zentraveler

We took Seabourn to Antartica and loved the 3 week cruise. It is quite expensive to go to Antartica - no matter which ship/cruise line you pick, so Seabourn was a really good choice given that the price range was small even for considerably less luxurious lines.. Seabourn had amazing naturalists, wonder We have never found the guests to be stuffy or snobbish and the all inclusive, no gratuity policy is a relaxing change of pace. Staff were friendly and accommodating without being intrusive and seemed to genuinely enjoy their jobs.

THANK YOU ZOnker! This answers a question I had not quite gotten around to formulating but really wanted to know. We live right in SF a few miles from the SF port and a short ride away. I have recently tuned into what is available to us in terms of cruising from here and have booked trips on both of those ships this summer - first on each. Your very succinct and specific information is incredibly useful. What I am still puzzling, and would love it if anyone know the answer, is why only those 2 two cruise lines? This is a world class city; why don't more cruise lines sail out of here?

Asked and answered earlier in this discussion. Only about 5: HAL, Windstar (Caribbean and upcoming Greece) and Seabourn (Antartica). But have Princess cruise to Alaska in 10 days and a Carnival one coming up in early September - which is how I ended up on this board and this thread. We are going to do more cruising and this has been a really useful thread and am grateful for everyone's input for my future planning!

@KmomChicago, you started this thread some #185 posts ago seeming to genuinely want information (which I have, gratefully, gotten a LOT of). And I am not bothered or upset that you have not changed your mind that your "simple tastes" don't need or want anything but Carnival - good for you! - but I have to wonder what of your insistence is all about. Sure, we get that you are a 'simple gal with simple tastes'. And really proud of it. I posted way early on that you seemed happy and you should stick with cruises you enjoy and go more often with the money you might save from "fancier" ones. I don't recall any response, or any sense that you have gotten more comfortable with what you like #185 posts later. Not enough information from many thoughtful posters to have answered your question?? But it seems that although you may have started with a genuine question, it seems to have devolved for you into repeating why you like your "simple taste cruises" (your words) and deriding anyone who has a different idea or taste for whatever reason. If your point is to convince those people that they are snobs (essentially) and wasting their money not cruising the way you do, that I think mission has been accomplished. Some of us need or want something different. Or if we are curious we will try Carnival.

Thank you Essiesmom! Even pre-covid my favorite part of hotels or cruises (really floating hotels) was to spend time wandering around the whole place to figure it out, and on cruises especially, finding the quiet spots. Will definitely look out for deck 3 Gatsby's Garden.

Thank you (!) for the tip about the lack of outlets USB ports. Will definitely bring an extension cord and power strip. Thanks also for the tips about where the quiet places are. There is a recent thread on the Princess board about people (an awfully lot of them it seems) getting covid on board. The main culprits seemed to be the excursions and to/from the airports, i.e. anyplace where people had to be packed onto buses. That plus the fact that mask wearing sounds virtually non-existent on the ship, the elevators also very crowded with unmasked people and even tables for two being quite packed together in the DR. I am grateful that I don't need to travel for this, don't care about excursions and am happy that this ship did not feel crowded.

I do understand that this is a mass market ship and am adjusting my expectations accordingly. Our last 3 cruises were on Windstar and Seabourn and we are on Seabourn in October and I don't in any way expect the experience will be similar. We have also been on HAL once to Alaska. We have a Princess trip booked in 2 weeks. The San Francisco port seems to only have Carnival and Princess and since we live here in the city we thought we would try some cruises where we could just take a 15 minute ride-share to the pier and get on - no flying needed. And of course, the fact that they are less expensive and much less trouble makes it easier to consider just getting on them. Trying to get a feel for both of these cruise lines, but will clearly know more after taking our first cruises on each of them.

I am sailing on the Miracle out of SF also on 9/1 - short trip to Ensenada. My first Carnival cruise. I live here so it will be a short ride-share trip to Port 27. Any other tips about the ship? Would like not to get covid, so likely to avoid "activites" and will be looking for quieter places to go and things to do.

Sorry OP, off topic, but am doing my first Carnival sailing on the Miracle out of San Francisco in early September. Any opinions about her and how she fits into the rest of the fleet? We usually sail on much smaller ships so I don't expect the same kind of service but tuning into Carnival since it sails out of SF so much (and I could walk to the port if I wanted to). Trying to orient a bit to that cruise line.

The real problems, although not the only ones, are the places where there a lot of people and they take their masks off, i.e. to eat. Indoor restaurants, weddings etc. Hard to avoid at many events and on cruises where the dining rooms are often full and no one can eat with a mask on. And room service and outdoor dining are the main options (which on our upcoming Alaska cruise is not very appealing).

Sorry about bad formatting and double post!! Did not intend to bold anything.

No stats, but just reading this and other threads where many, many people report turning positive during or after they get off the ship. There are a lot of people on these cruises so the people reporting here may not be a huge percentage, but we will never know what that figure is, but what seems more people than I would like were trying to be careful and came down with covid despite their precautions.

That was our experience too on Seabourn last December. Most everyone wore masks, were respectful and it was a whole different scene. I booked these two summer larger ship cruises (Princess and Carnival post-return to school for kids) because they leave and return to San Francisco and we had some time. And this being SF, people are generally tuned in and well behaved. And if this Princess Alaska trip goes badly I am cancelling the next one.

The mass cruise lines - and Princess was the poster child for this - got the worst PR in history when covid first began. If people/Princess keeps this up - no masks required etc - they are going to be in the same boat (ha!) again. If I had had any idea it was this bad I never would have booked this cruise. I am sure they are not required to publish any data about incidence and pretty much everyone (at least in my world) thinks it is crazy to get on a cruise ship, so even the news seems to think it is old news.

Sorry you got nailed on this brooker1217, doing all the right things. This is our first Princess and mass marketing cruise also and we plan to do exactly what you did, except we have been to Alaska on several [smaller] cruises and no longer do the expeditions. We are also not on the inside passage trip so we have fewer places we would care about expeditions anyway. We live here, so no planes, have good N95's and are going to get a lot of exercise avoiding the elevators. Would not dream of doing a show with that many people in an indoor space and I hate casinos. We will need to eat so will likely mostly eat outdoors too We have managed, despite quite a lot of travel, resorts and planes to not test positive so far and I am hoping to keep it that way. My husband has arranged travel insurance and evacuation insurance (for Greece and Turkey) and as a physician I know what to bring and do if we do get unlucky. I hope you are both feeling better.

Appalling really. Beginning to seriously wonder about this upcoming cruise. Another thing to consider is that vaccines effectiveness wanes over time. Not even close to zero and still prevents serious illness, but it does wane. I was eligible for my second booster in March but "saved" it until last week as close as possible to 3 cruises, a trip to Hawaii and a trip to Europe in the next two months.

Helpful; were you masking in crowded places? Was anyone else? What did you mean by the bolded edits above if you don't mind me asking?

We have taken two cruises since Covid and no one (including us) tested positive on either - and they tested us getting on, weekly and getting off. But these were MUCH smaller cruise lines (both with <400 people at lower capacity), hence my hesitation about this Princess one with SO many people. I picked it when rates were down and because it round trips SF-SF and I live just a few miles from the terminal. It was easy and we love the itinerary to Alaska. Fingers crossed. Next Cruise in October is another small ship!

Our hospital, and most I assume, test anyone coming in for anything. That is how we get a rough estimate of the community asymptomatic positivity. Come in for a colonoscopy or an ER visit because you think your leg might be broken and you get tested - covid symptoms or not. But also the numbers of people with covid who need the hospital is going up also.

True and I am in health care too, and what is unique to cruises is how many people are packed together for a long period of time. The "spreader" events are crowded events like weddings etc and cruise ships have lots of them (shows, restaurants, elevators, expeditions etc.) for several days.

Have been wondering this myself as we are about to get on an Alaska Ruby cruise from SF on 7/19. Lots of reports of people turning positive during the cruise. Actually made me concerned about going at all, despite vaccinated like a lot of people. The early June trip report I read for our cruise was some sort of casino tournament and a lot of passengers who seemed to spend a lot of time in close, casino smoke-allowed quarters, and that is my suspicion about what happened. But expeditions, crowded elevators etc. could certainly account for it. Covid spreads in close crowded quarters, and cruise ships - as 2020-2022 has shown - are certainly the poster child for this. Still going, but masking up and will likely spend a lot of time on our balcony, on the decks and walking around stops on our own. And taking the stairs.

Ah, I get it. I am one of those folks who enjoys looking at the menus when I get there 🙂. Hard enough to figure out what I want to eat for the next week. But someone in this helpful crowd will undoubtedly have what you are looking for.

There was a long post recently about a cruise from SF to Alaska and back. Early June 2022. Lots of menus posted if I remember and lots of ship info. You could look for that.

I completely agree with thanks for the generosity of time and effort that @crusin4us and others have shared. An enormous amount of practical and useful information for those of us just about to board. And @L11, I really don't care for gambling (smoking etc.) at all, and stay as far away from it as possible - even for free - so even the fact that they are giving people cruises to gamble makes me think I should have picked a different cruise. But that is just me and was happy to read about how much fun you all who enjoy it were having. (Scout raffle tickets is the extent of my gambling and I usually just donate the money and let them resell the tickets.) Honestly had no idea tournaments were a thing on ships. Some of these posts are making more sense now, as well as the "I was up until 3 am" posts 😁.