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Review of B2B Ruby cruise (California Coastal/Cabo)

kayred

By kayred,
in Princess Cruises

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kayred

kayred

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Our next port was Monterey. The weather was a light rain off and on, but it was not cold, so it was nice. We enjoyed a lovely walk and took a lot of pictures. We had originally thought of going on the princess excursion for the redwoods and vineyards, but we felt the price of 150pp was too much.Thanks to my Cruise Critic group I had purchased a groupon for a wine tasting in Monterey. We loved it! We had a beautiful view of the Ruby and the bay, enjoyed a nice cheese tray, a few nice (and one we didn’t like) tastes of wine and then a glass of our favorite. We saw what I thought was a couple dolphins (we saw the fin). By the time we left it started to rain a little more, so we walked back to the tender and back to the ship. We are not big shoppers so for us the day was sent walking and enjoying the view.

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kayred

kayred

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Thank you for your review and info. We will be doing the coastal that departs on Sat. Did you see any whales as you were cruising along?

 

We saw whales 2 different times sailing into Cabo and then when we were in Cabo, waiting to sail away, we saw a mom and her baby 3 or 4 times....very cool!

 

We did not see any on the Coastal leg of the tour but spoke to someone who did. I think the trick to seeing whales is spending time looking for them. I loaded 2 audio books on my kindle so we would sit outside and enjoy the water view while I listened to my books. I was glad to have the audio books so I could look at the water rather than looking at the book.

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kayred

kayred

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Living in Vegas we get to go to San Diego often, but we hadnever been to the San Diego Zoo, so we figured this was the perfect time. Wedidn’t want to book with the cruise ship because it was more money and we wantedto be able to stay as long (or little) as we felt at the time. We have an ongoingjoke in my house about me wanting to go to the zoo and my boys alwaysconvincing us to go to Disneyland instead, so I was very excited to finally go.

 

 

The weather was perfect for a day walking around, not too hot but not cold either. Norain and little overcast so we didn’t have to worry about sunscreen. We had noproblem getting a cab at the port and although the zoo was busy we could see everythingwith no problem. We were a little disappointed with the zoo. I think I had itbuilt up too big in my mind because it felt smaller than I expected. We enjoyedthe orangutans and the penguins the most. I felt like there was way too manybirds and small monkeys. Anyway, I am sure if I were to go with kids I would havestayed longer but we had walked the entire zoo (except for the kids petting zooarea) in a little over 3 hours. Once again, the idea of relaxing on the Rubybeat out the original plan of going to Balboa park. As I write this I feel likewe missed the opportunity to take advantage of the ports but we both work so manyhours during the week (50+) and then add the chores and responsibility ofnormal life we found that we really enjoyed being pampered on the ship.

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land lover

land lover

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Kayred...Glad to hear you choose relaxing cuz that is what cruising is all about..especially when you live close enough to drive to the port........We happened to be leaving on Ruby this Saturday, the Last PC of the season, so it is nice to read your take. Thanks...

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kayred

kayred

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This brings me to the end of the first leg of our cruise. We did go to Ensenada after San Diego. We got off the ship and enjoyed a really nice morning walk but didn’t do anything else and didn’t take any pictures. Also,in port was a Carnival ship (Splendor I think) and we enjoyed breakfast on the back of the Ruby watching some brave kids up and down the slide (It was too cold for me).

 

 

This was our first back to back, so we were not sure how it worked.We talked to Reynaldo, our room steward, who told us he would give us a letter, probably after dinner, the night before departure. He confirmed we were in the same room and that we did not have to pack or do anything. We book inside rooms (we like them, and they work for us) but previously we had only stayed in the sideways rooms. We first booked the Coastal cruise and got our favorite sideways room on the 14th floor. Around Christmas we decided to add the Cabo portion and there were no sideways rooms available for both cruises but the sideways room next to us was available for the Cabo leg. This would require us to change to the room right next door, bummer. We talked about it and went back and forth and finally decided to change our reservation, so we could stay in the same room both cruises. This, for us, was definitely the right plan. We were so glad not to have to pack and rearrange another room. Although I still like the sideways room better (you get a little extra room and an extra desk) we liked the regular inside just fine. I stopped by the front desk to make sure we didn’t need to close our credit card out (we didn’t). She told us that we could use our old room key to get off/on the ship and then in the next day or two we should stop by the desk for our new cards. She said we were only getting new room keys because we were changing from Gold to Ruby status. Turns out she was confused, with our letter of instructions were our new keys. I was fine with this, one less thing to do. We met up in the Wheelhouse to depart, they were running a little behind, but we were then ushered off the ship. We didn’t not know where to go,and it was little confusing, but we found someone who we saw waiting with us to depart and we followed them. We were only off for about 15-20 minutes and we got to re-board. Security scanned my husbands room key with no problem but mine had an error. The security guard acted like I was trying to sneak on board, told me to move over to the side and “not move”. No problem, I stood there for 20 minutes while he glared at me and talked on his radio 2 or 3 times. Finally, a supervisor came over, took my card and left. We waited again for what felt like a long time now but was probably another 10 or so minutes. The supervisor came back and told me to go the front desk. The security guard tried to scan the card again, but the supervisor told him twice to just let me go to the desk, he checked me in. Everyone looked at me and wondered what was up, I almost wondered if I was trying to sneak on…LOL. My husband was very helpful and told me his card worked so he would go wait for me at the bar…. thanks honey (for the record he was of course joking and stayed with me). I went to the desk, she made me a new card (no photo needed) and then I was on my way. I worried that there would be future problems but there wasn’t, all was good. I admit I was getting a little annoyed while I was waiting on the deck and felt that the security guy was rude but not a big deal and we shook it off right away.

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kayred

kayred

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I just took a moment to reread some of my posts and I am not sure why the spacing is messed up. Because I am typing for a few minutes and then puttering around the house I chose to write on Word and then copy and past it to the board. I didn’t realize it was messing up I will review my posts a little better.

 

Here are a few more random Ruby pictures a582aab08e1ca8a9b7163904c50bdc5c.jpg0bb4e4601fe1288f47eeb52c02aaad0c.jpge39ff648886f92746ebc9aadeda691e7.jpg5397bc6f869328766a15abe9d7cffe95.jpg3c2e2fbc299acff0de71f1ff1d57d1e0.jpg15fe327f6c0aab2899b4d4e435401ecb.jpg

 

 

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JF - retired RRT

JF - retired RRT

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I just took a moment to reread some of my posts and I am not sure why the spacing is messed up. Because I am typing for a few minutes and then puttering around the house I chose to write on Word and then copy and paste it to the board. I didn’t realize it was messing up I will review my posts a little better.

I think it's a formatting problem with Word.

Easy to quickly review after you post and correct any oopsies.;)

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kayred

kayred

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The Cabo leg of our vacation was a 5-day cruise, 1 sea day,overnight in Cabo, and then a sea day before going back to San Pedro. We really enjoyed Cabo. We saw 2 different whales during the morning we sailed into Cabo, that is always exciting. In Cabo we expected to wait a long time for tenders,but we got into Cabo early and so the tenders started early. I think we went down for our boarding number about a half hour after we were cleared and waited maybe 5 minutes to get on the tender. Very easy. It was nice and warm in Cabo with a pleasant breeze. When walking in the sun it got a little warm but that just made the margarita taste better. My husband is a musician, so we walked down to Sammy’s place, Cabo Wabo and had lunch. The food was very good and we learned that the house band would be playing at 10:30 that night. We decided to walk around and enjoy the afternoon then go back to the Ruby, relax and then come back for the band. We found the people selling tours and trinkets annoying but not aggressive. We went back to the tender about 10pm and it was our first time taking a tender in the dark. We found it kind of scary but had a really great view of the ship. I don’t think the pictures turned out well but the pictures in my memory are very clear 😊

 

We were very surprised at how quiet the Cabo tourist area was at night. Almost every bar was closed including Senior Frog. We saw a lot of security/military/police (armed of course) and felt surprisingly safe. We stayed on the main streets, so it is possible that the night life I expected to see was just off the beaten path. We went to Cabo Wabo and had a couple of drinks, but found the music was too loud. Now I know this sounds strange, but my husband suffers from tinnitus (too much loud music for too long) and it was bothering him, so we did not stay as long as we thought we would. We were back on the Ruby around midnight and the Love Boat deck disco party was in full swing. It looked like everyone was having a great time but once again the speakers were pumping so we called it a night. There was a day when we went out at night and come home when the sun came up…those days may be over, but we did enjoy our night.

 

The next morning, I had hoped to get up in time to go ashore and enjoy breakfast in one of the restaurants, but we overslept. No regrets, the international cafe had my almond crescents, so all was well in the world. Sail away was delayed as we waited for 3 passengers who were paged and asked to call guestservices. One must have responded but we don’t know if the other 2 ever made it on board.While we were waiting we thrilled to watch a large, and a smaller, whale in thebay. They gave us a nice little show but were a little far away. Also, in thearea was the Princess Grand and a Norwegian ship (I think that’s right, I can’tremember which one). Sail back to LA was nice and we savored the last dayon board. I will post some pictures from Cabo and then come back with just a fewcomments about the food and the Sanctuary…thanks to anyone who stayed this far.

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kayred

kayred

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Before we were ready, our wonderful vacation ended. We had a great time and really enjoy cruising with Princess. Last couple notes are on dining. We went to dinner at Share and Crown Grill during our cruise. We enjoyed the dinner at Share, glad we went, but probably would not go back. It was good but for us probably not worth the extra money. We had been to the Crown before, so we knew what to expect. Our reservation was for 8:30 and we were ready a little early, we went at 8:15 and asked if they could accommodate us early.The two-people working the podium both looked at me said only the word “no” and then continued to stare at me. Ok....that’s weird so I walked away. We returned at 8:35 and was told to wait. We (group of 2) were seated at a table for six by what I am sure was a very frustrated and tired person. The table was not set up correctly I had to ask for bread plates and a knife. The waiter stopped by, apologized and said he would be a little delayed but would be with us. He was very nice but obviously working too many tables. After waiting a while we asked the person filling our water for a couple of glasses of wine. (Later in the meal we had to ask twice for a second glass). The meal we had get was very good. We both felt that our steak and lobster were very good, neither of us got our sides right (I was missing mushrooms, my husband asparagus). I know these are all small problems, and no they did not ruin our night, but we were surprised by the really bad service and were happy to get back to the dining room with our wonderful servers, Benjamin and Adi.

 

We tried the Sanctuary for the first time and fell in love!I have been curious to try it and we finally did on the Cabo leg. We liked it so much we went back and did it a 2nd time. We only booked for the afternoon figuring we would sleep in and probably not get there much before 1 anyway. We enjoyed that they served afternoon tea and loved the quiet comfort. My husband and I have agreed that we will budget it next time and reserve a chair for the full cruise maybe even a massage. Because we typically cruise for the pampering and relaxing the Sanctuary was a great treat.

 

Well I think that brings this review to a close. As we drove home we always play the “what was best, what was worse game”. Our favorite port- San Francisco, our biggest surprise – sanctuary, our best decision – same room for each cruise, biggest issue/problem – room card and security on the second leg, what would we do again – cruise with princess, what would we not do again –bring binoculars and maybe not the camera (phone worked and was easier, only used camera at the zoo).

We are hoping to cruise again in 2020 and are considering Hawaii or the Caribbean…..time will tell. Hope you all enjoy your upcoming cruises, I know we really enjoyed ours.

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XBGuy

XBGuy

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Outstanding reports, Kayred. And a special shout out for the night pictures of the ship from the tender. They are great.

 

I have posted, more than once here on Cruise Critic, that service in the specialty restaurants can be iffy. We will often present ourselves at the restaurant 10-15 minutes prior to our reservation, but have never been treated discourteously, as you reported, The worst we have ever experienced is a request to wait--never more than a couple minutes--while a table was prepared for us. However, similar to your report, there have been times when we have been ignored at our table by the servers, and we have experienced mix-ups with our order. I place blame on the headwaiter. My observation has been if I see the headwaiter working in the room--helping the servers, checking with the diners, just doing whatever needs to be done--service in that room is excellent. Consistently, I find that if service is lacking--like you reported--then the headwaiter is not in sight.

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kayred

kayred

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Outstanding reports, Kayred. And a special shout out for the night pictures of the ship from the tender. They are great.

 

 

 

I have posted, more than once here on Cruise Critic, that service in the specialty restaurants can be iffy. We will often present ourselves at the restaurant 10-15 minutes prior to our reservation, but have never been treated discourteously, as you reported, The worst we have ever experienced is a request to wait--never more than a couple minutes--while a table was prepared for us. However, similar to your report, there have been times when we have been ignored at our table by the servers, and we have experienced mix-ups with our order. I place blame on the headwaiter. My observation has been if I see the headwaiter working in the room--helping the servers, checking with the diners, just doing whatever needs to be done--service in that room is excellent. Consistently, I find that if service is lacking--like you reported--then the headwaiter is not in sight.

 

 

 

You are correct no headwaiter seen at the tables

 

 

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