LACruiser88

The quiet, calm environment of breakfast in the Harmony Restaurant was quite different this morning.  There is now a family group of 12 and another family group of 8 in the dining room.  There are 8 young kids within the two groups.

The scene this morning was quite the "Ship Show!"  We felt sorry for the poor servers.  I think we probably should have disembarked in Vancouver.  No more short legs in our future cruises!

Off now to explore Victoria and the gardens...

1 minute ago, HotRoot said:

So, we are back to normal on Saturday.

Yes

4 minutes ago, HotRoot said:

Do we know anything about Saturday?  Will all bars be open or are we still in Canadian waters?

We will be in Canadian waters until we leave Victoria tonight.  Bar situation will be the same tonight.  And, I might add that the new passengers are a drinking crowd!

On our way to Victoria, 11 am arrival.  All onboard at 10:30 pm.  It is going to be another warm day!

3 hours ago, dreaminofcruisin said:

 

This has been true for many years. We first heard of it on an East coast Canada New England cruise in 2017. At least you will only be briefly in Canadian ports. On our cruise it was several days.

 

It has been a few years since we have sailed in Canada, either we don't remember this or we did not stay in port until so late?  🤷‍♂️  

Luckily, we still had a bottle of Shiraz (from Sydney) in our room.  We took it to Vines and our favorite stools!  And had a good 'ol time!  🍷  

We have secured a bottle of Silverado Cab for tonights repeat performance!

@PescadoAmarillo  It would have been fun!  Maybe on our next one?  🤷‍♂️

Tonight when we went down to Vines for our pre-dinner vino, we found this sign.

Apparently, Canadian rules only allow one open bar per deck while in Canadian waters.  We had never heard of this ridiculous rule!  We walked to the Crown Grill Bar and found it 5 people deep with a line down the hallway!

We walked to The Catch hoping to get a "good" glass of wine.  Mario, the Restaurant Manager, was pulling his hair out because all of their wines had been locked up and they were having to run to the Concerto MDR service bar to pick up wine for his diners.  Same situation at Alfredo's Pizzeria.  Crazy!!!  We will have the same situation tomorrow in Victoria.

There are also a bunch kids running around now.  There are close to 500 under 18 yr olds onboard.  The majority of the new passengers will be disembarking in 3 days in Seattle.  

There has definitely been a shift in "energy" onboard now.

We had a great day with our dear friend and Vancouver resident, Dena, today.  She showed us the highlights of North Vancouver and treated us to a fantastic lunch!

The Lions Gate Bridge in the background.

The view from our lunch table.  Downtown Vancouver and our ship in the background.

Miscellaneous photos from Downtown.

Lions Gate Bridge from North Vancouver

An interesting note, we just received a new mini-bar setup.  We didn't get one after the Sydney to Auckland leg.  🤷‍♂️

21 minutes ago, Joy1004 said:

Thank you so much for inviting us to follow along on your amazing journey! I hope you will do live reports on your future voyages as they are so enjoyable to read, although I know they are very time-consuming! Very much appreciated ~

Thank you!  To be honest, I almost didn't do a "Live" for this trip.  I was considering retiring from them.  I'm 50/50 on doing one for our October trip to the Far East.  We'll see...  🥺

@Yehootu  You are hilarious!!!  It was a pleasure meeting you guys.  We look forward to meeting up in Singapore in October.  Safe travels!

You can order 6 bottles at a time by calling Room Service if you have either Premier or the Plus Package.

Good morning Vancouver!

6 hours ago, Kari and David said:

I think Olivia got the numbers mixed up for her update.  I heard from Guest Servies about 1400 leaving, including crew, and 1000 joining.

Those were the numbers we were also given...

Tonight we had the last wine that we purchased in Sydney.  It was so-so, we rated the wine 86 points.  Very thin, not characteristic of a Cabernet Sauvignon.  One more bottle in our cellar, from New Zealand.

6 hours ago, Teechur said:

It is surprising that Vancouver to Seattle is a 3-day run. Does Princess intentionally extend the travel time?

On our Alaska cruise in September, we depart Victoria one evening and arrive in Seattle the next morning.

🤷‍♂️ We will be in Vancouver on Thursday, Victoria on Friday, sea day on Saturday, and disembark on Sunday.

5 hours ago, HotRoot said:

We heard 1000 disembarking and anywhere from 400 to 1400 embarking.  All numbers came from the cabin television.  We will have to wait and see.

We were given those numbers by the Guest Services Director at the MTG luncheon.  🤷‍♂️

Captain just advised that we will be going under the Lions Gate Bridge at around 2 am. 

Approximately 1,400 passengers will disembark tomorrow and 1,000 +/- new passengers will board for our 3-day run to Seattle.

Just now, Ken the cruiser said:

We have arrived back in Vancouver!!

 

We arrive in Vancouver tomorrow at 4 am, on the Majestic Princess.