Cruise Raider

We’ve. It found it to be open during the daytime. This was a while ago but they seem to open up shortly before the Platinum, Elite and Suite event .. so around 4:30 PM. The closest be would be at one of the midship pools or inside the buffet. The aft pool bar is only open occasionally. I believe Adagios also only opens for the evening. We’ve gone up to Skywalkers and ordered drinks via the app a couple of times during the day. It took a while for the delivery but they did get there.

I think anytime in Sept or Oct are great months. We have celebratory days in mid and late Sept so we usually tend to go then. Since my DH is colorblind, he really doesn’t understand what most of us get all excited about with the changing of the color anyway.

This actually happened to us a lot prior to the medallions. True story and honest mistake … we were onboard years ago and they asked for our cabin number when ordering drinks. We were in #C624 and kept giving them #C642 (not sure of the real cabins numbers but you get the point .. I simply mixed up the number). We then went to our cabin and couldn’t figure out why we couldn’t get into the door. We had a good laugh about it and went to the front desk to let them know those charges were ours. Since they have photos of you at the point of charge, this happens way less than it used to. Plus, they always ask our names. However, there are times when they simply have to write your room number down when they are super busy and don’t have a device to scan your medallions. We check our accounts on the app every couple of days and it seems like incorrect charges happen way less often than they used to.

I’ve booked my nephews in their own cabin when they cruised with us in the past. They were twenty at the time but they said it could be done if they were as young as 16 as long as we accepted full responsibility for them. They were even willing to allow them to be on a different deck but luckily, we could book them in a room right next door to our cabin.

@kluv2cruz .. you are I are exactly the same! Only those porcelain cups and saucer for my cappuccino in the morning. I also love the egg bites .. all three varieties. That green smoothie item is also pretty good.

I actually like the accessories sold on the ship. For everyday, we bought the sustainable (for my DH) and silicone (for me) bands. We both find the. Very comfortable and each one was under $20. We used our OBC for those. Right after the restart, I was gifted a silver metal bangle onboard. Once they adjusted the clip by bending the metal a bit, it stays securely in place. I tend to wear that one for dinner. Anyway, I’m not one to go out to spend a lot of money on something when I don’t have to. After all, it comes with a free lanyard and many people just wear that, men and women alike. However, I don’t like too many things hanging around my neck and we cruise so often, thought the bands would be well worth our while. They’ve held up for over 20 cruises so far and aren’t even showing the slightest signs of wear. We’ve also gotten the clips that come with the premium package and haven’t used them as of yet but may be giving them a try one of these days.

Not a direct answer to your question but this should help. The Global Entry and TSA will be of benefit to you and it sounds as though 90 minutes should be enough time. The busiest times at HNL checkpoints are generally 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. and 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The busiest days to travel locally and nationally are Thursdays and Fridays as well as Sundays and Mondays. TSA strives to get travelers through the general security screening process in less than 30 minutes and through TSA PreCheck screening in less than 10 minutes.

We always take a double pour from Vines to dinner. They oftentimes don’t have time to go to Vines get the wines we like. Now that they are filling the ships, I need to try going to the deck 5 dining room for dinner.

I’ve heard that before but it just isn’t entirely true. You are right about certain viruses being immune to hand sanitizers but not all. Norovirus, being a non-enveloped virus, is particularly tough to get rid of by using run of the mill hand sanitizers. Hand sanitizer is better than nothing but it is still better to wash your hands fastidiously and keep them away from your face.

Oh no! That sounds so awful! So sorry to hear of your experience

They are not offering it online at this time but I was just notified that my renewal was approved so should be getting it shortly.

Hank, the Emerald Princess had excellent wines onboard on our last cruise on the Emerald earlier this month. We enjoyed two dinners in the Crown Grill, as well as some photos. It was well worth the upgrade price for the wines alone. By excellent wines, I am talking about Rombauer Chardonnay and Seghesio Zinfandel and some Hartford Chardonnay and Substance cab. The Grigich Hills Merlot and Camus Cab were a definitely plus. Even though the Caymus cab was over the limit, it was well worth the extra charge for a special occasion. There were also some very nice sparkling wines and champagne. I just love California wines! I live in the right area for that but it’s still great to get great wines on a cruise.

I’ve had luck n the past before when I’ve booked the premier package ahead of time. I haven’t tried it lately because we usually check n the availability of decent wines before we upgrade,

Unless you have the premier package, you really can’t book specialty restaurants without paying for them ahead of time.

Better yet, try quick coach.com to Bellingham. I almost hate to give up that info because I enjoy my non-filled flights back home, but wow! The bus takes you right from Canada Place to the BLI airport (or SeaTac). It’s clean, it’s on time, it has a bathroom on the bus .. love this option! Of course, I have family in Bellingham so always great to go get lunch and a visit before our late afternoon flight back home on our nonstop Southwest or Allegiant.

I think Princess has improved exponentially since the post-CoVid restart! I could be happier with both Princess and even the app makes life so much easily. I have been on an average of a cruise a month since then and nothin with the app has been, even in the least bit, insurmountable. Cruisecritic has seemed to lost its appeal for so many. I still like it but there is a lot less interest or traffic than there used to be.

Just got notification that our passports have been approved .. yay! I expect to get them within the week or maybe next week. Either way, we will have them in time for our cruise up to Alaska next month. This month, we have too much stuff going on so, couldn’t fit another cruise in there anyway.

I may even have enjoyed Moorea more than I have loved my sea days. We met the kindest family there .. half Tahitian and and half Swiss. One of the bothers is an actually blonde .. his real name was Reggie but they called him Blan Blan. Him and his brother William and sister, Solange, took us everywhere and made us part of their family. We even got to go to their house and meet their parents. Oh, I just love the people of Moorea.

I am with you … they don’t have to call at any ports as far as I’m concerned. I think the days at a sea offer such gorgeous scenery.

The only times I’ve bid for an upgrade was when I bid on a premium balcony and once on a full suite. We love aft facing and midship cabins. On the Grand class, that’s a given that we’d get a cabin in a preferred location if they accepted our bid. And, the suites are pretty much separated out by location as well. We’ve never had a bid accepted but did notice once that when there was a price drop for a premium balcony, we removed the bid and paid for the upgrade instead. It was actually cheaper that way.

Looks like Vines … Hi to Aldrin!

The deluxe balconies (obstructed or not) can be in different locations throughout the ship. And no, they won’t necessarily put you mid ship. And you also can’t choose whether or not to accept it. Once you bid, you will be charged and your original cabin may be gone. If you’re happy with the location you’re in, you probably shouldn’t bid on an upgrade. Only bid if you’d be happy with any of the cabins in the category you’re bidding on. I believe your best best is to stick with your current cabin and if the ship isn’t full, ask to pay for an upgrade once onboard. At least then they could tell you which cabins are open and you have that option to say yes or no to what’s available.

Perhaps it is more prevalent on Facebook but there does seem to be a lot of people that ask questions about the need for a passport on specific cruises. All of the info is outlined on the Princess website, along with other government websites. But, the answers to these questions are oftentimes blatantly wrong! So, I guess the purpose of this is to answer some of those questions through my personal experience.

For US citizens: You only need a certified birth certificate and a government issued ID, such as a Real ID or regular driver license or ID card. But, you do need both. I am not entirely sure about flying out of the country as we haven’t ever done that without a passport. I know I can get into Canada or Mexico via land crossings without a passport. I have not expedited my passport because I won’t do so until I really need to, which is in late Sept. I was going to renew it early but we had a cruise up to Vancouver planned for late April. We sent our passports in the day after we returned home. So, it’s been several weeks already .. hoping to get them back for our Alaska cruise but if we don’t have them by mid Sept, I will make those calls to expedite it. I don’t want to spend the extra money if it’s not required.

We are frequent cruisers and didn’t want to give up some of our booked cruises just because the US passport offices are so very slow in getting passport renewals done. We wouldn’t intentionally book a cruise knowing we wouldn’t have a passport in time but, we just took a short closed loop cruise from Los Angeles with the only foreign stop being in Ensenada. This was a risk we were willing to take as in case of an emergency, as we are close enough to the US southern border to make it to San Diego without having to take a flight. We did take a certified copy of our birth certificates and our Real IDs. We also took a copy of our marriage license just in case the name change may have caused any issue. Well, it didn’t and we were in and out through check in within the same amount of time as using a passport. It was the same for going through immigration upon reentering the US .. very quick and easy. If we don’t have our passports back in time for our next closed loop cruise up to Alaska, we will do the same. Even though we didn’t need the marriage license, I will take it again, nevertheless. Better to be safe than sorry. While we don’t recommend cruising without a passport, in this case, we knew the risk was low and didn’t particularly want to cancel this sailing. We are well aware that we wouldn’t be able to fly back from a foreign port in case of an emergency. As I mentioned, the risk was very low and Ensenada is a port that is close enough to the US border that again, we took our chances. I may have to take my chances again for Alaska next month, too. Our one stop in Canada is also low risk .. hope it’s not a risk I have to take but I won’t cancel a cruise over it.