Paula_MacFan

Immediately when it's done. The machines have timers so if they can't come back in time that's their problem. Last week we were on a land & cruise trip to Hawaii (NCL) and needed to do laundry at the hotel before boarding ship. There was a big line of people waiting for machines. I took out someone's washing and sat it on the counter. My clothes were fully washed AND dried and the washer person STILL hadn't come back. Rude. So everyone else waiting there in person for machines was supposed to wait apparently hours for this person to come back? Don't think so and everyone in line agreed 😀

If this happened to me I would immediately be on the phone with Princess and not posting on CC for help. Call the 888# -- any person there would be more helpful than anyone here on CC. Whole thing sounds fishy to me.

It's a great way to see all the islands! We did the 3-day land tour before the 7-day cruise, which NCL calls the 11-day Hawaii Cruisetour. We really enjoyed our 3 days of touring Oahu prior to the cruise and felt it really added to our overall Hawaiian experience. Stops during those days included the Polynesian Cultural Center (great!), Pearl Harbor (very moving), and Kualoa Ranch (a fun & scenic place for adventure seekers and movie buffs). We ate at Cagney's and Jefferson's Bistro -- both were excellent. We ate at the Cadillac Diner 3X and the food and service was good each time. The rest of the time we ate at the buffet or off ship. We didn't do any other specialty dining or the MDRs. In Maui we rented a car and drove up Haleakala in the morning, partway to Hana in the afternoon, and to Lahaina for supper. Well worth the $55 rental and $20 gas. The second day in Maui we did a whale watch through NCL which was great. In Hilo we did the Volcanoes Nat'l Park tour though NCL which was fine. We had thought about renting a car but since the volcanoes started erupting again the Park Service has been warning about clogged parking lots and too much traffic. We decided to let them do the driving and we saw what we wanted to see for a reasonable price. In Kona we cancelled our planned tour and just had a 'down day' taking the tender into town and doing some shopping. In the afternoon we sat by the pool and just relaxed. This cruise is so port-intensive you are really on the go a lot 🙂 On Kauai we did the Waimea Canyon tour through NCL and it was good. Again, we had thought about renting a car but decided against it due to the cost vs the excursion and also the logistics of getting the rental car at this port. We were happy with our decision. The final day on Kauai we had a wonderful scenic sail by the Na' Pali coast with awesome weather. It was a beautiful end to a great trip. We didn't do much in the evenings except sit on our aft balcony with some occasional visits to the public areas for live music. We didn't attend any of the shows of which there weren't many anyway. The ship seemed to be in good repair and the public areas were generally clean and maintained. We never had long waits for food or drinks and staff seemed sufficient to handle the passenger load. The cruise director said there were around 2,100 passengers onboard so they are getting back up to full capacity. The drink package was good to have. We never used any of our free internet minutes because we had cell service the whole time. I did use the free app intranet just to check our account balance periodically, and you can also see the daily schedule there if you don't want to look at the paper version. That's all I can think of for now. If you have any other specific questions I'm happy to try and answer 🙂

We disembarked the ship on Saturday, but we did enjoy the whole trip and had a great time. The service was fine and there was plenty of staff. We disembarked in Maui on Sunday around 8am.

We haven't seen any shuttles. We rented a car on Maui and shared a cab to the airport with another couple. Very easy & about $13 total fare. There's a taxi line with an attendant right on the pier who manages the process. In general while planning our cruise I found the specific rental agencies' websites said if they had transportation available at the pier in each port. I'd advise you to look there. Our rental pickup on Maui was very easy. Yesterday & today we are on Kauai and we haven't seen many taxis. It's my understanding there are very few in general here on this island. The only shuttle we've seen here takes you up the road to the shopping center, which is very close & walkable.

We are on board POA right now. I can try to answer any questions. We're not in the Haven so no help there.

I haven't read the whole thread but we are on POA now and appreciate the sandwich bar at the buffet. We've taken lunch off with us for picnic lunches at national parks where no food is available and we have a rental car. I'm fully aware you can't do this at most foreign ports but since we're in the US there's no restrictions.

I think you misunderstood my post. We were on the 3 day pre-cruise land tour, not the post-cruise airport transfer. Hence luggage was not an issue nor were hotels involved other than our cruisetour. We had plenty of time to see everything, essentially spending the whole day at Pearl Harbor.

Not for the USS Arizona tickets. We are on the NCL cruisetour right now and went to Pearl Harbor yesterday. NCL provides entrance ticket to general admission areas but they can't get USS Arizona tickets. It's explained in their excursion page. Also see the National Park Service page with all the info on getting your own tickets. We did that for our tour yesterday in advance. Very easy.

Are you clicking here on 'Travel Summary'? When I open/save my Travel Summary it's a 7-page PDF, and I haven't even booked any excursions yet. That's just the normal boiler-plate stuff I've had on every other Travel Summary. Not sure what you mean about 'very short'.

I always refer to the Travel Summary. Sometimes even when the OBC doesn't show up under the Payment section it will be listed on the Travel Summary. That's also the best way to see everything in one place -- all your promotions, prepaids, OBC, excursions, etc. Plus it's easy to print or save in PDF format.

Not true. We have an upcoming cruise from Southampton and here's a screenshot from our Personalizer options under the Travel tab. We're not using a Princess hotel.

Here's the Daily from 12/25/22 -- see page 4 for dress code. Dec 24-31 Freestyle Daily - Day 2.pdf

We've been to Progreso twice, once on Princess and once on RC, and both were 'one off' itineraries, i.e. not part of a regular, on-going schedule. Both times the excursions were listed later than normal since the port wasn't typically visited by either line regularly. The first time we took a tour to Celestun Biosphere to see the flamingos in their wild nesting areas. The second time we specifically chose the cruise to get to Chichen Itza. That was a long day but totally worth it (to us anyway). The pier is the longest in the world and they have shuttles just to get you from the ship to land. There wasn't much to do at the end of the pier when we were there anyway, you pretty much had to book some sort of tour to do anything. There weren't any beach/bar facilities like you'd find in Cozumel/etc. Maybe things have changed and there are more options now. Hopefully Princess will get some excursion options for you soon. In the meantime I'd probably search out independent vendor options just to see what's available.

Yes

That's the way all our EZ Air flights show up and always have. Never had any problems checking in or boarding.

Glad you had a good time. We leave in 3 weeks. I've read many positive reviews lately elsewhere. Thanks for the report!

We are long-time Princess cruisers but for Hawaii in January 2023 we are doing NCL's Pride of America. We're flying to HNL, doing 4 days pre-cruise on Oahu, then the 7-day POA 4-island itinerary. Every day of the 7 days is in port so there's no sea days (2 ports are overnight stops). While we love Princess, the thought of taking 2+ weeks off work for only 4 days in port just didn't appeal to us. Best of luck with whatever option you chose 🙂

I just called my Princess cruise planner to see about re-faring under the new promotion and the rates were all messed up. Long story short what we had was cheaper than what was showing on the Princess website because even though I selected 'Princess Plus' in the pricing section it wasn't adjusting for it. He made it sound like they are getting lots of calls about this and lots of people are confused/annoyed. I thanked him for his time anyway. Not his fault their system has problems.

Google search result: https://www.ncl.com/sites/default/files/NCL-AK-Cruisetour-Brochure-May2022-273026.pdf#node-89790 There's a section on meals as well. 31 page PDF with daily schedules and other information from NCL website.

According to some online trip reports the VOG was too heavy and also high winds made it risky to tender.

Recent trip reports from last week say Moderno and LaCucina were open but not for advance reservations.

Log into your account, click the green button 'Add or Modify Flights', then click 'Change Flights' and go through the search process. Nothing will change or cancel your existing flights until you select new ones and get all the way to the end of the process. There will be a red button to acknowledge you are canceling the old ones and rebooking the new one. It's very easy! I do it every single day to check my own existing reservations and have changed several times to get better fares. 🙂

We were able to easily get USS Arizona tickets a few days ago on Reservation.gov. Per the site: Reservations are released daily at 3 p.m. HST in two windows: 24-hours and 8-weeks in advance. So for example on January 1, tickets were released for January 2 and February 26. Tickets are $1. We are leaving in 6 weeks and everyone on our roll call was able to easily get the USS Arizona tickets. There are many reports of people getting on the stand-by line the day of and getting tickets as well. As far as the NCL Hawaii land tour, here is the brochure with all the details including schedule. Hawaiiupdated111014.pdf

https://www.princess.com/html/global/disclaimers/crew-appreciation/ All those prices are on the Princess website.