Should we book Pacific P - Van to Hawaii in September?

[dianeh]

We 'think' we have found the cruise that basically covers all our wants - fairly warm destination, at sea on a signifigant birthday, and reasonable cost.

 

Can anyone give any suggestions or advice? We are new cruisers.

 

Thanks

Diane

[waltd]

Wow! I'm suprised that no one has replied to your question. Both Jak and I are thinking about this cruise. 9 days, 5 days at sea and 3 great ports and you arrive in Honolulu on a Friday so there is no hurry to go back to work so why not stay in Honolulu for a few more nights. Just one question to ask you. Do you get sea sick????? If so, and this is your first cruise I wonder if you should try a larger ship first. If you read some of the posts about the ship I think you will find that even though the ship has stabalizers it does have more movement then some of the other Princess ships. The plus side to the ship is it is small and I have found that smaller ships have better service and the food quality is a bit better. Now that is my opinion and I also have to say I was on the Golden a few years back and it is a much larger ship and the food was also excellent.

 

I don't think you can go wrong with Princess and the price is right. And I see you are from Vancouver so no long drive to get to the port, I hope!!!

 

Enjoy the cruise planning. For me this is part of the fun.

 

Joe

[2cruzzzzers]

My thoughts exactly. The Pacific Princess is much smaller than the rest of the Princess fleet and you will be spending a number of days on the open ocean. I am not susceptible to sea sickness, and was considering a longer south pacific cruise on this ship. There would be some benefits to a smaller ship, however I ended up with a combination 12 day cruise and land tour on the larger Saphire in part due to the concern over how the Pacific Princess may handle in rough seas.

[2cruzzzzers]

I would definately recommend extending your vacation in Oahu. We took a 7 day cruise on NCL of the islands a few years back and also extended our stay for a week on Oahu.

You could optionally also consider a commuter flight to Maui and a couple of days on that island. We really enjoyed that island.

Enjoy your cruise.

[BigWheel]

That birthday might dictate what you do, but here's some personal experience. We've done the fall cruise to Hawaii from Vancouver and also the spring cruise from Hawaii to Vancouver. I prefer the latter. We live in New Westminster, BC and I love getting the flying out of the way at the start of the vacation and then cruising home. It's so relaxing to get off the ship and be minutes from home.

 

In fact, we liked the homebound cruise so much that we're doing it again, boarding the Pacific Princess on May 27th.

 

Advantages to the outbound cruise: it gets warmer every day at sea; an hour after leaving home, you are truly on vacation - it happens the moment you board; you won't have to wait until May 2008! Just one thing to plan carefully: your flight home. We let Princess plan ours and it was terrible - red-eye to San Francisco and then a second plane to Vancouver. Brutal.