CruiseCrabs

This makes a lot more sense business-wise, to be honest. Why reward those who gamed the system to get to elite (I’m looking at you, three-day cruisers) and reap rewards while not really spending while onboard? No loyalty program is really free per se and the entitlement has gotten out of hand.

I think the main problem is that working adults don’t accrue loyalty quickly enough to enjoy the perks and elites are often pins in the rears who take many cruises yet sleep in chairs in all of the prime real estate, yell at guest services, and make entitled demands yet pull shenanigans like reversing the crew appreciation. Loyalty programs are supposed to entice rebooking while encouraging word of mouth advertising and spending dollars in new areas of the brand. Princess knows darn well that many elites are cheating on then and are turning others off to the brand. I love Princess… I don’t love many of their angry, entitled elites.

Dump any hand baggage in the room after greeting every room steward along the way; store carried-on, good bubbles in the mini fridge International cafe for toasted ham and cheese sandwiches and a “thank God we are on vacation” cocktail while watching safety videos. Sign offs with photos (ship and or food/bev) for family and coworkers. Deployment of the first of the cruise crabs. Muster check in. Spa appointments for final attitude adjustments for vacation. Sail away prep (unpack, uncork, order warm potato chips on the app, and watch the last of the dock scramble.

My husband left behind his keyless key fob once. It must have been wedged out of sight. Despite contacting lost and found multiple times and it being a unique brand, it was never recovered, which turned into an expensive mistake. The good news is we now put all items into an organizer and then into the safe! We joke that the staff must have a mini museum of lost items somewhere.

Doc Martens have been a classic travel companion and many have no break-in issues. My go to trial pair have zippers so they are a breeze when I forget to put my TSA Pre Check number into a flight booking! i picked a new pair up on on sale for an upcoming cruise and a few test wears went great with no hot spots. They’re waterproof, super stable, and have some grip in case you need it. https://www.drmartens.com/us/en/1460-trinity-waterproof-slip-resistant-boots/p/27861001

An investment in an aggressive, proactive survey of current, former, and potential clients to define the real client target for each of the brands before gently nudging each brand to that target. Princess got shoved in a direction it and it’s current clientele wasn’t quite ready for and they are overlooking a generation of empty nesters who are used to being overlooked but aren’t happy about it. The increasing ship size is also changing what ports can be accessed, which is creating additional challenges for marketing. Crisis communication personnel on each ship, ready to handle major issues like security incidents or health issues and minor issues like missed ports due to weather with similarly clear, effective language. It would save ship personnel from verbal abuse and passengers from frustration due to not knowing what they need to do in some situations. Seriously, that app should be able to blast a notification to passengers, when necessary. Nobody is hanging around their cabin waiting on a paper letter. Smaller groups/fewer motor coaches, experiences truly unique to the port regions, and greater connection cultures with shore excursions. A renewed focus of food quality, technique, and service in all dining rooms and restaurants. Streamlined app that covers all reservations (including spa and salon, meals, excursions, onboard offerings, etc) in the calendar function, feedback function for reviewing meals, shows, etc. (a la most other apps), and gets rid of the casino, games, and other fluff few use that bog the whole thing down. Tighter menus in all dining rooms to improve food quality, menu cohesion, and technical execution. No smoking onboard save for one enclosed venue (not the casino) with fantastic ventilation.

I am a huge Doc Marten devotee for travel and they have some great waterproof pairs that are also slip resistant for early season Alaska voyages. The boots last virtually forever, are incredibly stable the insoles are replaceable/interchangeable, and many pair are lightweight with little to no break in period… and they are timelessly cool.

This was a special event (PR escapade, really) and not your typical vow renewal.

We thoroughly enjoyed our B2B that were two seven day trips in the same cabin. We didn’t have to disembark so we had fun hiding out on our balcony with coffee watching the disembarkation shuffle. None of our shows were repeated so perhaps we were just lucky.

👻 Methinks autocorrect has you sailing on a pirate ship!

https://www.princess.com/news/backgrounders_and_fact_sheets/factsheet/Royal-Princess-Fact-Sheet.html

Room stewards are usually an amazing team of people who make a million things happen for you while keeping you healthy and tidy during your journey. The good ones are deserving of extra tips and a cruise crab or two during the journey. I’ve only had one bad one who was on the last voyage of their contract and likely would not be returning. The rest have been amazing. Post pandemic, Room stewards have more rooms than ever to take care of and, based on what I have seen, have a LOT to manage for some folks.

Unless you are participating in some mass special event, renewals and weddings are private. This is part of the reason you pay a fee. A portion of the coordination is done in advance, the rest is finalized with a member of staff onboard. Again, both experiences I have had were special, private, and wonderful experiences.

My parents did a renewal many years ago, it was a beautiful “candlelit” ceremony with lovely flowers and additional perks. To be honest, $250 if pretty inexpensive as far as renewals go and Princess can make it a very special moment for the couple and their family/guests. The flowers were beautiful and the photographers also did an amazing job for them. My husband and I were married on a Princess ship. That was far more complicated and some things went well, other things I built contingencies for wisely. Flowers were a bit off but I had a bouquet custom sculpted so I could take it on and off the ship, We had not planned to get photos or video but, again, the on-board photographers really did a great job and we negotiated the price for the final photos.

The OG Nespresso “Classico” machines can take a variety of branded pods. They (and off brands) are ubiquitous in many Italian properties and make great coffee. I prefer Illy but Lavazza isn’t bad.

That ship class has both. I will say that class also has hairdryers in the drawer that are decent if you are looking to save some packing room/weight.

Your post prompted me to look and the same thing happened to us. We opted out of club class this time but it sounds like we will miss club class after al! We never had that problem there.

We like the medallion for drink and food orders and have named it onboard Door Dash. Navigation prompts to get you around the ship and the find your family functions are wonderful, too. However, the app needs a diet. There’s a lot of fluff that is on there at the expense of refining things like the clunkiest activity schedule ever.

There’s a vast difference between steam table slop versus proteins prepped for finishing for a massive dining room. I’ve been on the ship tour, the chef’s table “tour,” have worked in the restaurant industry, and have coordinated my share of massive catered events to know what is and is not possible. If a kitchen is trying to make a huge menu with random options every night, it’s a recipe for a train wreck. The MDR menus we saw in 2022 across three different ships were huge and lacked cohesion. Many “imaginative” dishes fell flat, sometimes because the interpretation of international cuisine was off, sometimes because the plate didn’t live up to the promise of the menu description. Quality control and plating was off—even in speciality dining and chefs table/winemakers dinner (save for Crown Grill on the Royal)—which could be a training issue post re-start but a massive menu just compounds issues. We’ll see how the menu rolls this spring. Fewer options are welcome in our books.

You can ask when you are onboard but the new chef for the line is into technique so deviation from what makes Wellington a Wellington shouldn’t happen.

It is about time that Princess reduced the number of menu offerings per night to potentially ensure that dishes came out correct and consistent! Some of the menus over the past year were less than cohesive with mocktails masquerading as cold soups, random offerings that don’t flow course-to-course, and a deep menu with offerings that can easily be ordered off-menu (shrimp cocktails are thrown together, for example) or belong elsewhere (alfredos seemed like a perfect match for… wait for it… Alfredos). I’d rather have a tight list of well-crafted, fresh plates than a deep list of food that is largely sitting warm somewhere and a deep list is a recipe for food waste, which is never a good thing in any restaurant, let alone a cruise ship. Im not mad at the new menu and, if they can finally work out rendering the ft off the duck breast correctly, I will be happier than seeing a bunch of 1990’s Princess Favorites that are on par with a boring chain restaurant, not an experience.

While we are not keen on amusement-park elements on a ship, the build isn’t bad and resolves some of the issues we have seen with suite/club class minis and poor sight lines in the piazza. We cruise to escape the “real world” and, yes, the passenger max seems like a lot, but if everyone is disbursed across the ship, this may be a good design.

We’re going in May. The DH flies his James Bond freak flag and my level of dress depends on what I am fitting into at the time but it’s always on point. I will say that my heroes are those who just vary up the t-shirt to something more festive but still a t-shirt on formal night. Do you. Don’t apologize. That’s fashion.

I second that. I will say that your comfort is up to you but definitely consider protecting your feet from sharp rocks and freshwater crustaceans. Neither make for a fun experience.