Ken the cruiser

No problem. We will definitely be attending all of the lectures and will provide a brief summary of who was the lecturer and what was discussed.

I was just reading about Johnstone Strait. Pretty fascinating, especially with the potential of seeing so much wildlife on our first day after leaving Vancouver. Luckily, we’ll be cruising through this narrow passage 3 times! 😁 Johnstone Strait is a deep and narrow glacier-carved passage located between the east coast of Vancouver Island and the British Columbia mainland, extending roughly from Telegraph Cove in the north to Rock Bay in the south. Johnstone Strait serves as an important thoroughfare for marine vessels that include cargo freighters and cruise ships bound for Alaska in the summer months. Johnstone Strait is home to the largest resident pod of killer whales (orcas) in the world, with a population of approximately 200 whales. There is no better place to view these amazing marine mammals. In addition to the orcas that can be viewed around Robson Bight, Johnstone Strait offers up a wide variety of other marine life, including minke, humpback and grey whales, Pacific white sided dolphins, harbour porpoises, Dall’s porpoises, harbour seals and Steller’s sea lions. Bald eagles and an abundance of seabirds will also be encountered in the area. https://vancouverisland.com/plan-your-trip/regions-and-towns/vancouver-island-bc-islands/johnstone-strait/

I just took a sneak peek at the NOAA Northern Lights forecast for the next 2 nights and wouldn't it be awesome if there was a similar forecast while we were on the cruise! NOAA Aurora Viewline for Tonight and Tomorrow Night

We are Elite+ and my DW will be so excited when she hears hot chocolate is free at Al Bacio, as we will no longer book a cabin with the All Included package and get our bottled water and glasses of wine during Happy Hour!

That's a very good point on the theater seating, especially if you go to the early show. We usually arrive 20-30 minutes early to get the seats we want and play gin while waiting for the show to begin. However, if you happen to arrive only 5-10 minutes early, especially if it's a good show, most of the good seats are usually pretty much gone.

Nope. Well, they have a separate Reserve Dining area and get to have breakfast in Sabatini’s, and if you optionally purchase their Princess Plus package for $60 pp/day, you get free drinks, gratuities and unlimited internet. But Princess does have awesome Vista Suite cabins, with huge fully-covered aft-facing balconies on their Grand-class ships, with some pretty cool perks, for a lot less than a Sky Suite cabin on a similar itinerary. For example, with the Princess Plus package included, the Alaska cruise we’re getting ready to go on runs around $425 pp/day (with the Plus package) whereas a similar cruise in an S2 Sky Suite costs around $645 pp/day with a refundable deposit.. And best of all, you don’t have to pay extra for butler service! 😁

FWIW for those that may not have noticed on my initial post, I added a link to some of the entries to provide more information (e.g., detailed wildlife information, excursion description, etc.) regarding that particular underlined entry.

Understand. The comments on this thread just reminded me of this unusual moment in time. Funny thing was, there were still slots available to book a ship transfer to the airport when we arrived that day in Reykjavik. I'm sure there are plenty of private means of getting to the Seattle airport at a reasonable price.

This is not meant to sway you in either direction. The above examples of taking a taxi or Uber to the airport reminded me of when we arrived at Reykjavik, Iceland back in August 2022 on transition day of our B2B. As we were headed out on a ship excursion, this was the line of folks disembarking the ship that we’re waiting for a taxi or any other private means of transportation to the airport. Unfortunately, there were two other ships in port that day disembarking passengers as well.

Here's a fun Alaska memory to look back on. While I was stationed there in the early 70s, a small amount of marijuana in your home became legalized through the court system because in Alaska "your home is considered your castle", which includes your personal space such as the clothes you are wearing, and you can pretty much do what you want in "your castle". What triggered it was a lawyer purposely got pulled over for speeding with an ounce of MJ on his person and wouldn't sign the ticket causing him to be searched and subsequently arrested. Like I said, the memories have come rushing back, especially when we tested that law in my barracks room! 🤣 Ravin v. State - Wikipedia

OTOH we are low stress cruisers. We usually book the ship-to-airport transfer in advance and then just head to the bus after disembarking the ship, have the driver stow our luggage, find a seat in the back of the bus, and kick back and enjoy the ride. Now, if there is enough time for an excursion on the way to the airport, we will usually book one of their enhanced transfers as the cost is usually pretty reasonable. Princess Cruises - Port - Seattle, Washington

Ah yes. The memories coming rushing back, especially when driving around in sub-zero temperatures waiting for the air-cooled engine to start producing warm air through the heat vents! 🤣

Thanks! FWIW I was stationed at Elmendorf AFB back in the early 70s when there was only around 100,000 people living in Anchorage. Now there is almost 300,000 and homes are starting to be built on the nearby mountain sides. But I still remember seeing the underbelly of a moose walking along the streetside as I was "slowly" driving by in my VW minivan. Ah yes, Alaska can definitely leave some lasting impressions, that's for sure! 😊

Thanks! We like both Princess and Celebrity, but for different reasons. It also helps that we’re now Elite on Princess, Elite+ on Celebrity, and 4-star on HAL, as we love free laundry! In the case of Alaska cruises like the one we're getting ready to embark on, Princess was our number one choice not only for the variety of cruising destinations, but also because of the reasonable fare we paid for one of their aft-facing Vista Suites. However, HAL has a new Alaska 28-day “single-itinerary” cruise that includes going up the Bering Strait to Nome as well as a bunch of other stops at ports off the normal beaten path! But I will say our first Alaska cruise back in 2013 was on the Celebrity Solstice, and we had an awesome time on their 7-day RT cruise out of Seattle. We’ve also been on Disney and HAL cruises to Alaska, and had a great time on their 7-day cruises as well. But this time we’ll be cruising around up there for 22 days and are super excited, even though it’s forecasted to be a little chilly on embarkation day in Vancouver as well as for most of the cruise! 🥶

For those interested in following along on our upcoming 22-day Alaska cruise on the Grand Princess, I just started the following Live From thread.

For those interested in following along on our upcoming 22-day Alaska cruise on the Grand Princess, which we will be leaving for next week, I just started my Live From thread! 😁

It appears the closest we will come to seeing a “pigeon” might be if we are lucky enough to see a Rock Dove. However, it appears there are plenty of other birds flying around up there to keep us entertained! 😂 https://www.alaska.org/expert-advice/birds We will be in an aft-facing VS on this cruise, so our breakfasts will be in Sabatini's. But I have no doubt the service as well as the menu options in both dining areas will be awesome as usual! But if that’s not the case, I’ll let you know. But as with my other blogs, don’t expect any food or drink pictures! 😁

It’s time to start getting super excited about our upcoming cruise to Alaska on the Grand Princess! We have cruised to this part of the world a few times before and are looking forward to visiting this awesome place for the first time with Princess. We have booked some pretty cool wildlife excursions and will be visiting Glacier Bay National Park three times! 8-Day Inside Passage 14-Day Voyage of the Glaciers Date Destination Arrive Depart Date Destination Arrive Depart 4/29 Fly to Vancouver BC 10:30 PM 5/8 Port of Vancouver 7:30 AM 4:00 PM Fairmont Hotel 5/9 Inside Passage 4/30 Port of Vancouver 9:30 AM 4:00 PM 5/10 Ketchikan AK 6:00 AM 2:00 PM 5/1 Johnstone Strait 5/11 Juneau AK 8:00 AM 9:00 PM 5/2 Sitka AK 10:00 AM 6:00 PM 5/12 Skagway AK 7:00 AM 8:30 PM 5/3 Juneau AK 8:00 AM 9:00 PM 5/13 Glacier Bay NP 6:00 AM 3:00 PM 5/4 Skagway AK 7:00 AM 8:30 PM 5/14 College Fjord 6:00 PM 8:30 PM 5/5 Glacier Bay NP 6:00 AM 3:00 PM 5/15 Whittier AK 12:30 AM 8:30 PM 5/6 Ketchikan AK 9:00 AM 6:00 PM 5/16 Hubbard Glacier 3:00 PM 8:00 PM 5/7 Inside Passage 5/17 Glacier Bay NP 9:15 AM 7:30 PM 5/8 Port of Vancouver 7:30 AM 4:00 PM 5/18 Skagway AK 7:00 AM 8:30 PM 5/19 Juneau AK 6:30 AM 4:00 PM 5/20 Ketchikan AK 10:00 AM 6:00 PM 5/21 Inside Passage 5/22 Port of Vancouver 7:30 AM Fairmont Hotel 3:00 PM 5/23 Fly Home 9:15 AM Some of the wildlife we are hoping to see along the way includes migrating Gray and Humpback whales & resident Orcas, various seals & sea lions, a wide variety of birds to include Bald Eagles, and if we’re lucky maybe even a bear or moose, all the while surrounded by awesome scenery everywhere! Reference links: - Grand Princess Current Location - Alaska Current Weather Forecast - Northern Lights 2 Day Forecast - Northern Lights 30-90 Minute Forecast As always, please feel free to follow along and if you have any questions, let me know and we will try to find the answer.

We have always picked up our medallions at the cruise terminal as part of the check-in process and have never had to wait any noticeable extra time because of it. For us it’s just one less thing to worry about when we’re getting ready to go on a cruise.

Have a great time @Host CJSKIDS on your Eastern Caribbean cruise! We’re counting down the days, 9 and a wake-up, before heading to Vancouver to get on the Grand for an Alaskan cruise.

We are in our early 70s too and did a 17-day Princess Canada/New England land-cruise last fall, which included 5 days traveling from Toronto before embarking on the Caribbean Princess in Quebec City, and had an awesome time (see my Live From thread in my below signature). Here are the details of the land portion of your cruise which looks pretty cool! https://www.princess.com/cruise-search/details/?voyageCode=U436&resType=T&tourCode=T4F02D

Just in case someone is running into the below App issues we have been encountering for a while now. We had the same issue last week, only my DW's PCL account as well as her App profile had my email address, and my PCL account and App profile had her address. That was not the case a few weeks ago. Another issue we had was that my DW's "Elite" status would not show up in her App, even though it reflects Elite in her PCL account. App Problems: We first got on the Live Chat on the PCL web page and the Chat POC told us she couldn't help but gave us a phone number to call to get help with the App profile "email address" issues. The new App POC resolved the email address mismatches. However, she was unable to fix the App Loyalty issue. So she created a "ticket" for someone to fix my DW's Loyalty status display on her App, which was magically resolved two days later. PCL Personalizer Problem: Once the email addresses in our App profiles were corrected, the App POC switched us over to someone who could fix our online PCL Personalize email mismatches. To fix that issue, once he corrected the email addresses, the new Web POC had to reregister our accounts with different userids, basically giving each of our online accounts a new login entry. But no worries, all else stayed as it was in our respective accounts. That took all of 2 minutes and all was fixed. Funny thing is once he created those new PCL logins, we could subsequently log onto the App using the new login/password combination. Prior to this, we always had to use the booking number process as the login/password combination never worked. And so far all of the above fixes have remained in place! 🤞

We had the same issue last week, only my DW's PCL account as well as her App profile had my email address, and my PCL account and App profile had her address. That was not the case a few weeks ago. Another issue we had was that my DW's "Elite" status would not show up in her App, even though it reflects Elite in her PCL account. App Problems: We first got on the Live Chat on the PCL web page and the Chat POC told us she couldn't help but gave us a phone number to call to get help with the App profile "email address" issues. The new App POC resolved the email address mismatches. However, she was unable to fix the App Loyalty issue. So she created a "ticket" for someone to fix my DW's Loyalty status display on her App, which was magically resolved two days later. PCL Personalizer Problem: Once the email addresses in our App profiles were corrected, the App POC switched us over to someone who could fix our online PCL Personalize email mismatches. To fix that issue, once he corrected the email addresses, the new Web POC had to reregister our accounts with different userids, basically giving each of our online accounts a new login entry. But no worries, all else stayed as it was in our respective accounts. That took all of 2 minutes and all was fixed. Funny thing is once he created those new PCL logins, we could subsequently log onto the App using the new login/password combination. Prior to this, we always had to use the booking number process as the login/password combination never worked. And so far all of the above fixes have remained in place! 🤞

We're hoping sometime in the June/July timeframe based on this earlier thread.

One thing Princess has over Celebrity is their longer, more unique 3-5 week itineraries. Other than that, we have a great time cruising on either, as long as we can get a real balcony cabin when cruising on Celebrity E-class ships and a Reserve Collection mini-suite when booked with Princess.