Regal Princess 6/14/16 Mini-review

[lstone19]

My wife Maggie and I were on Regal’s 6/14/16 Baltic cruise. I’ve posted the Patters in another thread. My friend FraudBroad is in the process of righting a detailed review in another thread which I’m sure will give much more detail of a lot of what I’ve written below since we were together for a lot of this.

 

EMBARKATION: We arrived in Copenhagen two days in advance. Had plans to meet with FraudBroad and her family that night and a larger CC group for a pre-cruise dinner the next night. Both went well and helped set the tone for the cruise.

 

Returning to our hotel the first night, we discovered it was one being used by Princess for pre-cruise stays. A sign at the Princess desk was offering transfers for guests staying there independently. At $25/pp including bags (picked up at the room), it seemed like a good deal (I was already expecting at least $50 for a cab). We were assigned to the 12:15 bus. It left at 12:20 and we were on the ship and starting on lunch before 1:00. Bags were at our cabin when we arrived there after lunch.

 

THE SHIP: I was concerned about the size. About 2,000 passengers is the largest I’ve been on before. But the Royal class ships handle their nominal 3,600 passengers well. It was always easy to find some place uncrowded when desired. I have no idea where most of those people went because it rarely seemed to be where I was.

 

DINING: We’re traditionalists and had late traditional. Our table of 8 was great. Four of the other 6 were Warnemunde passengers so after Watnemunde, we had new table mates which were even better. Our table was right next to the chef’s table which was fascinating to watch. Service at our table was great. And on formal nights, all four men were wearing tuxes.

 

I was less impressed with service in the other dining rooms. We had one breakfast, three lunches, and one dinner (where we had a conflict with our traditional time) in Concerto. At all of them, service seemed slow and not as polished as at our regular dinner table.

 

Other than that, we ate most breakfasts and a couple of lunches in Horizon Court and one lunch in Alfredo’s (would have gone back on the last day but too many good things on the MDR lunch menu).

 

PORTS and other:

OSLO: We did this one on our own. It rained.

 

WARNEMUNDE (BERLIN): Tour to Berlin arranged through TJ’s (from St. Petersburg). It rained. Great tour guide. Traffic on the return was slow and we were getting concerned. Arrived at 8:15 for 8:30 “all aboard” to find out there were still a few hundred missing. Turned out the second Princess charter train was delayed (sadly, from what we heard, a passenger had died on it).

 

AT SEA between Warnemunde and Tallinn: While at lunch, the captain announced that an ill passenger needed to be evacuated by helicopter. The rear of the ship (including some cabins) needed to be cleared for this. Helicopter did not land - passenger was transferred with the helicopter in the air just like pulling someone out of the water. The ship did a 180 to turn into the wind and then slowed almost to a stop. Afterwards, it was “pedal to the metal” to make Tallinn on time.

 

TALLINN: We did this on our own as well. It rained.

 

ST. PETERSBURG: It rained some more. Two-day tour from TJ’s. Immediately announced that the order of the tour was being changed as due to the number of ships, the Hermitage was making a special Monday opening. Morning at Catherine Palace was a mess (too many groups all trying to get in at once) and as result, our restaurant meal turned into box lunches as we drove to the Hermitage. But it was worth it as we were the first there for the afternoon special session and we were walking into empty rooms as we made our way through the museum. Absolutely incredible to be in there with no one else. Did everything else on Tuesday. Did I mention it rained some more?

 

HELSINKI: It raine… Wait a minute, no it didn’t. Dutifully showed up at 7:30 for our TJ’s arranged tour. Lots of people waiting (including some from another company also sub-contracted to the same company) but no tour guide. After some calls, we found out the tour company changed it to 9:00 but the word did not get to us (don’t know if it was the tour company or TJ’s that messed up but I’m guessing it was the tour company since multiple companies’ customers were affected; none the less, TJ's refunded half the tour cost due to the mix-up).

 

With a speed run required to make Stockholm on-time, the captain warned everyone to be back on board at 3:30 as we were not waiting. Despite that, eight runners arrived at 3:59 as they were about to pull the gangway for our scheduled 4:00 departure.

 

STOCKHOLM: No rain here either. We docked downtown having come through the archipelago. Short five hour port call so our tour moved quickly. Back out through the archipelago and on to our speed run for Copenhagen.

 

ON-BOARD ACTIVITIES: Prior to this cruise, we had not been into things like Trivia. But our CC friends got us to go and we were hooked. One game, we lost by one only to find the winner included someone from our dinner table. Somehow, he ended up with the champagne bottle which he brought to dinner to share with the table. A couple of days later, I was on a winning team but all we got was pens. I brought the pen to dinner to “share”. We had a good laugh about that but when someone needed to sign a bar bill, he of course asked for the shared pen.

 

DISEMBARKATION: Princess has it all down to a science. With a 5:00am arrival, 9:30 was the earliest legal flight time. Our flight was at 9:55 so we bought Princess transfers. We were assigned to the second disembarkation group to leave at 6:25. Quick trip to the airport, grabbed our bags, and checked-in. Out on the course by 7:45 with over two hours to kill. Since we were independent air, we were done with Princess as soon as we got there but while we breezed through check-in at KLM, I noticed they had a couple of Princess check-in desks with long lines. Not sure why those with Princess air had to go there rather than checking in on the kiosks and immediately dropping bags at the bag drop area.

 

Loved it so much that we just booked Regal’s Sept. 2017 TA cruise Copenhagen to New York. Fire away with any questions I can try to answer.

[Clarea]

Nice report, thanks.

[riclop]

Thanks for the review.

[Keith1010]

Thank you for your review.

 

Keith

[plan09]

Thank you for the report. Which hotel was Princess using in Copenhagen?

[lstone19]

Thank you for the report. Which hotel was Princess using in Copenhagen?

 

 

 

The Scandic. There are several Scandic hotels in Copenhagen but this one is just Scandic with no additional qualifier on the name. It's on Vesterport across from the planetarium.

 

 

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[plan09]

Many thanks Larry, sorry about all the rain but it seems like you had a great time.

[anthonyy7]

Thanks for the review and the patters. We sail in 2 months! All of the Regal/Baltic reviews lately is getting me really excited.

[Mom33]

Thanks for your thoughts on your cruise. Sorry to hear it rained a lot, but it sounds like you made the best of it. :)

[lstone19]

Thanks for your thoughts on your cruise. Sorry to hear it rained a lot, but it sounds like you made the best of it. :)

 

 

 

Oh, we did. On a cruise ship in the rain still beats work. [emoji3]

 

 

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[DrivesLikeMario]

Really appreciate the review. You gave us all the pertinent information we needed in a concise manner. Thanks and welcome home! :)

[dee66]

Hi,

 

Can you tell me how rough were the seas on the Baltic cruise? We are in a forward minisuite and a little concerned about the motion on the ship.

 

Thanks.

[lstone19]

We were midship - B420 - so not subject to much pitching but for the most part, seas were pretty calm with very little motion. Even on a day with whitecaps I felt very little motion in the ship. The Baltic is sufficiently protected that I don't think there's much sea action unless you're actually caught in a storm

 

 

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[Poulsbo Cruisers]

Thanks for your review. We did this exact same cruise on the Regal last year (July 7). We only had rain in Oslo. This review brings back many fond memories. We loved the cruise and the ship.

[tchen811]

Hi,

 

Can you tell me how rough were the seas on the Baltic cruise? We are in a forward minisuite and a little concerned about the motion on the ship.

 

Thanks.

 

We were on the same cruise as Istone19 and our mini-suite was in the forward part of the ship L107. The seas were not too rough at all. We could feel the rocking of the ship a little bit when sleeping. I am guessing if your cabin is lower level, it should be more stable.