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Live on Ruby 4 Day - 12/14

NewPennCruiser

By NewPennCruiser,
in Princess Cruises

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lahoban

lahoban

Posted
Posted

Thank you everyone for taking the time to post a report! We are desperately trying to get to the ship:( We left at 8am from Sarasota and got stuck in a two hour traffic jam. We finally made it to Naples but still have an hour and a half to go :( Way to much stress to handle the day of a vacation. Do you think with the health inspection the boarding will be late ? Thanks

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NewPennCruiser

NewPennCruiser

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Thank you everyone for taking the time to post a report! We are desperately trying to get to the ship:( We left at 8am from Sarasota and got stuck in a two hour traffic jam. We finally made it to Naples but still have an hour and a half to go :( Way to much stress to handle the day of a vacation. Do you think with the health inspection the boarding will be late ? Thanks

 

 

Hope you get there on time. Disembarkation went quickly but the health inspection does sometimes delay things. Port traffic should be light considering only 3 ships are in port. Good luck and have fun.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Guest arowe6

Guest arowe6

Posted
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Thank you everyone for taking the time to post a report! We are desperately trying to get to the ship:( We left at 8am from Sarasota and got stuck in a two hour traffic jam. We finally made it to Naples but still have an hour and a half to go :( Way to much stress to handle the day of a vacation. Do you think with the health inspection the boarding will be late ? Thanks

 

We are driving home from the cruise and saw all this traffic. They closed 75 South. Seriously a *** moment. Felt bad for you guys.

 

Good luck.

 

-Andrew :)

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alexspepa

alexspepa

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Posted
Thank you everyone for taking the time to post a report! We are desperately trying to get to the ship:( We left at 8am from Sarasota and got stuck in a two hour traffic jam. We finally made it to Naples but still have an hour and a half to go :( Way to much stress to handle the day of a vacation. Do you think with the health inspection the boarding will be late ? Thanks

 

this was posted by another passenger who embarked today...

 

The coast guard decided they wanted to check the starboard lifeboats today so after the last passenger was disembarked the ship went out into the channel and turned around. I wonder if that counts a a cruise for the b2b people still onboard? Fun to watch our ship come in but its delaying embarkation a bit.

 

On another note they were super strict with the carry on alcohol today. I only had 1 bottle of wine for the 2 of us but I still had to go over to the table for them to write down my name and cabin info. Took several minutes. Can't imagine how much it will slow down the line later when it's busy. __________________

 

Please let us know that you made on board OK!

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Crzn-Life

Crzn-Life

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Didn't realize someone was doing a "live" thread from the Ruby. The internet was so bad some of the times it must have been a challenge. I spoke with the Internet mgr. about the issue of not being able to log on and the extremely slow download times if you were able to get on. He said it was a problem with the satellites and that they even switched satellites! :confused: What I found to be quite interesting was that I couldn't use the paid internet service, but could always get on princess.com with no problems and the speed wasn't that bad. I was searching for cruises so spent quite a bit of time on the free site. Did have good connectivity on the last day and part of the day in Cozumel.

 

Like the OP said, the passenger demographics were different from any Princess cruise we've been on. There were a lot of children and they seemed to be the best behaved of any demographic. There were young couples enjoying their first cruise. And there were lots "middle-aged" pax (those around 50 or so) who were the worst behaved of any of the age cohorts. Many didn't seem to understand that if they let people get off the elevator it would be easier to get on instead of pushing in and blocking those trying to get out of the elevator plus some were abrasive and rude.

 

There was no MTP lunch. Instead the 20 most traveled received a free dinner at either Crown or Sabatini's. We usually go to Sabatini's every cruise and had never been to the Crown Grill so decided to give it a shot. Found it to be somewhat of a disappointment. Very glad we went but would never pay $25 pp to go there. There was a couple seated at a table right in my line of view and I must say they probably wouldn't agree with my assessment. If they paid for the dinner, then they definitely got their money's worth. I say that because they started with 2 lobster tails each, then the next course was steak for her and chops for him. The third course for him was the filet mignon. I was a bit in awe that they were able to do that. Go for the gusto:D

 

We too got the coupons, compliments of the captain, for the free drinks at the Elite/platinum lounge. These were in lieu of the CC party. When we gave the waitress our order and the coupons, she asked for ID:confused: Of course all we had was a key card so she insisted that we write our names and cabin #'s on the coupons. Thought it was a little strange but what the heck, it was a free drink.:

 

Speaking of drinks: when we got to our cabin the 1st day, the minibar set up included all of the soft drinks, water & beer but 2 bottles of gin instead of the usual 8 liquor bottles. The steward (who by the way was really good), said they ran out because there were 300 elites on the TA crossing. Later that day, we tried to call room service to request exchanges for the liquor when they delivered it. Weren't able to get through. The 2nd day, same story. No answer, just the "sorry ...." message over and over. Actually put the phone on speaker & just let it ring for awhile. Finally wised up & called passenger service & they put me through to room service. Later the supervisor who delivered the liquor said they were having phone problems.

 

The OP mentioned that when they arrived for embarkation there was a wine table set up with people signing in. We didn't see that at all. We were early and went through security around 11:00 and it was a breeze with no questions about our 2 bottles of wine and definitely no table. However, once we got to the lounge we had a long wait because of the coast guard inspection so we didn't get onboard until after 1:00.

 

We booked the cruise on 11/29 so it was pretty last-minute. We're on the Emerald 12/19 cruise and had already booked a hotel for 12/18 so decided what the heck, let's take advantage of the cruise credit offer. Plus it gave us a chance to check out the Ruby before our 3 B2Bs on her next spring when she goes back to Europe. For the 1st time ever had problems getting the Shareholder benefit. It was faxed within minutes of booking the cruise, but after a week when it hadn't appeared in the personalizer called to see what was happening. We ended up faxing it 3 times but it wasn't applied until I gave copies of the paperwork to a passenger services rep who faxed it in & it finally showed up the last day of the cruise.

 

We had traditional dining, 2nd seating. I respectfully disagree with the OPs comments about the food. We found the food to be quite good. Much better than what we had on the Crown in Oct & Nov. The maître d' was very nice and accommodating and we were also very pleasantly surprised to find that our HW was the same one we had on the Grand on the SA Circle in Jan. He remembered us and knew what we liked. Our waiters were really good.

 

We went to the Horizon Court the 1st day for lunch and weren't impressed at all except for the salad makings and desserts. They had blueberry roulade, one of our favorites so we were happy. We had pizza the day we were in Cozumel and it was good. The only meal we were disappointed in was the one in the Crown Grill and perhaps that was because we went in with such high expectations after reading some of the comments about it here and it just didn't live up to the hype. But the food issue is so subjective, whether or not we liked or disliked anything has little value to anyone except us.

 

This was a big gambling crowd and some of them were also big drinkers which made for really big losers at the tables. One evening there was a visibly intoxicated player who was a big bettor at 3-card. The table supervisor kept giving this person free drinks and even "helped" process a charge of a large amount to the room account after this person had lost a few hundred $$. We're casino regulars and this was the first time we'd ever seen a supervisor so blatantly take advantage of a drunk passenger. We've seen them suck up to big spenders and ply them with drinks, but this was different.

 

The disembarkation process of all walk-offs was a new and different but made sense in that most pax on for just the 4 days probably wouldn't have much luggage, plus this was a much younger crowd than usual. The instructions gave you the time for your disembarkation plus the option to switch to the regular service of having your luggage picked up the last night. There were quite a few who took advantage of this since there were several in-transits who had made the TA crossing so had a lot of luggage. We went to the Elite disembarkation lounge because we were in no hurry to get off. The CC hostess announced that you couldn't just walk off anytime and should go at your assigned time because this was the order of passengers on the manifest given to US Immigration. According to her you were supposed to show your disembarkation instructions form that included your name & time when you disembarked.

 

Also according to her, there were some Elites that thought that Elite priority disembarkation meant you could leave whenever you wanted by just showing your card. She went on at length about how the process was supposed to work. Have no idea whether or not people were able to get off whenever they chose to do so. There were problems and slow-downs with the disembarkation because again, according to her, there were only 4 agents so the lines through immigration/customs were going slowly. They did close the gangways a couple of times stopping the process until the congestion cleared.

 

The future cruise consultant really earned her money on this cruise. With the requirement that the future credits for the cruise be used in 2014 (not booked, but sailed), lots of people were always there waiting to talk to her.

 

Was this a good cruise? You bet. Would we do it again? Definitely if we had something else lined up. Wouldn't want to just go on a 4 or 5 day cruise. We're glad we went. The service was great and we enjoyed ourselves.

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FLTinyDancer08

FLTinyDancer08

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Your review was pretty spot on! We were first time Princess cruisers and one of the younger couples on board.

 

Weather to me was a bummer and the ship was really moving on Monday night, several of our group got sick. I think the clouds/weather and amount of people trying to use the internet is what made it sooo slow.

 

LOVED the ship and the crew, made me want to book another, but unsure if I should try another line first to make sure. Food in MDR was good, Horizon Court was awful to us, and Sabatini's was very nice. Favorite things on board was tea time for me and our awesome crew members that bent over backwards for us it seemed.

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NewPennCruiser

NewPennCruiser

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The disembarkation process of all walk-offs was a new and different but made sense in that most pax on for just the 4 days probably wouldn't have much luggage, plus this was a much younger crowd than usual. The instructions gave you the time for your disembarkation plus the option to switch to the regular service of having your luggage picked up the last night. There were quite a few who took advantage of this since there were several in-transits who had made the TA crossing so had a lot of luggage. We went to the Elite disembarkation lounge because we were in no hurry to get off. The CC hostess announced that you couldn't just walk off anytime and should go at your assigned time because this was the order of passengers on the manifest given to US Immigration. According to her you were supposed to show your disembarkation instructions form that included your name & time when you disembarked.

 

Also according to her, there were some Elites that thought that Elite priority disembarkation meant you could leave whenever you wanted by just showing your card. She went on at length about how the process was supposed to work. Have no idea whether or not people were able to get off whenever they chose to do so. There were problems and slow-downs with the disembarkation because again, according to her, there were only 4 agents so the lines through immigration/customs were going slowly. They did close the gangways a couple of times stopping the process until the congestion cleared.

 

We actually thought the disembarkation went very smooth except for the slowness of Immigration as was mentioned. From Princess' side of things I suspect they will think this new process was a success, especially for one of these short sailings, but as quickly as everyone was getting off the ship, it just caused longer lines at Immigration.

 

As sometimes happens, this is also another example of getting different information depending on who you talk to. We really didn't speak to Bernadette about this but did go to the desk they had set up on the last sea day for questions or group changes. In our case we were assigned a late walk off time and needed to leave early so we asked about being changed to a different walk off group. We were told we could just basically leave when we wanted and we did not need to be reassigned as long as we were ok with Walkoff and could carry our own luggage.

 

Even though Bernadette said you needed to show folks your disembarkation form, the instructions didn't say. (I don't think) It just said that if you actually had colored tags and Princess offloaded your luggage, then you should show that color tag like always. So in our case, we picked a time that was better for us which was actually walk off group 7 (we were assigned group 14) and just left when that group was called. Nobody asked us to show them anything and we got right off. In fact we left the ship at around 8:10, took about 30 minutes to get through immigration and were at the airport via taxi by 9.

 

I do certainly understand that even if you assign most of the ship as walk off, that you still need groups since having everyone trying to leave at once would just not work. Maybe they should just give you a tag to show, or something identifying your group. As we can attest to, it was very easy to just leave when you wanted to but it seemed like most waited for their pre assigned group.

 

We were told it was the first time trying this process and it would probably be tweaked. It did seem a little confusing, especially for longtime Princess cruisers expecting to get tags, etc. but it was actually very simple and if you did need assistance and couldn't carry your own luggage, you could still arrange that and leave the ship the usual way. I suspect if you were new to Princess, you probably just thought it was pretty simple and didn't think much of it.

 

Now back to reality. It was fun finding my car encrusted in ice back home at the airport. (should have done a b2b!) Dave

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cruisetvl

cruisetvl

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We actually thought the disembarkation went very smooth except for the slowness of Immigration as was mentioned. From Princess' side of things I suspect they will think this new process was a success, especially for one of these short sailings, but as quickly as everyone was getting off the ship, it just caused longer lines at Immigration.

 

As sometimes happens, this is also another example of getting different information depending on who you talk to. We really didn't speak to Bernadette about this but did go to the desk they had set up on the last sea day for questions or group changes. In our case we were assigned a late walk off time and needed to leave early so we asked about being changed to a different walk off group. We were told we could just basically leave when we wanted and we did not need to be reassigned as long as we were ok with Walkoff and could carry our own luggage.

 

Even though Bernadette said you needed to show folks your disembarkation form, the instructions didn't say. (I don't think) It just said that if you actually had colored tags and Princess offloaded your luggage, then you should show that color tag like always. So in our case, we picked a time that was better for us which was actually walk off group 7 (we were assigned group 14) and just left when that group was called. Nobody asked us to show them anything and we got right off. In fact we left the ship at around 8:10, took about 30 minutes to get through immigration and were at the airport via taxi by 9.

 

I do certainly understand that even if you assign most of the ship as walk off, that you still need groups since having everyone trying to leave at once would just not work. Maybe they should just give you a tag to show, or something identifying your group. As we can attest to, it was very easy to just leave when you wanted to but it seemed like most waited for their pre assigned group.

 

We were told it was the first time trying this process and it would probably be tweaked. It did seem a little confusing, especially for longtime Princess cruisers expecting to get tags, etc. but it was actually very simple and if you did need assistance and couldn't carry your own luggage, you could still arrange that and leave the ship the usual way. I suspect if you were new to Princess, you probably just thought it was pretty simple and didn't think much of it.

 

Now back to reality. It was fun finding my car encrusted in ice back home at the airport. (should have done a b2b!) Dave

 

For your cruise, your ship was due in at 7:00am for disembarkation. What time did people actually begin to get off, and how long would you say the process took. I'm looking at flight schedule now for my trip, and would like to know whether I can make a 10am flight with just carry on for the January cruise. Based on the bookings, this cruise does look quite full though.

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karena1

karena1

Posted
Posted
Yes, the Elite Happy Hour is still happening daily. In fact reading the small print of the free drink we got in place of the Captain’s Circle party, you need to get your drink at the Happy Hour.

 

 

. Dave

 

Did you get free drink vouchers for every day or only 1 free drink the entire cruise?

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NewPennCruiser

NewPennCruiser

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For your cruise, your ship was due in at 7:00am for disembarkation. What time did people actually begin to get off, and how long would you say the process took. I'm looking at flight schedule now for my trip, and would like to know whether I can make a 10am flight with just carry on for the January cruise. Based on the bookings, this cruise does look quite full though.

 

You know, I think they started pretty promptly right after 7. The ship actually was dockside very early and by the time they got to the Walk Off 7 group that we chose to exit with at around 8:05, they were right on schedule. Also, no matter how efficient Princess is, you still need to deal with Customs and they were awful. There were 3 maybe 4 tops processing people and the line backed up numerous times where Princess had to actually delay the process because the line stretched to the escalator. We got through customs in 30 minutes but I'm sure others who left later were delayed. Get off as early as you can.

 

If you are getting back on a weekday, you might be fine with an early flight, but weekends at FLL can be a real hassle as well with the large crowds. We had 2 other ships in port. We were at Terminal 2, Coral at Terminal 21 and I think Eurodam maybe at Terminal 26 or something out in the channel. Traffic was still light and the airport was not busy. Dave

Edited by NewPennCruiser
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