Crown Princess has a lot of maintenance issues

[DrSea]

Let's be honest, the Crown Princess needs a lot of work. 

 

I just got off the ship last week after being on it for a 2 week trip to Hawaii and Mexico. The ship has a lot of maintenance issues. There is something that always seems to be broken. It's big things, not just small things too. 

 

-Plumbing/bathroom issues. This was the big one all over the ship constantly. In the center of the ship on one day, the bathrooms on the 5th, 6th, and 7th floor next to the shops and 2 MDR didn't work for about half a day. The bathroom gyms were out of order about half the time. Random bathrooms would always be out of order throughout the ship. On the Aloha floor, the bathrooms to cabins didn't work on an entire stretch of hallways and kept failing multiple times during the cruise. It smelt like raw sewage for 2 days. It was unbearable. I understand bathrooms are easily clogged bc of the vacuum system. But the bathrooms were constantly broken all over the ship. I have never seen it happen this frequently and ubiquitously all over the cruise ship. This really needs to be addressed more promptly. 

-There are a lot of leaks in the buffet area from the ceiling. I am not sure if it is clean water or sewage. But the entire cruise, there was a least one active leak. The most prominent one was when you entered the buffet from the middle of the ship. Another day, there was a second leak in the buffet at the same time about 10 feet from this leak. It was weird seeing buckets in the buffet, and everyone acted like it was all normal while they ate. There were other random leaks around the ship from the ceiling, but they were patched throughout the cruise. 

- HVAC issues. In my stateroom, they first kept the vents wide open so that the AC was on constantly. Then they closed the vent and I would freeze at night and it got hot during the day. They couldn't fix it and I had to be moved. 

- Small issue is that my stateroom TV has a lot of connectivity issues and would just be a black screen. 

- Small issue is that some of the elevators were under maintenance and were shut down for the bulk of the cruise. Doesn't affect most ppl bc you could just wait for other elevators for the most part. Except the dedicated elevator that went to floor 19 was broken for about half the cruise. 

- Small issue is that some of the automatic doors didn't work and had to be manually opened. Not a big deal. 

- Small-ish issue is that a lot of the ellipticals and the 3 stationary bikes require maintenance. I could change the resistance setting to 20, and it would randomly reset to 1 about every minute before slowly building back to 20. I was on the bike and peddling it while standing when the resistance dropped from 20 to 1. Thankfully I was firmly holding onto the bike rails and didn't fall. 

 

I didn't recall the mid size ships of princess in the past having so many issues. Anyone experience this on other ships? I was on the Regal princess over a year ago, which is one of the kinda newer ones and didn't experience so many issues. I'll be on the discovery princess in a month, so hopefully no major issues. 

Edited March 8, 2023 by DrSea

[cruisingrob21]

9 minutes ago, DrSea said:

Let's be honest, the Crown Princess needs a lot of work. 

 

I just got off the ship last week after being on it for a 2 week trip to Hawaii and Mexico. The ship has a lot of maintenance issues. There is something that always seems to be broken. It's big things, not just small things too. 

 

-Plumbing/bathroom issues. This was the big one all over the ship constantly. In the center of the ship on one day, the bathrooms on the 5th, 6th, and 7th floor next to the shops and 2 MDR didn't work for about half a day. The bathroom gyms were out of order about half the time. Random bathrooms would always be out of order throughout the ship. On the Aloha floor, the bathrooms to cabins didn't work on an entire stretch of hallways and kept failing multiple times during the cruise. It smelt like raw sewage for 2 days. It was unbearable. I understand bathrooms are easily clogged bc of the vacuum system. But the bathrooms were constantly broken all over the ship. I have never seen it happen this frequently and ubiquitously all over the cruise ship. This really needs to be addressed more promptly. 

-There are a lot of leaks in the buffet area from the ceiling. I am not sure if it is clean water or sewage. But the entire cruise, there was a least one active leak. The most prominent one was when you entered the buffet from the middle of the ship. Another day, there was a second leak in the buffet at the same time about 10 feet from this leak. It was weird seeing buckets in the buffet, and everyone acted like it was all normal while they ate. There were other random leaks around the ship from the ceiling, but they were patched throughout the cruise. 

- HVAC issues. In my stateroom, they first kept the vents wide open so that the AC was on constantly. Then they closed the vent and I would freeze at night and it got hot during the day. They couldn't fix it and I had to be moved. 

- Small issue is that my stateroom TV has a lot of connectivity issues and would just be a black screen. 

- Small issue is that some of the elevators were under maintenance and were shut down for the bulk of the cruise. Doesn't affect most ppl bc you could just wait for other elevators for the most part. Except the dedicated elevator that went to floor 19 was broken for about half the cruise. 

- Small issue is that some of the automatic doors didn't work and had to be manually opened. Not a big deal. 

- Small-ish issue is that a lot of the ellipticals and the 3 stationary bikes require maintenance. I could change the resistance setting to 20, and it would randomly reset to 1 about every minute before slowly building back to 20. I was on the bike and peddling it while standing when the resistance dropped from 20 to 1. Thankfully I was firmly holding onto the bike rails and didn't fall. 

 

I didn't recall the mid size ships of princess in the past having so many issues. Anyone experience this on other ships? I was on the Regal princess over a year ago, which is one of the kinda newer ones and didn't experience so many issues. I'll be on the discovery princess in a month, so hopefully no major issues. 

The title of the thread says Grand but you mentioned the Crown - so which is it?

 

The Crown had a drydock in fall of 2022.  I sailed the voyage right before the drydock and was honestly shocked - the ship appeared in great condition and looked younger than its age.  If you are talking about the crown, that's pretty sad to hear.

 

The grand - well, the ship is 25 years old and likely to be the next Princess ship sold off due to its age.  But its well liked by some and the last of the original Grand class ships left, so there is some nostalgia I suppose for the last grand class ship with a vista lounge and the unique One 5 night club.

[DrSea]

Whoops. I meant crown princess

 

I edited the title

Edited March 8, 2023 by DrSea

[cr8tiv1]

5 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

The title of the thread says Grand but you mentioned the Crown - so which is it?

 

The Crown had a drydock in fall of 2022.  I sailed the voyage right before the drydock and was honestly shocked - the ship appeared in great condition and looked younger than its age.  If you are talking about the crown, that's pretty sad to hear.

 

The grand - well, the ship is 25 years old and likely to be the next Princess ship sold off due to its age.  But its well liked by some and the last of the original Grand class ships left, so there is some nostalgia I suppose for the last grand class ship with a vista lounge and the unique One 5 night club.

 

Wash your mouth....The Grand is NOT leaving the fleet.....please.

 

Yes, I am also very confused.  It sounds like OP was on the Crown.  But it takes 15 days to go to Hawaii and back.  How does Mexico fit in?  That's another week long itinerary.  

[DrSea]

Just now, cruisingrob21 said:

The title of the thread says Grand but you mentioned the Crown - so which is it?

 

The Crown had a drydock in fall of 2022.  I sailed the voyage right before the drydock and was honestly shocked - the ship appeared in great condition and looked younger than its age.  If you are talking about the crown, that's pretty sad to hear.

 

The grand - well, the ship is 25 years old and likely to be the next Princess ship sold off due to its age.  But its well liked by some and the last of the original Grand class ships left, so there is some nostalgia I suppose for the last grand class ship with a vista lounge and the unique One 5 night club.

It looks nice for it's age. But it's not really functional, given the constant bathroom clogs and leaks on the ship. 

[DrSea]

Just now, cr8tiv1 said:

 

Wash your mouth....The Grand is NOT leaving the fleet.....please.

 

Yes, I am also very confused.  It sounds like OP was on the Crown.  But it takes 15 days to go to Hawaii and back.  How does Mexico fit in?  That's another week long itinerary.  

We went to ensenada for a day just to get our international port. 4 ports in Hawaii. 

 

My bad for the confusion everyone. I changed the title of the post. 

[cruisingrob21]

1 minute ago, cr8tiv1 said:

 

Wash your mouth....The Grand is NOT leaving the fleet.....please.

 

🤐

 

Non functioning toilets is a major issue - and quite disgusting, and has the  potential to spread disease.  Hopefully the maintenance team can figure it out.

[SCX22]

The Crown Princess has propulsion issues in Alaska for the 2022 season and had to undergo unscheduled dry dock.  It will be based out of San Francisco in Fall '23 and Spring/Summer '24.  Some  itineraries have one an extra day added.  Instead of the normal 15 days for Hawaii, the Crown Princess' itinerary is 16 days; for Alaska, 11 instead of 10.

 

[fpsphil]

Your issues sound far less than how much vibrations we had in May

[DrSea]

2 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

🤐

 

Non functioning toilets is a major issue - and quite disgusting, and has the  potential to spread disease.  Hopefully the maintenance team can figure it out.

Yes. A lot of toilets were not working. I am in my 30s and can easily walk to another bathroom on a different floor

 

I cannot imagine a person in their 60s or 70s or older with (urinary or fecal) incontinence having to find a bathroom. 

[cr8tiv1]

1 hour ago, SCX22 said:

The Crown Princess has propulsion issues in Alaska for the 2022 season and had to undergo unscheduled dry dock.  It will be based out of San Francisco in Fall '23 and Spring/Summer '24.  Some  itineraries have one an extra day added.  Instead of the normal 15 days for Hawaii, the Crown Princess' itinerary is 16 days; for Alaska, 11 instead of 10.

 

San Francisco is a little further away than Los Angeles to Hawaii.  Will the extra days be sea days or an extra port?  Also, it’s a long run from Ensenada (PVSA)….at least 2 sea days.  

[SCX22]

1 hour ago, cr8tiv1 said:

San Francisco is a little further away than Los Angeles to Hawaii.  Will the extra days be sea days or an extra port?  Also, it’s a long run from Ensenada (PVSA)….at least 2 sea days.  

Royal Princess, San Franciso to Hawaii this year is 15 days like Los Angeles sailings.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from HI to Ensenada, so 5 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 4.

 

Ruby Princess, San Francisco to Hawaii this year and last is/has been 10 days.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from Victoria to SF, so 2 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 1.  Time in Victoria also extended by a few hours on the Crown sailings.  Victoria is usually a 06:00 to 12:00 stop on these sailings.  Also, Prince Rupert replaced Victoria on SF to Alaska this year on the Ruby.  On Crown next year, it's still being listed as Victoria to satisfy Jones Act.

[cr8tiv1]

3 minutes ago, SCX22 said:

Royal Princess, San Franciso to Hawaii this year is 15 days like Los Angeles sailings.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from HI to Ensenada, so 5 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 4.

 

Ruby Princess, San Francisco to Hawaii this year and last is/has been 10 days.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from Victoria to SF, so 2 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 1.  Time in Victoria also extended by a few hours on the Crown sailings.  Victoria is usually a 06:00 to 12:00 stop on these sailings.  Also, Prince Rupert replaced Victoria on SF to Alaska this year on the Ruby.  On Crown next year, it's still being listed as Victoria to satisfy Jones Act.

Jones Act is for cargo.  Passenger Vessel Service Act is for passenger cruise ships,  Ruby could not possibly do Hawaii in 10 days.  

 

I can’t speak for Alaska.  And it is too late (aka lazy) for me to do research on your voyage, but only speculating.  Which is your first/last port in Hawaii?

 

You do present a very interesting scenario.  Are they charging you extra for that sea day? 16 for the price of 15 is a super deal.  

 

 

[SCX22]

42 minutes ago, SCX22 said:

Royal Princess, San Franciso to Hawaii this year is 15 days like Los Angeles sailings.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from HI to Ensenada, so 5 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 4.

 

Ruby Princess, San Francisco to Hawaii this year and last is/has been 10 days.  On the Crown Princess, it's an extra day at sea from Victoria to SF, so 2 days at sea on the way back, as opposed to 1.  Time in Victoria also extended by a few hours on the Crown sailings.  Victoria is usually a 06:00 to 12:00 stop on these sailings.  Also, Prince Rupert replaced Victoria on SF to Alaska this year on the Ruby.  On Crown next year, it's still being listed as Victoria to satisfy Jones Act.

Mea culpa!  I meant to say Ruby Princess, San Francisco to ALASKA.  Thanks for the law claification!

 

Not sure about the prices about the Crown Princess cruises next year.  I just noticed the changes when I looked up SF itineraries for next year.  But also, not so much of a deal if the ship has as many issues as the thread starter mentioned. Won't be cruising out of SF next year on the Crown Princess.

[mom says]

Sorry to hear about the issues you had OP. We were on the 28 day LA-Tahiti-LA  cruise in November and experienced none of that. The October drydock was to repair the propulsion issues it had had during the Alaska season, and seemed to have been successful.

 

As for the extra day added to some of the upcoming cruises; I believe that this MAY be due to recent maritime speed limits being imposed for ships sailing in certain waters where sea life, and particularly whales, are considered to be at-risk from ships.

[chengkp75]

7 hours ago, DrSea said:

-Plumbing/bathroom issues. This was the big one all over the ship constantly. In the center of the ship on one day, the bathrooms on the 5th, 6th, and 7th floor next to the shops and 2 MDR didn't work for about half a day. The bathroom gyms were out of order about half the time. Random bathrooms would always be out of order throughout the ship. On the Aloha floor, the bathrooms to cabins didn't work on an entire stretch of hallways and kept failing multiple times during the cruise. It smelt like raw sewage for 2 days. It was unbearable. I understand bathrooms are easily clogged bc of the vacuum system. But the bathrooms were constantly broken all over the ship. I have never seen it happen this frequently and ubiquitously all over the cruise ship. This really needs to be addressed more promptly. 

98% of all toilet issues are caused by people flushing things down the toilet that don't belong.  Who does it can be learned from where the problem happens.  Crew don't have toilets up where passenger areas are, so if they cause a problem, an entire section of the ship loses toilets.  Clogs don't always happen directly where the item was flushed, but may travel down the piping for a ways until it finds a particular elbow or junction where it hangs up.  It requires maintenance to check pipes to find the exact location of the clog, and then it can be extremely difficult to roto-root out some clogs, particularly when people flush things like underwear, swimwear, dinner napkins, towels, face cloths, and other fabrics down the toilet (over the years that I worked cruise ships, this was far more common than most passengers will believe).  I've seen it where it took my men, working round the clock, several days to roto-root out a towel that was causing loss of 20 or so cabin toilets, so to say that the crew are not responding "promptly" enough is disingenuous.

[cruisingrob21]

32 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

98% of all toilet issues are caused by people flushing things down the toilet that don't belong.  Who does it can be learned from where the problem happens.  Crew don't have toilets up where passenger areas are, so if they cause a problem, an entire section of the ship loses toilets.  Clogs don't always happen directly where the item was flushed, but may travel down the piping for a ways until it finds a particular elbow or junction where it hangs up.  It requires maintenance to check pipes to find the exact location of the clog, and then it can be extremely difficult to roto-root out some clogs, particularly when people flush things like underwear, swimwear, dinner napkins, towels, face cloths, and other fabrics down the toilet (over the years that I worked cruise ships, this was far more common than most passengers will believe).  I've seen it where it took my men, working round the clock, several days to roto-root out a towel that was causing loss of 20 or so cabin toilets, so to say that the crew are not responding "promptly" enough is disingenuous.

As ships get larger and larger, I would have to hope that marine plumbing designers (and Princess/Carnival) management consider installing redundant plumbing systems are since the likelyhood for clogs goes up with more passengers and as you mentioned, the remedy for those clogs is a major drain on maintenance teams.

[DrSea]

33 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

98% of all toilet issues are caused by people flushing things down the toilet that don't belong.  Who does it can be learned from where the problem happens.  Crew don't have toilets up where passenger areas are, so if they cause a problem, an entire section of the ship loses toilets.  Clogs don't always happen directly where the item was flushed, but may travel down the piping for a ways until it finds a particular elbow or junction where it hangs up.  It requires maintenance to check pipes to find the exact location of the clog, and then it can be extremely difficult to roto-root out some clogs, particularly when people flush things like underwear, swimwear, dinner napkins, towels, face cloths, and other fabrics down the toilet (over the years that I worked cruise ships, this was far more common than most passengers will believe).  I've seen it where it took my men, working round the clock, several days to roto-root out a towel that was causing loss of 20 or so cabin toilets, so to say that the crew are not responding "promptly" enough is disingenuous.

Not having access to your stateroom toilet for 12 hours is not prompt enough. Can you go an entire day not using your bathroom? Some ppl had covid and had to isolate in their room. IDK what happened in those situations. 

 

And toilets all over the ship were out of order. 2 likely scenarios: customers were flushing inappropriate things all over the cruise ship or there is a systemic issue. The mens gym bathroom was literally out of 3 days.

 

Princess needs to hire more people to fix these maintenance issues if their workers are working around the clock. 

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, cruisingrob21 said:

As ships get larger and larger, I would have to hope that marine plumbing designers (and Princess/Carnival) management consider installing redundant plumbing systems are since the likelyhood for clogs goes up with more passengers and as you mentioned, the remedy for those clogs is a major drain on maintenance teams.

By the physical limitations of vacuum toilet systems, the larger the ship gets, the more systems they have.  Even a "small" ship of about 2400 capacity will have 3 completely separate toilet systems, and larger ships will have more, each system handling a "zone" of the ship (forward, midships, aft, for the three system ship), to prevent one clog from disabling the entire ship's toilets, though a clog in any one system can take down the entire zone (perhaps 1/3 of the ship).  Each of these systems has redundant pumps to prevent a pump failure from taking down the system.  The problem is that all of the toilets combine into common piping (just like the sanitary lines in your house, not every drain is separate all the way to the sewer), and a clog in the piping will affect every toilet "upstream" of the clog, just like a clog in the sanitary lines in your house can affect toilets, sinks, and showers "upstream" of the clog.  Not certain what other kinds of "redundancy" you think would help, unless you have every toilet have its own piping all the way to the engine room.

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, DrSea said:

Not having access to your stateroom toilet for 12 hours is not prompt enough. Can you go an entire day not using your bathroom? Some ppl had covid and had to isolate in their room. IDK what happened in those situations. 

 

And toilets all over the ship were out of order. 2 likely scenarios: customers were flushing inappropriate things all over the cruise ship or there is a systemic issue. The mens gym bathroom was literally out of 3 days.

 

Princess needs to hire more people to fix these maintenance issues if their workers are working around the clock. 

First off, I was speaking of my personal experience in clearing clogs on ships, not on Princess ships, and not in the cases you mention.  Let's say that you report a toilet being out of service, and the maintenance people get there within 15 minutes, yet it requires several hours to clear the clog.  Is this "not prompt enough", or is this the physical limitations of clearing a clog.  If your sewer clogs up at home, and the roto-rooter guy takes several hours to clear it, is this "not prompt" service?  What do you do for a toilet in this case?  This could affect all the drains in your house, do you have a neighbor you can go to to uses the bathroom?  As for the time involved, the incident I mentioned was to grind through an entire bath towel that had been flushed, this is not a quick and easy job to do, and you may well ask why someone would flush a bath towel down the toilet, but that does not change the time involved to get things cleared.

 

As I noted above, there are completely separate systems for the toilets around the ship, so having toilets go down "all over the ship" does not indicate a "systemic failure", but does indicate that many people are flushing things down the hopper that they shouldn't.  I don't know what the level of noro you had on this cruise, but I have certainly found over the years, that the incidence of toilet clogs goes way up during times of noro illness (to put it bluntly, people mess their underwear and then flush it down the toilet rather than deal with it themselves).

 

 

[DrSea]

46 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

First off, I was speaking of my personal experience in clearing clogs on ships, not on Princess ships, and not in the cases you mention.  Let's say that you report a toilet being out of service, and the maintenance people get there within 15 minutes, yet it requires several hours to clear the clog.  Is this "not prompt enough", or is this the physical limitations of clearing a clog.  If your sewer clogs up at home, and the roto-rooter guy takes several hours to clear it, is this "not prompt" service?  What do you do for a toilet in this case?  This could affect all the drains in your house, do you have a neighbor you can go to to uses the bathroom?  As for the time involved, the incident I mentioned was to grind through an entire bath towel that had been flushed, this is not a quick and easy job to do, and you may well ask why someone would flush a bath towel down the toilet, but that does not change the time involved to get things cleared.

 

As I noted above, there are completely separate systems for the toilets around the ship, so having toilets go down "all over the ship" does not indicate a "systemic failure", but does indicate that many people are flushing things down the hopper that they shouldn't.  I don't know what the level of noro you had on this cruise, but I have certainly found over the years, that the incidence of toilet clogs goes way up during times of noro illness (to put it bluntly, people mess their underwear and then flush it down the toilet rather than deal with it themselves).

 

 

12 hours is too long. A couple of ppl had accidents in their pants waiting for the clog to clear. Fecal accidents...bless their hearts...I understand that it can be a grind to get it done given all the engineering complexities that you are an expert at. But princess needs to hire more people to fix things to get the down time reduced. More ppl working on an issue can get down times down. It isn't rocket since here. It was so gross trying to avoid carpet with feces bc ppl had accidents. 

 

You're assuming that people are flushing things down that they shouldn't be all over the ship. You or I have no evidence of that. 

[cruisingrob21]

1 hour ago, chengkp75 said:

Not certain what other kinds of "redundancy" you think would help, unless you have every toilet have its own piping all the way to the engine room.

Best that could probably be is additional cleanouts, but then to what end?  Just have a bunch of weak points in a pressurized system so I suppose there isn't much redundancy other than having several smaller vacuum zones instead of a few.  I'm guessing that takes up significantly more room and costs more.  Bigger pipes might help but require more suction power - and using gravity for sanitary flow (like on land) isn't as reliable on ships obviously.

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, DrSea said:

More ppl working on an issue can get down times down.

How many people can you use to operate a roto-rooter?  How many would be just standing around, since you can only have one person driving the machine, and one helper handling the snake.  Whether the clog has affected 1 cabin or 30 cabins, only the same number of people will be able to clear it, since it is just one clog.  Sorry, there are a lot of things in life that throwing more people at will not change physical laws.

 

1 hour ago, DrSea said:

You're assuming that people are flushing things down that they shouldn't be all over the ship. You or I have no evidence of that. 

Based on my years of experience with cruise ship toilet systems, I can say that when you have more than one or two clogs a week, you are going to have lots of them, and all over the ship.  And, if they are not flushing incorrect items down toilets all over the ship, how do you explain that redundant systems are failing?  What is causing the failures, if not clogs in the lines?

 

26 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

Best that could probably be is additional cleanouts, but then to what end?

There are quite a few cleanout positions, but they are not necessarily in the right locations, depending on what caused the clog.

 

26 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

I'm guessing that takes up significantly more room and costs more. 

A vacuum toilet system is the most efficient means of dealing with the quantity of black water that is produced.  Yes, more piping would require taking more space from passenger areas to put the pipes in, and more systems would mean more cost.  But, even with 20 systems, if someone at a toilet that is at the "downstream" end of the piping causes a clog, then all the cabins "upstream" will still be affected, whether it is 30 cabins for a 20 system ship, or 30 cabins for a 3 system ship.

 

26 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

Bigger pipes might help but require more suction power

Without getting too crude, bigger pipes don't work in vacuum systems, regardless of suction power.  In order to work, the "product" needs to hold together in a "plug" that is pulled down the vacuum line, and so the size piping that vacuum systems use has been shown to be the optimum for retaining this "plug" all the way down.  It has been shown, and is designed into the systems, that if the piping run is too long, that there needs to be "vacuum boosting stations" that "re-form" the "plug" to get it moving down the pipe.

 

26 minutes ago, cruisingrob21 said:

and using gravity for sanitary flow (like on land) isn't as reliable on ships obviously.

The big drawback to gravity sanitary systems (and really, the "gray water" from sinks, showers, galley, laundry, etc, flows quite nicely in ship's systems by gravity) (unlike shore systems, the "black water" from toilets is in a separate system from the "gray water"), is that a gravity system requires larger and larger pipes as the number of inlets grows (gets further down your house or down the ship), and this takes up space.  For "black water" systems, the "non-uniform" constitution of the "product" does not lend itself to slowly moving drain pipes that may or may not be sloped downwards due to vessel motion.  This may deposit portions of the "product" in horizontal runs, that will tend to build up over time, contributing to the clogging problem.

Edited March 8, 2023 by chengkp75

[SCX22]

I think the OP makes a valid point in the critique.  It's unacceptable for toilets to be non-operational for such a long period of time.  Using the toilet is a basic human function and to be deprived of that can cause problems to for those that can no longer "hold it in"  and it's not healthy to hold it in.  Also, the ship isn't like a hotel on land, where if maintenance goes wrong, you can check-out and check-in somewhere else.  You're stuck on the ship, and with sewage, there's no hiding the stench.

 

For all intensive purposes, it might have been user error that caused problems, but it's unacceptable for the fix to take this long.   If the sewage pipes take this long to clear, then that means probably time to overhaul the system in a dry dock.  Props to all and any maintenance crew that has to deal with such a dirty and disgusting job.

 

The OP's account of the experience reminds of the "Poop Cruise" on the Carnival Triumph.

[Cruise Raider]

As for someone that lives just outside of San Francisco, we e been spoiled now having the Ruby, but especially having the Royal Princess home parted here.  I was so disappointed to see the Crown Princess coming to our home port full time for a couple of years.  Maybe it’s just time for some land vacations for a while.  
I will get in as many sailings as possible before the Royal and then, the Ruby leaves us once again later this year.  When cruises out of SF seem to sell like hotcakes, I just can’t imagine why they wouldn’t give us a really nice ship on which to cruise, like one of the Royal class ships.