Island princess vs. Emerald

[trophy_23]

Just off the Island, but have never been on the Emerald only the Star. There was never any crowding in the horizon court area, but the one and only night we went to ‘any time dining’ in MDR it was really lined up, but we were given a buzzer and got in fairly quick. Not a fan of not being able to walk all the way around the promenade. There is aft viewing on deck 8. We liked the horizon court being forward, but overall preferred the Outside areas on the Star.

 

 

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[Ken the cruiser]

Plan on going 60 minutes before any show in Princess theater. We had early dining and would race straight to the theater just to get a seat. Bring your phone to read or play games. We also had trouble in the buffet at lunch time finding open tables. We just shared with anyone just to have a place to eat. I hope your experience is better, but we will never book her again.

Thanks for the heads up! We usually bring a deck of cards and play gin to keep entertained until the show starts. That's pretty much SOP as we learned that trick from cruising with HAL where we usually needed to get there a good 30-40 minutes ahead of time.

 

As far as dining times go as my DW needs to eat early and we like to eat alone whenever possible for personal reasons, we booked a vista suite to hopefully avoid the long lines at dinner and I understand we get to eat breakfast in Sabatinis. But on port days, I'm not sure how much advantage that's going to be at lunchtime if we're back onboard and the only place to eat lunch is the buffet. I remember on the Diamond, it was pretty busy at lunch time at their buffet and a challenge at times to find a seat as well. I'm sure it will all work out, but thanks for the heads up.