Grand Princess Review - Window Suite with pictures

[jbobst]

Grand Princess Alaska cruise May 25th-June 1st

Round trip from Seattle

 

This was our second time on the Grand Princess. Our first time was back in 2006, before the latest big refurbishment. We took this cruise to celebrate our 20 year anniversary and we decided to upgrade from our usual inside cabin and try one of the unique Window Suites! I believe Princess only offers these Window Suites on the Grand, the Caribbean and the Golden Princess. The Window suites seem to be a much better value (price wise) then the traditional suites, but they do not have a balcony, just two very large windows. All the additional “perks” that Princess offers their suite guests come with the Windows suite. Plenty of pictures to follow in my next posts…

 

We flew into Seattle from Phoenix the day before the cruise and stayed at the Hyatt Place near the Space Needle. We used a Towncar service to get back and forth from the Airport to the hotel and also when we returned to get from Pier 91 to the Airport. The Hyatt place was fine, although after taxes and such, it ended up being just over $200 for the night (we typically stay at a Hampton Inn and Suites in Orange County for around $100 when we do cruises out of LA). The hotel was about three miles from the cruise terminal and we grabbed a taxi at the hotel the morning of cruise. The cab ride was around $10 I think, but could have been a dollar or two less…I don’t recall exactly.

 

We like to arrive at the cruise terminal fairly early, and we arrived between 9:15 and 9:30 in the morning. We usually cruise out of San Pedro (in California), and this was our first time cruising out of Seattle. The Grand was the only ship in port, but since we were early, we were not allowed into the terminal until around 10:30am. There were some large concrete benches where we sat and waited. One of the porters came over to us and said he was sorry that there was no place to put our luggage yet, and he was also sorry that there wasn’t a better place to wait. He said he was trying to get the people at the Pier to get a better setup for early arrivals (like us), but it wasn’t bad waiting (we knew we were early and would have to wait). Soon we dropped our checked bags off at the xray machine and took the escalator upstairs for the security screening and the check-in process. We were probably one of the first people to check in, and there was no line at all. Since we were in a suite, we were told there was a small area off to the side where we could wait with the “Elite” members and other suite passengers. There was nothing special in the area, just some chairs and a small partition wall to separate the area. But soon, the little area was packed and standing room only. At about 11:15 they took the Bon Voyage people onboard, and by 11:30, they took the passengers in our area to the gangway to board.

 

We were excited to get to our room and check out the suite. By the way, we choose cabin F303, which is the suite closest to the front of the ship…almost. There was one more window suite next to us that is farther forward, but if you look at the deck plans, you will notice that this cabin is smaller than the other window suites. This smaller suite is F301 I think, and it was vacant the whole cruise.

 

Our room steward was still in our room cleaning when we showed up, and he seemed a little surprised we were already on board, but he told us we could come on in and that he was finished with the room. It was very apparent he hadn’t finished cleaning as the coffee table still had a bunch of crumbs on it and the floor had not been vacuumed (there were clothing tags, and what seemed like shiny sequence pieces from a woman’s formal outfit as well as other debris on the floor). We knew our steward would vacuum later, so we didn’t really mind. The mini bar was stocked, the fruit bowl was filled, and the trays of “canapés” were on the counter. Our steward asked us if we wanted Champagne and he said he would bring it by later. The Champagne was waiting for us when we got back from the Muster drill. By the way, the muster station for the window suites is the Crown grill, one deck above the suites. We like to get to the muster drill a few minutes early to get a good seat, as it really does get crowded.

 

After we checked out the suite, we went to the Piazza (atrium) and bought a single coffee card to share, got our cruise cards punched for our lanyards at the passenger services desk and went to the International Café for desert items. We try to avoid the buffet on the first day because it’s so busy. Our past three princess cruises were on the Sapphire, and like the Grand, they both have the Alfredo’s Pizza restaurant. That has been our latest embarkation lunch routine, and this trip was no different. We took our deserts from the IC to Alfredo’s and got a table. There was only one other couple in Alfredo’s and just like when we were on the Sapphire, Alfredo’s is very under-utilized on embarkation day for some reason. I suppose it’s because the crew members try to shuffle everyone up to the buffet right away, but they should tell the passengers that there other options (like the IC, Alfredo’s and the dining room). The pizza and deserts were good, and we enjoyed the quiet low key experience of Alfredo’s. We will definitely miss Alfredo’s on future Princess cruises.

 

After lunch, we explored the ship and went back to our cabin. Oh, we also stopped by the Crown grill to make reservations for that evening, since a specialty restaurant is “free” for suite passengers the first evening. When we first arrived in our cabin, I tried calling the dining line on the phone to make the Crown grill reservations, but it just rang and rang and no one ever answered.

 

We also had a note in our cabin stating that we had a complementary dinner at Sabatini’s scheduled for Wednesday night. There was some sort of booking promotion that included a specialty restaurant when we booked last November. So we were able to try both specialty restaurants free of charge this cruise!

 

Dinner at the Crown grill was somewhat underwhelming for me, though it was probably my fault for ordering what I did. I love nice steakhouses, and my favorite cut is usually the Filet. However, I decided to try the ribeye as I read a recent review from someone on cruise critic about how much they loved the ribeye at the Crown Grill. The ribeye was very thin and just slightly above average quality. I love a thick steak, but this ribeye was anything but thick. It wasn’t a bad steak, but only slightly above the quality of an Outback type of steak (we eat at Outback steakhouse quite frequently, so it was fine, just not the “Ruth’s Chris” type of steak I was expecting). The meal was fine, just not spectacular, and if I had paid $50 for the meal, I probably would have been somewhat disappointed. My wife got the lobster and she really like it. She wasn’t very impressed with her bisque soup, but she did enjoy her lobster. I really do like the Crown grill atmosphere as it’s a very elegant restaurant feel. I was considering trying it out one more time before the cruise was over and ordering the Filet, just to give it another shot, but we never ended up going back.

 

Speaking of food, our Sabatini’s dinner later in the week was excellent! I don’t do seafood, and I had the NY Strip steak, along with the chef’s daily pasta special, which was homemade ravioli (cheese ravioli thankfully and not something with seafood). I also had this fantastic mozzarella cheese appetizer thing…it was soft and creamy and very good. Like the Crown Grill, the steak wasn’t the best quality, but the appetizers, bread, and ravioli more than made up for the steak. My wife had the lobster and loved it. Our waiter also brought us out a Veal steak/chop (on the bone) to share. It was pretty good, but it was a lot of food!

 

One of the perks of a suite is that you can have Main Dining room food delivered directly to your cabin for dinner if you choose. This was our first cruise where we didn’t eat in the main dining room at all! We decided not to bring formal wear on this cruise so we had the formal night dinners delivered to our cabin, and also had one other meal delivered during the week. We ate in the buffet for dinner once…maybe twice. When the waiter brought dinner to our cabin, he put a nice table cloth on our coffee table and put all the food on the table for us. It was great watching the scenery go by while having a private dinner in our cabin! By the way, we would go check out the dining room menu during the day and snap a picture of it on our smart phone to make ordering with the room service person easier. I sure wish they would figure out a way to post the menu on the TV system.

 

One of the other perks of a suite is breakfast at Sabatini’s. This perk has been talked about so much on cruise critic and many people seem to agree that it’s the best suite perk. We ate breakfast here every day but one. Most of the time, everything was very good at Sabatini’s, but the second day at breakfast we had a few issues. When they finally brought out our food, they gave us cold (and hard) Belgium waffles, and they couldn’t find any whip cream anywhere (first world problem I know!). These waffles are advertised on the menu to come with whip cream, which is the way we like them, but the waiter eventually just gave up on the whip cream and said they were sorry, but they couldn’t get any. They always had whip cream in the buffet, so I wasn’t sure what the problem was, but service on that second day was really slow. Also on that day, we had to ask them to bring the pastry tray over at least three times before they finally brought it over. There was also lipstick on my wife’s water glass (she wasn’t wearing any lipstick) and we had a difficult time flagging down a waiter to get a fresh glass. Finally the Maitre’d came by and we told him about lipstick on the glass. He just picked up the glass, looked at it, and took it away…and didn’t even say anything. The other couples that arrived after us were served promptly and had their entrees well before we had our food that day. This second day certainly wasn’t normal, and the other days we ate breakfast in Sabatini’s were very good, but all in all, it just wasn’t as amazing as everyone talks about. That second day in Sabatini’s had a slightly different staff then the other days, so maybe that was the issue. Oh, and one thing to note about Sabatini’s breakfast is that the Orange juice is fresh squeezed! I love fresh squeezed OJ. We didn’t take advantage of the Mimosa’s or Bloody mary’s in Sabatini’s, but other couples seemed to enjoy them very much.

 

I really thought the Grand Princess was in very nice shape. Being the oldest Grand class ship, I expected to maybe see a little more wear here and there, but I was very impressed with the ship. My only real complaint with the ship was one thing…dirty windows. We sat and played cards in the buffet area often and those windows were not very clean, and were never cleaned during the week. Also, since our suite didn’t have a balcony, we used the windows quite a bit to watch the scenery go by. Our suite windows were also very dirty and not cleaned during the cruise. I understand that there are a lot of windows on the ship and that the nature of a ship being in the ocean means that windows will get salty and dirty. However, there was always a Holland America ship in port with us each day and I saw them cleaning the HAL ship windows twice that week while we were in port next to them (once in Ketchikan and once in Victoria - two different ships). It seems like HAL makes an effort to clean the windows, but Princess didn’t do this even one time. This was a minor annoyance, but it would have been very nice to have cleaner windows especially since we would see the HAL ship next us getting their windows cleaned.

 

My wife and I typically cruise for the experience of the ship, not really the

ports. We didn’t do much of anything in the ports, except get off the ship and walk around the towns a little bit. I now realize that if you take an Alaska cruise, you really need to do excursions and get out of the town areas to really see anything. The towns are pretty much the same thing at each stop…little towns with the same sort of expensive jewelry shops and the same sort of trinket shops. But the scenery from the ship really was great. We just wanted to spend most of the time on the ship and the weather was great all week long for the most part.

 

We loved the windows suite, and all the suite perks. It is going to be a little difficult to go back to inside cabins, but I told my wife that maybe every 5 years we can splurge for a suite. The window suite was a perfect option, a GREAT location on the ship, and just a fantastic room. The bathroom was awesome and I used the jetted bath tub everyday, and even twice one day! (I probably shouldn’t admit this in public since I am a guy). Oh, one small thing to note about the bath tub. I’ve read other reviews about the Grand Princess having plumbing problems. We didn’t experience any plumbing issues really, but we did notice rusty water coming out of the bathroom sink once for about 2 seconds before it cleared up. Also, the bath tub would leave a rust looking ring around the tub after we used it most of the time. I asked our room steward about the rust ring, and he said something about it not being used too much and that is why the rust was there. It bothered me a little to think I was bathing in rusty water, but the water itself looked crystal clear…it was just the ring it left that looked kind of gross. It could have been the bath salts they provide (which I added to the water). That bothered me a little, but the jets and the deep tub were just perfect otherwise.

 

There was a fantastic DVD “rental” (for free) menu that was in our suite, but we had brought our own movies/tv shows to watch on my laptop. I was able to easily plug my laptop Display port cable into the HDMI port on the TV. The TV remote is the actual real remote that comes with the TV (not the hotel type of remote) and I could easily switch the input modes.

 

We ended up missing Tracy Arm Fjord and instead went into the Fjord next to it called Endicott Arm. The captain said we couldn’t do Tracy Arm because of operational issues…but I wasn’t sure what that meant. I later heard that since it was so early in the season, there was too much ice in Tracy Arm for the ship to go through. Endicott seemed fine, but there was no wildlife that we could see. The floating ice was not very plentiful, and we never got to see any sort of glacier up close from the ship (my wife really wanted to see a big glacier next to us with ice chunks falling off like they show in the brochures and promotional videos, but nothing was like that at all).

 

Embarkation was about the easiest embarkation we have ever had! We were in walk off group c and we pretty much walked right off the ship (about 8:15am), and right out through the terminal to the taxi pickup area. They have custom agents standing at the exit of the terminal and they just do a quick passport check and collect the customs declaration form.

 

I’ll post some pictures below, but if anyone would like more detailed information about the Grand Princess, the ports, or the window suite, please ask!

 

[jbobst]

 

 

 

I brought the wine bottle with me...it wasn't included in the mini bar.

 

 

[jbobst]

 

 

 

 

 

[jbobst]

Buffet

 

 

 

 

 

[jbobst]

Star Princess and Oosterdam coming in behind us on arrival to Ketchikan

 

Beautiful Star Princess off our Starboard side during Sea day (evening)

 

 

 

Outdoor Pool area

 

Indoor Pool area

[jbobst]

Heading into Victoria Canada final day

 

Docked back to back with the Star Princess in Skagway

 

Disney Wonder and Oosterdam in Skagway

 

Plane landing next to Coral Princess in Juneau

 

Star and Coral next to each other in Juneau

 

Sunny day!

[jbobst]

Location of our mini suite F303

 

Door on the far right is the door you access to get to the Window Suite corridor (next to the Casino entrance)

 

Alternate entry to the Windows Suite corridor near the front stairs/elevators. The suite right through the doorway was our suite.

 

Quiet hallway for Window suites

[Pam in CA]

Thanks for the review.

 

As an FYI, Muster stations are based on cabin location, not cabin type. All cabins above your area were assigned to the same Muster station whether they are insides or full suites. :)

[jbobst]

The water was so calm and beautiful this night as the sun was setting (at sea on the way to Ketchikan)

 

Looking over the bow taking a picture of the reflection on the water (if you look hard enough you can see me at the tip of the bow...that tiny dark spot).

 

The One5 Lounge

 

The Grand Princess used to have a nice kids area up here where they had one side for the teenagers (their own hot tub, ping pong table, chairs) and the other side for the little kids with a little "whale" splash pool. Now, they just have this lousy little splash pool and a bunch of open deck space. Why did they change this???

 

The NCL Pearl docked next to us in Victoria

[jbobst]

Little city park in Ketchikan

 

[jbobst]

If anyone reading this was traveling on the Star Princess, the Oosterdam, the Pearl, or the Coral during this week, I have a ton of pictures of your ship if you are interested.

[jbobst]

Thanks for the review.

 

As an FYI, Muster stations are based on cabin location, not cabin type. All cabins above your area were assigned to the same Muster station whether they are insides or full suites. :)

 

Correct...I didn't mean to imply that only the windows suites were in Crown Grill, I was just making a point of mentioning which location the window suites had for their station. The Crown grill was packed full of passengers....WAY more than the few window suite passengers!

Edited June 4, 2014 by jbobst

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the report!

[Keith1010]

Enjoyed your review and the photos.

 

Keith

[jean s]

Really nice review and great photos. Thanks for sharing.

[jbobst]

Correction - on the caption that says "location of our mini suite" with a photo of the ship and a red circly, that is incorrect. This was a window suite, not a mini suite (obviously!) I can't go back and edit the caption now, I guess they don't allow edits after a certain time.

Edited June 4, 2014 by jbobst

[librarians@sea]

Thanks so much for the balanced review and BEAUTIFUL photographs (the reflection of the bow photo is amazing!) We will be in a Window Suite on the Grand next April to Hawaii and it was great to see what we can expect...:)

[Cobraman]

Thanks for the review, we will be on the Grand again in October. BTW - if you are a suite guest, always request that your steward pick up MDR menus and leave them in your room. That way you have the lunch and dinner menu so you can plan accordingly. Much like you, my wife and I often times eat dinner in our room so we don't have to dress up, then if we want to go to a late show or the casino we can take our time getting ready.

[hobo1937]

Thanks for the great review and photos. We will be in a window suite on the Grand in December. Second time in a window suite, first time on the Grand.

[jbobst]

Thanks for the review, we will be on the Grand again in October. BTW - if you are a suite guest, always request that your steward pick up MDR menus and leave them in your room. That way you have the lunch and dinner menu so you can plan accordingly. Much like you, my wife and I often times eat dinner in our room so we don't have to dress up, then if we want to go to a late show or the casino we can take our time getting ready.

 

That's good advice...I didn't know they could/would do that.

[lenalucci]

Love your photos. Thanks so much for posting.

[IdahoCruises]

Thanks for the great pics and review.

 

Nice room!

 

BTW....we love Sabbatinis.....

[trbarton]

If anyone reading this was traveling on the Star Princess, the Oosterdam, the Pearl, or the Coral during this week, I have a ton of pictures of your ship if you are interested.

 

Thanks for your review and photos. I was on the Star, May 23-June 4. If you have any photos I can be reached at trbarton743@aol.com.

 

Thanks!

 

Tom:)

[cactus_baby]

We were on this cruise as well. Great pictures. They look very familiar. :D I was not impressed with the buffet. Everywhere else the food was fine. We didn't discover the Piazza until the second day, after that I loved the ship! We had an inside cabin the first 4 days and got to finally upgrade to a suite for the last 3 nights. It was worth it! Next time, I will book through Princess themselves and not Expendia or I'm sure we would have been offered an upgrade sooner. The Ports like you mentioned, unless you have an excursion booked are all very much the same. We disliked Juneau and I told my husband we should have booked an excursion, he didn't want to and we wished we had. Skagway was our favorite port. Glad you enjoyed the cruise also!

[lovevacadays]

Thank you for your review and pictures. The suite looks lovely. The only thing I noticed that seemed off was that the TV seems to be on the side wall as opposed to in front of the beds. While I don't watch much TV while cruising that might bother me??