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Right, but you booked GTY. You're missing the "OR BETTER" part of booking a GTY. Wait for Princess to assign you a cabin before reacting. What if Princess wanted to upgrade you with the GTY booking, but instead you placed a bid and won? Then you missed out on a free upgrade.

This isn't a Princess problem. It's your anxiety getting to you. Wouldn't jump the gun. Just because you don't see availability, doesn't mean that there isn't non accessible availability in said category. You could be upgraded at no cost. The ivory tower has the infinite wisdom on this subject. That's how GTY bookings work. Another situation is that there could be move over offers put forth and those willing to accept will produce availability and you will be assigned one of the cabins that those people have freed up. Not sure where your gripe about the bidding system comes from because no where does it say in the bidding system that you're guaranteed to win. If you can pay the max bid now, you should have considered higher categories when you booked. When you max out category bids, the total fare comes very close to paying the full fare of higher categories. Patience is a virtue.

Fare fluctuation is normal with EZAir. The prices can change minute to minute, morning or evening. Is the airline Delta? Delta is notorious with releasing inventory to EZAir far in advance and then renegging on booked EZAir reservations as the flight date gets closer and their inventory management realizes that they sold a seat on prime time flight for too low. Happened to my parents FLL to SFO via ATL. They booked their Delta flight with a 2 hour connection in ATL 6 months prior. 3 months before they were supposed to fly, they got an EZAir notification that they had been moved to a later ATL to SFO flight with a 5 hour layover in ATL. Not happy, they called EZAir made a stink and EZAir reinstated their original flights at no extra charge. Had they not made a stink, the flights with a 2 hour connection would have cost them and extra $300 pp through EZAir.

Years ago, Santorini was amazing. Now, it's bombarded with tourists. No joy for me at all. Even before the pandemic, Fira was an absolute zoo. It's a shame if people didn't get to see it before all the overtourism.

You won't be missing anything. Santorini is more of pain than a pleasure as a cruise ship passenger because you get dropped off at the bottom of a cliff and you're at the mercy of a cable car with not enough capacity, donkeys, or a path full of donkey dung to get to town--all of which are terrible options.

My tastebuds detect a chlorine/metallic taste in the ships tap water. My reason for not drinking the ship's potable water is hygiene. Regardless of the signs put up in the buffet, someone will always shove their water flask under the spout and refill directly from the dispenser. Some decide to refill from pitchers in the buffet and the pitcher spout touches the lip of their flask. This happens whether you see it or not. Some people fill their flasks from their cabin bathroom faucet. If you check the aerator of your cabin faucet, you'll find a build up of gunk, which you have no idea what it is; it could be dried up toothpaste or soap buildup. A no go for me. I always drink sealed bottled water when on a cruise ship.

Another way for Princess to pinch a penny out of customers and justify their package fares. Remember when Princess had cruise cards and there was no choice but to pick up at the port? It wasn't a big deal then, not sure why it would be a big deal now.

Tip in Euros or don't bother tipping. The hassle of doing the FOREX conversion and the FOREX fee at the conversion shop/bank isn't worth it for the person on the receiving end.

Princess will send a paper notice of the water shuttle hours the night before the arriving into the tender port. The notice will tell you what time the last shuttle is for the night, what time the water shuttles resume the following day, and that you should make plans to stay in town for the night if you miss the last water shuttle to the ship for the night.

OP stated SOU is out. So either LHR or LGW. See below...

Princess recommends the earliest flight to be booked is 7 hours after the published arrival time of the ship (for LHR). If you follow that, that would mean, the earliest flight you should book is 14:00. Lines at LHR can get crazy at times so I would heed Princess's advice. You also can't predict the traffic conditions. Southampton is quite far from Heathrow.

The way that Princess packaged the Plus/Premium fare packages is like they created solutions for non problems. Before these packages all you really need was the drinks, wi-fi, and crew appreciation. Now, they throw in all of these ancillaries (some of which Princess just made up, like the "Premium Desserts" and "Juice Bar") to try and make make the value of the packages go up. Not to mention they failed to take into account that adding these aspects require more manpower. I feel so sorry for the crew at Gelato and Coffee and Cones who have to make these sundaes that most passengers don't even finish. Even if they do finish the toppings and ice cream, I've never seen anyone lick the chocolate drip off the rim of the glass.

It's really hot and humid the further the cruise goes south, like 90° with 80 to 90% humidity. Being from a dry, temperate climate, we found ourselves running towards air conditioning every time every time we've done a Panama Canal cruise. We couldn't stand being outside for very long and were melting in Panama City, Cartagena, and the Central American ports (except for Cabo and Puerto Vallarta). When we did had a balcony we seldom used it because of the heat. We did the Panama Canal in an interior cabin this past January. It was the coolest cabin we've ever had on a Panama Canal cruise because the sun didn't beat down into the cabin. IMO, (obstructed) oceanview will be fine.

Pre cruise, if your loyalty level is correct in the App, the App will reflect a wifi purchase price with the 50% Elite discount. If not, you can try calling the 800 number and see if the person on the other end will adjust the price to reflect the discount. If your loyalty is incorrect in the App and purchase the wifi pre cruise at full price, then, yes, you will have to get your discount as OBC. You can wait until you're on the ship and connected to intranet, which for most corrects the loyalty level in the App and the App will also automatically reflect the discounted price.

It's because the Princess experience doesn't appeal to most Millennials. All in all, Princess ships feel like floating retirement homes. The overwhelming sentiment of Princess' current demographic is that they don't want to cruise with kids. Millennials can scrape up enough money for an experience if they really wanted to do it. Millennials cruise on RCCL and Disney, and their fares are even higher than Princess.