Live From Emerald June 4 2016 Baltic Heritage

[San10s]

Thank you for doing your "Live From" thread while on the Emerald Princess! :) My husband & I will be boarding the Emerald for the same itinerary in 5 weeks on July 9th. I hope you have smooth sailing for your cruises! :D

[lovevacadays]

Yah!! I'm so excited to see a '"live from" thread from you. I've enjoyed reading your threads in the past. I was just mentioning to a friend this morning that I had not seen many "live from" threads lately.

 

Enjoy your cruise.:):):)

[riclop]

Thanks for the report.

[PescadoAmarillo]

I always enjoy your live froms; thanks for taking the time to do them. Say hi to the Emerald Princess for us!!!

[pack2much]

...another 9 JULY baltic cruiser following your adventure! Thanks...Hoping Guiseppe Pollara is still on duty on ours. He was the Executive Chef on our 09 Norway cruise on the Crown where we did the Chef's Table! It was AWESOME!!! His MD Francesco was on our last one on the CB. Great times/small world.

Safe travels to all!

[mjmalino]

If you think about, please also post what the weather is like in the ports. Thank you!

[ccrain]

Hi ccairn,

 

Wish you are great adventure, we will be following you, see you in a few weeks,

 

question

 

who is head chef,

 

thanks

 

yours Shogun

 

Giuseppe Pollara is the Executive Chef - I think that's the head guy!

[ccrain]

Ahh, my favorite morning ritual. A hot latte, an empty IC, a good night’s sleep, my computer (love this Surface Pro), a fresh Patter and a day at sea to plan. Just enjoying the moment. I unfortunately HATE traveling to and fro these cruises. No matter how much I try and relax, my OCPD will not let me until the last detail is taken care of, the last plane departed, the last piece of luggage arrived, the last scheduled even occurred. And with the resolution of the shore excursions yesterday, I was able to get into full cruise mode. FINALLY!

 

But first its PET PEEVE TIME!

 

Climb up on soapbox – prepare to orate – orate:

 

Everyone knows the rules of the almighty coffee card – right? With the most recent coffee cards you are ENTITLED to one specialty coffee per punch AND the freebies (tea, black coffee, etc) ON THE VOYAGE THE CARD WAS PURCHASED! I’m not talking about the old original SUPERCARDS! Now all of us have ‘stretched’ the rules a bit. Primarily from an undated, unused card from a previous voyage for tea or black coffee, or more commonly in a B2B situation in which the wait staff is pretty flexible for. But those of us who sail a lot know the rules and it’s just not nice to a) act like you don’t know the rules to wait staff, or b) express your indignation at the cruelty of the rules to the wait staff, or c) (the worst transgressions of all) invoke a higher power or name drop a supervisor or matre de to the wait staff in order to get your way.

 

Now on this voyage we traded in our mini-bar for two new cards. And they are different from our old cards – and now marked with the voyage and a green stripe across the top. That’s ok. Them’s the rules and while we might stretch them a bit, we never, ever want wait staff to break them for us. So now we carry two cards – the old one for punches, the new one for the freebies. It’s that simple.

 

Come on folks – give the wait staff a break!

 

Oration complete – climbing down off soapbox.

 

Yesterday In Bruges –

 

Went up to the shore excursion desk at 0700 and checked the I-pads they have out front for reservations. Sure enough, ours was in there. So I simply got new tickets. No muss, no fuss. The shore excursion staff was smiling and fun – and best of all – no line at 0700!

 

In short, great day. (Even though when we left the ship it was raining – but wasn’t in town and the sun came out.) We did the Bruges on Your Own, but with a little guided tour and a canal cruise before they kicked you loose for four hours. (Next cruise we will do Bruges on our own completely.) Had a very interesting tour guide. A good tour guide, but what was more interesting was listening between the lines. We’ve never had a continental central European tour guide before and he was Flemish – about as central and continental as you get – very, very interesting perspective on Brexit, the wealth gap and immigrants. Not so much in what he said, but how he said it and how he didn’t say it. Not something to talk about in this forum, but something I’d like to sit and get a British perspective on someday. I absolutely love to observe the differences and similarities between cultures via the tour guides, the staff on board and people watching. I think in a previous life I was either a social anthropologist or a geologist, or some kind of ‘gist’.

 

I do have to say that the canal water was probably the dirtiest looking water I have ever seen. OMG! This stuff looked NASTY! But the canal ride was fun. It gave you a little more location perspective and emphasized the compact nature of the city center – it is small and very walkable. We had lunch at one of TripAdvisors highest rated restaurants – Huisbrouwerij De Halve Maan. A popular brewery. We had 2 each of the Brugse Zat Blonds. Wow! Really, really good beer. We had one full menu lunch and a 2 item lunch. Judy had the cold cucumber and tomato soup – and loved it. I had the watercress and mixed green salad with goat cheese, and it was really good as well. For her main, she had the stuffed pepper and I had the Steak. It was a really great lunch. The food was excellent, the service great, the beer fantastic. The only downer was the dessert. It tasted like cereal, had a texture of soggy cereal and had no WOW factor. Oh well. The previous courses were fantastic. As I posted on Facebook I had lunch with a blonde and a brunette! Considering the quality of the food the prices were not bad for a touristy type town. We probably would have spent just as much at any chain, like Old Chicago’s, on beer, apps and pizza in the US for lunch.

 

We followed this up by shopping in the back alleys. We stayed away from the larger shops and went for the smaller small business owner shops. Got Ally another hat and found a chocolat shop with free samples. Both owners were so glad to see Americans. According to one, tourism is down 30% because of the terrorist attack in Brussels. Always glad to help.

 

After shopping, we walked around the area, admiring the horses pulling the carriages, people watching, swan and duck watching, found some really good ice cream and ended up in one of the prettiest little parks – Minnewaters – you know, land of little drinks, not Minnesota, and just chilled in the warm sunshine and people, pet and children watched for a while. It was a really great relaxing, lazy Sunday afternoon in the park in Bruges, Belgium.

 

We got back to the ship around 1630. It was time for shower, dinner and a movie. The Martian was on MUTS and it gave us a chance to just rest our feet after walking a lot during the day. Unfortunately, the wind was COLD and we abandoned the movie about 2/3’s of the way through. Needed a mummy bag to stay warm during that movie.

 

When we got back to the room, we had another pleasant surprise. We got invited to the most traveled party and it’s a Luncheon! Those are great!

 

So today is a sea day. One of the precious few in a port intensive itinerary. It is a formal night, one of three on this cruise. The second being the night of Helsinki and the third being the 2nd to the last sea day.

 

This cruise has the most cruise staff we have ever sailed with before. Kelvin, the CD, Matt, the ED, Kim, Matt’s better half, Megan, from the cruise with Ally to Alaska last June, and Fernando, from the Crown Tahiti last October. We picked them up some chocolate in Bruges to brighten their week a bit. Cannot go wrong with Belgium hand crafted chocolates!

 

Today in the patter is Zumba at 0930! And Kim is teaching the class! Haven’t Zumba’ed with her since the Asian cruise on the Diamond. Gotta get them endorphins working this morning. As usual, lots of stuff on the first sea day. Trivia’s, shopping show, fruit and vegetable carving, Pub lunch, a tour of SHARE, a CSI lecture by Ron Bowers (I think it’s the same guy as on the Crown last October), line dancing, ballroom dancing, art lecture and auction, matre de wine club, bingo…lots of typical sea day ‘stuff’.

 

Tonight is the Captain’s welcome aboard celebration. Three shows by Luke Graves, the comedian. (He kind of bombed out at the 1st welcome aboard show.) Three production showings of I Got The Music. We have the ‘Voice of the Ocean’ tonight. Might stop by to see what the difference is between this and Karaoke and Princess Pop Star. The Quest game show is tonight in Fusion.

 

Nice job of stuffing the schedule Matt!

 

And finally, unlike previous cruises with lots of sea days, the next couple of weeks is going to be intense. We have day long excursions planned at all ports, so these updates will be a lot less comprehensive than my typical Live Froms. I’ll try and make it up in the review to be published later. On top of that, intranet connection from our room is the worst I’ve ever had. Its not the internet connection, its connecting to the intranet to start with. Takes minutes to actually connect, even though the node is right down the hallway. So the only reliable connection is in the IC in the mornings.

 

So that’s it for now!

[ccrain]

This is the second cruise in a row that we have had great roll call organizers. From Gary's info on Alla to Karen's google spreadsheet, all of that effort is greatly appreciated.

 

I feel kind of guilty, but I really, really promise that when I finally quit work, I'm going to help out on these things. But they keep paying me and helping pay for these cruises, so I really can't complain that much!

 

Anyway, thanks to all who made the roll call fun and informative. Look us up. We owe you a drink based on all the money you saved us on this and the Norwegian cruise.

 

See you at the M&G later today!

 

Thanks Again!

[ccrain]

Today starts the Alla tours for the Baltic. Looking forward to it. And as usual, it’s up early and in the IC for coffee. Must be getting used to this time zone as I was awake at 0330 – pretty much normal for me back home.

 

Yesterday was a day at sea, the first formal night, the CC meet and greet, Zumba with Kim, a couple of really good naps, watching the Martian without freezing and in general just chilling out for the day. Zumba with Kim brought back memories of our Asian cruise together on the Diamond. Back when Matt was still chasing Kim before she caught him. Nothing really exciting yesterday, just a couple of interesting observations from the past couple of days.

 

The full length chair covers in MUTS are now gone. Replaced by a single covered head rest with the MUTS logo. So make sure you place a pool towel on top of the chair mattress before sitting or you could end up with a very wet behind.

 

The mixed snacks with wasabi peas typically available at bars have been replaced with some sort of poppy seed infused savory animal cracker. I miss the peas! Picking out the peas and sesame crackers first was a pre-drink ritual!

 

The pillow top mattresses are really nice. Almost luxurious. Quite the difference between that and the rock hard bed at the Hilton in Southampton.

 

There are over 300 elites on board so laundry is taking two days. Not bad. We had anticipated a lot of elites on these two cruises so we brought extra.

 

Service has been great so far. Smiles, quick to please. No issues. Food in the HC has been really good. For those of you who have not heard this in the past, we do prefer the HC to the dining room because of the food variety, and to keep me away from consuming vast quantities of BREAD and BUTTER! (Oh do I love that stuff!) But seriously, the chefs have a set menu and recipes in the dining rooms. They are not allowed to deviate that much. On the other hand, they are much freer to try different things and recipes in the HC. So there is some variety. Yesterday was a delicious split pea soup and a non-traditional hot and sour soup with shrimp in it – and some spice to boot. The cold salads were really good as well, some nicely battered deep fried shrimp and fresh salad makings.

 

That’s it for the morning. Off to Copenhagen…

[icat2000]

Thanks for sharing your experiences on the cruise so far. Really interested in hearing more.

[hansi]

Thanks. If you see RJ Lewis, tell him Ed and Margaret send regards:D

[Shogun]

Hi ccrain

 

Thanks for info

 

We have a long history with Giuseppe Pollara, been in newspapers with him etc,

 

Will be good to catch up with him again,

 

Weather in Copenhagen looks nice, lock up your credit card, some very nice but expensive shops,

 

yours Shogun

[LoriPhil]

Quick question concerning currency: are you bringing any local currency or do you have a small amount of euros available for small items in port? We're thinking of the Bruges on your own tour and wondering what would be appropriate.

 

Thanks!

[petes family]

If you can let us know where you dock at each port that would be really helpful. Thanks. Sounds like you are having a good time.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums mobile app

[IECalCruiser]

Quick question concerning currency: are you bringing any local currency or do you have a small amount of euros available for small items in port? We're thinking of the Bruges on your own tour and wondering what would be appropriate.

 

Thanks!

We did the Copenhagen RT Baltic cruise a couple of years ago. I would probably get Euros at an ATM in Bruges. We have an ATM card with no transaction fees or foreign exchange fees that we have used in the Baltic and the Med. Euros will cover you for Bruges, Helsinki, Tallinn and Gdansk. The tour stops in St. Petersburg will accept EUR, USD and GBP. In the Gamla Stan in Stockholm we found one or two shops that accepted USD, EUR and GBP or our we used our credit card. We spent several days in Copenhagen and used our no foreign exchange fee credit cards. We purchased a few items and got a VAT refund in Danish Krone which we used at a vending machine in the airport waiting for our departure.

[jpj39]

Quick question concerning currency: are you bringing any local currency or do you have a small amount of euros available for small items in port? We're thinking of the Bruges on your own tour and wondering what would be appropriate.

 

Thanks!

 

I am doing the Norwegian fiords cruise June 18

The currency in Norway is the Nok Krone $1=8.117 krone

I am bringing Krones , I don't want to be looking for ATM's or the hassel of paying in either $'s or Euro's

If I were doing a cruise visiting EU ports I would bring some Euro's

Oh one other thought on Norway, a very expensive country, prepare for sticker shock

[ccrain]

Quick question concerning currency: are you bringing any local currency or do you have a small amount of euros available for small items in port? We're thinking of the Bruges on your own tour and wondering what would be appropriate.

 

Thanks!

 

We always bring local currency. That being said, they are taking US$ or Euros or Danish Krone in Copenhagen, but you get a little better exchange with the local currency as everyone rounds up!

[ccrain]

Boy are those pillow top mattresses soft and delightful. I’m not typically a fan of soft mattresses, my sleep number is 65, but these are really nice. In the old days, on long cruises, we used to order foam mattress toppers while on board and when those became scarce or very thin, we would bring our own. Not with these. This is just downright nice and once having gotten used to the time zone shift – finally – a good night’s sleep is a wonderful thing.

 

So yesterday was our first tour with Alla on this trip in Copenhagen. Called Wonderful Copenhagen, it was a 3 hour whirlwind tour of the major spots in Copenhagen, followed by some free time in down town Copenhagen and then back to the ship. And the weather was absolutely gorgeous. Clear blue sky, not too hot, not too cold. Finding Alla was easy. We docked at the Langelinje Pier. The big long one closest to the city center. The security gate was right at the midship exit and the two Alla guides were standing on the sidewalk just across the vehicle parkway about 50 feet from the ship. We were split into two groups, our group was 14 people with Hannah as our guide. (We, of course, were in the cool group.)

 

One thing to know about Copenhagen, which all the guide books stress, is that the city center is pretty compact and easily accessible from the port. About a 2-3km walk from the ship. In fact you can see the ship from the downtown area. But you can’t get a ‘feel’ for the actual compactness until you’ve been there. So for those DIY’ers and aspiring DIY’ers, this is a great city to do it on your own. In fact many people walked the waterfront, via the little mermaid statue, from the ship to downtown. We will probably do the same next time we are back on the next cruise.

 

Our tour took in much of the downtown area with walking around the residences of the royal family, with a very alert and watchful guard force. We saw the Citadel, the Gefion Fountain, the little mermaid, Nyhavn, City Hall, drove by Tivoli Gardens, Chistiansborg Castle and a bunch of stuff in between. The Rosenborg Castle tour was really interesting. The historical weapons, jewelry, statuary, paintings, architecture, furnishing, plastering and history was very interesting and well presented by Hannah. Once again the cultural biases came into focus as she talked about the Danish-Swedish-Norwegian historical rivalries from the Danish perspective. (It’s going to be equally interesting to get ‘the other side of the story’ from the Swedes and Norwegians!)

 

As in Rome and other older European cities, the footing is tiring on the old cobblestones with gaps that can easily trap a cane or a wheel. You just have to be careful. And like Rome the drivers are in a hurry constantly and traffic is a real bear. Unlike Rome, bicyclists, not scooters, are everywhere. Copenhagen prides itself on striving to be a ‘green’ city. So even on foot, you have to be aware of the bicyclists. And there is a lot of construction on the new metro which makes things even tougher.

 

We ended up in the center of town for lunch. While there were a lot of sidewalk cafes around, and not a few American restaurants, like TGI Fridays, Hannah pointed us to a basement café that served the traditional open faced sandwich. Unfortunately, I did not take a picture of the café, so I will have to retrace our steps on Google to figure it out later when I have a better internet connection. We had lunch with Wendy and John from Australia. And It was different and unique food – something different. I had smoked Herring for the first time. Judy had a white wine poached salmon. The fish was very fresh, the beer really good as well. The dessert was an apple creamy crispy thingie, and the coffee, while very thick like an expresso, was really mild and flavorful, not harsh or strong at all. But warning. It’s expensive in downtown Copenhagen. Our meal was close to $85 US – but well worth the experience.

 

Now having seen and scoped out the area ourselves, we’ll probably investigate the Citadel a bit more on our next visit in a few weeks. That’s the nice thing about seeing a port more than once. You get to get out on your own with confidence.

 

We got back to the ship about 1400. Got the obligatory magnet to put on our travel map and worked out way through the security lines back into the ship. Dinner in the HC was standard fare. A really good mixed green salad with all kinds of greens and veggies. Judy tried, and did not like, the tandoori shrimp – the spices were just not cooked enough – but the garlic soup was great, as was the fried flounder and the steak.

 

We finally got some dancing in last night to Starwave, the R&R band in explorer’s. Mainly four count Rock and Roll, appropriate for Cha-Cha’s and Hustle’s, but we did get one Rhumba in as well. The off the to show. The ventriloquist Jimmy Tamley. After seeing him last night, we do recall having him on another cruise or two before. Good show. Quite fun. Got to spend some time talking to Matt Thompson, the ED, and Kelvin, the CD. It’s nice to reconnect with staff that you’ve cruised with before.

 

For those of you interested the new ED is a 3 ½ striper. (Matt was wearing his uniform.)

 

So today is our last day at sea in preparation for the next 5 consecutive port days. It’s a bit overcast and windy this morning, but the seas are just fine. The coffee is good, as usual, and the IC is very quiet. One nice thing about sailing in a ship full of Brits on Holiday is that they take their holidays very seriously and are not about to get up at 0500 for coffee. They wander in starting about 0800. Most around 0900. That makes the lines in the IC and HC very short early in the morning. Nothing like, say, a Hawaii run on a ship full of Americans.

 

Today is the Most Travelled Luncheon. We are looking forward to that. Tonight will be a mix of dancing and seeing Jimmy’s show in Explorer’s. We will definitely try that one tonight.

 

That’s it from the Emerald this morning – off to Zumba with Kim!

[ccrain]

Nope, not Stockholm. The Captain announced yesterday afternoon that the winds and low tides would cause us to divert to Nynashamn rather than go into Stockholm proper. I’m sure Alla will find us one way or another. Not sure whether or not we will tender as a ‘floating dock’ was mentioned. Hey, whatever will be, will be.

 

The weather this morning is blue sky, clear, chilly and a bit breezy. The scenery is gorgeous. Reminds me of Alaska with all the little rocky islands and forests.

 

So today starts a five day marathon of successive ports. I hope we’re ready for this. The last time we did a port intensive itinerary was five years ago on the Grand in the Med and we were dead on our feet by Barcelona.

 

Yesterday’s day at sea started clear and warmer, but turned cloudy, windy and chilly later in the evening. No chance at MUTS at all. The cut off for the most travelled luncheon was 400 days and the most traveled is somewhere in the 1400 range. We were seated with Matt Thompson, the Entertainment Director, whom we’ve traveled with before and has his one year wedding anniversary this month with Kim – our Zumba instructor. Matt was fun to sit and chat with over lunch and the lunch was great with Carpacio or Pasta as the starter, Lamb or fish as the main and a really tasty fruit tart thingie for dessert. I really like the luncheons as opposed to the cocktail parties.

 

We went to see Jimmy Tamley’s show in Explorer’s as well. We have seen him before, but he’s always funny. One of the few remaining really good ventriloquists. We did catch a few dances with Starwave in Explorer’s and did listen to David Marken, the solo guitarist, in the Wheelhouse. Salty Dog had the most people we’ve ever seen in it so far – 12 covers. Not sure how long this is going to last. We haven’t stopped by to see Share yet. We are planning to do Crown Grill at least once or twice in this series of cruises. We also sampled the whiskey menu in the Wheelhouse. They have a 1.75l bottle of a particular whiskey for $1100 on the menu! Their whiskey flight was $25 and consisted of a 25 year old, a 17 year old and a 14 year whiskey. (We settled for the $8 honey flavored Jack Daniels – a bit more smokey/molasses flavor than the honey wild turkey we sip at home.)

 

So it’s off to explore Sweden. Later…

[Shogun]

Hi ccrain,

 

Thanking for such a detailed review, have a great day ashore,

 

yours Shogun

[GUT2407]

Hi

 

Can you tell me what sort of power outlets a Emerald has, only US or have they put on the universal ones.

 

Thanks.

[IECalCruiser]

Hi

 

 

 

Can you tell me what sort of power outlets a Emerald has, only US or have they put on the universal ones.

 

 

 

Thanks.

The power outlets are primarily grounded (3 prong) 120V U.S. outlets at the desk and behind the TV. There is still the ungrounded low current draw outlet in the bathroom with a U.S. and a European plug. The lamp on the nightstand nearest the bathroom plugs into a 220V European plug located under the bed.

 

For those of you who have sailed on the Diamond, Sapphire or Golden in Asia/Australia, have other outlets been added?

[FlynnRider78]

Anybody know who's taking over as Cruise Director as we read Kelvin is leaving on the 23 July?

 

 

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[RTcruzer]

Thank you for your "Live" review. We will be on her for the July 9th sailing. My question involves the self-serve laundry. Do we need coins? Do they have detergent to purchase? On my cruise with Azamara:D-laundry was free as was the detergent...

 

Thank you in advance--I cannot find a current answer!:p