West Coast Gal

Hopefully Princess will read this thread.

 

Without exception everyone on this thread, agrees that the dishes should either be left in the cabin or RC phoned and asked to collect.

 

No-one thinks leaving them in the corridor is appropriate.

 

Princess - If you are reading this, perhaps you might consider putting a card on the Room Service delivery tray asking people not to leave the dishes in the corridor.

Oh Boy, I second your proposal . . that would be a great idea for Princess!

If the mini suite is on the tail end of the ship, I would love to have the balcony when pulling into and out of ports, so you can see what is on both sides

Thank you. That clears things up. This will be our first Princess cruise, and we're new to cruising generally, so I'm not up on any of this stuff. I booked with Princess and got no OBC or anything special, but that's okay. I'll keep my eyes open for deals if we ever cruise again.

Yikes . . . yep keep your eyes open, I always book with a TA to get more specials [not all TAs are cruise savy though}

We will be spending 2 nights in Seattle prior to our May 17th cruise and I need some advice regarding transportation.

 

We plan on relying on the light rail pretty heavily, from the airport to our hotel, Doubletree Arctic Club, and to sight-see in downtown given that Pioneer Station from what I can tell, is only a block from our hotel. However, I have a few questions:

 

- Is the one block from Pioneer Station to our hotel an "easy" walk or is it hilly?

- DH would love to go to the Museum of Flight. What is the best way to get to the Museum? From what I can see the light rail does not go near the Museum.

- The hotel does not offer a shuttle to Bell Street @ Pier 66 - is it easy to get a cab the day of departure or should I make arrangements prior? And is a cab to the pier our only option?

 

Thanks for your input!

Make sure that you ask the hotel to get a peek at the Arctic Dome ballroom, it is quite an awesome site! In fact the history of this place is incredible, originally a men's club, in fact the room that the valet parking guys use was the "special" entrance for the ladies of the night. I use ABC Transportation 206 242 0102, town car and cheaper than taxis.

Our summer season looks unusually bad this year in terms of hotel prices; the travel people at my firm are freaking out.

 

Seattle's downtown is barely a mile wide and about three miles long, so there aren't any horrible locations. I would tend to suggest Seattle Center/South Lake Union (Hyatt Place, Holiday Inn Express, Courtyard, Silver Cloud) as they tend to be more reasonable and aren't so far off the grid that you can't enjoy the sights.

I agree with VibeGuy, there is also a Hampton Inn. Seattle traffic can get ridiculous, so a 30 min drive can turn into twice or more of that. Besides, the Seatac Hwy 99 area is not the safest place to stay. You can take the historic monorail from Seattle Center/Space Needle to a few blocks to Pike Place Market.

Good suggestions. Thanks! We can always splurge and spend more if something looks really great but we're more casual folk, and our first choice would be something with entrees topping out around $25 or so. I guess I should expect a downtown/waterfront area to be much higher than the local Red Lobster. ;)

 

I'll check some online menus of the places you mentioned and around the area.

One thing about Seattle is, we are a "casual" town . . .there are very few places that you can go that casual won't work for you. I have been to opening night of a big play and the sequin gowned lady is sitting next to a flannel shirt and jeans couple! grin . . in other words, just go with what sounds good and don't worry about it. Seattle restaurants have fabulous service and food.

Booked a room at SeaTac Clarion Hotel in Seattle for before cruise and after. Will use Shuttle Express ($12 per person one way) to get to and from port. Looks to be just steps from light rail for our visit to downtown etc.

 

Anyone ever stayed here? We don't need anything fancy, but would like to be safe and clean.

 

JB

SeaTac area is not a safe area, like after dark I would not want to be outside. The light rail is quite a hike approx 20 blocks from the hotel.

I keep seeing references to STILA, but I can't find a website for them. Maybe it's by a different name (?).

 

Do they only do airport pickups, or do they pick up from other locations as well (like airport hotel to pier 91, and pier 91 to airport)? Do they have SUVs or Minivans for 4 people+luggage?

 

Thanks.

STILA's contract with Seattle is they are the sole taxi pick up AT Seatac

Airport, that is the only place they can pick up. Personally I use ABC Transportation, [town cars] Steve is the dispatcher 206 242 0102, cheaper than taxi's.

We're staying a couple of days post cruise in Seattle. We have an 8 am United flight from SEATAC. I'm guessing a 5:30 am pickup from the Hampton Inn Downtown would be OK but not knowing early morning Seattle traffic I thought I'd ask here. We're probably going to use Century Car Service for $50.

 

The date of the flight is July 15 (Wednesday).

 

We considered staying at the airport but with just a couple of days for sightseeing we thought staying the last night downtown was best.

Seems a little high $$ for your Car Service . . . I use ABC Transportation, [town cars] 206 242 0102 Steve is the dispatcher

We are flying in to Seattle May 31 and spending 5 nights before cruising June 5. We will also have one full day in Seattle when our cruise returns June 12 since we are flying red-eye out June 13... I am looking for both lunch and dinner restaurants that are reasonably priced. I am seriously thinking of food trucks for lunches most days (thoughts?), and I am pretty sure we will do the Space Needle restaurant for lunch June 12. What are some Seattle area restaurants that are not very expensive? I would love to pay $20 or LESS per person, and although my husband is a seafood fan, I would rather not eat seafood.

I don't know that it makes a difference, but our Seattle days will be Sunday through Thursday pre-cruise.

 

 

Thanks in advance!

--Susan

I agree, I live in Seattle and this is the best thread . . . fyi, if you want to eat at the Space Needle make sure that you make reservations . . . ask for a window seat better chance of getting one. It is a incredible experience, and it rotates once in an hour

Have you tried the Arctic Club Doubletree (this is also a Hilton property)? It's closer to Pioneer Square, but only a block away from the light rail. We are staying there prior to our May cruise and I got the room for $179 a night.

 

Given it's location, we can take the light trail from SeaTac and save on cab fare, plus from what I've read it's a really easy, short commute to the Market and Space Needle.

Great Location . . make sure that you get them to let you see the Arctic Dome ballroom, it is simply incredible! The building was originally a men's club. . in fact, the little room that the valet parking guys utilize was the door that they let the "ladies" wink wink enter into the building.

We were faced with nearly the same dilemna for our July cruise. Downtown hotels were damn expensive, while Sea-Tac hotels are half the price (or less). So we opted just to fly in another day early and spend 2 nights in hotel for the same price. We did choose a little nicer hotel than the cheapest ones (Cedarbrook Lodge) for $170/ni + tax (AARP rate). Our flight arrives 2:45pm and we'll just take their free shuttle to the hotel and relax around the grounds that evening. In the morning we're light railing it to downtown (a mere $1 senior fare). Doing a Pike Place Food Tour, monorail to Space Needle/Cihuly, free time for shopping/misc, and then dinner before heading back to the hotel. Then in the morning we relax before catching the Seattle Express ($12pp) shuttle to Pier 91 (then the same shuttle service to Sea-Tac after the cruise).

 

We have an older senior with us that we don't want to push very hard with walking and luggage, so this looks like a pretty good balance between price, time, personal preference, etc.

YOU will love the Cedarbrook, it was initially built as a leadership center for a big bank influenced by Boeing's leadership center, the rooms are lovely, each "lodge" [building of a group of rooms] has it's own living room with a refrigerator with freebees [water, ice cream, snacks] Beautiful buildings, very northwest in design, walking trails with fountains on the property, and a 4 star restaurant. This is the safest hotel in the SeaTac area. Simply Lovely! I have stayed here a couple of times.

Believe it or not, I heard the most popular cruise out there is to Alaska, and the most expensive per day.

I give you a second vote on Cedarbrook . . . it is back in a neighborhood, so is an entirely different environment than the rest of the SeaTac area. Breakfast there is not as great, but it is a 4 star rating for other meals. In fact Cedarbrook IS the place to stay in SeaTac, exceptional place with living rooms and free goodies in the living room refrigerators [ice cream, water, malted milk balls, etc] The other place that I like to eat in that area is Sharps Roasthouse. There is a lot of mediocre restaurants in the area.

By the way, SeaTac can be unsafe, be very careful after dark.

UBER and LIFT are alive and well in Seattle, very reliable and fast.

I live in Seattle and have taken the cruise out of Seattle 3 times. June 6th is a Saturday, and you should not have traffic difficulty that early in the morning.

I booked a guaranteed balcony and just got upgraded to the highest category of balcony mid ship. And my cruise is not until November.

While of course I prefer Princess . . . the other day I was talking to a friend of mine and was floored by the deal that she got with Celebrity. I have been asking the same questions. I have always felt that Princess's service was more crisp than the other lines of her class, that Princess's itineraries were more interesting to me . . . but the food has seen a decrease in uniqueness over the years, so has many of the entertainments. I hope that their marketing department gets a clue.

I also had some problem logging on earlier in the weekend, glad to hear that it wasn't my new booking going hinky!:D

We've been on both (and will be on the Royal again in October) and they are very different but that is not to say the Caribbean Princess is bad. It didn't seem tired when we sailed a year and a half ago. In fact we loved it for the British Isles cruise because it has window suites (unlike the Royal) that cost basically the same as a mini-suite but are much larger and entitle you to all the full suite perks. It was a fantastic cabin since the BI cruise is very port intensive and the weather can be dicey.

 

Everyone's priorities are different but I wouldn't pick newness of a ship over itinerary. Hope you find something that fits your priorities -- it is a wonderful cruise especially if you go in August and attend the Edinburg Tattoo.

We are on the Caribbean Princess this Nov, and tried to book at Window Suite and it is the only category that is totally booked at this time! We were in a Window Suite and a penthouse suite on two different trips last year and we preferred the Window Suite . . Regardless, We can't wait to be on the Caribbean again

Wow this is all really good information. I am upset with my TA's assistant, they offered an upgrade to owner's suite [for a small fee] and she sent an email . . to my husband . . . he didn't open his email that night and it had a time limit on it. Why couldn't she pick up the phone, we missed out. bummer!

I didn't know about the bus from pier to pier - He has a rental car planned so we can sightsee also.

Definitely going to check out the mini bar to wine or coffee card, that was awesome information!

A week ago, we just returned from a Alaska cruise and my DH surprised me with a birthday present of a one day cruise on the Golden from Seattle to Vancouver this coming Saturday . . . I am an elite and I just wondering if anyone out there has done a one day and what to expect? [This is so weird and so fun at the same time] I booked a guaranteed mini suite and while the cruise looks booked up, we still do not have a room assignment. And by the way our Alaska cruise was in a window suite on the Grand and it was lovely!;)

Highly Highly recommend Cedarbrook, it was designed as an executive leadership center, that has been bought by a hotel chain, so that means each lodge has a living room area with a kitchenette, the refrigerators use to be stocked with water, ice cream and some other goodies [free], and there was jars of malted milk balls and other fun candy. Very very comfortable beds and the restaurant at Cedarbrook is a 4 star rated restaurant. Cedarbrook is located in a residential neighborhood off the main drag. They have a free shuttle to and from the airport, and the park like setting with walking trails is gorgeous.

I worked across the street from the airport for 7 years, Hwy 99 [international Blvd] is not safe after dark, we use to tell all of our employees not to walk to their cars alone after dark.

If you want to think about downtown, check out the Holiday Inn Express, less expensive than most and breakfast and free WiFi is included.

This thread has AWESOME stories . . okay I will admit, while they are all great, PAM you are a favorite!:rolleyes: Luckily I do not get seasick, and DH has not on a cruise, only during a fishing trip:eek: . . . almost falling out of bed was uncomfortable for him and a sleepless night.