Sky Baltic redeployment

[fluffybunny22]

My TA just dropped an email on me last night that our 11 night Baltic leaving Copenhagen is now a 12 night leaving Southampton. We weren't 100% sold on the original cruise because we don't know if it will be safe to travel internationally in June or if Americans will be allowed in Europe but now I'm even less sold. My in laws are traveling with us and have a FCC that they got in return for an air penalty for our original cruise that was cancelled this June. Not happy right now. Super glad I booked a back up vacation to Disney World.

[nini]

Princess is playing "Musical Ships" again. Yesterday, we  also had two Sky cruises cancelled.

[DrivesLikeMario]

Yes, it's really annoying when they do these kind of things!  People have already had enough disappointment lately and now the cruises that are supposedly going are cancelled.  And if you want to rebook, they don't even have alternatives ready for some of these!  Very frustrating for passengers.

[loriva]

We received an email today from Princess with the tentative new itineraries.  The Baltic is dropping Berlin, Oslo, and Helsinki (mostly)--now has a total of five sea days for the 12 night cruise.  The email said they were still working to finalize the itineraries, so hope they are planning on adding some or all of those ports back.  Oddly, one--and only one--of the itineraries over the summer has Helsinki.  If it could be on one sailing, you'd think it could be on all.

 

[azbirdmom]

19 minutes ago, loriva said:

We received an email today from Princess with the tentative new itineraries.  The Baltic is dropping Berlin, Oslo, and Helsinki (mostly)--now has a total of five sea days for the 12 night cruise.  The email said they were still working to finalize the itineraries, so hope they are planning on adding some or all of those ports back.  Oddly, one--and only one--of the itineraries over the summer has Helsinki.  If it could be on one sailing, you'd think it could be on all.

 

 

Agree - way too many sea days on the replacement Baltic cruises!  Not sure if the $200 OBC enticement will be enough for us to rebook one of these.

YP_2021_Southampton.pdf

[fluffybunny22]

10 hours ago, azbirdmom said:

 

Agree - way too many sea days on the replacement Baltic cruises!  Not sure if the $200 OBC enticement will be enough for us to rebook one of these.

YP_2021_Southampton.pdf 218.39 kB · 10 downloads

This is not acceptable for us. Way too many sea days. Especially to have 2 sets of back to back. We'll probably wait until 2022.

[isosika]

We have B2B cruises scheduled for June and July 2021.  The first 2 weeks will be in Norway/Iceland and the second 2 weeks will be in the Baltics.  When we first booked the ship was the Grand Princess and now it's the Regal.  

 

We had the same cabin on the Grand for both cruises but in the transfer process we have different cabins on the Regal, according to what's been posted on their website.  We have received change information for the first cruise from the TA but no confirmation on the second cruise. 

 

We booked these pre-pandemic and have been holding out hope that they will go.  However, as we get closer to the sail date, and with Europe not opening up to cruises, it looks more and more like these cruises will not happen.  I'm going to wait until almost final payment date to cancel, if it appears they will not go.

[shellgirl61]

The Sky redeployment affects me to. I was scheduled to sail on May 16, 2021. I am not sure what I will do. The options that we have right now are not that great. Losing 3 ports and gaining more sea days does not make me excited about the cruise. Missing about half of the ports takes a lot away from the overall enjoyment of cruising the Baltic.

Moving Baltic cruises from RT Copenhagen to RT Southampton does not make a lot of sense to me.

[ilovetexas]

We were supposed to be on Sky on May 5, which was canceled outright.  I didn’t feel like waiting for all the new itineraries to be posted in a few weeks, nor did I like the price tag on the one they already have up and suggested as a replacement.  Going from 11 to 14 days, r/t Southampton instead of Copenhagen, and an increase of about 3k.

 

We found an Alaska cruise tour that we liked and booked it instead.  It irritates me more than a little that if we had kept our booking in Europe in 2021, we’d be getting $200 obc each but since we booked Alaska instead (and spent considerably more money, too) we got $15 obc each.  I’m hoping they reconsider that.

[senior lady]

On 9/10/2020 at 5:58 PM, azbirdmom said:

 

Agree - way too many sea days on the replacement Baltic cruises!  Not sure if the $200 OBC enticement will be enough for us to rebook one of these.

YP_2021_Southampton.pdf 218.39 kB · 27 downloads

I'm ok with new itinerary.  Booked because of St Petersburgh and Tallinn.  This way we can enjoy Southampton before cruise.   More sea days to enjoy the drink pkg...lol

[cruisen JJ]

We should have been on the Sky Princess right now doing a Baltic and then TA to New York. We rebooked the same cruise for next year. Since they cancelled that on us this week we're now doing a TA from New York to Southampton on RCCL, spending a week in London and then sailing on the Regal Princess for the Baltic Heritage. It's working out cheaper, even with a week in London, than the 26 days on Sky Princess. We really wanted to be on the Sky Princess but I'm happy with our new plan. I will miss my free laundry and internet while on RCCL.

[caribill]

11 hours ago, shellgirl61 said:

 

Moving Baltic cruises from RT Copenhagen to RT Southampton does not make a lot of sense to me.

 

Nor to me.

 

I have no idea why Princess made this move.

[susancruzs]

I'm thinking it is because of varying countries rules and/or regulations.  Princess wants to get schedules set up for a restart probably and I can imagine it isn't easy with all the logistics.  I'm bummed about my Crown Grand Adventure cruise being cancelled, switched to Sky. 

 

I should be on the Baltic/TA Sky right now, too.  I didn't book 2021 cruise because of pricing, went with Crown instead.  Now with no replacement cruise, I have to wait for all the move overs before I can book a cruise on the Sky.  I want to do the British Isles plus TA end of August will depend on cabin availability.

[CruisinFinsUp]

Baltic cruises have historically had varying ports of embarkation - you can start the cruise from one of three cities.   Thus people are embarking and disembarking every couple of days from different places.  
 

Given Covid-19, it would make sense to have everyone on the SAME schedule.  That way excursions are the only on and off.  The excursions can be controlled according to whatever requirements are necessary at the time of the cruise, should the cruise be allowed to occur.    Look at the MSC cruises in the Med currently.  
 

Perhaps Southhampton is the best choice for the volumes of passengers that will be travelling.   Perhaps the other ports / countries are less likely to allow the travel, or perhaps not willing to contract at this time - Or shoreex operators are not contracting - or other reasons we cannot imagine --- so they are dropped off the itinerary, and / or are no longer embarkation options.    
Keeping one embarkation port only also allows for changes to itinerary that will not affect other embarkations.  

 

There is still a lot of future uncertainty because of Covid.  I think Princess is trying to put together plans that will have even a chance of happening.   Round trip from Southhampton seems reasonable.   
 

I think any future travel will be very different than past travel - a lot of changes to get used to, most of which we cannot predict today.  

Edited September 13, 2020 by cruisintoddler

[caribill]

15 hours ago, cruisintoddler said:

Baltic cruises have historically had varying ports of embarkation - you can start the cruise from one of three cities.   Thus people are embarking and disembarking every couple of days from different places. 

 

Keeping one embarkation port only also allows for changes to itinerary that will not affect other embarkations.  

 

 

 

They could have just kept Copenhagen as the only port to embark the Baltic cruise.

 

No obvious need to move from Copenhagen to Southampton so that passengers could pay more for less ports to visit.

[susancruzs]

Now it is wait and see mode for the Sky transatlantic.  I was going to book the prior British Isles but changed my mind and booked the following 7 day New England cruise, I love those ports. 

 

My TA is going to watch for the Sky booking to open for me and hopefully get the same cabin (or similar) for both cruises.

[azbirdmom]

11 hours ago, caribill said:

 

 

They could have just kept Copenhagen as the only port to embark the Baltic cruise.

 

No obvious need to move from Copenhagen to Southampton so that passengers could pay more for less ports to visit.

 

Keeping Copenhagen as an embarkation port only works if you have back to back itineraries that stop in Copenhagen.  In many cases the Baltic itinerary is alternating with British Isles.  I wish they had found a different way to make this work since it resulted in a cancelled cruise for us.

 

[senior lady]

On 9/13/2020 at 12:08 AM, caribill said:

 

Nor to me.

 

I have no idea why Princess made this move.

it's because they are rotating the cruises.  Baltic one cruise, the next British Isles, Baltic, etc.

[caribill]

7 minutes ago, azbirdmom said:

 

Keeping Copenhagen as an embarkation port only works if you have back to back itineraries that stop in Copenhagen.  In many cases the Baltic itinerary is alternating with British Isles.  I wish they had found a different way to make this work since it resulted in a cancelled cruise for us.

 

 

 

I suspect that most people who took the 12 day 6-port Baltic cruise round-trip Copenhagen were not looking for a B2B experience except as a part of a season starting or ending TA.

 

This was a very popular itinerary.

[caribill]

2 minutes ago, senior lady said:

it's because they are rotating the cruises.  Baltic one cruise, the next British Isles, Baltic, etc.

 

Yes, that is what they ended up doing.

 

But in the past they had a ship dedicated to the British Isles itinerary out of Southampton and another to the Baltic area from Copenhagen.

 

They certainly did not make the change so that many people could book a 24-day B2B that covers both areas.