Enchanted Itineraries Changed! Good Grief! Head spinning!

[newcomm]

19 hours ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

I feel like the new Enchanted Mediterranean 7 day itineraries are designed more to appeal to the EU/UK market who want a 7 day fun in the sun type of sailing closer to home and not really geared to US & Canadian travelers.  The same could be said for the northern Europe sailings all switching to Southampton.  There is a strong possibility that for much or all of the 2021 European season that US based travelers may not be able to travel to the EU/UK without a quarantine period upon arrival.  Princess are adjusting their schedule to be less dependent on multiple embarkation ports (allows for more consistent and cost effective application of health protocols at embarkation) to also account for fewer travelers from the US & potentially Canada as well

I think your theory has considerable merit. We were booked on a wonderful 18-day Japan Cruise in July 2021 consisting of two 9-day itineraries aboard Diamond Princess. Our cruise has now been cancelled. According to our TA’s conversation with Princess, It will be replaced with three identical 6-day cruises that will appeal more to the Asian market. Possibly trying to account for loss of North American cruisers. (Diamond Princess is still scheduled to sail in Japan during 2021 and then redeploy elsewhere in early 2022.)

[steveww48]

3 hours ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

Enchanted was basically deployed (initially) on a 21 day "interport" itinerary that you could book r/t Barcelona, Rome or Athens. You could then book 14 day segments from Barcelona to Athens, Rome to Barcelona or Athens to Rome, and then complicating things even more as 7 day segments from Barcelona to Rome, Rome to Athens and Athens to Barcelona.  Basically 9 different sailing options on one ship that rolled throughout the entire summer season with passengers beginning/ending various cruise length combos in each of those main ports.  This is a complicated enough approach during normal times let alone during a pandemic with heightened safety protocols.  I think the switch to Rome only departures was to simplify the shoreside aspect of boarding/disembarkation and helping to create a consistent "bubble" around the ship for health/safety protocols.  With the new itineraries there is one start/end port only and 3 itinerary options - 2 alternating 7 day itineraries that can be booked as a 14 day b2b.  This makes managing a reduced cabin inventory easier along with tracking health/safety related issues far less complex.

 

This makes sense to me. The reduced number of embarkation/debarkation points is a definite simplification with respect to safety protocols, as you point out. I can see that the new arrangement simplifies things for Princess in significant ways, in view of the current health concerns.

 

 

[gardenbunny]

On 9/24/2020 at 5:54 PM, Ombud said:

Were you able to book May 8th TA?

No. I was thinking that might be my new trip being the same dates.  Nope....Because this morning I got the cruise cancelled Princess email on one I had booked RT Barcelona.

So,  will wait til Oct 2 and try to book the September dates.

I am OK with the ports, I was most excited that I had the new floor to ceiling Ocean View room!!!  Hope I can still get it.

[turquoisesea]

2 hours ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

You can see the new itineraries here (11 page document): https://s3.amazonaws.com/ips-cic-filestore/j283755/monthly_2020_09/1481167_EnchantedPrincessSummer2021NewItineraries_pdf.793d4e3118f2b932e7e94c529b6f5438?X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Content-Sha256=UNSIGNED-PAYLOAD&X-Amz-Credential=AKIAI3TJTOYHZJGUGHPA/20200926/us-east-1/s3/aws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20200926T212824Z&X-Amz-Expires=1200&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&response-content-disposition=attachment; filename*=UTF-8''1481167_EnchantedPrincessSummer2021NewItineraries.pdf&response-content-type=application/pdf;charset=UTF-8&X-Amz-Signature=913dcead35d1546b03670ef6926e6ce7e08d6d2ce8a7e31410edd30aac29a10c

 

Thank you, I would love to have read this. But...it says Access Denied. 😢 

[AtlantaCruiser72]

26 minutes ago, turquoisesea said:

Thank you, I would love to have read this. But...it says Access Denied. 😢 

 

Try this instead.  Sorry the link didn't work

Enchanted Europe Redeployment 2021.pdf

Edited September 27, 2020 by AtlantaCruiser72

[turquoisesea]

23 minutes ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

 

Try this instead.  Sorry the link didn't work

Enchanted Europe Redeployment 2021.pdf 284.76 kB · 5 downloads

 

23 minutes ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

 

Try this instead.  Sorry the link didn't work

Enchanted Europe Redeployment 2021.pdf 284.76 kB · 5 downloads

Thank you!  That worked. 

[CalLuvsCrusingToo]

First time I tried:

 

Sorry, there is a problem

This attachment is not available. It may have been removed or the person who shared it may not have permission to share it to this location.

Error code: 2C171/1

 

Tried again, and it worked.

Edited September 27, 2020 by CalLuvsCrusingToo

[Tucker in Texas]

Apparently the going opinion is that Greece is the reason the cruise was changed around.  Before going into any ports after the virus is contained is that the ports provide information about availability of facilities if someone does get the virus and has to be taken off the ship.  These would include such things as hospitals, doctors, accommodations to quarantine people if necessary, transportation available to get them home among others.  Greece has failed to provide any of these "guarantees."

[Ken the cruiser]

53 minutes ago, Tucker in Texas said:

Apparently the going opinion is that Greece is the reason the cruise was changed around.  Before going into any ports after the virus is contained is that the ports provide information about availability of facilities if someone does get the virus and has to be taken off the ship.  These would include such things as hospitals, doctors, accommodations to quarantine people if necessary, transportation available to get them home among others.  Greece has failed to provide any of these "guarantees."

Hope that's either not the case or if it is it's because Athens is a main embarkation/disembarkation port for some of the various Enchanted Princess legs. Reason being we just booked a 24 day Med cruise on the Pacific that is a B2B with Rome and Venice being its main embarkation/disembarkation ports, both Italian. But it goes to a variety of Greek ports along the way to include Athens. 

 

Funny thing is the Pacific sails R/T from Venice on July 10th, the same day our 21 day Enchanted B2B2B cruise was scheduled to sail from Barcelona, before it was cancelled.

[Tucker in Texas]

I think it is just Athens that is being "stubborn" and not all the Greece ports.  

 

 

[kjg46]

Just speculating, No bookings until October 2nd or October 13th for the Enchanted Princess. Seems Princess is waiting for the CDC to provide continued sailing guidance after September 30th. Now, if the CDC says you can only start sailing with 33% capacity. Princess would have had to some how cancel some folks who already had booked the pre deployment cruises. So redeploy the Enchanted and everyone starts over. Princess is only out the max $200 OBC per guest. ❔

[Ride-The-Waves]

Not unexpected and just the beginning of "new normal" cruising.  I anticipate more "changes" coming which will focus on shorter itineraries, on EU/Schengen cruisers, be more expensive (changing itineraries enables prices changes without backlash), reflect limitations on available ports, and enable cruise lines to easier contract for shore tours.  All consistent with the reported results from the RCG/NCL study on what it will take to restart safely.