KruzPrincess

22 hours ago, BirdTravels said:

7 miles. $8 roundtrip shuttle. 25 min each way. 
 

Today, there was only one HAL ship at the downtown dock. 
 

Yesterday, there were no ships at the downtown Juneau docks. 
 

To rub salt in the wound, our ShoreEx drove through town on our return and the driver would not drop us off. He said that it was NCL policy. So,,, after being at creek street, it was 25 minutes back to Ward Cove and 25 minutes (and $8) to return. 

That honestly stinks. 

Delete. 

We got notification of the change for a March cruise, too. In addition to the Maui change, we noticed that the itinerary says we leave Honolulu at 6pm. It used to be 11pm. That gives us a much shorter time to see things in Honolulu. I liked being in port late seeing the lights. 

2 hours ago, Astro Flyer said:

Thanks for the photos…I noticed that the Lobster Roll price increased to $15 from $12 in the photo posted from the 7/25 cruise.

I was thinking the same thing. 

8 hours ago, AF-1 said:

For those who asked question about Marriott Waterfront.  I used lyft to get from airport to hotel and then from hotel to port.  I arrived three days prior and did sightseeing;  looking at Oceania, and NCL dock across the street from hotel made me think;  hmmm I should have sailed with them instead of Princess.  But anyway,  if you want seafood;  there is a place across street from Marriott right where the cruise ships dock.  Up the hill 1/4 mile is Pikes fish market and the original Starbucks on Pike Street.  Have fun on your cruise.  

I’m following the “live” thread for the Encore on the NCL board and it looks great. They still have self serve buffet and had crab legs on it the first night. Of course, the crab may not be on subsequent cruises. No mask or mention of mask requirements on future cruises...yet. At least, I haven’t seen anyone post about it. I’m so jealous. I’d be happy to be on either ship. 

Did they have Covid testing options for people who are handicapped or have reduced mobility? That’s a long line to stand in for some people. 

How are things being handled in the buffet?

22 minutes ago, Thrak said:

 

The last few cruises we have been on the library was pretty much a joke anyway - although it did provide a quite place to read. We always found a different place to read but did see some folks who were in there fairly regularly. It wasn't a place to peruse a lot of reading possibilities though. Face it, there are a lot of really slow readers out there who wouldn't manage to finish most books during their cruise. (Depending of course, on the length of the cruise.)

 

Edit: Sorry if I offended anyone. In my household the TV rarely worked so we went to the library. We read all the time. I still read all the time. When I was 15, Star Trek came out. I took the tubes out of the TV, got my mom to take me to Safeway where they had a tube tester, persuaded her to replace the bad tubes, (multiple tubes...) and repaired the TV myself because I wanted to be able to watch Star Trek.

I don’t want to go off topic here too much, but some Princess ships have had a good selection of books and some are terrible. I’ve read as many as 15 books during a two week cruise and they were all from the library. I will miss it. 

29 minutes ago, Maddies Mom 46 said:

 

Now, dinner. We had dinner with a couple that we met this morning on the ship. The wait staff were a little cluster because we hadn’t reserved together, but they did seat us together. I have to explain that John and I are buffet people and today’s dinner did not change our minds. Dinner was ok but I went to the buffet later and found all of the same foods plus more choices so we probably won’t be changing our habits. I will continue with the menus, however.

 

I’m a buffet person, too. Will you share how things are being done there? Is everything being served by staff? Is anything self serve? Is there a salad bar? How does that look? Thank you. Have fun. I’m jealous. 

So this is probably the space from taking the library away. Personally I ‘d rather have the library, but they don’t make money from it.  

You can order the Caesar salad from the regular menu and ask them to put chicken fingers from the children’s menu on top. It’s a great entree if you’re looking for something different. You can get grilled chicken, too, of course. 

I never get emails from Princess and I have been cruising with them for 30 years. I do get the insurance email after I book a cruise. I have tried many times to get this fixed to no avail. It’s good to know I’m not alone. 

9 hours ago, HaveWeMetYet said:

So you go out to all sorts of places with crowds of people that are not vaccinated but you won't get on a cruise ship. I don't get it.

 

But I don’t go out to all sorts of places with crowds of unvaccinated people. I’m not alone in that. I have 3 cruises booked and none of them are out of FL. I hope other states respect the cruise lines choices on what is necessary to protect their passengers and employees. 

I priced Luggage Valet once after I had surgery and was thinking it would be nice to have someone else handle my luggage. It was several years ago and it was more expensive than I expected. More than $100 a bag. I would have been happy to pay that. I didn’t use it, so I don’t have any personal experience. There were some restrictions, too. 

7 hours ago, PACD_JG said:

Thanks for the feedback.  We are going on an Alaska cruise on the Sapphire in June 2022, so I guess I'll get a first-hand experience on a Grand class.  Maybe that will impact my decision to stay small or go bigger.

The Sapphire Princess is a Gem Class ship. Sapphire and Diamond were sister ships. Loved the Sapphire. 

I read on another social media site that the Ruby Princess is going into dry dock and some cruises are being cancelled, but I don’t know if that’s true. 

I like both, but Princess is my first choice. 

If you want to spend the money for he Haven on NCL you will have a very good experience. Nothing on Princess compares to the Haven which is like a cruise within a cruise. 

Outside the Haven, NCL is more crowded. I’ve only been on the big ships. NCL has money makers and Haven space on the top deck, so the pool space for regular folks is tight. The entertainment on NCL is very good. You need to make reservations for some shows. I like the casual atmosphere. Some specialty restaurants are good and fun. Some of them are mediocre. MDR has decent food, but the menus don’t change a lot. It is advisable to make reservations for dining. They have interesting music venues. More smoke in the casino. 

Princess is more traditional. There are more pool options and a lot more outdoor seating. Entertainment is typical cruise ship entertainment: singers, dancers, comedians, and shows. There are dress expectations for the MDR. There are other dining options if you don’t want to dress up for the couple of formal nights. Princess has  Movies Under The Stars which some love and some dislike. Princess has specialty restaurants that are quite popular, but they vary by ship (Crown Grill, Sabatini’s, Alfredo’s, Salty Dog, etc). Princess is instituting a new plan where you can make dining reservations ahead of time. They also have anytime dining. 

Dang. It will be interesting when they sail from FL/TX without a vaccination requirement. 

In the beginning, there will likely be buffets, but they won’t be self service. Staff will serve the food. In time, depending on how things go, they could go back to self service. 

On 4/30/2021 at 4:34 AM, rbtan said:

So it's safer if you serve yourself? Safer for whom?

Did I say it was safer? I think it’s just as safe. Covid is transferred through the air. You’re far more likely to catch it standing in long lines of people talking and yelling out their orders to workers than you are making a fast trip to grab your own food and leave. Standing in multiple lines to get different things increases the odds. There isn’t enough room in the buffet for people to socially distance and wait to be served. While I think it’s highly desirable for everyone to have clean hands, there’s very little chance of catching Covid from surfaces. So far, there’s no proof that Covid is carried in food. 95% of cruisers are going to be vaccinated. The switch from self serve buffets isn’t going to stop transmission of Covid. It’s likely it will be easier to catch it in the elevator or standing in line. The experience I shared was to say staff served food isn’t perfect. And, maybe it is safer to have self service. Safer for me. 

I don’t get them, nor do I get any advertisements from Princess. I read about the elite pre-sale on a Facebook group. My friend received the email late in the day yesterday. 

I just noticed the Princess statement is dated  March 4, 2021, so this isn’t new information. There are rumors about vaccination requirements that are coming by May 1, so I guess I’ll wait to see if they change anything else in the near future. 

This will be a dealbreaker for my friends who just go to the beach and shop in every port. I could probably go on a cruise and stay on the ship, but it would get old. I like to be able to get off and just go for a walk. This isn’t new information, but thinking my friends won’t be cruising and I’ll have to decide if I want to go solo. 

I eat salad from the salad bar every day of my cruise, sometimes for lunch and dinner, and I like to make it myself. On the Royal class ships, Princess has a nice, mostly well kept, uncrowded salad bar. I went on the HAL Eurodam a couple years ago for 15 nights. Often times I would have to wait for 15/20 minutes or more to have someone make my salad. This was even when there were only a couple people ahead of me. There wasn’t room for social distancing. The salad bar had several choices, but you couldn’t really see what was in each container.  A child or a couple children would be ordering their salad and it would take a LONG time as each one asked what every item was. Many adults did this, too. The server would use tongs to fill your salad bowl and use the same ones between all containers. They would pour in the amount of salad dressing they thought was appropriate, often a lot, and proceed to mix it all up. Then, they would take the tongs and dunk them into a container of water with other tongs. For the next person they would pull tongs out of the same container of dirty water and serve again. I never saw them change that container. They clearly were cross contaminating between foods, salad dressing and dirty water. Just because they serve you doesn’t mean it’s that much safer. Princess changes their serving utensils every 15 minutes. That’s the plan, anyway. They change them if they see anyone do anything unsanitary. Sometimes I ask them to change it and they comply. 

This is the conclusion of a CDC report this week regarding Covid transmission from surfaces. Covid transmission is via air particles. Yes, it is possible from surfaces, but the likelihood is very low. I’ve been saying this for months now. Long lines waiting to be served, with people talking, asking questions and yelling out their orders, is far more likely to spread the virus through the air than having people go and grab their food. There is no proof that Covid is transferred in food. Hand washing has always been good. Wear gloves if you like. Sanitize your hands when you get to your table. Serving food does help with norovirus, not Covid. Self service buffets and salad bars are opening up across the country. You’re more likely to catch Covid eating at your table than getting food at the buffet. You’re more likely to catch it in an elevator. If the cruise line requires vaccinations, and follows guidelines on changing serving utensils, etc. serving food is really not going to make that big a difference.