Pearl specialty dining package?

[Kdgisgr8]

We are sailing the pearl from Seattle for the 7 day Alaskan trip. For those of you who have taken this trip, is it worth purchasing the 3 day package? We are 2 adults in our 50's so we don't have children to worry about! If you recommend purchasing the plan, please give suggestions for restaurants that we should not miss! Thanks!

[SuperCrewBear]

I was just on the 10-day to Alaska on Pearl May 5-15. We had a 5 meal specialty dining package. We ate at all of the extra cost venues. Honestly, the only one that I would absolutely do again would be Cagney's Steakhouse. In second place would be Teppenyaki. Otherwise...I could do without the others. La Cucina, Le Bistro and Moderno...yawn...nothing I had at any of those three was any better (to me) than something I could have gotten at the no cost places. If you think you could get three good meals out of the deal, it would be worth it. O'Sheehan's had very good Buffalo Wings, I liked the food at Lotus Garden pretty good - we ate at those places twice each. (I got a sushi roll from the Sushi Bar while at Lotus Garden both times but just paid for it instead of using one of my dining package meals for it.) If I had it to do all over again I'd have ate at Cagney's at least twice if not three times but I wanted to try everything - using the rest at Teppenyaki. I'll know next time. :)

 

Enjoy your trip!

[BirdTravels]

We are sailing the pearl from Seattle for the 7 day Alaskan trip. For those of you who have taken this trip, is it worth purchasing the 3 day package? We are 2 adults in our 50's so we don't have children to worry about! If you recommend purchasing the plan, please give suggestions for restaurants that we should not miss! Thanks!

 

Yes, a 3-day SDP would allow you to have three "dinners out". The biggest savings are using the SDP in the a la cart restaurants. We love Cagney's and Le Bistro. Teppanyaki is always great fun, but the SDP offers a tiny savings over just paying for it onboard. Also, Teppanyaki seating is very limited so book ahead online or immediately when you board if you want to go there.

 

BTW: We did an Alaskan cruise out of Seattle last summer and it was FANTASTIC. Spent hours each day watching the whales and dolphin as we moved between ports. Have a GREAT time!

[casofilia]

If it of interest we have recently finished the cruise from Buenos Aires to Valparaiso to San Francisco. We are Platinum so had two free meals on each leg.

 

We decided that we would like to have some more Specialty meals on some of the sea days.

 

We had 3 on the first portion and 4 on the second so 7 for the two of us. The average cost of the 7 dinners was USD32 each for each of us.

 

We are not intending to buy again as there was no real saving on the 3 or 4 meals; I would think that you would need to buy 10 days to make it really worthwhile. If we feel the need to have a Specialty meal we will pay for it!! The MDR meals are good enough without paying for them in the original cost and then paying again for Specialty meals.

 

Mike

Edited June 5, 2016 by casofilia
clarification