Crown Princess - Onboard Quick Review 11-20-2018

[CruisingWalter]

I’ll write a full review when these 10 days are up, but in the meantime, here’s a quick review after 3 days onboard.

 

After our very first three cruises were aboard Caribbean, Sapphire and Island Princesses, we have not sailed this line in over 8 years.  In those years we’ve sailed Celebrity (3x), Royal Caribbean (3x), Disney, Holland America and NCL.  After those ships and experiences, it honestly felt like a little bit of a throwback when we got onboard Crown Princess.  We’ve gotten so used to the wide expanses and features of the more modern ships, the Crown feels more like an oversized yacht than cruise ship.  I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. 

 

Embarkation was a bit of a cluster as the Crown had to go through a full Coast Guard inspection so boarding was not scheduled to begin until 2 – 2:30pm. Problem was, Princess did a very poor job of notifying the passengers.  Princess had our email addresses and had no problems offering us upsells and specials in the months leading up to the cruise, but nothing in the week leading up to the cruise about the inspection and late boarding.  Fortunately we heard about it here on CC so we were prepared, but as 2:00pm rolled around, it seemed all 3000 passengers were waiting in Terminal 4.  Most everyone we talked about had no idea there was an inspection or late boarding.  Once we got onboard everything was fine, but Princess did a very poor job managing the situation before arrival and in the Terminal.

 

Boarding the ship, the first re-impression was the Crown felt dated.  Tighter spaces, lower ceilings, lots of wood and older style decor and much more intimate than the more modern ships.   At first it was a bit of a disappointment. Maybe I was expecting more because the ship recently came out of a refurbishment. But as we have sailed these first three days, I’ve come to re-appreciate the many venues that spread people around the ship so other than the Muster Drill, we have not had any issues with large crowds clogging the walkways or public spaces.   The Crown public spaces are spread across multiple decks, fore, midship and aft and none of them are a ‘showstopper / must be in this place’ so the crowds are spread out.   We feel like we’re cruising along with a few hundred of our best friends instead of the 3000+ passengers this ship can hold.

 

The cabin itself is a bit dated in its appearance, but as a mini-suite, Club Class, it’s perfectly functional.  We’re on Dolphin Deck 9, D423, so our balconies are the ones that stick out the furthest so we can look directly down into the water.  Folks can look down into our balcony from above because we do stick out so far.  It’s not been a problem, but it’s definitely very sunny out there.   I will say the bed is not comfortable for me at all, feels kind of like a classic futon.  My shoulders have been sore each morning. 

 

Food has been good and the Crown has been showing us that Princess still has the most consistent Main Dining Room experience in terms of food quality and service.  The food has been good and well served.  Disney is the one line that has a better Main Dining Room experience.  We’ve been taking advantage of the Manager’s Special each evening in the Club Class section of the dining room.  He prepares the special right there in the dining room and so far they’ve been fabulous.  The Fish and Chips lunch in the Crown Grill was fun and I would recommend that if it comes up on your cruise.  I’ve been taking advantage of espressos and cappuccinos at the Coffee and Cone up on Deck 15 each morning.  They open early and there’s no line.  Very nice folks up there too.  The Horizon Court buffet is absolutely tiny compared to really any other ship we’ve been on.  The selection in the buffet is very weak compared to any other line we’ve been on, save Holland, and the secondary buffet behind it is not open that much.  Probably a good thing as it keeps us from eating too much at lunch. 

Drinks have been a mixed bag.  Have not found a single bar that serves consistently good drinks which is ironic since we see bartender “Isaac” from the Love Boat on the monitors each day.  Old Fashioned was the worst drink I’ve had at sea in the Wheelhouse Bar.  Tasted like rubbing alcohol.  The “Isaac” was decent in the Explorers Lounge.  Other drinks like Mojitos and Martinis have been good to so-so, hoping to find a great bar before these 10 days are over.  My wife did enjoy her Bahama Breeze at Explorers lounge, so far the best drink we’ve had on the ship.  Celebrity with the World Class Bar makes the best drinks at sea, especially the Old Fashioned. 

 

My wife booked the Sanctuary for the entire week as we don’t have a lot of excursions planned.  It has been worth the money as the cushioned chairs are the most comfortable on deck and we have direct access to the Spa Pool below.  The staff here is extremely friendly and makes sure we have plenty of water.  They also serve afternoon tea at 3.  It’s extremely windy up here when the ship is moving so be aware of that.  The only thing I question is placing the ‘quiet sanctuary’ directly below the ship’s horn. 😊

 

I do appreciate the addition of thick astroturf throughout the pool and upper deck areas.  Prevents our feet from burning on the hot decks and less slippery when the decks are wet.  The Terrace and Spa pools have been very cold so far.  Not sure if that’s because she just came across a Transatlantic and is just starting her Caribbean circuits, but there’s no way to ‘ease in’ to the pools so far, just fall in.  The Terrace pool is still one of my favorite pools at sea with the almost unobstructed view out the back of the ship.  We missed that on the other ship lines.

 

Entertainment has been quite good so far.  Magic To Do was an entertaining show, the bands in the various venues have been good and as I mentioned before, crowds have not been an issue because everyone is so spread out.  We’ve not hit bad logjams of people even though most of the venues have been nearly full when we visit them.  I do miss the piano player, Bert Stratton, who was a fixture on Princess in the early 2000’s and was an absolute delight to watch perform. 

 

Internet is, in a word, terrible.  Especially compared to the other cruise lines we’ve sailed.  Princess is rolling out a new internet service, but it’s not on this ship yet.  My laptop cannot log into the WiFi anywhere on the ship except in the Internet Café, which is where I am now to upload this.  My phone gets one bar of WiFi in the cabin, in the Sanctuary and pretty much everywhere on the ship.  The Princess@Sea service works pretty much everywhere on the ship, but actual internet, not so much.   

 

Speaking of which the Princess@Sea app does work quite well, though you can’t look up anything beyond today.  If you try to use “Itinerary” to see what the events and shows will be in the upcoming days, you’ll just see the same schedule from today repeated. 

 

So this ship does not have all the modern features of many of the ships we’ve sailed recently or even of her sisters the Royal, Regal and Majestic.   So it was a bit of surprise for me when we first boarded and yes I was a little disappointed at first.  Some of it is a bit worse for wear, the internet is terrible and the drinks are so-so.  But honestly I’m warming up to the old gal again and enjoying the incredibly relaxed atmosphere on board.   More soon in the full review at the end of the cruise. 

 

Feel free to send along questions and I'll answer them when I can get the WiFi to work.  :)

 

[jasbo49]

Thanks for weighing in. I like the Crown quite a bit, but then I’m quite accustomed to Princess ships.

 

Try a Chairman of the Board in Crooners. It’s a good bet you’ll like it.

 

Jim

[rocklinmom]

Enjoying your review so far!  We will be on the Crown next June so this is helpful.  Quick question, do they also have the mocha and latte coffee drinks at Coffee and Cones?  Same as down in the International Café? 

[goldie099]

Thanks for this great start to a review! We board the Crown mid-December so this is very helpful info 🙂 I'll try and temper my expectations, the last two ships I've cruised on have definitely been more modern, but I cruised on Golden to Alaska back in 2014 so I'll rely on those good memories as to what to look forward to on the Crown!

[mellon1]

Thanks for the update!  We are going on Crown in January for 20 days.  Who is the Maitre' D on board now.

[loonline]

We will be boarding the Crown next week.  Can you tell me if the MDR menus have some of the Crown Grill items for an extra charge?  Thank you.

[hpeabody]

1 hour ago, mellon1 said:

Thanks for the update!  We are going on Crown in January for 20 days.  Who is the Maitre' D on board now.

 

 

I just got off Saturday.  It was Oscar Perego.

[hpeabody]

8 minutes ago, loonline said:

We will be boarding the Crown next week.  Can you tell me if the MDR menus have some of the Crown Grill items for an extra charge?  Thank you.

 

I just got off Saturday.  I did not notice that on the menu.  I had heard this new opportunity to spend was coming to the MDR.  Maybe it has not been implemented on all ships yet.

[phonejock]

Thanks . Will on the Crown in early March. I will look forward to your next post.

[jagsfan]

When I saw you were in a Club Class mini I was really hoping you’d say they have added a curtain to separate the sleeping area from the “living room”.

i guess they're keeping  it for just Royal, Regal, and newer. 

I’m looking forward to reading the rest of your review. 

[SquishTheWhale]

Thank you for your review! We are on her in 2 weeks. I suspect we'll feel the same about her to start off with- we are used to new megaships with water slides and 20 dining venues etc etc. So the Crown is a change for us. However, I'm hoping we aren't bored and instead come to appreciate the more relaxed atmosphere.

 

If you have any time later in your cruise can you let me know if Stargazing at sea was offered? That's one thing I was looking forward to.

Edited November 21, 2018 by SquishTheWhale

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 11:41 AM, jasbo49 said:

Thanks for weighing in. I like the Crown quite a bit, but then I’m quite accustomed to Princess ships.

 

Try a Chairman of the Board in Crooners. It’s a good bet you’ll like it.

 

Jim

Thanks for the tip, I'll try that tonight!

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 2:37 PM, rocklinmom said:

Enjoying your review so far!  We will be on the Crown next June so this is helpful.  Quick question, do they also have the mocha and latte coffee drinks at Coffee and Cones?  Same as down in the International Café? 

Yes, they have all the coffee drinks up at Coffee and Cones

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 5:05 PM, loonline said:

We will be boarding the Crown next week.  Can you tell me if the MDR menus have some of the Crown Grill items for an extra charge?  Thank you.

 

I have not seen that actually on the menu but I thought I heard one of the servers say that they had an additional item for an added fee.  But nothing is actually listed on the menus for extra charge.  As I mentioned in my review, we are sailing Club Class this time and we have been really enjoying the special prepared in the dining room each evening.  I'll see if I can find out about the Crown Grill items tonight and report back.

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 6:50 PM, jagsfan said:

When I saw you were in a Club Class mini I was really hoping you’d say they have added a curtain to separate the sleeping area from the “living room”.

i guess they're keeping  it for just Royal, Regal, and newer. 

I’m looking forward to reading the rest of your review. 

 

I have not seen a curtain, but honestly it would be in the way.  The cabin narrows between the bed and the sofa due to how the furniture is laid out.  So it's kind of a natural separation.  It's a nice cabin though.  

[CruisingWalter]

18 hours ago, SquishTheWhale said:

Thank you for your review! We are on her in 2 weeks. I suspect we'll feel the same about her to start off with- we are used to new megaships with water slides and 20 dining venues etc etc. So the Crown is a change for us. However, I'm hoping we aren't bored and instead come to appreciate the more relaxed atmosphere.

 

If you have any time later in your cruise can you let me know if Stargazing at sea was offered? That's one thing I was looking forward to.

 

It's supposed to be, we have not had it yet, but we are now halfway through the cruise.  We're looking forward to it and I'll report back if it's offered.  Waters have been rolling so the ship has been pitching and rolling a bit in the evenings.  Not sure if that's affecting the schedule, but I hope we do have a chance to do that.

[CruisingWalter]

Quick update on the internet on board.  I've been in the Internet Cafe for the past hour trying to use my tablet via the wifi.  It connects just fine but then no webpages will load.  I used up over 25 minutes of my internet time just trying to connect to this very forum to answer these questions.  I gave up and am now using one of Princess' computers in the internet cafe.   Internet is bad on this ship, very bad.  But it forces you to do things other than report back to other cruisers on Cruise Critic.  :)

[KKB]

Gees...been 8 years since we sailed Princess. I remember the internet being horrid, but it has been great on all our other cruises since then so I thought that the times had just caught everyone up--guess not! 

We are on the Crown to UK in June & I will have 250 free minutes. But with so many ports, I am going to take advantage of $10/day (just days I use it; 24 hours from first usage) International plan with Verizon. 

 

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 2:52 PM, goldie099 said:

Thanks for this great start to a review! We board the Crown mid-December so this is very helpful info 🙂 I'll try and temper my expectations, the last two ships I've cruised on have definitely been more modern, but I cruised on Golden to Alaska back in 2014 so I'll rely on those good memories as to what to look forward to on the Crown!

 

One of our very favorite cruises was the Cruise Tour of Alaska with the Sapphire Princess.  7 days on land, 7 days on the ship and then 3 more tacked on at the end in Vancouver.  It's a bit of deja vu when you reboard the ship, especially the first night you eat in the MDR.  Brought back a lot of memories of Alaska.  As always, the dinner staff is so incredibly friendly and helpful.  One thing we've really noticed is that there's not nearly the level of rushing around that we have seen on some of the other lines.  A professional pace, but not rushing all over the place.

 

As always, the staff will turn any main course into an appetizer portion if you want to sample more than one entree.  We've been doing that each evening.   Enjoy the trip!  

[CruisingWalter]

9 hours ago, KKB said:

Gees...been 8 years since we sailed Princess. I remember the internet being horrid, but it has been great on all our other cruises since then so I thought that the times had just caught everyone up--guess not! 

We are on the Crown to UK in June & I will have 250 free minutes. But with so many ports, I am going to take advantage of $10/day (just days I use it; 24 hours from first usage) International plan with Verizon. 

 

 

Princess is rolling out an updated internet service that was originally scheduled to be on the Crown by now. That got delayed (along with the Princess Medallion wrist band) with no word on when they will now be installed.   With any luck it'll be installed by the time you sail in June.  I'm pretty certain there is a communications contractor on board at this time, we've seen them several times and it looks like they're doing something with communications.

 

Our plan with T-Mobile allows us unlimited data in over 150 countries so we use that in all the ports.  But it's 2G speed for free so it's good for texting but not so much for looking up websites.  

[CruisingWalter]

If I can get my laptop / tablet to work again in a future day, I'll upload some photos from around the ship.  We're off to Barbados tomorrow, maybe the wireless will be happier there.  Have a great evening all!

[jagsfan]

1 hour ago, creativegenius said:

 

I have not seen a curtain, but honestly it would be in the way.  The cabin narrows between the bed and the sofa due to how the furniture is laid out.  So it's kind of a natural separation.  It's a nice cabin though.  

Thanks. I don’t know if the minis are the same dimensions as on Royal. Photos people post looks like the exact same cabin except for the curtain. 

I did without it on Coral, so I can do without it on Crown. I was just hoping to have a really dark room to sleep in!

[CruisingWalter]

1 hour ago, jagsfan said:

Thanks. I don’t know if the minis are the same dimensions as on Royal. Photos people post looks like the exact same cabin except for the curtain. 

I did without it on Coral, so I can do without it on Crown. I was just hoping to have a really dark room to sleep in!

 

It's very dark in the cabin with the main curtains closed at the balcony.  They do overlap would while they are not completely black out, it's very dark in the cabin if you want it to be.  We are in D423.  

[jagsfan]

It’s not the curtain on the balcony glass wall, it’s the tv flickering because DH watches it for a couple of hours after I go to sleep. The curtain that divides the cabin makes it marvelously dark so I don’t care if he watches till 3am. 

I was surprised to see one on Serenade because we were not in a junior suite. 

It is more of a plus on Royal and Regal to me than anything else!

As regards the regular curtain, I clip a couple of clothespins and it is pretty much a blackout curtain. As you can see, I love sleeping in pitch dark!

I hope the internet somehow improves so you don’t run out of minutes!

[CruisingWalter]

On 11/20/2018 at 11:41 AM, jasbo49 said:

Thanks for weighing in. I like the Crown quite a bit, but then I’m quite accustomed to Princess ships.

 

Try a Chairman of the Board in Crooners. It’s a good bet you’ll like it.

 

Jim

 

Hey Jim, I tried it tonight and it was fantastic!   I also talked to the server and he said tomorrow night they'll make the Old Fashioned the way I like it.