janecambridge

That's great news.Glad it has worked out for you. I have found this thread extremely interesting although I do not have,never had,or will never hire a nanny.The power of cruise critic is priceless.Well done everyone and best wishes to your family Jack..

We did a 4 night taster last year on Cunard.Loved it and don't see why you wouldn't.:)

Just off Emearld last Satureday,had a good crew.

Very unhappy with Michaelangelo.Waited 3 nights on the trot for over half an hour or more for table.Requested seated dining at 8.15 and got a wonderful table,excellent service and much better food.

Found the Horizon court very busy and often got frustrated at no tables.

Sat at Caribe cafe,outside a lot and enjoyed that.

Cabin superb with great steward.

Preferred The Adagio as best bar as quieter.Best bar staff too.

Cocktails were really good.

Sabatinis was better then Crown Grill.

Met some lovely people on our roll call.

All embarkations and disembarkations were done with sleekness.

Never a problem with checking our bill over the week.

Patters not as good as I remember them on Star.Just seemed to be adverts.

Didn't do entertainment.

Good choice of MUTS films and music.

This is just our personal opinion of course.

Have a great trip.

If you had booked one cabin and your wife the other and planned to switch room cards after boarding, then your wife could have canceled the 2nd cabin.

 

How do you do that? The 2 cards open different cabin doors.If you don't swap cards,then The nanny can put whatever she likes on the wife's card!

Is the mini bar set up a one-off? Or do they refill it during the course if the cruise?

I had it last week on Emerald in MDR.It was poor.Tough meat and very very thin wet pastry.The pheasant served at the same meal was one of the best meals on board.

Lobster on Emerald last week.But poorly cooked and small.two shrimp with it.

I don't understand why any parent would be happy to let their child swim in such a strong current when there are other pools that are a lot safer.even adults struggled at times to keep themselves balanced without banging into others or the side of the pool.Any adult could quite easily knock a child hard whilst trying to swim against the current and losing their co ordination,Isn't it about safety,parental supervision or not?

]4. If a stateroom steward is notified, after the cruise, that one of his guests has neither prepaid nor auto-paid, then he can conclude one of the following:

(a) the guest has very limited funds and cannot afford to pay gratuities;

(b) the guest could afford to pay, but was raised by parents, or in a culture, that rejects the idea of gratuities;

© the guest was dissatisfied with the steward's service and may or may not have reported the dissatisfaction [to be determined soon];

(d) the guest intended to pay him a gratuity in cash, but forgot to do so;

(e) the guest DID pay a gratuity in cash, and it was the amount that the guest thought was fair.

 

 

We spoke to a couple who after three days of waiting nearly an hour for ATD,removed their auto tip.They had 4 questions on a slip of paper to tick their reason,2 were about their dining experience.so it isn't just stewards,culture,forgetfulness and limited funds.It goes further than that.

No, they charge your account once you're on the ship, and you have cancellation rights up until a day or two before the excursion--cancellation deadlines vary by excursion.

 

Correct....:)

When you book your shore excursions in advance through Princess, you will be charged the price at which you booked. If (and it sometimes does) the price of the excursion goes up, you are locked in at the price when you booked. :)

LuLu

 

 

Last week that happened to us. We pre-booked at $55,it went up to $59 a short time later,then we had to cancel and it was at $69.

What is a WS? Is it a suite with a window? Does it have suite extras?

Lovetocruiseprincess

Thank you for the photos.rules numbered 10 and 11 are two rules that were not adhered to.As I said in my original posting,there were buckets of beers ( glass ones) around the pool.as for getting into pool slowly-absolutely not by kids.

 

I was so happy when I found the spa pool thinking it was adults only.I am an extremely strong swimmer but have undergone knee surgery recently that involved bone marrow and stem cell therapy,reconstruction.So to find somewhere that I could feel 'safe' to swim in after removing my brace,was an extra benefit.I felt very very vulnerable,nervous and actually scared of any damage to my knee when the kids were jumping in randomly.

What a shame then that someone who may be permanently disabled cannot have a 'safe' place to swim.

One restaurant...garnish on all meals.other restaurant...none

One restaurant...hot plates with hot meals.other restaurant ..none

One restaurant...chef cooking fresh pasta three times a week who comes and discusses it before you order.other restaurant...not once.

One restaurant...steak knife with steak.other restaurant ...not.

One restaurant..cheeses as advertised with soaked apricots and garnish as described....other restaurant...2 cheeses they thought I would like.few apricots thrown on plate and no garnish.

One restaurant...biscuits for cheese on plate..other restaurant,basket of packet biscuits.

One restaurant..sit down when you book..other restaurant..half to one hour wait with a buzzer,

And on and on. We continued to ask about Michelangelos later on in the cruise.

 

 

This was the difference between Michelangelos and Bottecelli.apologies if the subject changed slightly.

The main point was that this pool has a swim simulator.Very strong when on.

All pools are dangerous to unsupervised children but more so with this one.It has a very strong current.

Jacuzzi pools should not be ever used by children if there is a high water temperature.It raises the child's temperature suddenly and a child's brain can't cope with this,so as seen with sudden rapid temperatures due to infection,the child will convulse in order to help reduce their temperature.

I saw this sign that said adults only.It is there.

I was not referring to a pool that has child supervision,but a pool that is adult only for safety reasons.

Often there were no other adults in the pool.

One restaurant...garnish on all meals.other restaurant...none

One restaurant...hot plates with hot meals.other restaurant ..none

One restaurant...chef cooking fresh pasta three times a week who comes and discusses it before you order.other restaurant...not once.

One restaurant...steak knife with steak.other restaurant ...not.

One restaurant..cheeses as advertised with soaked apricots and garnish as described....other restaurant...2 cheeses they thought I would like.few apricots thrown on plate and no garnish.

One restaurant...biscuits for cheese on plate..other restaurant,basket of packet biscuits.

One restaurant..sit down when you book..other restaurant..half to one hour wait with a buzzer,

And on and on. We continued to ask about Michelangelos later on in the cruise.

Thanks for reporting back.

 

Hope you enjoyed your time on Emerald and please let us know any little insider tips you picked up. We are sailing in October, still seems a long way off but I know it will here in a flash.

 

Hi

 

We had poor meals in Michalangelo.It has it's own kitchen.Different sous chef.The other two share a Kitchen and they have the same sous chef.Suggest you anytime dine or pre booked dining in Devincis or Botticelli.I can go into that more if you want me too anytime.

Use the pool at the front if you like a swim.Adult only and has a swim resister in it.

Best coffees and teas at international cafe.

I took a tray and used it to collect our breakfasts for the balcony.I know it looked strange but made the lift easier.

Adagio was by far our favourite bar. the bartenders( especially Ron) make the best cocktails and are very cheerful.It is a quiet bar which we needed with a full ship.

Not sure of your sleep times!! But Skywalkers is brilliant late at night.

If you have the drinks package,make sure you ask for cans of coke or tonic instead of the tap stuff. Much better.

Enjoy

Oops.sorry it was at the front of the ship.we did ask the boys to leave as they were also jumping in directly under the sign that asks you not to.But after a while they took no notice of me.

Just stepped off Emerald.

We noticed that the adult only pool at the back of the ship under The Sanctuary was not supervised.I understand that there is no life guard but no one seemed bothered that children were in the pool and running around the edge of the pool.We did report it to the young man in The Sanctuary,who told us to phone the purser.We did and he then rang the young man back to tell him to remove the children.He did, but after that no one seemed to be around. We did notice twice, that there were also buckets of beers left lying around and piles of wet towels.Who is responsible for this?

As the pool had a resistance swim machine on it,it was a bit of a worry.

I cancelled as I had pre booked in pounds and the conversion rate was an extra $10a day.so I rang and it was removed. It did take about 8 days before it was put back into my bank account,but done immediately.

Pre booking is fine as long as you are not paying in GBpounds. Their conversion rate is way off.we cancelled ours and bought once onboard.

Just got off Emerald today and found the bar staff more then helpful.Only one got funny when we ordered 2 glasses of wine and two bottles of water at the same time with two cards.But at the end of the day he was only doing his job.

Since the CDC defines "heavy drinking" as 15 drinks a week for men and 8 for women, we're clearly entering problem drinking territory here, whatever the economics of the situation.

 

People tend to think that those of us who have the package,are alcoholics or heavy drinkers.NO.

Yes we did use it for wine,beer,cocktails and the odd after dinner drink,but we used it heavily for decent teas and coffees instead of buffet rubbish and also cans of proper coke and tonic and not the fizzy machine stuff. We also enjoyed many bottles of water and a large carbonated water with our dinner each night.We got our money's worth..

Just off Emerald last week. I started to get to like Twinnings over Liptons.

 

Hot water just not quite hot enough for a great cuppa though

 

I agree.The water is not hot enough for tea.We had the tea in International cafe which was a lot better. They were serving twinings in all the main dining rooms this week on. Emerald..

Sabatinis turned out to be best.Not much to compare but the light and airiness of sabatinis outweighed the dark,dingey room of crown grill.

Plus we felt the staff were much more professional.

So...auto tip left on and any extra tip to cabin steward,he keeps.
Auto tip off and any tip given to them has to be shared.???
What is the gratuity at the bar then? Do the workers who work behind the scenes get any extra for going beyond their duty,ie special food requests etc?
Very confusing...