out. So the “since you don’t smoke it they’ll never know” assumption could be problematic. Wasn’t Brittany Griner arrested for possession of an oil and not a smokable substance?

That is the point that people are missing. If you book today you pay $50 per day for Plus and you get what you get. There is no obligation, legal or otherwise for you to get included desserts that you haven’t paid for. That doesn’t mean that Princess might not make a goodwill gesture. But it isn’t obligated to do so.

It would have been very easy for the press release to have said that guests who have already purchased a future cruise that will set sail after February will automatically be upgraded to the new package…but it didn’t. It cannot have escaped them that this question would be reoccurring. Sometimes you have to read a lot into words that aren’t there. Also, the new packages aren’t available for sale until 12/14. If the allow retroactive application (or at least announce retroactive application) people can game the system by booking now under the $50 per day price but getting all the benefits of the $60 package. Of course there is always time for them to change their minds. I think that a $10 per day upgrade option is coming for people who are already booked, or as a show of good will, they might announce a free upgrade. They just can’t advertise this now otherwise people will game the system and rush to book.

Well, it does seem to be the sine qua non of the price increase as there aren’t any other enhancements that would drive the change in price. It makes perfect sense to weigh (pun intended) the pros, cons, value and desirability of the carnival concoctions (pun intended) when discussing this upcoming change.

The Ruby ones are fine, and pair well with a nice Pinot Noir. The Silver ones have an odd metallic finish and the Blackened ones are fine with an ale, but utterly obliterate the nuances of any wine pairing. 😜

It was featured in Horizon Court at lunch on the first Sea Day. Consecutive chafing dishes in an area of the buffet serving all of the usual options. Not really the same as the sit down meal with beer service. And battered fish served en masse in a chafing dish does the texture no favors. But it was better than not having it at all.

Ah, but I am on the literal opposite side of the spectrum. To me the apps are where the experimentation and joy reside. I could (and have) make a whole meal out of a coursed tasting menu of four appetizers.

In culinary texts and cookbooks, I have seen it spelled as foo foo; foo-foo; fufu; and fou-fou. All seem to be accepted.

My condolences to the poor crepe!

Fufu is a sticky dough ball made from cassava root. What does it have to do with coffee? (Not a coffee drinker, so maybe I am missing something, but I have never seen fufu juxtaposed with coffee before.)

And while I said that we average 1 to 1.5 desserts per night for the three of us, we almost NEVER skip drinking our dessert. Port. Sambuca. Irish coffee. Scotch. Always find room for that!

I guess it is semantics. I don't consider the gelato on Deck 5 to be "dessert". I think of dessert as the last course of a sit-down meal, and for that, gelato, ice cream and sorbet have always been included. The gelato station on Deck 5 has always been viewed (by us) as a mid-afternoon snack, (and rarely used at that.) Am I going to eat one of those carnival monstrosities in the middle of the afternoon? Heck no!

To each their own. The sight of adults sharing a rainbow colored pinwheel lollipop in a dining room would cause me to look away, hard.

I'm sure some will. Honestly, those look horrid to me. A mish-mash of textures and flavors, and way too substantial to order as the last course of a dinner in the MDR. Who the heck wants a giant pinwheel lollipop with a bowl of ice cream? Even when they are included in the price, our family averages 1 to 1.5 desserts between the three of us on any given night, and that is for desserts that are one quarter the size of these.

Gelato is not sold a la carte as a dessert in the MDR.

Couldn't answer the survey because my choice isn't represented. It is: **On a domestic (U.S.) we will go Basic and bring our own supply of wine, drinking very little of the ship's alcohol and will not miss the perks of either package one little bit. **On cruises from foreign ports where we cannot bring on our own wine, we will evaluate Plus to see if it works for us. But the increased price coupled with the downgraded $12 and under wines makes this a tough pill to swallow. Still, the math might work. TBD.

This would be true for items that have a cash value, such as drinks. But unless the new desserts are going to be sold as upcharge a la carte items, this would be impossible, (or complicated) as they have no equivalent cash value. That said, I think that those of us who already have Plus Package cruises booked for dates after February, we can all expect emails from Princess informing us that we can keep our current Plus Plan, or pay $10 per person per day to upgrade to Plus 2.0.

We shall see, but I have a hard time believing that the MDR servers (or the program coders) are going to be bothered with trying to figure out if a diner has Plus_1.0; Plus_2.0; Premium_1.0 or Premium_2.0. Nothing in it for them. Much easier to grandfather in everyone who has a package.

To keep my Wordle streak going. That’s about it. 😁

Then choose a different cruise line and stop complaining that Princess doesn’t have a mini amusement park for your kids. That is not the Princess business model. Its business model is port intensive cruises where the destination is the raison d’etre of the cruise.

My post was not about you specifically. It was directed to the collective of posts on the topic.

How about...get you to your next destination. There are a lot of posts that contain assumptions that Princess is running 4 day cruises to nowhere out of FLL and the ship has to provide your kids with entertainment 24/7/4. But that is not the product that Princess sells. Instead, it takes you to Roatan where you get off the ship at 8:30, head to one of the several ziplining course, then go to a Botanical Garden with tropical animals, and then go to a West End beach to access a portion of the largest coral reef system in the Western Hemisphere where you snorkel for a few hours. And then you get back on the ship, have dinner, maybe catch a movie under the stars and go to bed. Where in that day is the time (or the need) for a rock climbing wall or a go-kart track? And the day before you were in Belize and you got off the ship at 8:00 and took a boat up river to a magnificent Mayan archeological site as part of a 7 hour excursion. You had a bit of time for shopping and then you got back on the ship in time to shower and change for dinner. Again, when in that schedule were kids bored? If you are a family who values travel, intent on seeing many different places and seeing many different things, then a Princess cruise is a perfect option and the lack of kiddie parks is completely irrelevant. Those are for ships with shorter itineraries that go to Nassau, a private island, and then bob around the Bahamas with a couple of sea days. The idea that a Princess ship needs that stuff when it is going to Mykonos, Santorini, Istanbul, Naples and Barcelona is, pardon my bluntness, absurd. Frankly, if a child needs all that stuff on a ship to have a good time, maybe cruising isn't the best option. Maybe take them to Cedar Point or Orlando. Sorry for the rant. Tough day.

The Regal MDR had a small selection of Port in October. Within the price point of the Plus Package. I had a glass with my dessert course on at least three nights.

Premium is really only relevant for wine. Mixed drinks and specialty cocktails are almost all within the Plus Package. For Premium to be worthwhile, you’d have to figure on around $20 per person per day in wine upcharges. Since most of the better wines are in the $16 range, that comes to 5 glasses per day per person. Certainly doable, but on port days when you are off the ship, it can be a stretch. For a 7 day cruise, I would buy a $100 Princess Gift Card for $90 and apply that as OBC. With that $100 you are banking money that will cover 22 or 23 glasses of wine at a $4 surcharge. That is 3 glasses a day at a cost of $90. The upgrade charge for Premium would be $25 x 7, or $175. Subtract out the value of the Specialty Dining credit and you are still paying more for Premium.

If you book a Mini Suite, you will always get a cabin that can accommodate three people minimum due to the presence of the convertible sofa. Some Mini Suites will hold four. There is no prohibition against parties of one or two booking Mini Suites.