LIVE: Emerald Princess, Boston to Quebec, August 28, 2024-September 7, 2024. Geoherb

[Teechur]

1 hour ago, phabric said:

If the ship has to wait for a late Princess excursion, sometimes the ship has to go faster and use more fuel to get to the next port on time.  There is no benefit for the ship to sabotage any excursion, Princess does own the tour companies vehicles.

Princess contracts with local tour providers. It's unlikely that they own the vehicles.

[memoak]

9 minutes ago, Teechur said:

Princess contracts with local tour providers. It's unlikely that they own the vehicles.

Not only unlikely nut not possible. Independent tours have their own vehicles 

[kiwimum]

6 minutes ago, memoak said:

Not only unlikely nut not possible. Independent tours have their own vehicles 

It is not unusual for the vehicles the tour company uses for this excursion to breakdown.  Happened to us last year.  Absolutely waisted time.

[phabric]

1 hour ago, phabric said:

If the ship has to wait for a late Princess excursion, sometimes the ship has to go faster and use more fuel to get to the next port on time.  There is no benefit for the ship to sabotage any excursion, Princess does own the tour companies vehicles.

It should read - Princess does not own the tour companies vehicles.

[geoherb]

We had a nice day in Prince Edward Island. We had been here before 13 years ago on a Holland America cruise. We stayed on the ship to play trivia this morning. Our team won, but the prize was just one wine bottle stopper for the four of us to share. That was chintzy. As we walked through the port building, the PEI Fishermen's Association was sampling lobster on crackers. Delicious.

 

We walked up to the basilica to tour it. Afterward, we stopped by Cows for ice cream cones. I had the gooey mooey--burnt sugar ice cream (vanilla ice cream mixed with English toffee), English toffee marble, caramel cups, and chocolate flakes. Delicious. We stopped in several shops on our way back.

 

Lunch was at the Water Prince Corner Shop, a Charlottetown institution since 1991. DH had the lobster roll with potato salad. I had the Water Prince platter: mussels, half a lobster, fried scallops, and fries. Everything except the wait was great. The 20-minute estimate was closer to 45 minutes. The couple right in front of us ended up abandoning the wait since they had an excursion at 2. Someone ate half my fries and got a taste of the mussels and scallops.

 

Edited September 4 by geoherb

[geoherb]

Last night's dinner menu in the dining rooms did not appeal to me that much. I decided to make us reservations for the Salty Dog Gastro Pub. Before dinner, we went to Vines to check out the situation on the Zinfandel someone on Facebook mentioned. They have it in stock. The bartender opened a new bottle for me. I enjoyed it. They serve wine in nice glasses there. I decided to continue drinking the same wine at dinner, and the bartender poured me a double portion in a less nice glass that I could take away from there. They're protective of their nice glasses.

 

I had hoped that we would sail under the Confederation Bridge after leaving Charlottetown. We ran into an officer and asked about it. He turned out to be the entertainment director and not one of the navigation officers. But he pulled up the map on his phone of the ship's current location. By then, I could tell that we were going the long way around the island instead of under the bridge.

 

Dinner at the Salty Dog was nice. DH said the creamy white tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich was the best appetizer ever. He had the burger and sweet potato fries for his main course, and I had the lobster mac and cheese. I was disappointed in the mac and cheese at first. The sauce was too runny, and I was not finding any chunks of lobsters. It got a lot better when I found them toward the bottom of the dish.

 

Portion sizes are not huge, but we did not need a big dinner after our seafood lunch. The desserts were both tasty. I had the lemon posset, and DH had the coffee and doughnuts. He did not realize the coffee was coming in the form of a mousse.

 

I joined friends for the Liars Club game show after dinner, then met DH in the theater to see the ventriloquist/singer. The Liars Club was hilarious as usual. I did not care that much for the show in the theater. He sang too much and did not do enough ventriloquism, although that wasn't the best either. It reminded me of when Darci Lynne performed on "America's Got Talent: Fantasy League" earlier this year as just a singer without one of her puppets. She's a great ventriloquist, but just an average singer. She did not make the top three.

 

 

[latebuyer]

Thanks so much for sharing about your trip. I'm on the oct 7th sailing. It is great to see the photos of dinner and hear about the ports. I was going to go to water prince to have the lobster so good to see a photo of that. Glad you had a better time than on island princess!

[geoherb]

4 hours ago, latebuyer said:

Thanks so much for sharing about your trip. I'm on the oct 7th sailing. It is great to see the photos of dinner and hear about the ports. I was going to go to water prince to have the lobster so good to see a photo of that. Glad you had a better time than on island princess!

 

Thanks. I still had a great cruise on the Island in spite of the flooded cabin and the other plumbing and HVAC problems. I think the food was better on the Island. And the smaller number of passengers--and not being at capacity--made it a lot better. But I love having the International Cafe again.

[geoherb]

We just attended the Captain's Circle party. The future cruise consultant announced the numbers:

 

921 Blue (first-time Princess cruisers)

803 Gold

377 Ruby

670 Platinum

310 Elite

 

I already mentioned that it took 489 days to make the Top 40 luncheon. They held that today. I haven't talked with anyone how attended yet. We met one couple at breakfast who said they were going.

 

The top three couples had 1,083 days, 1,270 days, and 2,084 days. I did not manage to write down the number of cruises for each of them--but they were all over 100.

 

 

[Honolulu Blue]

@geoherb: I'm glad you enjoyed your dinner at the Gastropub. I remain a big fan of the lemon posset. 

 

Interesting numbers from your cruise. Thank you for sharing them. I wonder what they were on mine a few weeks ago. I missed our Captain's Circle party.

 

It's been a good read so far. Keep on keeping on. 👍

[Cinerama]

On 8/31/2024 at 6:29 AM, geoherb said:

We enjoyed watching the sailaway from the Promenade Deck. They used two tug boats to guide the ship out of the harbor. There was a bagpipe player on the dock. I remember that tradition from our cruise that went to Saint John two decades ago. 

 

Some bars were closed while the ship was in port, including the Wheel House. Here's the sign.

 

 

 

Were any bars open?

[HotRoot]

1 hour ago, Cinerama said:

 

Were any bars open?

One bar is open on each deck.  I believe Crooner's is the bar open on Deck 7.

[memoak]

3 hours ago, Cinerama said:

 

Were any bars open?

In any Canadian port there is one bar open per deck

[Cinerama]

1 hour ago, HotRoot said:

One bar is open on each deck.  I believe Crooner's is the bar open on Deck 7.

 

Thanks!

[geoherb]

The casino closed late last night. It won't be open tonight. The same with the shops while we overnight in Quebec City. I hope everyone remembered to claim any winnings. 

 

We had a relaxing day at sea on Wednesday followed by our day in Saguenay yesterday. I had not studied the itinerary much and did not realize how far up the Saguenay River the ship had to sail to get there. It's nearly 80 miles. I was up early to see the sunrise. 

[latebuyer]

Beautiful! What did you do in saguenay?

[geoherb]

We walked together to the church. The woman there talked a bit about its history. DH headed back to the ship. He can't walk very far. I walked to the Ha Ha Pyramid. Unfortunately, it was closed, but I enjoyed the walk along the river to get there and back. I did not realize how much of a tide the river would get in Saguenay. There were some people swimming in the water at the beach. A few hours later, the beach was totally covered by the rising water.

 

I ordered room service for my lunch when I returned to the ship. It came in 7 minutes. I had a cheese quesadilla, fries, side salad, fruit cup, and key lime pie. The pie was not as good as it's been on some ships, but it was better than on the Majestic.

 

Departure was delayed for a medical emergency. They brought an ambulance for someone. We had gorgeous light as we were leaving Sanguenay.

 

[geoherb]

We had another day of walking. The ship was a bit late getting cleared for passengers not doing excursions. They had shuttle buses taking people to an area close to the city. The ship is docked at Quai 30. When we took a Holland America cruise, we were at a closer cruise terminal. We did not wait in line for the shuttle, choosing to walk out of the port. That was a mistake for DH. We walked a couple of miles to get to the Museum of Civilization. It has some interesting exhibits. One of the special exhibits is on professional wrestling in Quebec. I found it more fascinating than I anticipated. They did a great job.

 

We took the short cut back to the ship but had to wait for a boat to clear the locks to get to the shuttle. We ate lunch at the International Cafe. I ordered us some salads to go with our sandwiches. Once again, they came quickly.

 

The shuttles go tonight until around 10:30. I'm not sure if there is a time people have to be back to the ship. They have not advertised it in the Patter or any announcements that I heard. But we aren't planning on leaving the ship until tomorrow. We'll catch an Uber to our hotel to drop off our  bags then wander around the upper portion of the old city.

[geoherb]

The shows have gotten better. Wednesday night they had a guest vocalist present a show called "She Will Rock You." She was very good. Last night was "Magic to Do." It's a production show I had not seen before, even though it's been on Princess ships for many years. I enjoyed it as well.

 

 

[geoherb]

The cruise portion of our trip is winding down. We ate dinner with a friend in Michelangelo. He had actually eaten dinner at the Crown Grill tonight, but went to have dessert with his favorite waiters. He's one of the ones staying on the next cruise to Boston. He has to move cabins in the morning, but he doesn't think it will be bad.

 

Tonight was prime rib. It was really good. I had an appetizer portion of the crab risotto. It wasn't that good. I searched for all the tiny bits of crab I could find. I ate about half of it. We left before dessert since they had one farewell show tonight at 8:30. The singers and dancers performed a number. Then a couple of others did. The highlight was the return of Stephanie Hodgen, the "She Will Rock You" singer. The magic maker from "Magic to Do" also came back to sing a few songs. I enjoyed his selection from Les Mis.

 

I had a final mini cheesecake from the International Cafe since we had skipped dessert in the dining room. I had to ask our cabin steward about some missing laundry. He said he had checked at 5 and did not see any items for us. Fortunately, he found them so we could pack and get our bag out for pick up. We have just one checked bag. Our total laundry charges would have been $130.50 for the cruise. It's nice not to have to pack as many clothes. I did fine with two pairs of shorts, two pairs of dress pants, four T-shirts, one long-sleeve T-shirt, one dress shirt, four polo shirts, and underwear and socks. 

[geoherb]

I have saved all the Patters and will scan them when I get home. We have the last color for passengers with independent plans. Our scheduled disembarkation time is 10 a.m. I'm betting they get ahead of schedule. We're in no hurry. We'll clear our items from our cabin and go to breakfast before 8:30, then hang around in the Wheel House until it's time to go.

 

We've had a great time. I wondered how we would do since it's been nearly five years since DH has been able to join me on a cruise. I miss having all the shelves to myself, but we managed to share OK. I've learned that DH can't walk far. We'll have to rely more on Ubers and cabs on future cruises. I've used the elevators just once on this cruise when going from Deck 5 to 15. The rest of the time, I've used the stairs. I've probably gained 5 pounds, though, in spite of that and all the walking in ports and on the ship.

 

 

[geoherb]

Someone on our roll call posted that there are 180 people staying on for the next cruise.

[geoherb]

Disembarkation did run ahead of schedule as predicted. We had a nice leisurely breakfast in Botticelli Dining Room for one last time. It was a little too leisurely for one of the guys sitting at our table. He left without eating. 

 

We found the disembarkation lounge for Elites--the Michelangelo Dining Room. By the time we got there, they had called all the colors except ours (Light Blue #6) and a couple of others. They called our number within a few minutes--around half an hour early. Finding our checked bag was easy. There's a place for people to wait inside for Uber rides. Unfortunately, a lot of folks can't read. They were crowding around the Uber area outside before their rides had arrived. We had to wait a couple of minutes from when the app said he was there until he finally made it around. Surge pricing was in effect with so many people getting off the ship. But it was a reasonable price to get to the hotel--Hotel Sainte Anne. It's around the corner from the Chateau Frontenac. 

 

We walked into the Chateau Frontenac to check out the public areas. It's nice but too busy with throngs of people. The Princess folks have a desk set up for the people who booked pre- or post-cruise stays through Princess. I know those folks paid even more than the cost I saw on the website booking the hotel directly.

 

From there, we walked through an artisans market behind a church, then up the hill to the Citadel. We did not go in the fort, but we had great views from the top of the hill, including seeing our ship in the distance.

 

We toured the Quebec Parliament. I had forgotten about the Princess bottle stoppers in my backpack. They showed up on the scanner. The security folks let me keep them. I'll be moving them to our checked luggage before we had for the airport.

 

The Parliament is very interesting. All of the signs, though, are in French. Thank goodness for Google translate. We walked back down the hill to our hotel and got to check in early. They had moved the bags there were storing for us into our room already. 

[Lucky TGO]

Thanks for sharing nice review and great photos.

The Captain of The Rowboat,

Tony

[paddingtonbear]

On 9/7/2024 at 7:35 AM, geoherb said:

We ate lunch at the International Cafe. I ordered us some salads to go with our sandwiches. Once again, they came quickly.

 

Did you get the salads from the IC? Someone on another thread said the IC doesn’t serve salads anymore.