Abercrombie2019

I got this feeling talking to people on our last cruise. We met a lot of people that used to cruise on other lines, but had switched to Princess because they weren't satisfied with their previous favorite cruise line. I understand why people are upset, but I just can't get myself worked up by this round of changes. I booked "Plus" because we were able to get a good deal. I'm Canadian, so we have never been able to have the medallion mailed to us. I don't bother with room service because I prefer to get my own food (best chance of it being hot or at least warm). I don't bother ordering from the app because I'm usually near the bar or venue that I want the food or drink from, and we didn't really like the pizza at Alfredo's on the Regal - so it won't be hard to limit it to two visits on our next cruise.

No one will accuse Princess of consistency (unless it is for being consistently inconsistent.)

The Princess website now separates dining into "Complimentary Dining", "Casual Dining" for a small fee and "Specialty Dining" for a fee.

There are laundry rooms on every deck. Try going up or down a deck if it’s urgent.

You will have to hold it against a reader when going through security to get on or off the ship. You will also have to hold it against a reader at International Cafe when ordering coffee, and when checking in at your muster station.

We initially had the rubber ones, but one of them had a hole that was too big and the medallion fell out before we even got on the ship. The fabric watch bands have a plastic holder that has a screw on top. We do like them, but we must not have screwed it on all the way.

Be careful if you get the watch band from Princess. We lost one of our medallions after returning to the ship. The medallion holder unscrewed and fell off the band. We didn’t realize until we were seated at Alfredo’s for lunch. We were able to locate the medallion using the app on our phone.

$39 USD is charge for Crown Grill but ship will convert to AUD for your charge. Your credit card will convert back to USD. CC rate will not be same as Princess conversion rate.

Your credit card statement will show what the charge was in AUD and the exchange rate used to convert to USD.

What is the on board currency for the cruise? Is the cruise in Australia?

We tried the premium cakes on the Regal (July) and unfortunately they were stale. They displayed the cakes at Gelato in a very hard to see location - so no one was ordering them. A week into the cruise we noticed that the cakes had moved to a prominent display case in the International Cafe. That seemed to solve the problem of the stale cakes. I'm always amazed when a dessert looks like it will be delicious, but ends up being almost flavorless. The icing on the red velvet cake had no real flavor to it. I do like a good dessert every so often, and this wasn't it. We also tried the premium ice cream sundae - but we asked the woman at Gelato not to bother with the lollipops and extras. She was relieved (and said the hardest thing was trying to remove the wrapper from the lollipop with her gloves on). It really was just ice cream, fudge sauce and a piece of brownie. We enjoyed it, but wished that they didn't put the chocolate and sprinkles on the glass. I imagine that all of that chocolate ends up in the dishwasher because there was no way you could even get it off the glass.

I just got off the Regal on Monday (July 31st). Food in main dining room was pretty good. We didn't find the buffet to be all that great, but many sections were often closed and it was fully shut down each night by 10pm. We enjoyed Crown Grill and Sabatini's. The pizza was the biggest disappointment for us after enjoying it on Discovery.

We ate lunch at Gigi's every day on the Discovery last October. Gigi's was always crowded and the food was amazing. We were on the Regal in July and only ate at Alfredo's a few times. We noticed that the pepperoni had been switched out for something that looked like (and tasted like) bologna. We didn't notice many crowds at Alfredo's on the Regal. If I had to pay extra for the food that we had at Alfredo's on this last cruise, I would have been very disappointed. Maybe (hopefully) they will switch back to the better pepperoni now that this is a revenue generating restaurant otherwise it won't matter to me if I can eat there twice each cruise as part of a package.

Are you booking "Flexible" or "Restricted" fare?

We have done Rome to Venice (including Greece & Turkey) in August. The coolest temperature on an excursion was 36 celsius (96.8 F). The hottest day was in Turkey where it was 42 C (107.6 F) in Ephesus. There were misting stations set up to cool everyone down. We enjoyed every minute of it, but we do look like sweaty lobsters (red) in all of our photos (especially Pompeii and Ephesus).

This could be part of the reason why the Sun & Star Princess have dropped the letter in the room description in favor of just using the floor number. (ie. 11222 instead of B222)

What I find interesting is that L106 very clearly has a metal railing, but the room description on the Princess website doesn't make note of that. Every time that I've looked at an Obstructed Deluxe Balcony cabin, the room description identifies that it is a "part obstructed view, non-glass balcony railing". Strange that they don't do that for L106, L107, L201 or L202 for the Emerald.

Checked baggage fees for Air Canada are $75 per bag per flight for Europe ($300 for two bags return). The level of "dress up" that we achieve will rely heavily on how much we can jam into two carry-on bags and two personal item bags.

@krufrank I will preface this by saying that I don't know how old this photo is (I just pulled it off the internet), but it does look like L202 has a metal railing. The lowest category of balcony cabin on the Emerald Princess is BF. There doesn't appear to be a separate category for obstructed balcony cabins.

Yes, I would too. If you are lucky enough to be able to select one of the less obstructed rooms, it feels like you are getting a deal. The only problem now is that most of these rooms are showing as "Guaranteed Staterooms" .

The only problem with giving them a separate designation is that Princess will charge more for the "less" obstructed ones. DV will be more expensive than DW. The last few cruises that we've booked have had one price for all of the Deluxe Obstructed Balcony cabins, and one price for all of the Obstructed Balcony cabins regardless of location or actual obstruction.

The "Travel Summary" will show the amount that Princess assigns to each item of the Plus Package if you booked through Princess. The charge for Plus is $60 USD per day. The values listed in the Travel Summary add up to much more than $60 (Princess is trying to show that the Plus Package is a deal). It still says "Compliments of Princess" when you are in the Cruise Personalizer and look under the "Onboard Purchases" tab.

We have a cruise booked for next year that is currently about 140% more expensive than when we re-fared it a couple of months ago. So it would seem that demand is currently high.

I stalk my vacations. I plan where I want to go, and when. I tend to book a year and a half in advance, usually at a price that I'm not very happy with and wait for the prices to come down. I always go for the "refundable deposit". If the prices don't come down, I tell myself that I will cancel. If prices do come down to a point that I am comfortable with, then I start to book flights and hotels. I will book EZAir if it is priced better than booking direct with airlines. I try to keep my options open for as long as possible. So far, I've always been able to re-fare or rebook for much better rates. I've even been able to move from balcony to deluxe balcony for much less money than I originally booked for.

Am I missing something? Isn't $649 for a 7 day cruise a good deal? I like that Princess gives people the option of having a low price, or having the "inclusive" package. It allows you to decide what experience/expense you are comfortable with.