wallyj

With all Princess ships converting to Dine my Way for the dining rooms. It will be ship and passenger dependent if you will be able to get same table and time every night. What happens when multiple parties want the same table at approximately the same time? Restaurant manager will do his best and at least get you in same section of your preferred servers. Window locations seem to be popular, but at night, not much to see unless on Norway or Alaska where it is still light outside. I have heard reports of passengers requesting same table every night and being accommodated and on other ships told, sorry, the best we can do is same section/servers, or even, sorry, the computer assigns the tables now with Dine my Way, but you are welcome to wait till a table in your desired section becomes available.

@SWACruising, there was a great, imo, live from Majestic from June of this year, where they did the cruise first but also land tour after and had great pictures and recommendations regarding food, activities and the lodges. I do not know how to copy the link, but search for thread title ‘its going to be majestic’ by @Stealthdog. Going in May, animals are not as active and Salmon will not be running yet. NB , with Princess you usually get Glacier Bay and College Fiord, SB usually includes Glacier Bay and Hubbard Glacier. The ships you are considering are smaller and do not have a ‘concierge lounge’ which are on the Princess Royal Class ships. Booking a full suite will give you access to ‘suite’ breakfast usually held in the morning in one of the specialty dining venues, which gives you made to order ‘attentive’ waiter service. Full suite will also entitle you to ‘reserve class’ dining in the assigned dining room where a section is specifically only for reserve class, has different table cloth and usually ‘orchid’ flowers instead of ‘princess lily’ flowers on the table. See suite benefits on the Princess website. Unless you have a plus or premier pkg, if you choose Sapphire, this is the only ship of your choices, with Casual dining venue ‘Alfredo’s’ that would have a charge. Caribbean Princess may be scheduled to have Planks BBQ and Steamers Seafood reactivated by 2025.

If you are all in the same stateroom, it should not matter and easier for the person putting in the order, assuming you all 3 have the package. I just had an issue on my Emerald sailing. One day I noticed my count was off for number of alcohol drinks. I went to GS and they have a device to identify what and where you were charged. I recognized all orders except one which was for a beer which I did not order. The guest services agent would not remove the order/count from my folio and said if I do go over my 15 allotment, they will credit my 16th drink charge, but of course I would need to return to GS to have it done. I almost made a note in my mind to make sure this would happen, but I did not, and I assume the same logic for your case, unless an account maxes out and is charged for a 16th drink, they do not want to be bothered to fix allocations to the correct counts. Someone got a free beer on my account somehow. It only happened once on my 16 night sailing. If the charges are all going to DH which eventually caused a charge for going over 15, then yes, GS needs to remove and you should insist the server scan each medallion for each persons order so the correct count it being allocated to each account. The scanners have history, so for dinner service they only need to scan or input your info once and can reorder your 2nd glass of wine by scrolling the history.

Plus pkg includes ANY 2 fitness classes. They cannot be booked before sailing as the class schedules are not set in stone and most likely vary depending on itinerary and if it is a port or sea day. Go to the fitness center and they will have the sign up sheet for the classes with the date and times the particular classes are scheduled. Every type of class(yoga, trx, cycle, stretchlab) are not offered everyday.

Just to be a little clearer, your ‘cruise fare’ is locked in once you book. ‘Upgrading’ to the Plus or Premier pkg which includes crew appreciation and WiFi, is available up to Day1 and 2 of your cruise, subject to any daily pkg rate increase. Some passengers will wait to purchase on Day1 of cruise as it will not increase cost of Princess insurance if you have that on your booking as I believe it will add about 8%, if you add before cruise.

Taxis and rideshare services should also be available if you do not want to use Skytrain. My last few trips arriving YVR were solo and I had just a roller-bag and backpack, so it was easy for me to do Skytrain. Years ago, I was doing a quick SFO to YVR and there was a delay getting docked in YVR, I believe we did not get off as first ‘walk offs’ till just after 10:30, grabbed a taxi and just made it for 11:55am flight back to the States. Assume you are flying back to US from YVR? You also need to clear US/Customs at YVR so that can add delay. I believe my Ezair would not allow/display any flights earlier than Noon or 12:30, so assume you booked air independently? Even if your ship is scheduled to arrive very early in YVR, they have to wait for port workers to arrive for scheduled work hours.

Have you sailed on a Princess ‘Royal’ class ship? The Majestic is a Royal class ship. On Royal class ships, in the Buffett, they do not use syrup/brick + water thru a spigot. They have a machine with real ‘beans’, so the easiest conversion would be the beans would now be Lavazza beans, but I have no ideal if the area will be retrofitted for the large Lavazza drip containers as shown in the previous post that is now on the Sapphire which is an older ‘grand’ class ship and the buffet beverage area setups are not the same as on the newer ‘Royal’ class. Assume like most rollouts, it will be on a ship by ship basis, when the coffee is converted to Lavazza. I think I saw a post another ship besides Sapphire has Lavazza. I was on the Sapphire early July is when the first Lavazza drip containers were installed, but only for the front Buffett beverage station. The back Buffett still was using the spigot syrup/brick + water mix. @ceilidh1 will you verify the back buffets beverage stations, on Sapphire, also are using the large Lavazza branded drip vessels as shown in your picture? And is the coffee in the MDR now from Lavazza? I am not a coffee drinker so I would not know as I did not order coffee in the MDR.

Yes, there is usually a ‘bar’ steps away from the International Cafe on most Princess ships. Please review the deck plan of the ship you are considering to verify. They will serve bottled water and complimentary ‘ship’ water by the glass. Island and Diamond Princess have no IC, on Coral, very small IC on deck 6 next to Casino and no bar close by.

Most Princess ships have a ‘bar’ right next to the IC, literally connected next to the serving counter of the IC. You would not order non coffee/tea drinks from IC, but you just need to take a few steps. This is true for most Grand Class ships, for Royal Class ships the Lobby Bar or similar is maybe 10 steps away, see deck plans for your particular ship.

My opinion is bring back the unopened bottle and ‘if’ taken/checked, it should be returned to you at the end of the cruise just like any other alcohol/spirits you might have purchased in port.

See post #13, when u apply a FCD, Princess will give you OBC, based on the length and cabin category booked. Usually, a passenger will use a FCD as the initial low deposit, but there are circumstances when that is not possible.

@cr8tiv1, a similar story for my brother. He purchased a couple of FCD’s on board for himself earlier this year. When my sister called the agency they would use to book a cruise for November, the agent said they could not see a FCD for my brother. My sister sent me a message while I was on ship and I went to the future cruise desk and they were able to look up and gave me the future cruise certificate numbers, so it seems there is a ‘glitch’ sometimes when agents are trying to find FCD’s, but if you have the certificate number, no problem.

Hi @trinitygirl, enjoying your thread and pictures. Just to clarify I think in post #13 and #78 you refer to the Production show in #13 as Soul Bar and in #78 as Starlight Bar, but pretty sure the name of the show is ‘Spotlight Bar’ so those not familiar will be able to identify. Princess has another show called ‘Sweet Soul Music’, but not sure if being done on your ship, but was performed on my recent Emerald sailings. Also the Gibraltar ‘Macaques’ are known to steal objects from passengers and bite and scratch. It seems every time I have made this port stop, passengers have medical stops on board to attend to ‘bites and scratches’.

What I have seen, is you post a reply asking moderator to make change as you are original poster, or quick reacting moderator will make change.

Thanks, I booked the cruise because it was included as one of the on board booking sailings you can get at 50% off. I think originally the cruise was stopping in SF, but now will skip and arrive LA early for an overnight. The Emerald just came back early to LA for an overnight because of Hurricane Hillary and it was a bit of a mess. As it was our first US port after visiting a foreign port, everybody has to do immigration and customs. The ship was also allowing any passengers the option to disembark early on Sunday instead of normal Monday scheduled arrival. You had to complete form and turn into guest services. The form stated you were leaving the ship early voluntarily and no compensation will be given. I was told about 700 passengers opted to leave Sunday morning and there was a delay, as you had to be able to carry ALL your luggage, plus many passengers who were staying on board got in the line early, instead of waiting for their decks to be called which was the protocol. In San Pedro, there is only one small elevator and the escalator is not very wide so with all the passengers with luggage, it was a challenge. I assume this process will be repeated for this cruise.

Yes, minibar exchanges are not affected by the new Plus and Premier changes if that is your concern, even if you have to call room service for the change, no charge. @Ombud, the Canapés for elites on formal night form specifically state ‘no substitutions’ as I remember way back, you could ‘write’ chocolate covered strawberries. If they are still allowing for you, congrats, but I have not heard recently of any elites being successful in getting them instead of what canapés are listed.

I am booked on the Majestic YVR to LA cruise that is now this Themed Dallas cruise. I booked it in early July and it was not at that time labeled Hollywood Insider Dallas, so it is a little surprising to me to see it is now a theme cruise. While on my last cruise, Emerald August 5-21, I heard references to other theme cruises that I do not remember seeing Princess advertising such as the Magic cruise in early October this year and the ‘Mythbusters’ cruise I think is after Thanksgiving.

Sorry, but I have had a friend who was denied being able to apply a FCD to a booking not paid in full because the acquire date of the FCD was AFTER the booking date. it is my understanding Princess no longer allows ‘backdating’ a FCD. @Steelers36, did you read my post #4? I have posted about this a few times already. I have been able to add a FCD to a booking with a deposit already made by credit card. I do get the OBC associated with using said FCD. @cr8tiv1, I have purchased FCD’s for friends not on board and the FCD’s show immediately as soon as the future cruise person charges my credit card. It has never taken weeks. Just did end of July 2023, and the FCD’s were in the friends accounts immediately.

Might want to send message to moderator to change title to Emerald instead of Enchanted.

This was NOT the case on August 5 when I embarked Emerald at San Pedro. The previous month, on July 22, I embarked at San Pedro and they had an ‘elite’ lane. I did not have my Medallion, and it took maybe 5 minutes. On August 5, there was only Blue lane(no medallion) or Have Medallion lane and a special assistance lane. Arrived about same time as previous cruise which was 10:30ish and there was a long line for Blue lane. Took over 40 minutes to snake to front to collect Medallion. Elite, Suite priority gone. After receiving my medallion, no wait to board, as Elites were already boarding.

A long time ago, Princess would allow ‘backdating’ of a FCD so it could be used. No more. I believe the current rule is your FCD acquire date needs to be BEFORE your cruise booking date, so if you bought a FCD on your upcoming February 2024 sailing, you would not be able to use it on a cruise you ‘booked’ in 2023 or any cruise cruise booked before the date you acquired/bought the FCD. You are able to apply a FCD to a booking that may already have deposit made by credit card. Example, my TA office is closed on the weekend but I want to grab a particular cabin, so I book using their online booking portal, but it does not have the ability to apply a FCD. I use credit card for deposit, then when TA office is open, I call and ask for a FCD to be added to booking and I receive the OBC associated with using the FCD. The FCD to be applied needs an acquire date earlier than my booking date. UK and outside US and Canada rules may be different. Princess allows passengers currently on a sailing to purchase FCD’s for people NOT on the sailing. The passenger on board pays for the FCD and hopefully will be reimbursed by the person whom they are purchasing the FCD. Many passengers like to have one or more FCD’s in the bank, so they have one ready. If you happen to know someone on a sailing willing to do this, this is a possible option in the future when you find you need a FCD and will not be sailing soon.

@gvre, I just disembarked from the Emerald Princess and at the Future cruise desk, they have flyer regarding a Cruise Package, but I thought the price was lower than your $7499 stated price, it seems there may be a lower package offered with less amenities as you have listed? The package is not for me, but hopefully someone currently on board a Princess ship can post a copy of the flyer available at future cruise.

@IndyKid, are you concerned your Travel Summary has not been updated to include the ‘new’ components of Premier, being ‘Ocean Now’ access, room service and unlimited casual dining ? I believe Princess IT has not gotten to this item yet, but as you have verified, your APP already shows Ocean Now access and unlimited Prix Fixe. You seem to not understand unlimited Prix Fixe mean you will NOT be subject to the $14.99 Prix Fixe at casual dining venues. Looking the the deck plan for the Caribbean Princess, ‘casual dining venues’, on this ship would be Planks BBQ and Steamers Seafood? I am not sure if Planks and Steamers has been re-activated on this ship yet? If so, then you would get unlimited ‘free’ prix Fixe meals at these 2 venues. Check the boards for any passengers posting from the Caribbean Princess reporting if Planks and Steamers has been reinstated. As the changes for the Caribbean Princess were to start on August 14, 2023, look for posts from passengers reporting what is going on the ship.

Your question is too vague. Changed stateroom for what reason or circumstance? If directly related to this thread, if a cabin of same category would be available on embarkation day, normally guest services can accommodate you without additional charges. With most cruises currently being fully booked, I do not see available cabins. My currently sailing on the Emerald Princess was fully booked, I met passengers with cabin issues that wanted to be moved, but no cabins were available. One passenger told me they were offered FCC for the inconvenience they suffered. Princess has a bidding for upgrade program so complimentary upgrades may happen, but I would assume not as often. Guest services has more flexibility if the sailing is not fully booked. I have had friend’s recently request if upgrade cabins are available and guest services has responded with availability of cabins and rates and also have received a complimentary upgrade upon asking on board. This situation is ship and circumstance dependent.

Hi R&D, assume you saw/read post #53? Sea is very calm but expected to get rocky closer and after technical stop in Ensenada. Hopefully we get back to San Pedro on time. I was on a sailing a while ago that was late leaving San Pedro, because ship could not leave Ensenada because of strong winds. Ship finally got to San Pedro early evening and boarding did not start till about 10-10:30 pm. Princess allowed option for passengers to arrive the next morning for boarding. For those waiting in the terminal that possibly arrived via flights that day, we were given granola bars and chips while waiting to board. The Buffett was open if you wanted to eat once boarded.