"Diary" of a Crown Princess Cruise - VERY long

[Lauren's_Dad]

 

Greetings all:

With my wife's help, I kept a day-by-day "diary" (I prefer the word "journal") of our Crown Princess cruise. I tracked this information in order to remember all of the details of the week and to assist in my decision-making process regarding future cruises. It is excruciatingly long and overly detailed, so if you're not a fan of lengthy, rambling reviews, this is probably not a good read for you.

First, a few quick notes:

- Trip includes my wife and I (late 30’s) along with a friend and his girlfriend and my dad and his girlfriend.

- Weather throughout the week was not good by Caribbean standards, very little sunshine, occasional rain, and LOTS of wind

Saturday, February 28th: Arrived in FLL airport at 7:15pm, headed to Crown Wine and Liquor to pick up 6 bottles of wine. My buddy grabbed a 1.75L of Absolute to pour into his Rum Runner Flasks (if you're not sure what these are, do a search, I'm sure it will come up). Went to Shooter’s Bar and Café on the Intercoastal Waterway for dinner and had a great time (very reasonable prices for a waterfront restaurant). Stayed at the Courtyard Fort Lauderdale Plantation – decent room, $10 breakfast buffet on Sunday morning was fine as well.

Sunday, March 1st: Packed 2 bottles of wine in my carryon, 2 bottles in my wife’s carryon, and 2 bottles in our checked bag and headed toward the pier. Dropped off my friends at 11:30am (I had to return the rental van). Rental car area has a free shuttle to pier - very convenient. Got in shuttle around noon, received a call from my buddy that they were already in their room! I asked him to call for a Chef’s Table reservation for 4 – he got through immediately and was the first name on the list. Was told that they would let us know on Monday. My wife and I arrived at 12:30pm – embarkation was a breeze, was in room by 1pm. No problems with the carry-on wine. Too bad I packed the opener in the checked luggage! Went to buffet lunch (pretty good, not great – held true for the entire week). Went back to room to hang out on balcony (4th cruise for us but first one with a balcony). We were in Baja 604 (covered balcony 5 feet by 9 feet that fits 2 people comfortably, but wouldn’t fit any more without some maneuvering). Our room steward Paul paid us a visit – we requested 2 wine glasses, robes, egg crate. All were done quickly except the robes (they came on Monday). We had traditional dining (early seating) at 6pm. Our checked luggage arrived at exactly 5:56pm (note to self – pack at least one pair of pants in carry-on luggage). Arrived at the Botticelli room (only traditional dining room) for early seating just after 6pm. Waiter was Filiberto, assisted by Joao. Neither very friendly on first night – oh well. Had barramundi (perch-like fish), was just OK, but my wife’s salmon (which can be ordered every day) was excellent. Desserts were good but not great (I had the Princess Love Boat, another everyday offering). Ended the night at the casino (up $70 at craps – casino is decent sized, only one craps table and one roulette table though. One note for craps players - the dealers move the game along at record speed, like they get paid per roll. You're collecting your money after a successful roll and the dice are already flying. Took me a while to get used to this).

Monday, March 2nd: Cloudy, windy day, around 74 degrees. 8:30am announcement that Princess Cays was cancelled due to rough seas – not a difficult choice given the choppy waters. Staff scrambled to fill the day and put out a new Patters (daily newsletter). Ended up going to sit-down lunch – service wasn’t too good, were never offered beverage (either were the tables on either side of us) and the burger was burnt. My wife’s chicken curry, on the other hand, was excellent. Wandered the ship for a while, then went to the wooden horse races at 3:30pm. Lost $30 (insider tip - the #6 “horse” won all three races) and stayed for bingo (between $20 and $30 each session for 4 games). Went back to traditional dinner at 6pm at Botticelli. Without going into too much detail, a combination of poor service (again) and a pricing issue involving a bottle of wine (felt like we were being scammed) almost derailed the night. Food was really good (veal scallopine), though the tiramisu was a slight disappointment. Also should note that one of our dining companions had food allergies and our waiter did a great job of being cautious (the one bright spot in an otherwise dismal performance for him). However, once we were through with dinner, we notificed the head waiter that we would not be returning and he could give our table to someone on the waiting list. After dinner, my wife went to see comedian Scott Wyler (liked him), while I went to Vines for sushi (the sturgeon was interesting, to me it tasted like high-quality turkey meat).

Tuesday, March 3rd: Another sea day and it rained the entire day. Everyone was getting a bit restless without land or sun. Had room service on the balcony for breakfast (croissants, fruit, cereal, juice – very nice). Worked out in their very nice fitness center (don’t recall seeing a fitness room on a ship quite this big). At 10am, we had our Chef’s Table meeting (19 people in total were selected) and were assigned Wednesday at 7pm (Friday was the other night for the Chef’s Table). Afterwards, had the English-style pub lunch at Wheelhouse Pub for lunch – loved the fish and chips! Didn’t get to try the “bangers and mash”, but it looked great as well. Went to bingo again in the afternoon (won the 2nd game for $200 – they give you cash on the spot – very nice!) Had the pizza as well in the afternoon – as good as I had heard! Spent some time at Adagio Bar on the 16th deck before dinner (nice place to relax and listen to some piano music). Since we needed to make new dinner plans, we booked a table at Sabatini’s, the Italian restaurant ($20 cover charge per person). Our experience can be summed up in one word – WOW! Great wine, appetizers were fantastic, and the lobster and sea bass were perfectly prepared. Best of all, our server, Francisco, was phenomenal, especially compared to our previous two dinners – enthusiastic, patient (we had a very seasick diner in our group as well as another diner that had consumed too many beverages throughout the day – both situations were handled wonderfully). After dinner, too tired and full to do anything but go back to the room, very satisfied after a great experience.

Wednesday, March 4th: Finally back to land! Arrived at St. Maarten early (about 8am). 3 ships already there. Had room service breakfast again, then headed to Divi Little Bay Resort ($5 per person cab ride) for beach time and 12pm massage at their spa, Indulgence of the Seas (80 minute couples massage for $205). Sun came out for a while in the morning, which was nice. Massage was great (much better price than the ship was offering). Then took a cab to Front Street in Philipsburg to do some shopping. The highlight was the visit to Guavaberry Emporium – those Guavaberry Coladas are very tasty. Brought some bottles back for gifts (which were confiscated when we returned to the ship). Went back to the boat and awaited our Chef’s Table dinner.

Everyone has raved about this experience and my expectations were extremely high. I can honestly say that it was one of the best dining experiences of my life and the highlight of the entire trip. Started with a greeting from the Maitre d’Hotel in the International Café, then we put on our chef’s coats, scrubbed our hands, and headed for the kitchen. Learned some interesting facts along the way (for example, did you know that 20 tons of food are consumed on the Crown Princess EACH DAY???). Then we met Chef Giuseppe (very engaging guy) and the food started to come out. Crab salad first, then quiche, then escargot, then caviar. All amazing, and the champagne was tasty and the glass was kept full. Took what was left of the champagne and headed for a special table for 10 in the dining room. Next course was Gnocchi in a cheese sauce with a Fume Blanc wine to match. Then came the famous Bloody Mary Sorbet soaked in Grey Goose vodka. Then the “entrée” came out – a flaming Medieval Spiked contraption filled with beef, veal, and pork tenderloin. Amazing presentation, and the food (along with the accompanying Shiraz) were incredible. We were stuffed at that point, but not close to being done. Next came a Stilton cheese dish with walnuts, paired with a port wine. Liked the wine, but the cheese was very strong. Last but not least, the Pastry Chef made an Orange Mousse with Raspberry Mango glaze, paired with Lemoncelli liquor. Spectacular. To cap off the night, the ladies received a signed cookbook and a rose, and we all took a picture together with the chefs. They also made a copy of our menu for us to keep. We stayed for a while, finished off the wine and liquors that were left, and bonded with our great tablemates. Worth every penny of the $75 per person charge, and then some.

Thursday, March 5th: Arrived at St. Thomas on schedule. Another lousy weather day and our Power Snorkel excursion was cancelled, so we book the same excursion on Grand Turk for Friday afternoon. After a good breakfast in the buffet, hopped off ship and took a taxi to Paradise Point, looking for a great view and a Bailey’s Bushwacker (both were as good as advertised). Did some quick shopping at Havensight Mall across the street, then took cab back to Crown Bay. Hoped to do some jetskiing, but place was closed (probably due to the weather and/or rough seas). Went back to the ship, had some more great pizza, and did some laundry while hanging out on the balcony (4 quarters for washer and 4 quarters for dryer, each takes about 40 minutes). Thank goodness for the balcony on this trip – we were able to enjoy the 74 degree temperatures without getting soaked! Definitely will be getting a balcony on each cruise going forward, despite the extra cost. Checked out anytime dining (no wait at 6:15pm) and had a great meal with equally great service. Watched the Marriage Gameshow in Club Fusion and called it a night.

Friday, March 6th: More rainy, crappy weather. Better than 21 degrees and snowy, I guess. Checked out sit-down breakfast – food and service were both good, and my dad loved his eggs benedict. Were scheduled to go to Grand Turk at 1pm, but due to strong winds, we sat off shore for a while as the Captain attempted to dock. After over an hour of inching back and forth, they were able to get us docked at 2pm (about an hour late). Caused us to miss our Power Snorkel excursion again – guess it wasn’t meant to be! Instead, we headed to the beach, which is right off of the pier (all of the beach chairs were quickly claimed) and headed to Jack’s Shack, a small bar a short walk from the boat. Had some Pink Flamingos (one of Jack’s specialties), and at about 3pm or so, an amazing thing happened – the clouds lifted completely and the sun came out! Had a great time at the Shack with some new friends we made on the boat, then headed back to the ship at about 6:15pm. After getting ready in record time, headed to Crown Grill for 6:30pm dinner ($25 cover charge). First class experience all the way – had lobster for the third time this week (excellent all three times, probably liked Sabatini’s lobster the best). Attentive service and big portions. Nobody left hungry. Memory is a bit foggy due to the Pink Flamingo and Red Stripes on Grand Turk combined with the wine at dinner (brought a bottle from our room, paid $15 corkage fee), but I believe we went back to the room and crashed.

Saturday, March 7th: Slept in, buffet breakfast, went to MUTS area of pool. Cloudy again the entire morning, had burgers and fries at the poolside grill – burgers were great but the fries were just OK. Clouds went away at 2pm so we enjoyed one final burst of sun. Went to wooden horse racing and bingo (they gave away the $2,200 jackpot – ended up split 3 ways). Back to room to pack and set out luggage before dinner. Went back to Sabatini’s for our last supper on the ship – outstanding service and food again. Loved the pumpkin risotto so much from Tuesday that I ordered two side portions. Hit the casino one last time and went to bed.

Sunday, March 8th: 8:20am luggage tag time in Gatsby’s. Debarkation was almost as easy as embarkation, thanks to a resourceful porter and a quick cab ride, we arrived at the airport by 9am! Good thing since the AirTran line was an absolute mess and we just made our flight.

A few more quick observations about our cruise:

- Internet Café was helpful to keep in touch with family, I wasn’t getting cell phone service anywhere except St. Thomas. Paid $55 for 100 minutes (plus $3.95 activation fee). Note that the connections can be slow.

- When the seas are rough, the pools are almost impossible to swim in. One of the pools was closed much of the time.

- The "secret door" on the Lido deck was locked the entire cruise.

- Movies Under The Stars is a nice feature of Princess ships, the picture quality during the day was surprisingly good.

- Didn’t discover the free muffins and pastries at the International Café until Saturday, but they were quite good. The hot chocolate was pretty good as well.

Overall, on a scale of 1 to 5, Princess gets a score of 4. Definitely better than my experiences with Carnival and Royal Caribbean, and similar to my experience on Celebrity. Only blemishes were some service issues during dinner and our interactions with the shore excursion group – spent way too much time disputing cancellations that were slow to come off of my cabin account. Food ranged from pretty good to excellent, though most of the excellent food came through the paid dining experiences (Sabatini’s, Crown Grill, Chef’s Table). Our room steward was friendly and efficient, and the crew (in general) was knowledgeable and willing to provide assistance when asked. I will definitely give Princess strong consideration when booking future cruises.

Feel free to ask any questions, I'll answer what I can.

Bon Voyage,

Jason

[DrivesLikeMario]

Nice, well-written, fair review! Thanks! ;) And, welcome home! :)

[sultan_sfo]

Nice Review -- I especially liked that the negatives (traditional dining) was written factually! Seems you truly enjoy gourmet dining with wine.

[kendon]

Loved the review. I'm sorry you missed all the Caribbean sunshine, but you had a great attitude throughout.

[Colo Cruiser]

Great review, thanks. :)

[davidnsteph]

Thanks for the interesting and candid review. Sorry to hear about all the rain, but it sounded like a great cruise, anyway.

 

DavidnSteph

[wanderlust88]

Great review...i kept frowning everytime you mentioned rain.:(..sorry about that..

We sail on the crown this sunday...really looking forward to the time off. It seems like the weather will be nice.

thanks for the tip on the intl bar area...

:D

[NSWP]

Nice, concise review, well done. We are on Crown in June/July, B2B, European Explorer/British Isles. 27 days on the ocean.!

 

These reviews help us pending cruisers a lot.

[JRT5000]

Hi Jason,

 

Good review. Thanks

 

My girlfriend and I are on the Crown in mid April and since you offered, I do have a few questions.

1) For Sabatini's and The Crown.......did you need to reserve the first day or were you able to just call and get a table when you wanted during the week.

2) For the Chef's Table....do you tip and if so who do you tip.

 

Thanks

[Lauren's_Dad]

Everyone, thanks for the feedback. JRT5000, answers to your questions as follows:

 

 

 

"1) For Sabatini's and The Crown.......did you need to reserve the first day or were you able to just call and get a table when you wanted during the week."

 

We made our Tuesday reservation for Sabatini's on Monday night, our Friday reservation for Crown Grill on Tuesday night, and our Saturday reservation for Sabatini's on Thursday night. No problems with any of these reservations, and only the Crown Grill looked to be near capacity when we dined.

 

 

"2) For the Chef's Table....do you tip and if so who do you tip."

 

We did not leave a tip after the Chef's Table dinner. We had a few servers that helped with the meal, much as they would have helped the anytime diners that were at the tables near us. I assume that they get tipped in the same manner as the other anytime dining servers (though the $10.50 daily charge). As for the Head Chef and Pastry Chef, I didn't feel right offering a gratuity - didn't want to offend anyone. Just thanked them about a million times for a wonderful experience and left it at that :D.

 

Thanks,

Jason

[Infi]

Very nice and well-balanced review, thank you for sharing. I really enjoyed the diary style of it. Sorry to hear you had such poor weather, but it sounds like you had a great attitude throughout.

[kywildcatfanone]

Jason,

 

I agree, very well written review. We will be on the Crown in a couple of weeks and I'm looking forward to it. Thank again!

 

Mike

[JRT5000]

Thanks for the info. Do you remember your table #. I too have traditional early sitting and want to try to avoid your waiter if possible.

 

Thanks again.

[1 HappyCruiser]

Thanks for the info. Do you remember your table #. I too have traditional early sitting and want to try to avoid your waiter if possible.

 

Thanks again.

 

The waiters very often change tables from one sailing to the next.

[Host CJSKIDS]

Jason, thanks for the exceptional review. Sorry you had so much rain but it sounds like you were still able to have a great time and that's wonderful.

[billet]

Great review and it encapsulates the Eastern Caribbean trip in a nutshell.

I was sorry to read about your weather. We did the two weeks before you and the first was similar to yours but the Feb 22 sailing had very pleasant weather overall.

I agree with you comments about Sabatinis and the Crown Grill and we reckoned that Sabatinis was the best we have tried so far. I wish we had done the Chef's Table!

[Sunlifer]

Great review Jason....and having been on the same cruise, I can only agree with you especially concerning the weather!

 

I would only offer.........and I must do this as it was , hands down, the highlight of our cruise.......that we, my husband and I and another wonderful couple we cruise with, were also in the 6pm seating in the Botticelli dining room. Our waiters were Paul and Viktor at Table #15. Although there was little sun during the day, the hour and a half we spent with our two waiters and the other two delightful couples that we met at our table, made dinner each night a very bright spot in our cruise. We tipped them well at the end of the cruise in addition to the tips already deducted......They were terrific and we looked forward to our dinner each night with all of them.

[Lauren's_Dad]

Thanks again for the feedback everyone - a quick response to some questions/comments.

 

JRT5000: "Thanks for the info. Do you remember your table #. I too have traditional early sitting and want to try to avoid your waiter if possible."

 

JRT5000, we were at table 11.

 

Sunlifer: "I would only offer.........and I must do this as it was , hands down, the highlight of our cruise.......that we, my husband and I and another wonderful couple we cruise with, were also in the 6pm seating in the Botticelli dining room. Our waiters were Paul and Viktor at Table #15. Although there was little sun during the day, the hour and a half we spent with our two waiters and the other two delightful couples that we met at our table, made dinner each night a very bright spot in our cruise. We tipped them well at the end of the cruise in addition to the tips already deducted......They were terrific and we looked forward to our dinner each night with all of them."

 

Sunlifer, on my three previous cruises, I had similar experiences to you. Even partied with one of our waiters at Carlos and Charlie's in Cozumel during that cruise. All of these prior great experiences with our waiters were the reason we went with traditional dining. Although this trip was disappointing, we will likely continue to go with traditional dining on future cruises. One isolated experience hasn't changed my overall opinion.

[dogsdogs]

Thanks for the review. We were on the same cruise. We were fortunate to have an excellent waiter and assistant in the Botticelli in the second seating. We know we were lucky because we ate almost all meals in the dining room and we had some dreadful servers for breakfast and lunch. I'm glad you enjoyed your meals at the premium restaurants, but if you don't want to pay the extra charges, please go see the Maitre D about changing to a table with a more experienced waiter. It is YOUR vacation and I think you are entitled to enjoy your dinners without paying extra. IMO, the dinners in the Botticelli were some of the best we have ever had aboard a ship.

[BoardwalkBabe]

Thank you for a great review and I am sorry about the rotten weather - wish it had been better for you!

[SingerEsq]

As others have said, great, detailed review. Not too long at all. Enjoyed reading about your trip. Sorry about the weather, nothing you can do but make the best of it. You guys sound like fun people to travel with. We were there the 10 days prior ... it was better than what you had, but doesn't sound like much. Sorry you missed BOSS on St. Thomas. It was great (see picture above). Try to do this your next trip. Your Chef's Table experience sounded almost exactly like ours. It was also way up there for us, too.

[LARGIN]

Thanks for the review...

[DavidsNana]

Lauren's Dad -Please forgive me if I'm not doing this correctly, but I would like to ask a question. We will be on the Crown on the 3/22 sailing and I was wondering if you noticed if they had the golf carts on the pier in St. Maartin to take you to the cruise center if you can't or don't wish to walk from the ship? My husband has trouble walking long distances and some say that the pier is very long. Thank you for the information and your review. Barbara

[1 HappyCruiser]

Lauren's Dad -Please forgive me if I'm not doing this correctly, but I would like to ask a question. We will be on the Crown on the 3/22 sailing and I was wondering if you noticed if they had the golf carts on the pier in St. Maartin to take you to the cruise center if you can't or don't wish to walk from the ship? My husband has trouble walking long distances and some say that the pier is very long. Thank you for the information and your review. Barbara

 

They did in Feb when we were there.

[sunsetbeachgal]

Jason,

 

Thanks for such an interesting and honest review. So sorry your weather didn't cooperate...:(