Sapphire Princess out of Vancouver BC

[south1246]

It was a bit of a struggle to give the "thumbs down" to this thread. I hate coming off as a whiner but I may just do that a little.

 

We booked a short cruise out of Vancouver B.C. to Seattle. We have done these cruises before and we have cruised on several lines mostly in the Caribbean. So I like to think I have some basis for my thoughts.

 

Additionally, I don't want to sound like we didn't have fun, "it is what you make it". If you want to have fun, you will and you won't let the little things get to you.

 

Embarkation: The absolute most heinous process I have ever been part of. We arrived at the pier at approximately 12:00 noon. We found parking and walked to Canada Place to hop on board. We noticed immediately the Golden Princess and Zuiderdam were in port as well as the Sapphire. Canada Place was completely unprepared for this process and this amount of passengers. The layout of the pier is not setup to accept anything more than about one cruise ship at a time. I am not exaggerating when I say the line was the largest line I have ever been in. I don't think the embarkation lines for all ten cruises we have been on were as long as this line! It was the entire inside of the building, around the entire building all the way to the rear. In other words, the length of TWO Sapphire Princess ships with switchbacks! I don't think my words will do this justice.

 

After an hour in line we were getting a little grouchy, we were not even in the building yet. We crossed a corner and realized we had the entire length of the building yet to go! After the second hour came and went, we noticed there were people actually having medical problems due to standing in line so long. I watched as wheelchair after wheelchair was led out of the building with folks having a rough go. We were finally in the building and could "see" the security area. Again, it was painfully obvious this was not set up for a large crowd but a small event. We were then notified by a Canada Place employee that the US Customs was the problem and that they just go about their pace without input.

 

During the process, knowing this was awful, I felt Princess failed us a bit. I don't expect room credits, free cruises or other things like that. What I do expect, a representative to be working the line telling people what is going on and keeping us updated. There were people asking about the ship being late and people were worried. There was No one around to be found. We then were told customs was not allowing anyone else into the customs area. Now, the crowd actually started some chants and booed the staff. We then watched as a large group of US customs employees headed out en mass. Instead of rotating out to keep things moving they all changed over at the same time and stopped the line for about twenty or so minutes. When we reached the cruise check in, the Princess folks did not even offer a sympathy for the line. Only "It's not our fault". Yes, actual words. I did not appreciate that.

 

Finally right at three hours, on to the ship AFTER the scheduled depart time! The ship is in great shape. Looks good and the staff are of course helpful and friendly. Everything I expected of the Princess ships. We have been on the Golden before and noted the one thing missing and I am sure they will add later is the large screen and sound system at the main pool. It is missed. We had the standard muster drill and sailed out.

 

The first food was the buffet up on deck 14. Seating was available and there was no line at all. The food was borderline fair-poor. It was dried out and looked pretty bad. The taste wasn't terrible but it wasn't real good either. The presentation is good and selection a little below average. It's tough to plan on all the people coming to eat when they can't get on the ship, I can't imagine they were prepared for that either. The deserts were great. Enjoyed them very much.

 

After about an hour or so, I wanted to take advantage of the outdoor burger and dog joint along with the pizza. I thought that pizza was pretty darn good. Has a wood fired flavor to it and I thought it was pretty good. The burger and dogs were pretty standard and tasted just fine.

 

We had dinner at the Sterling. This was a bit of a stretch for the staff here. For a $20 per person charge, I expected a bit more. They don't have enough staff to handle the crowds. Dinner took just over two hours which is stretching a bit. However, the waiter was very courteous and did what he could. The Filet Mignon I had was perfectly cooked and seasoned. I loved every bite of it! The other items we ate were very good and everything we expected. Time and lack of staff was the only problem in there.

 

Skywalkers lounge was busy well into the night and we watched the stage show at 10:30. It was cruise ship standard fare not bad. We never saw our room steward which is a good or bad thing depending on your preference.

 

Breakfast again was in the buffet. Breakfast was a bit better. My only request would be an egg station. They had a cook doing generic fried eggs (no requests for type cooked) but he could have been better used doing eggs to order. But the food was good so I have no complaints there.

 

For a quick trip, we still had a good time. While I was disappointed in Princess, we still managed to put the shortcomings behind us to have a good time. I always hope they eventually read one of these and ask some questions of themselves!

[senior lady]

ufortunatly Vancouver seems to always have this problem the first "big" weekend of Alaska cruising. I was in Vancouver all week at a convention and there was ships in port everyday. One day there were 3 large ships and everything went smoothly. We've cruise out of Vancouver and never seen the mess that transpired yesterday. Living in Vancouver and knowing what a beautiful city it is, always makes me sad when these things happen:(

 

On the news last night they said that 19,000 people leaving and arriving made it the awful mess that happened. I think it's a combination of new employees by Princess and the port and Customs making the lines longer because of not enough people.

 

I'm glad that you made a good time of the short cruise.

[Coral]

I have heard these complaints the first weekend every year. I believe you and it seems to happen every year.

 

I have been to Canada Place several times with 3 ships and never had a problem before. This is usually at the end of May time frame....

 

As far as the Princess Reps saying "it wasn't there fault" - it is probably true. A lot of this has to do with Customs and Immigration and Security. Also, it is not uncommon for the first time a ship hits a new home destination, the cruise ship employees have formalities they have to go through (customs, immigration, etc..) that they can't control.

 

2 hours at Sterlings is not uncommon.

[Pam in CA]

Sorry to hear that your embarkation experience was so awful. It's unfortunate but there's little Princess can do when a port is overwhelmed with the number of ships and passengers. Yes, they could have sent more reps to tell people what's happening but with two big ships in port the same day, I'm guessing they were stretched pretty thin. I'm pretty sure the Princess "reps" you see on the pier don't work directly for Princess. They will be HAL or Carnival reps another day.

 

I've had the same experience in Buenos Aires but it didn't affect my cruise. It was actually worse in Buenos Aires because there was only a very narrow, one-person-wide sidewalk to stand on, with suitcases, and busses and cars going past to drop people off. I was fortunate in that I'd taken a Princess city tour and the rep on the bus knew exactly what was going on and let us know. He guided those of us with Priority boarding directly into the building so it took me only about 30 minutes to board. My sister and BIL waited three hours before they discovered the Priority boarding line. It happens.

[Putterdude]

This is a bit of a cut and paste of a post that I made one our roll call.

I am not sure what happened in the embarkation process but it obviously went bad. We were a transfers from the Golden but once thru US customs we were mixed with others going to the Golden and the Zuddy and it all went very smoothly for a while. We were actually aboard minutes after the ship was cleared for passengers at 11:30 sharp. The International Dining Room was open for lunch from noon until 1:30.

I suspect the embarkation problems stemmed from there not being enough scanners for the volume and the fact that a huge number of Princess the shore people are new hires, clearly they did not know what they were doing...we had the check-in person hand us back our boarding passes...I told her that I was pretty sure that she would need them so she called over her supervisor who said he "thought" she should keep them, but wasn't too sure.

 

Welcome to Canada Place on the biggest ship day of the year...and his always happens at this time, it's an annual event and these boards will be full of complaints for the next week.;)

Now let's talk about this morning's walk down the ramps in the rain and 1.5 hour wait in the rain for a taxi at Seattle's Pier 91, that place certainly was not built for the weather in the PNW.:mad:

[don'tleavewithoutme]

The transfer from the Golden to the Sapphire was truly horrible, but much worse for the people just boarding in Vancouver. We noticed the confusion in the terminal long before the US Customs. There were Canada Place staff pointing some of our group one way, then another. Conflicting instructions were had at every step - actually the US Customs was the easiest, once we got through security. Waiting after US Customs was horrible, too - with people shouting at us. Then when they called the Sapphire people, we were herded into another waiting area, again with the shore side staff giving conflicting instructions and being unsure what was going on. My friend was almost handed two room keys - one for someone else - with her own.

We did get lunch in the International Dining room, and there were almost no staff and very few passengers. We nearly had the place to ourselves.

Dinner last night was ridiculous - we were told that dining room waits (at about 1930) were 2-3 hours, so we abandoned and went to the Horizon Court which was not at all crowded, but the food selections didn't seem up to Princess' usual.

The room was clean and quiet enough, but no water or beverage in the refrigerator - to be expected, I guess, since it's one night and they wouldn't know if you used any.

Still debating whether or not I want to do another 1-nighter, unless it is at the end of the season instead of the chaotic beginning.

So this trip is in the category of "we had an experience" rather than "we made a memory."

That said, the trip on the Golden Princess was wonderful in every way until we got off!

[VibeGuy]

I was on this sailing as well, and had much the same experience.

What really torques me is that there's no reason for Canada Place to be chaotic every year; every May and September as predictably as tulips blooming and the Seattle Mariners underwhelming, there are Saturdays with four (or more) ships that need US preclearance services in port (standard is three at CP, one at Ballantyne, but I've experienced 4CP/1B). Every year it not only fails to "get better", it fails to "not get worse.".

My friends and I are no longer inviting first-time cruisers to sail with us on the Southbound 1NTs and Coastals because the boarding process is so awful it sours them on ever cruising again. We're now bringing newbies on the SEA-VAN 1NTs, because you never stop moving from the moment you get to the terminal door until you're in your stateroom. I'm shocked how well Pier 91 works given the heritage and our relative lack of experience operating cruise terminals here in Seattle.

[VibeGuy]

So this trip is in the category of "we had an experience" rather than "we made a memory."

 

As I posted on the Princess Facebook page, "Our escape turned into an escapade".

 

I agree that the buffet was *weak* last night. Fortunately, we had the first-boarding member of our group call DINE and secure dinner reservations, so we were seated about 20 minutes after our reserved time in Vivaldi. Food quality was excellent; I've had enough of the Sailaway Dinners to say that this was totally top-tier - it was the best barramundi I've ever had onboard of the 12 or so since the new menus of a few years ago. Some members of our party were in the HC when the ship listed a bit - food displays tipped over, stacks of plates fell and general chaos ensued.

[VibeGuy]

double-post; darned computers! ;0)

[Cruisin' Chick]

I seem to remember reading here that's there's usually a problem when there's a few ships there at the same time at the beginning of the season. Much of the problem when there's chaos at embarkation/disembarkation is often traced to the port and not the cruiseline.

 

The Sapphire isn't going to get Movies Under the Stars until it undergoes a drydock.

 

And the one time we disembarked in Seattle (at terminal 30), it was pouring rain, with just a canopy to keep people dry. Unfortunately it was a mess trying to get land transportation as the port personnel there did a crummy job keeping order with the leaving passengers (it wasn't Princess's fault).

[Sea_princess1]

As I posted on the Princess Facebook page, "Our escape turned into an escapade".

 

I agree that the buffet was *weak* last night. Fortunately, we had the first-boarding member of our group call DINE and secure dinner reservations, so we were seated about 20 minutes after our reserved time in Vivaldi. Food quality was excellent; I've had enough of the Sailaway Dinners to say that this was totally top-tier - it was the best barramundi I've ever had onboard of the 12 or so since the new menus of a few years ago. Some members of our party were in the HC when the ship listed a bit - food displays tipped over, stacks of plates fell and general chaos ensued.

I totally agree on the barramunda in Vivaldi last night. It was fabulous. Waiter was definitely overloaded...especially with the 3 tables of 8 that loaded in right after us, and believed they were chartered for a private club, as loud 'as ya like' and all. As for the buffet...after being on a bus since 9:30 which should have been 8am, and getting onboard at 3pm for the first blood sugar drip since 630am ANY food from the buffet would have seemed like black cavier or crown roast!!

[Putterdude]

The transfer from the Golden to the Sapphire was truly horrible' date=' but much worse for the people just boarding in Vancouver. [/quote']

 

You remark surprises me. We had learned thru the roll call that Princess was going to do the transfer. Once we got our disembarkation package we went to the PSD and they confirmed that this was the case and exchanged our luggage tags with Brown 5 tags. Our bags were in our Sapphire cabin by 1:30 and we were off the Golden about 10:30 and on the Sapphire about 11:34 maybe 11:35.

[vickie_bernie]

have to agree with others, these one day cruises are always an issue when a few ships are in port. Last year we had a similiar problem as was experienced yesterday at Canada Place. We will never do another one day again. But we have done numerous sailings out of Canada Place including many repos and have just walked right on and experience the quickest imbarkation.

 

One big issue is with one days many people carry on their stuff so security screening is a little longer. Four ships trying to clear all the people off the ships and then new passengers on causes problems.

 

Kind of miss Ballayntine being open as they would then spread out the ships between the two ports.

[wrp96]

Kind of miss Ballayntine being open as they would then spread out the ships between the two ports.

 

Ballayntine was open. There was a ship over there too according to the port schedule.

[vickie_bernie]

Ballayntine was open. There was a ship over there too according to the port schedule.

7

oh wow really, didn't know they were using it still

 

Thanks

[Putterdude]

NCL (not sure which ship as we are still in Seattle) used Ballantyne.

 

Having been thru it, I am not at all sure why Princess do not spend more time training their shore people and secondly why if they know in advance that the problem is central scanning, as the call it, why not do more scanning of carry-on on the ships, they have the equipment.:confused:

[Coral]

NCL (not sure which ship as we are still in Seattle) used Ballantyne.

 

Having been thru it, I am not at all sure why Princess do not spend more time training their shore people and secondly why if they know in advance that the problem is central scanning, as the call it, why not do more scanning of carry-on on the ships, they have the equipment.:confused:

 

I am guessing these are all "pier people" and not "princess people".

 

Sort of like blaming Princess when Customs and Immigrations send half the staff they usually do and there are delays getting off the ship.

[Putterdude]

I am guessing these are all "pier people" and not "princess people".

 

 

They are contractors to Princess, but wear Princess uniforms and to most are Princess people. They are the people who direct you and check you in. Unlike customs officers, they are people who Princess can control and need to be properly trained by Princess. Frankly many had no idea what was going on. Please read my post above re the boarding passes as an example.

[Coral]

They are contractors to Princess, but wear Princess uniforms and to most are Princess people. They are the people who direct you and check you in. Unlike customs officers, they are people who Princess can control and need to be properly trained by Princess. Frankly many had no idea what was going on. Please read my post above re the boarding passes as an example.

 

I saw that and that was un-acceptable.

 

It has just been my experience that the delays at Canada Place had very little to do with the people who check you in. It was everyone else.

[wifeofbedo]

We were on the Sapphire sailing, and sad to say, we experienced the exact same thing...lineups that are insane..:mad:..2 years ago on the same inaugural weekend. I don't understand why they don't have seperate lines for each cruise ship? I think that would make things more clear for passengers and produce shorter lineups. I felt sorry for the ones dropping off checked luggage, there was no clear space for it and I saw many halfway through the security line and had no idea where to go to drop off their baggage. I was emabarrased for my hometown port.

 

:)On a delighted note, we had the same captain, Nick Nash, that we just had on our March sailing of the Crown. He had his usual dry witted humor in his announcements. Welcome to the Vancouver Zoo indeed!

I did notice we did not get the Princess bags in our stateroom as we did last cruise. I guess one nighters don't qualify :(

It was still a great way to spend the weekend. I can go back to work on Monday and when people ask, what did you do this weekend....oh, just cruised around :D

[iluvcruzin]

That's a shame. Unfortunately it can happen (and does) in other ports as well. I remember being in line for hours in San Francisco emabarking on the Golden some years back. People were having a hard time standing and it was like a cattle call where they moved us from warehouse to warehouse. Once in Port Canaveral we waited outside for 4 hours to embark because there was a medical emergency on the previous sailing. Things happen. Sounds like you did have a some fun which is good.

[captainron]

It was a bit of a struggle to give the "thumbs down" to this thread. I hate coming off as a whiner but I may just do that a little.

 

We booked a short cruise out of Vancouver B.C. to Seattle. We have done these cruises before and we have cruised on several lines mostly in the Caribbean. So I like to think I have some basis for my thoughts.

 

Additionally, I don't want to sound like we didn't have fun, "it is what you make it". If you want to have fun, you will and you won't let the little things get to you.

 

Embarkation: The absolute most heinous process I have ever been part of. We arrived at the pier at approximately 12:00 noon. We found parking and walked to Canada Place to hop on board. We noticed immediately the Golden Princess and Zuiderdam were in port as well as the Sapphire. Canada Place was completely unprepared for this process and this amount of passengers. The layout of the pier is not setup to accept anything more than about one cruise ship at a time. I am not exaggerating when I say the line was the largest line I have ever been in. I don't think the embarkation lines for all ten cruises we have been on were as long as this line! It was the entire inside of the building, around the entire building all the way to the rear. In other words, the length of TWO Sapphire Princess ships with switchbacks! I don't think my words will do this justice.

 

After an hour in line we were getting a little grouchy, we were not even in the building yet. We crossed a corner and realized we had the entire length of the building yet to go! After the second hour came and went, we noticed there were people actually having medical problems due to standing in line so long. I watched as wheelchair after wheelchair was led out of the building with folks having a rough go. We were finally in the building and could "see" the security area. Again, it was painfully obvious this was not set up for a large crowd but a small event. We were then notified by a Canada Place employee that the US Customs was the problem and that they just go about their pace without input.

 

During the process, knowing this was awful, I felt Princess failed us a bit. I don't expect room credits, free cruises or other things like that. What I do expect, a representative to be working the line telling people what is going on and keeping us updated. There were people asking about the ship being late and people were worried. There was No one around to be found. We then were told customs was not allowing anyone else into the customs area. Now, the crowd actually started some chants and booed the staff. We then watched as a large group of US customs employees headed out en mass. Instead of rotating out to keep things moving they all changed over at the same time and stopped the line for about twenty or so minutes. When we reached the cruise check in, the Princess folks did not even offer a sympathy for the line. Only "It's not our fault". Yes, actual words. I did not appreciate that.

 

Finally right at three hours, on to the ship AFTER the scheduled depart time! The ship is in great shape. Looks good and the staff are of course helpful and friendly. Everything I expected of the Princess ships. We have been on the Golden before and noted the one thing missing and I am sure they will add later is the large screen and sound system at the main pool. It is missed. We had the standard muster drill and sailed out.

 

The first food was the buffet up on deck 14. Seating was available and there was no line at all. The food was borderline fair-poor. It was dried out and looked pretty bad. The taste wasn't terrible but it wasn't real good either. The presentation is good and selection a little below average. It's tough to plan on all the people coming to eat when they can't get on the ship, I can't imagine they were prepared for that either. The deserts were great. Enjoyed them very much.

 

After about an hour or so, I wanted to take advantage of the outdoor burger and dog joint along with the pizza. I thought that pizza was pretty darn good. Has a wood fired flavor to it and I thought it was pretty good. The burger and dogs were pretty standard and tasted just fine.

 

We had dinner at the Sterling. This was a bit of a stretch for the staff here. For a $20 per person charge, I expected a bit more. They don't have enough staff to handle the crowds. Dinner took just over two hours which is stretching a bit. However, the waiter was very courteous and did what he could. The Filet Mignon I had was perfectly cooked and seasoned. I loved every bite of it! The other items we ate were very good and everything we expected. Time and lack of staff was the only problem in there.

 

Skywalkers lounge was busy well into the night and we watched the stage show at 10:30. It was cruise ship standard fare not bad. We never saw our room steward which is a good or bad thing depending on your preference.

 

Breakfast again was in the buffet. Breakfast was a bit better. My only request would be an egg station. They had a cook doing generic fried eggs (no requests for type cooked) but he could have been better used doing eggs to order. But the food was good so I have no complaints there.

 

For a quick trip, we still had a good time. While I was disappointed in Princess, we still managed to put the shortcomings behind us to have a good time. I always hope they eventually read one of these and ask some questions of themselves!

 

That's normal for disembarkation breakfast If you had eaten in the DR you could've had a choice of fried or scrambled. You gotta remember an overniter in a floating hotel can in no way be truly compared to a "cruise experience".

 

Ciao for now!!!

[Vexorg]

I also noticed that there didn't seem to be anything for Captains Circle except for the passport stamp on this trip. This one got me to Platinum, but I did t get a pin or anything else for that (I did verify the updated status on the website so I know it counted.

[VibeGuy]

It doesn't matter if the problems at Canada Place are because of Princess employees, TMS Gateway employees that wear a Princess badge, CPB, CSBA or Metro Vancouver police directing traffic; Carnival Corporation is responsible for something like 70% of the passengers moving through Vancouver, and they're the ultimately responsible party - the only one with enough clout to make everything work as a system. It wasn't good for the HAL passengers, it wasn't good for Princess customers and it makes the Port look inept.

 

And, again, it wasn't just the embarkation process that had issues.

[Vexorg]

One thing I did note was that shortly after we got in line, there was a HAL rep pulling Statendam passengers out of the line. Were they being processed separately?