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The Grand 3-03-12 ...our impression

Crzn-Life

By Crzn-Life,
in Princess Cruises

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Crzn-Life

Crzn-Life

Posted
Posted

The Grand is definitely grand ...

 

We’ve been looking forward to this cruise for some time so followed the live threads for the last few weeks just to see what was happening. I appreciate the time those posters took to do that. I couldn’t do that because it really takes a lot of time and I don’t know how they do it.

 

Embarkation:

Went smoothly and quickly. We waited less than ½ hour after we arrived. The preferred waiting area was filled and we were seated in the passage way outside the main seating area. The Princess staffers did a good job of keeping people in the right areas and insuring that we went in in the order we arrived. (This was a much better process than what we experienced waiting to board the Crown in November where we had to wait for a long time then there was no order when embarkation was announced and those that arrived last went first!) After checking in we had another short wait before we could board and again the staff maintained order very well. We arrived at the terminal a little after 11:00 and were in our cabin before noon.

 

We had lunch in the Da Vinci dining room then walked around the ship to check out the changes since we were last on board just before the dry dock.

 

Our take on the new areas/changes:

 

  • · The International Café is nice but smaller than those on the Ruby, Emerald & Crown. The coffee area is connected to the IC. I used an unused coffee card purchased on a previous cruise and the barista told me that I could use the card for lattes but it couldn’t be used for free coffee. Since I don’t buy that anyway, it was no problem. All I wanted was my latte then & to use it for cappuccinos after dinner, so there shouldn’t be any problems.
  • Alfredo’s is really nice. Had lunch there the 2nd day. Pizza’s are good. They certainly aren’t stingy with the toppings.
  • Library/Leaves: Looks really nice and yes they serve tea there. I read in a thread a couple or so weeks back that the poster (can’t remember who it was) said they didn’t think Leaves was open anymore; just the library was. Not so. They’ve served tea every day. Serving times are listed in the patter.·
  • Cabins: There are new mattresses. They’re still the super extra firm mattresses, but at least there are no sags. With a foam topper they are quite comfortable.
  • · Balconies: The new balcony chairs are nice but not the most comfortable. The mini-suites and Caribe balconies no longer have 4 chairs. On the mini’s there are 2 chairs and 2 leg (foot stool) rests. Unfortunately they didn’t put those on the Caribe balconies. Even though the balconies are larger than the regular ones, they are furnished the same as the smaller ones with just 2 chairs and a tiny little table less than ½ the size of those on the mini suite balconies. Also we found the painted balcony surface to be a little better than having the mat. The mat was always so dirty with stuff stuck in it and standing water beneath it. The painted surface is cleaner. When it was wet from spray wore slippers so don’t know if it was slippery or not. However, when the sun shines on it, it is HOT! Slippers or shoes are a must. I never went barefoot on the old mats anyway, so this didn’t create any problems for me.
  • · Food and Service: The food in the MDR has exceeded our expectations. The old menus are still in effect, but there seem to be some new interpretations of some of them. Service has been excellent. Went to Sabatini’s one night and while it was nice & the service was good, the food was nothing special. Cannot address the quality of food in the buffet because we do not go there.
  • · Casino: people can only smoke in the designated areas and cannot smoke at the table games. They also enforce that. Anyone lighting up around the tables is asked to go to the smoking area. The casino was very full the whole cruise. After dinner it was difficult and almost impossible to find a slot machine or a place at the Black jack or 3-card tables.
  • Internet: Connectivity has been good considering it’s via satellite. The only time I had a problem connecting was the afternoon of the last day. Guess everyone was busy printing boarding passes and it took a while to sign in.

Every staff/crew member with whom we’ve interacted has been very friendly and professional. Service is top notch and we’re having an absolutely wonderful time.

 

Rumors and updated information:

 

  • On a recent thread someone reported that they heard the Grand was going back into dry dock for up sprucing up balconies and rooms, i.e. general maintenance things that weren’t done in the earlier dry dock. Asked the Captain if there was any truth to the rumor and he said no. The Grand won’t be going back to dry dock until its regularly scheduled one is due in a couple of year.
  • For those staying on for a 2nd cruise, they now provide a patter just for us which is nice.
  • Leaves Tea Room and Library serves tea every day.
  • The muster station is now printed on the key card.

General Info:

  • Our cabin is a little tired looking, but it’s clean and everything is in working order. Our steward Renato is one of the best, if not the best we’ve had on our cruises. He seems to know ahead of time what we need and anticipates it.
  • There is quite a bit of rust on the balcony and hopefully they’ll start scraping and painting them in the near future.
  • The Grand is one of the older ships in the fleet now but she is aging well. The dry dock changes spiffed her up quite a bit.

There are to be 250 under 21 passengers on the 3/10 cruise. There were also some software glitches with the key card readers, so it slowed down the re-embarkation process. Later we were watching people come on board and there seemed to be very long lines in gangways so don’t know if they had continued issues with it or not.

 

Now we are set to enjoy our 2nd cruise. If they way it is starting is any indication of the way the whole cruise will go, it will be as good as if not better than the 1st one.

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kywildcatfanone

kywildcatfanone

Posted
Posted

Thanks for posting your observations. We were on the Grand in December and had a great time, and will board again in a couple of weeks. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, and have another great time this week.

 

I'm glad you are having good internet overall, it did not work on the Lido deck cabins at all in December, and I hope they have that fixed now.

 

Mike

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windsor26

windsor26

Posted
Posted
The Grand is definitely grand ...

 

We’ve been looking forward to this cruise for some time so followed the live threads for the last few weeks just to see what was happening. I appreciate the time those posters took to do that. I couldn’t do that because it really takes a lot of time and I don’t know how they do it.

 

Embarkation:

Went smoothly and quickly. We waited less than ½ hour after we arrived. The preferred waiting area was filled and we were seated in the passage way outside the main seating area. The Princess staffers did a good job of keeping people in the right areas and insuring that we went in in the order we arrived. (This was a much better process than what we experienced waiting to board the Crown in November where we had to wait for a long time then there was no order when embarkation was announced and those that arrived last went first!) After checking in we had another short wait before we could board and again the staff maintained order very well. We arrived at the terminal a little after 11:00 and were in our cabin before noon.

 

We had lunch in the Da Vinci dining room then walked around the ship to check out the changes since we were last on board just before the dry dock.

 

Our take on the new areas/changes:

 

  • · The International Café is nice but smaller than those on the Ruby, Emerald & Crown. The coffee area is connected to the IC. I used an unused coffee card purchased on a previous cruise and the barista told me that I could use the card for lattes but it couldn’t be used for free coffee. Since I don’t buy that anyway, it was no problem. All I wanted was my latte then & to use it for cappuccinos after dinner, so there shouldn’t be any problems.
  • Alfredo’s is really nice. Had lunch there the 2nd day. Pizza’s are good. They certainly aren’t stingy with the toppings.
  • Library/Leaves: Looks really nice and yes they serve tea there. I read in a thread a couple or so weeks back that the poster (can’t remember who it was) said they didn’t think Leaves was open anymore; just the library was. Not so. They’ve served tea every day. Serving times are listed in the patter.·
  • Cabins: There are new mattresses. They’re still the super extra firm mattresses, but at least there are no sags. With a foam topper they are quite comfortable.
  • · Balconies: The new balcony chairs are nice but not the most comfortable. The mini-suites and Caribe balconies no longer have 4 chairs. On the mini’s there are 2 chairs and 2 leg (foot stool) rests. Unfortunately they didn’t put those on the Caribe balconies. Even though the balconies are larger than the regular ones, they are furnished the same as the smaller ones with just 2 chairs and a tiny little table less than ½ the size of those on the mini suite balconies. Also we found the painted balcony surface to be a little better than having the mat. The mat was always so dirty with stuff stuck in it and standing water beneath it. The painted surface is cleaner. When it was wet from spray wore slippers so don’t know if it was slippery or not. However, when the sun shines on it, it is HOT! Slippers or shoes are a must. I never went barefoot on the old mats anyway, so this didn’t create any problems for me.
  • · Food and Service: The food in the MDR has exceeded our expectations. The old menus are still in effect, but there seem to be some new interpretations of some of them. Service has been excellent. Went to Sabatini’s one night and while it was nice & the service was good, the food was nothing special. Cannot address the quality of food in the buffet because we do not go there.
  • · Casino: people can only smoke in the designated areas and cannot smoke at the table games. They also enforce that. Anyone lighting up around the tables is asked to go to the smoking area. The casino was very full the whole cruise. After dinner it was difficult and almost impossible to find a slot machine or a place at the Black jack or 3-card tables.
  • Internet: Connectivity has been good considering it’s via satellite. The only time I had a problem connecting was the afternoon of the last day. Guess everyone was busy printing boarding passes and it took a while to sign in.

Every staff/crew member with whom we’ve interacted has been very friendly and professional. Service is top notch and we’re having an absolutely wonderful time.

 

Rumors and updated information:

 

  • On a recent thread someone reported that they heard the Grand was going back into dry dock for up sprucing up balconies and rooms, i.e. general maintenance things that weren’t done in the earlier dry dock. Asked the Captain if there was any truth to the rumor and he said no. The Grand won’t be going back to dry dock until its regularly scheduled one is due in a couple of year.
  • For those staying on for a 2nd cruise, they now provide a patter just for us which is nice.
  • Leaves Tea Room and Library serves tea every day.
  • The muster station is now printed on the key card.

General Info:

  • Our cabin is a little tired looking, but it’s clean and everything is in working order. Our steward Renato is one of the best, if not the best we’ve had on our cruises. He seems to know ahead of time what we need and anticipates it.
  • There is quite a bit of rust on the balcony and hopefully they’ll start scraping and painting them in the near future.
  • The Grand is one of the older ships in the fleet now but she is aging well. The dry dock changes spiffed her up quite a bit.

There are to be 250 under 21 passengers on the 3/10 cruise. There were also some software glitches with the key card readers, so it slowed down the re-embarkation process. Later we were watching people come on board and there seemed to be very long lines in gangways so don’t know if they had continued issues with it or not.

 

Now we are set to enjoy our 2nd cruise. If they way it is starting is any indication of the way the whole cruise will go, it will be as good as if not better than the 1st one.

 

 

Thanks for the review I am pleased to see they allow lunch in the dining room on embarkation day great news.

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windsor26

windsor26

Posted
Posted
Lunch in DR on embarkation day closes at 1:30.

 

Yes Pia but it is open for those who embark early which many many threads for other ships have said it is not open at all unless you are b2b

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Pia1913

Pia1913

Posted
Posted
Yes Pia but it is open for those who embark early which many many threads for other ships have said it is not open at all unless you are b2b

 

Not so, re: only for B2B. It's just that most people don't know about it.

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cruiserdru

cruiserdru

Posted
Posted

Is there a charge for having tea in Leaves? Do they have a good selection? Are they making tea with tea bags or brewing from leaves? Is it served by the cup or by the pot?

 

I am a confirmed tea drinker and am hoping this will be a great place to visit during our Baltic cruise in July.

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Pia1913

Pia1913

Posted
Posted
Is there a charge for having tea in Leaves? Do they have a good selection? Are they making tea with tea bags or brewing from leaves? Is it served by the cup or by the pot?

 

I am a confirmed tea drinker and am hoping this will be a great place to visit during our Baltic cruise in July.

 

Tea is brewed; not with bags. Here is what they offer:

 

Tea Flights - $3.00. You can choose 3 different varieties of tea in a combination flight.

 

Tea Cocktails - $6.95. Cold drinks with booze choice of gin, rum, scotch or vodka.

 

Tea - $2.75. Zillions of choices, such as: black, organic, jasmine, chocolate mint, etc.

 

Nothing is free at Leaves other than the assorted pastry nibbles.

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Gettingwarmer

Gettingwarmer

Posted
Posted

· Balconies: The new balcony chairs are nice but not the most comfortable. The mini-suites and Caribe balconies no longer have 4 chairs. On the mini’s there are 2 chairs and 2 leg (foot stool) rests. Unfortunately they didn’t put those on the Caribe balconies. Even though the balconies are larger than the regular ones, they are furnished the same as the smaller ones with just 2 chairs and a tiny little table less than ½ the size of those on the mini suite balconies. Also we found the painted balcony surface to be a little better than having the mat. The mat was always so dirty with stuff stuck in it and standing water beneath it. The painted surface is cleaner. When it was wet from spray wore slippers so don’t know if it was slippery or not. However, when the sun shines on it, it is HOT! Slippers or shoes are a must. I never went barefoot on the old mats anyway, so this didn’t create any problems for me.

 

 

Very disappointed to learn that there are now only two chairs on Caribe balconies and no foot rest to raise your legs. Are they upright or do they recline slightly? I do not like the idea of the hot metal either.

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Britter16

Britter16

Posted
Posted

here's a photo of the new furniture

 

<a href="http://s1223.photobucket.com/albums/dd506/Britter168/?action=view&current=IMG_0041_0425_edited-1.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1223.photobucket.com/albums/dd506/Britter168/IMG_0041_0425_edited-1.jpg" border="0" alt="Grand mini suite balcony"></

 

sorry will try again

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