Majestic Princess Jan 22 and Feb 19, 2022 live report

[dhanakorn]

Day 2 main show in the theater was Princess production show: Sweet Soul Music. It’s pretty good but the show was only 30 minutes long. I think they cut some songs on tonight show. 

 

 

Ballroom dance is very popular on Princess ship. 

 

[dhanakorn]

Internet on the cruise is super slow — it was very fast during my January cruise. I think there’re a lot more passengers on this cruise so it impacts the speed and bandwidth. 
 

Day 3 breakfast from the buffet. The quiche was cold but they can heat it up for you. Coffee was typical American drip coffee. 

 

We got to Cabo around 10:30am - a little bit ahead of schedule. We’re the only ship here today. I think Carnival Panorama might do the reversed itinerary. 

 

I didn’t have any particular plan today so I didn’t rush to get out. There’re more guests on this cruise so we have to wait for tender. By the time I got the tender ticket line, they’re distributing tickets for tender number 33. I got to the tender pier around noon and it looked very empty. Normally you’ll see a lot of lines forming here for various excursion tours.

 

I took a walk around the marina to Medano beach. It’s about half an hour leisure walk using the street next to Luxury Avenue shopping mall. There’s free restroom to use inside the mall — there’s no public restroom on the beach so this’s a good place for restroom stop. You could also get there by water taxi from the tender pier. Weather was great so I enjoyed the long walk. 
 

Nice view of Majestic from Medano beach

 

This’s a very long beach. I walked to Riu Palace then turned back. Water has turquoise color and it’s little cold. Overall it’s a very beautiful beach. There’s some crowded areas but you could walked further away if you want some quiet area. 

 

 

The famous Mango Deck beach bar. I was initially planning to stop here for drinks and lunch. But they had some kind of party going on with contests and loud music so I decided to skip it. 

 

 

 

[dhanakorn]

I walked back from the beach to explore the Cabo town. 

 

Then I saw many locals walking into this restaurant so I went to check it out.

 

It’s a rotisserie chicken place. It smelled pretty good.

 

After a long walk I started to get hungry so I sat down for lunch here. 

 

A quarter chicken for 60 pesos ($3)

 

Fried fish with garlic sauce - 130 pesos ($6.5)

 

You can’t have Mexican food without a margarita. 

 

Total bill was 325 pesos ($18) for 2 drinks and 2 dishes. I think it’s very cheap. Cash only, you can pay in peso or dollar. Food was very tasty, no wonder it’s very popular among locals. The name of the place is El Pollo De Oro, highly recommended. 

[dhanakorn]

After late lunch I felt like something was still missing. I think it’s the dessert. I saw this ice cream store on the way back. 

 

2 scoops for 50 pesos ($2.5). It’s very good - better than ice cream on the ship. 

 

Then I walked back to the marina. Stopped by the tequila store. 

 

Tequila is all you need. Medallion Pay is accepted here. 

 

Edited February 22, 2022 by dhanakorn

[mlgb]

I probably should have posted my Baja restaurant recommendation since we seem to have similar tastes.

Tacos Gardenias (not just tacos but that is what I had). Paseo de la Marina L31, between Camino Real and Acuario. Credit Cards accepted.

Edited February 22, 2022 by mlgb

[dhanakorn]

The marina looks very beautiful. The water is clear you could see fish swimming. 

 

 

I got back on the ship around 4:30pm. It’s a good day in Cabo. 

 

[fpsphil]

5 hours ago, dhanakorn said:

Internet on the cruise is super slow — it was very fast during my January cruise. I think there’re a lot more passengers on this cruise so it impacts the speed and bandwidth. 

Interested in your observations about the internet over the next few days. I have the 5 day Cabo cruise on the Discovery booked in April and was planning to work onboard (internet on my Jan Majestic cruise was lighting fast so I figured I could do it). 

[dhanakorn]

1 hour ago, fpsphil said:

Interested in your observations about the internet over the next few days. I have the 5 day Cabo cruise on the Discovery booked in April and was planning to work onboard (internet on my Jan Majestic cruise was lighting fast so I figured I could do it). 

On my Jan trip, the speed was very fast I didn’t have any issue doing some works on the ship. It was very slow during the past few days even during the late night time (when less people using the internet). Today internet is back to very fast speed again while we’re docking in Mazatlan. Maybe it was satellite signal glitch when we were at sea. 

[tukogirl]

17 hours ago, dhanakorn said:

The port time could be slightly different from cruise to cruise. They don’t run exactly the same itinerary on every cruise. 
 

The ship time is one hour behind the local PV time. On this cruise we’ll arrive PV at 8am ship time — so it’s 9am local PV time. Very confusing but it’s kind of standard practice on other cruise lines too. Most vendors that deal with cruise passengers are probably familiar with this. 

Thank you!  It sounds like our 10:30 meet up across the street from the port in PV will work out well! 
 

thanks again for your lovely reports. Enjoying this second week as well! 

[dhanakorn]

Day 3 dinner - same menu as my last cruise so I didn’t take the picture. 
 

The banana rum chilled soup

 

Grilled seafood - shrimp, jumbo scallop, salmon, and snapper. I asked for a bowl of curry on the side (it’s the sauce on another menu item). The curry saved the day. It added spicy kick to the main dish. 

 

Cheese plate, vanilla gelato, and blueberry sorbet. Cheese plate was good - it had brie, cheddar, grapes, prune, walnuts, dried apricots, and soft nut breads. Ice cream wasn’t good as the one served during lunch. During dinner, we only have limited choice of vanilla, chocolate, and blueberry sorbet, unless you bribe your server to get you other flavors. 

 

Watching the moon from the balcony. Ship was sailing at high speed so photo was a little blurry. 

[MissP22]

On 2/22/2022 at 3:16 AM, dhanakorn said:

Day 2 main show in the theater was Princess production show: Sweet Soul Music. It’s pretty good but the show was only 30 minutes long. I think they cut some songs on tonight show. 

 

 

 

Ballroom dance is very popular on Princess ship. 

 

I see that not everyone follows the indoor masking protocol. 

Maybe their practicing for the March 1 change in rules. 

[dhanakorn]

Let’s continue on Day 3. Today we arrived at Mazatlan. I woke up at 7:20am to the noise while the ship making 360 deg turn in the harbor. You don’t really need an alarm clock on port day - the noise from the ship will wake you up. 

 

 

We started approaching the dock around 7:35am. Tour buses were already waiting there. 

[dhanakorn]

I went down to MDR for breakfast. The daily special changes everyday. 

 

Papaya was the reason I came down to MDR. There’s no papaya in the buffet - only available in the MDR. 

 

Huevos Rancheros wasn’t very good. I think they forgot to bring me salsa. The server was quite busy so I didn’t bother getting anything else. 

[dhanakorn]

Today I planned to visit Stone Island in the morning then go back to the town for lunch. I walked out of the terminal and headed to the water taxi pier. Paid 30 pesos and got on the water taxi. You needed to keep the ticket for the return trip. 

 

Got to the Stone Island around 10am. 

 

Walked along the beach and saw this RV community. They’re Canadian snowbirds who came down to stay here for a few months during winter.  

 

Weather was great. It’s very peaceful and quiet here (when you walked away from the restaurant area). 

 

 

Literally it’s just me on the beach. 

 

Stone Island is much better in the morning. It started to get very windy in the afternoon. 

[dhanakorn]

The sea water doesn’t have turquoise color like Medano beach in Cabo. But it’s much less touristy here. I spent a couple hours on the beach then took the water taxi back. 
 

Then I walked to Carnaval street. From this corner, you can catch a public bus back to Old Town. The fare is 11 pesos. I paid 10 pesos and the driver didn’t say anything. You could pay $1 if you don’t have pesos. 

 

I got off at the Municipal Market next to the Cathedral. I always wanted to try one of the restaurants on the second floor of the market. 

 

During my first time to Mazatlan I took a bus tour and saw this nice balcony seating on the second floor of the market and I noted to myself that I need to eat here one day. You can see the Cathedral from in the far back. 

 

I ordered shrimp ceviche for starter. 

 

Shrimp soup. I think it has around 10 medium sized shrimps. The soup was tasty. 

 

Deep fried whole fish for the main dish. The fish was huge - served with usual rice, beans, and salad. Assorted bottles of salsa are on the table. 

 

I ordered much more than I could eat but I wanted to sample different types of food. I don’t know when I’ll be back again. All three dishes were very delicious. I asked for the bill and they wrote down 250. Three seafood dishes and one drink for only 250 pesos ($13)!!! It’s amazingly cheap. I’m probably the only non-local here on the second floor. Most tourists can’t find the stairs to get up here. 

[dhanakorn]

The I came downstairs and went inside the market for dessert. I tried the smoothie from this store before on my previous trips.

 

Big cup of papaya smoothie for 48 pesos ($2.5). 

 

Then I took a public bus from the market back to the cruise terminal. You need to take the bus with “Sabalo” written in the front. Usually it’s a green bus. Or if you have enough time, you could walk back to the terminal (around 25min). 

[jwattle]

@dhanakornif you have a moment, could you grab a pic of the officer's board please (it shows their pics and names as well as positions)? Thank you so much!🥂

[dhanakorn]

1 hour ago, jwattle said:

@dhanakornif you have a moment, could you grab a pic of the officer's board please (it shows their pics and names as well as positions)? Thank you so much!🥂

There you go. This board is on deck 7 near mid-ship elevators. I’ve never noticed it until today. 

[jwattle]

Thank you so much!!!!🥂

[dhanakorn]

Now I start to like cruising from LA. It’s a short flight back to San Jose. I got back home before 2pm. 
 

Made it to Ruby now. I’ll probably reach platinum after Alaska cruise this summer.

 

[KLM3164]

@dhanakornWhat time was your flight home and did you fly out of Long Beach or LA? Our flight home just got moved to 11 am out of LB and I’m hoping that we will have enough time to make the flight.

[dhanakorn]

4 minutes ago, KLM3164 said:

@dhanakornWhat time was your flight home and did you fly out of Long Beach or LA? Our flight home just got moved to 11 am out of LB and I’m hoping that we will have enough time to make the flight.

My flight was at 12:10pm. I left the terminal around 9am and arrived at LAX around 9:25am. 
 

If you leave the ship earlier around 8am, you should get to the airport (either LAX or LGB) before 9am. Usually there’s no traffic in the morning. Plenty of Uber or Lyft. Princess transfer ($25 to LAX) has many buses waiting. The bus will leave once they fill up. 

[dhanakorn]

Back to Day 4 in Mazatlan. All aboard time was at 5:30pm but the gangway was already pulled from the ship. I guess we got everyone back on board early. 
 

Starboard side has the view of the terminal and the Old Town. Although you may not be able to enjoy the quiet time on the balcony due to the noise from the trucks and cranes in the terminal area. Mazatlan terminal is a major port to transport goods to Baha peninsula - it’s much closer to sail across the Sea of Cortez than traveling by land. 
 

 

 

 

View of the Old Town from the balcony

 

We started pulling away around 5:40pm

[dhanakorn]

We had very beautiful view of sunset while the ship leaving the harbor. 
 

 

 

We sailed past the El Faro Lighthouse.

 

 

[dhanakorn]

I think today we had the best sunset view of the cruise. 

 

 

 

We started to increase the speed after we exited the harbor. Look at the big wakes the ship created. Balcony on deck 9 is huge  - I think it’s more than double the size of standard balcony.