Trip Report, Crown Princess November 2 - 9, Pacific Wine Country, with pictures

[jaycruising]

Going to do a somewhat abbreviated trip report of our recent sailing on Crown Princess.

 

On this Trip is myself (Jay) and my mom (B), we usually take one trip per year together, so we are good to travel together.  

 

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2022

Our day started bright and early, and since this cruise was leaving from close to home we were able for the first time fly in on the morning of the cruise.  B was flying in from Saskatoon and meeting me in Calgary.  Lucky for me, the weather changed overnight the night before and we got a bunch of snow and it was blowing, but I managed to slip and slide myself safely to the airport.  I went to B's incoming gate and waited for her to arrive, the we headed to the lounge for a bit, got some breakfast and headed to our gate, only to find out that our flight was delayed as we were waiting for pilots to come in on another flight.  Well turns out the plane they were on got stuck in the snow while trying to get to the bridge so they activated new pilots and we got on the plane.  However because of the terrible weather, we had to de-ice and wait for our turn, all in all we were 2 hours late leaving Calgary, luckily it is only an hour flight, so we still landed in Vancouver with plenty of time.

 

We had decided to go ahead and book Princess transfers from the airport to the ship and it turns out it was a great option for us.  Mostly because B's carry on suitcase handle broke during her first leg of the day, so we didn't have to deal with that.  We got on the bus right away and it left for the ship right away.

 

Once we arrived at port we went through security and the checkpoints, picked up our medallions (can't have them shipped in Canada) and made our way on board, we were in our cabin within about 20 minutes of arriving at the port.

 

We were in a port side balcony, aft on the Aloha deck.  Our absolutely amazing cabin steward Eduard came and introduced himself right away, he was so fantastic and was a joy to see each day.

 

Below is our view from our room while in port.

 

This was our first cruise post covid and I have to say I sure love that I love the new muster drill, it is so much faster and more efficient.  After muster we had lunch at the International Cafe. I know everyone has different ways they want to cruise to avoid covid, for us, we made the decision to not eat at the buffet, so we ate a lot in the International Cafe, the breakfast also suits us as we usually are just yogurt or something light.

 

We spent the afternoon exploring a bit, getting unpacked and started to relax.  We had booked a nightly reservation for 6:20 in the dining room at a shared table.  We really enjoy the shared tables and have met some great people.

 

After dinner we just walked around the ship some more and went to an upper deck to take in the night view (pictures below).  They were doing something to the ship and pushed our disembarkation time until 11pm.  We headed back to the room and I was long asleep before we left port, I had worked until the day before and was exhausted

 

 

Edited November 19, 2022 by jaycruising
pictures

[jaycruising]

Thursday, November 3, 2022 - Victoria

 

The thing I loved most about this itinerary is how long we had in port each day since they are so close together.

 

We started our day as usual with breakfast in the international cafe.  I then headed our for the 2.5km walk to go and pick up our rental car for the day.  I'm really glad I headed out early as I was treated to a really pretty sunrise.

 

 

I really enjoyed the walk, the weather was nice and the fall colours were so pretty. I went by the legislative building and the port with some of the ferries.

 

 

 

 

 

I then picked up the rental and headed back to port to pick up B.  From there we headed north out of Victoria.  We were taking this opportunity to go and have lunch with my aunt, she lives about one hour away from Victoria.  We enjoyed the drive so much, and I am kicking myself we didn't make more stops along the way.  We will just have to make sure we do next time.

 

 

We had a lovely lunch and visit, also got to catch up with one of my cousins, I really enjoyed the afternoon.  We headed out around 2 to head back to the ship, we had to have the rental car back by 4.  We also made a quick stop at Costco so B could look for a new suitcase and I filled up with gas.  

 

While waiting for her, I opened Facebook and saw on the Crown Princess page that they had made the decision to to cancel Astoria.

 

We got the car returned and the guy behind the desk told his he called us a taxi, but I never heard him speak to anyone on the phone.  We stood outside and waited for about 20 minutes, it had started to rain and was getting quite cold.  I finally gave up on waiting and we decided to walk over to the Fairmont hotel and caught a taxi right away.

 

Back on the ship and out of our wet clothes, we got ready for dinner and went for a drink.  Again we had a great dinner with great table mates in the main dining room.  I don't really remember what we did after dinner so it must have been really exciting... lol

Edited November 19, 2022 by jaycruising

[jaycruising]

Friday, November 4th, 2022 - Sea Day

 

Today was the day we were supposed to be in Astoria, but the weather had turned pretty bad and they had cancelled this port.  From what I understand is that you have to cross a bar to get to the port and it can be one of the most dangerous ones.  So thanks to our captain for making the best decision for us.  I was looking forward to this day, as we visited the area in 2019 and really love it.

 

This day ended up being a solo day, unfortunately B does get a bit of sea sickness and usually goes down for one day during each cruise.

 

I did a bunch of wandering around on this day, I went to the gym for a little exercise on the treadmill, they have.a nice little gym on the Crown, I prefer to go outside but they had the promenade deck closed because of the weather.  I went and partook in Crafts, I learned how to make origami.  I sat next to a very nice lady, she had a fascinating story.

 

I went and spent quite a bit of time in wheelhouse bar on my iPad.  I ended up playing music trivia and won, all on my own!

 

Then it was time for my favourite Princess activity - Tea Time!  I love tea time, but was a little sad they didn't have any of the sandwiches, or at least any at my table.

 

I would often go back and check on B and see if she needed anything.  she was feeling better, but was not quite ready to venture out (we did have 12-14 foot waves).  So she ordered room service, and I headed out to dinner.  On my way to my table I saw someone we at with the first night, and they invited me to join.  We had a really nice dinner.  Our dinners were taking about 2 hours each night.

 

Again, I have no idea what I did later... lol

[jaycruising]

Saturday, November 5, 2022 - Sea Day

 

B was feeling better, but decided she wanted a light breakfast, and I wanted to go to the main dining room, so we went our separate ways. I had a nice breakfast in the MDR.

 

One feature that I really like about the medallion app is that you can use it to track down your travel mates, so I used that and found B sitting near the International Cafe.  We hung out there for a while and chatted and then decided we would head to craft time, today we did another paper art, I really liked this one better then yesterdays.

 

Back to the international cafe for lunch and then we ended up in the Wheelhouse bar again, we play crib quite often when travelling.  And we couldn't have picked a better time to go, they had a the participants from Voice of the Ocean in there and they were practicing and selecting the songs they would sing on the final night.  Some of them were so good.  One guy sang a Josh Groban song and gave me goosebumps he was sooo good.

 

They had opened the promenade again, so I decided to have my walk outside today, I use my Apple Watch to track my distance, etc.  however because of the movement of the ship, it thinks I walked 4.67km in 15 minutes... have to say I am so impressed with myself... lol

 

 

The rest of today was much like the others, tea time, dinner and hanging around, playing cards.

 

I was so looking forward to the next day and our day in San Fransisco.

[jaycruising]

Sunday, November 6, 2022 - San Fransisco

 

We had to be up very early today, as the Border agents were coming on board to do a passport check and our time was 7am, just before 7 we headed down and the line went pretty much the length of the whole ship.  I was worried about how long it was going to take, but it actually went by really quickly, you just walk in hand them the passport, they look and you and then send you on your way.  We then headed for breakfast and then off of the ship, we had a 9am excursion booked through the ship.  It was super easy to find them, as you exit into a large building, that actually looks like a barn and the buses come right in there.

 

We were off on a trip to Muir Woods National Monument and Sausalito.  There were about 40 people on our bus and we had the most amazing tour guide.  

 

We made our way out of the city and he was telling us all kinds of stories about the different areas we were going through, and all kinds of history.  San Fransisco has some of the best architecture.

 

We winded our way through the city making our way to cross the Golden Gate Bridge.

 

At this point we were supposed to make a stop at the top of the bridge to get photos of the bridge but the area was closed since they were holding a marathon in the area.

 

So we continued on our way to Muir Woods. The road winds up through the hills and due to the size of our bus we couldn't take the main roads we had to take an alternate road.  It still was a little freaky for me, I am not good with heights and our tour guide kept saying "oops".  Finally I may have yelled the "oops are not helping". 

 

We finally arrived and the crazy drive was well worth it.  We were given 1.5 hours to explore, (the entrance fees were covered in our excursion costs).  There are a number of walks / hikes you can take and they have various bridges you can use to turn around on, depending on how long you want the walk to be.

 

 

B & I walked together for the first little bit and then she walked back to the visitor centre and I kept going.

 

 

 

 

It is one of the most majestic places I have ever visited, I was in awe the whole time.

 

To be continued...

[jaycruising]

Sunday, November 6, 2022 con't

 

I went about as far as I could along the paths, keeping in mind how much time I would have to get back to the bus and I wanted to look at the shop.  I took a ton of photos and I could have stayed all day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We all got back on the bus and made our way to Sausalito... to be continued

[jaycruising]

November 6, 2022 - con't

 

For our drive back to Sausalito I let B have the window seat, so that I could have a relaxing ride.  It was a short trip over, and while we were on our way back there was another tour guide on the bus, and she told us about the process to become a San Fransisco City Guide, it takes them almost 6 months before they can lead tours, they shadow people, then start leading the tours, then they are audited, it is quite the process and it really shows, they are so good.  If you are interested in a tour in San Fransisco City tour, I highly recommend it, they are all volunteers and it is done via the San Fransisco Library.

 

The bus parked in the main area of town and we were given another hour and a half to explore.  They have a lot of house boats here and I was really looking forward to seeing them, except we parked to far away.  B found a nice park to hang out in and people watch, and I went off to explore.  I just wandered around.

 

I didn't find the main houseboat area, but I found some.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I headed back to the park to find B and we just enjoyed the view and people watching in the park until it was time to get back on the bus.

 

They were not sure if we were going to find a spot to view Golden Gate Bridge, but our awesome bus driver and guide actually found the best spot, we had great views and didn't have that many people around.

 

 

 

This is the chain link fence around the area, I loved the affects of the ocean on it.

 

 

 

 

We made our way back to the ship via the Presidio, such a cool area that I would love to explore more.  We got back right around 2 and headed to the international cafe for a bite as we were hungry.

 

 

 

[jaycruising]

November 6, 2022 con't

 

After our snack we headed back out and down to Pier 39, we had wanted to do some other things but we actually got back last from our excursion. So we walked over to Pier 39 to look around, see the sea lions and I wanted to do some street photography.

 

 

There weren't too many sea lions, but they were still entertaining.

 

 

 

 

The clouds were coming in.

 

We didn't get on the cable cars, but the street cars are awesome.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crown Princess in the background.  We headed back to her to get ready for dinner.

[PurpleTraveller]

1 hour ago, jaycruising said:

 

 

 

Beautiful photo!

 

I have cruised on Crown Princess previously for a Baltic cruise in 2017 and have booked an Alaskan cruise on her for June 2023. Looking forward to reading about the rest of your cruise. Thank you for posting your review. 😊

 

[jaycruising]

November 6, 2022

 

By the time we got back on board it had gotten dark so I grabbed my tripod and headed up to deck 16 to take some night photos, the city is so pretty.

 

 

 

 

 

For dinner tonight we decided to have our first ever meal in a speacialty restaurant, we picked the Crown Grill steakhouse, we picked to do it tonight because, it was my birthday today.  It was really an awesome way to spend the day.

 

IMG_0370.HEIC

 

Our dinner was fantastic, I really enjoyed it and was so full when it was done, when we left there was a comedian in explorers and he must of been good there was standing room only.  We didn't try and get a table as it was getting close to sail away and I wanted to catch sailing under the bridge.

 

 

 

 

It was so cold up there, but worth it to witness it.

 

It had been a super long day and we were both pretty tired after our long day and our very full bellies.

 

That's it for now, have to edit some more photos, more to come soon.

[cr8tiv1]

Thanks for taking all the photos I missed on my repositioning cruise in September.  I wish we had stopped in Victoria instead of San Diego. Your photos are remarkable.

[jaycruising]

On 11/19/2022 at 12:33 AM, cr8tiv1 said:

Thanks for taking all the photos I missed on my repositioning cruise in September.  I wish we had stopped in Victoria instead of San Diego. Your photos are remarkable.

Thank you so much!

[jaycruising]

November, 7, 2022 - Sea Day

 

Our day started out much like the others, breakfast at the International Cafe, I really like the Chia Pudding.  After breakfast we headed to Explorers Lounge for Unlocking the DaVinci Code.  I'm not sure what we thought this would be, but it ended up being an art talk and looking at the secrets in DaVinci's art.  It was alright, and we were gifted with a print on our way out.

 

Next we headed to the theatre for a talk on the Pacific Ocean.  The same speaker also presented on the other sea day about Humpback whales, that talk was great.  This one was just ok.  After that we headed to the dining room for lunch, I really enjoyed it.

 

After lunch we headed to Explorers Lounge to hang out, play trivia and cards.  We lost horribly in Trivia, it's amazing to find out how much you don't know.  Today was the nicest day we had all week, so it was the first time we got a decent sunset.

 

 

 

Back to finish our card game prior to getting ready for dinner and I got my first ever 28 hand in crib, I was pretty happy about that, still only barely won that game.

 

 

It was formal night tonight, so back up to the room to get ready, we didn't get really fancy, but I do like to put a dress on for dinner.  Our dining time was 6:20 and we still had some time, so headed to Good 
Spirits at Sea and there I found my favourite drink of the cruise. Sandra En Feugo, it is so good, I came back for more later... just watch out for that Serrano pepper.

 

 

Dinner was pretty good tonight, I actually had a couple mains, only ate a bit of both, but the standout for me was the lobster tail, it had great flavour.

 

We decided tonight to go to the Theatre to watch the show, I cannot recall the name of it, and it was just ok for me, the singers were fantastic and I enjoyed the dancing they did, but it was a little too dated for my taste.  The set was beautiful though.

 

 

After the show we went to the casino for a bit, B didn't stay very long as it is quite smokey in there.  I stayed for a while longer and cashed out ahead.  I headed up to the cabin as we had an early excursion tomorrow and other things to take care of.

[jaycruising]

November 8, 2022 - Santa Barbara

 

I was so looking forward to our day in Santa Barbara as it was the first time either of us have been there.  They are also known for having great weather, well this was not to be the case for us today 😞

 

We had our usual breakfast at International Cafe and then headed to the Wheelhouse to meet for our excursion we had booked through the ship.  We quickly checked in, got our tour group number 3 and then I snuck out of the lounge as I had finally found what I thought was a good spot to re-hide this little duck that I had found earlier in the week.

 

 

Back to the lounge and our group was called quite quickly, we headed down to the tender and headed for the shore, it wasn't currently raining so that was ok, for now.  We had booked an excursion to Los Olivos for wine tasting, a Mexican lunch and a stop at the Santa Barbara courthouse and mission.

 

We boarded our bus and headed to our first stop which was the Courthouse, I really wish we had longer to visit as I think I would really like to explore the area more, I really admired the architecture in the area.

 

We arrived at the courthouse and our tour guide just hopped off the bus with no indication that we should follow him, this was the first in a number of issues we had with this guide.

 

We got off the bus and he expected us to follow him while he toured the Courthouse, and while I appreciate learning things about the places we are visiting, as an amateur photographer I love to go off and explore and find the small hidden gems.  B did note he did tell the same story 3 times, so...  

 

About the Courthouse, it was designed by William Mooser III and completed in 1929, in the usual Santa Barbara style of Spanish Colonial.  It was designated a National Historic Monument in 2005.  It was gorgeous and I wish I had even more time to explore the grounds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued...

 

 

[Bobkat120]

We will be in San Fran 12/20 for 12/22 cruise to hawaii. We have looked at the Muir Woods excursion and after seeing your beautiful photos I think it is a must see.  Your pics are breath taking. Thank you for sharing.  Enjoy the rest of your cruise. 
 

[Calgary3]

I absolutely love your photos - thank you so much for taking the time to do this trip report.  Looking forward to more.

[jaycruising]

1 hour ago, Bobkat120 said:

We will be in San Fran 12/20 for 12/22 cruise to hawaii. We have looked at the Muir Woods excursion and after seeing your beautiful photos I think it is a must see.  Your pics are breath taking. Thank you for sharing.  Enjoy the rest of your cruise. 
 

I cannot say enough about Muir Woods, it is unlike anything I have every experienced before, I would love to visit again and spend more time.  Here is a link to a little reel that I did as well... https://www.instagram.com/reel/CkodbsnpRv3/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

 

Thanks for the compliment of my pictures, I love doing them.

 

13 minutes ago, Calgary3 said:

I absolutely love your photos - thank you so much for taking the time to do this trip report.  Looking forward to more.

 Thank you 🙂

[jaycruising]

Continued

 

After our time at the Courthouse we made our way to the Mission. The mission was built in 1820 and then repaired in 1825, we were not able to go inside, but they do have some public washrooms you can use and a small gift shop you can browse through.

 

This is a lavanderia or wash basin and was completed in 1818.  They soaped the clothes on the sloping sides and rinsed them in the centre pool.  This guy fed the water into the basin.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From the top of the steps to the mission you can see down to the ship in the distance.

 

 

 

I couldn't resist taking a photo of a cactus with rain drops on them, and well I also love macro photography of flowers and plants.

 

Edited November 21, 2022 by jaycruising
spelling

[jaycruising]

After our time at the mission we began making our way to Los Olivos, the drive was about an hour, but felt like it took 10 hours, more on that in a bit.  We winded our way through the mountains and really enjoyed looking at the scenery, except the rain did get worse as we made our way there, and it was raining quite heavy the further we went.  

 

While on our way our tour guide was talking the entire time, however he wasn't telling us anything about the area we were in, he talked a lot about wine, which is great since we were on our way to a wine tasting, but he wasn't talking about local wines it was about wine in France.  We learned a lot about burgundy.  And then when he was done talking about wine (sort of), he talked about the movie Sideways, which had been filmed in the area.  Again, be proud of it, but we pretty much got an entire synopsis of the movie.  I wanted to learn about the area, but none of that happened.

 

We had made it to the area early so we took a quick drive through Santa Ynez, it is a very interesting looking town, very cowboy like, and I would love to give it more of a visit at some point.  No pictures as we didn't get off of the bus and it was raining.

 

Then things got interesting, we headed into Los Olivos, and drove around for a couple minutes.  The place we were going for a tasting has a very large area around it, including a dirt parking lot, that would be great to use when it hadn't been pouring rain all day.  But our tour guide advised our bus driver that he should just go ahead and pull in there, it would be fine.  I don't know which was was dumber in this case.  This is what it looked like outside.

 

 

Well, shocker of shockers our bus was now stuck, the driver tried for about 15 minutes to get out, but really was just getting us more and more stuck.  Finally we were able to get out when the owner of the Winery pulled us out with his truck, we all owed him for that one.  

 

Sorry for the language, I did take it from the owners instagram.

 

 

Once we were out we went around the block and parked on the street.  Again a super cute looking town that I would definitely like to explore more, but again raining and we didn't really have time.

 

We were having our tasting with Saarloos&Sons.  They initially started out as a fruit (apple) farm and the switched over to grapes, they never intended to turn it into the business it has become, but they are unique in that they are still family run, and their whole family is involved, his daughter made one of the wines available.  You also cannot find their wine in any stores, you can only purchase it there or order it, they do also have a monthly wine family you can join.

 

Their tasting room grounds are gorgeous, I just wish our weather was better.

 

 

 

 

We tested 4-6 wines with them and I quite enjoyed them, the whites more the the reds for me.  One of the most interesting things is that they pair their wines with cupcakes, so we each got this little 6 pack of cupcakes.

 

 

The inside of the tasting room was so interesting, I could have taken many more pictures.

 

 

 

These are the actual labels on their bottles.

 

 

I really enjoyed this stop, they had a number of things available for purchase aside from wine.  B did pick up a bottle of wine, I am not that much of a wine drinker so I ended up picking up a hat.  Another couple on the bus signed up for the wine club, they were looking forward to that!

 

All too soon we were back on the bus heading back to Santa Barbara and hearing about Sideways.

 

We did take a quick drive through Solvang, again another area I would like to visit, and sorry about these photos but they are the best I can get while on a moving bus in the rain 🙂

 

 

Edited November 21, 2022 by jaycruising
removing duplicate

[jaycruising]

We headed back to Santa Barbara and our tour guide was finally talked out, so we did get a bit of peace on the drive back. Our tour also included lunch and it was supposed to be taco's with a famous chef of some sort, however due to the wine the location we were supposed to go to had a power outage, so I am thankful to whoever ran our tour in the background was able to get us into somewhere else. It was very close to where we would catch the tender back to the ship.  We did really enjoy the tacos and a visit with a nice couple we had met at dinner the night before.

 

I was just going to walk back to the ship and maybe take some more photos, but when we got done eating it was raining quite hard.  So back on the bus to basically go 3 blocks back to the drop off point.

 

I really enjoyed the tour as a whole, but he really was the worst tour guide we have ever had, and maybe it was just especially bad after the great one we had had in San Fransisco.

 

We made our way over to the tender boat to head back to the ship, and quite a tender ride back it was, we got thrown around all over the place, a big well done to our tender captain for getting us back over safely.  If you do get sea sick this would not have been the tender for you.  We spoke to a lady later on who had been on a tender earlier in the day and it had taken an hour to get back to the ship, the weather was really bad.  In fact the captain had suspended anymore tenders going ashore around noon due to the conditions.

 

Back on board and it was time to start packing, I headed out on our balcony to take a look around and that is when I realized that at some point while we were gone the captain had also turned the ship around and we no longer had a land view.  

 

 

I have to say I don't think I am a big fan of having a port day on your last day of the cruise, oh well at least packing to leave the ship is easier then packing to get on it, toss it all back in!

 

It had quit raining so I went down to deck 7 to try and take a few photos of Santa Barbara from the ship.

 

 

 

 

We were done packing and it was time to head down for dinner, we had another great group of table mates.  Our dinners were taking us about 2 hours per night, a lot of times just from visiting.

 

We really wanted to see the the Finale of Voice of the Ocean, but it started at 7:30 and of course we were still at dinner so we missed that.  But I did have a chance to go to Good Spirits and get another one of those drinks before we headed to the theatre to watch the comedian.  It was the same comedian who had been in explorers the other night.  I really enjoyed him, I had tears in my eyes from laughing so much!

 

After the show I headed back to the casino I needed to cash out my winnings.  Well I actually played a bit more and doubled what I went in there with earlier, so I cashed out and made a run back to the cabin and bed since we had to be up and off the ship in the morning 😞

 

[jaycruising]

November 9, 2022 - Disembarkation and Final Thoughts

 

We woke up before our alarms and we were already docked at San Pedro.  Our disembarkation time was 9:00, we have them take our suitcase off.  So we finished up and then headed down to International Cafe for one last breakfast.  We then headed back up to our cabin to pick up our carry-ons and head down to the wheelhouse, however when we got there they let us know that our time had already been called and we could just head off of the ship, so out we went.  We quickly found our bags and headed out, I guess since they had done the passport check in SF we could just walk out, the border agents didn't even blink at us.

 

Outside and to the finally sunny warm California we had heard off, we were off to catch an Uber and to pick up our rental car.  We spent 2 more nights in Los Angeles, being tourists and seeing some stuff we hadn't seen on our other trips, including Malibu, Beverley Hills and the Santa Monica Pier.  It was a nice ending to our trip.  I didn't really take many photos for the rest of our trip.

 

Final thoughts

 

We heard a lot of noise about the Crown throughout the summer, including vibration, slowness, etc.  And then she went into dry dock about a month before our sailing.  Three was one sailing between dry dock and our sailing and some of those people were pretty unhappy as well.  I'm not going to lie, I was a little worried about how it was going to be.

 

And it turns out, we really didn't have any issues, we had hot water, we didn't have any flooding, the internet worked for the most part, we thought the food was pretty good (not as good as before but still good) and best of all we had a good vacation and neither of us got covid!

 

We had planned to do a land vacation across Canada next year instead of a vacation outside of Canada BUT I found a great deal on an 18 day ocean to ocean cruise through the Panama Canal in April and I convinced Mom that we could delay the Canada trip another year 🙂. This will be our longest, by over a week, cruise ever, so hopefully it goes well.

 

I hope you enjoyed my report and photos and if you have any questions feel free to ask.

 

Until next time...

[travelin.sisters]

thank you for your report & the wonderful photos...Panama is a great cruise, just prepare yourself for a bunch of sea days

[CruzeQueen2]

On 11/20/2022 at 6:28 PM, jaycruising said:

November 9, 2022 - Disembarkation and Final Thoughts

 

We woke up before our alarms and we were already docked at San Pedro.  Our disembarkation time was 9:00, we have them take our suitcase off.  So we finished up and then headed down to International Cafe for one last breakfast.  We then headed back up to our cabin to pick up our carry-ons and head down to the wheelhouse, however when we got there they let us know that our time had already been called and we could just head off of the ship, so out we went.  We quickly found our bags and headed out, I guess since they had done the passport check in SF we could just walk out, the border agents didn't even blink at us.

 

Outside and to the finally sunny warm California we had heard off, we were off to catch an Uber and to pick up our rental car.  We spent 2 more nights in Los Angeles, being tourists and seeing some stuff we hadn't seen on our other trips, including Malibu, Beverley Hills and the Santa Monica Pier.  It was a nice ending to our trip.  I didn't really take many photos for the rest of our trip.

 

Final thoughts

 

We heard a lot of noise about the Crown throughout the summer, including vibration, slowness, etc.  And then she went into dry dock about a month before our sailing.  Three was one sailing between dry dock and our sailing and some of those people were pretty unhappy as well.  I'm not going to lie, I was a little worried about how it was going to be.

 

And it turns out, we really didn't have any issues, we had hot water, we didn't have any flooding, the internet worked for the most part, we thought the food was pretty good (not as good as before but still good) and best of all we had a good vacation and neither of us got covid!

 

We had planned to do a land vacation across Canada next year instead of a vacation outside of Canada BUT I found a great deal on an 18 day ocean to ocean cruise through the Panama Canal in April and I convinced Mom that we could delay the Canada trip another year 🙂. This will be our longest, by over a week, cruise ever, so hopefully it goes well.

 

I hope you enjoyed my report and photos and if you have any questions feel free to ask.

 

Until next time...

Loved your photos! Thank you for the report. Great information. Glad you enjoyed the ship!

Crown had so many poor reports this summer, I applaud you for going ahead and enjoying yourself. Will watch for your next report from your ocean to ocean trip. I hope you will be reporting from that sailing as well. Your pictures are fabulous!

[disneyochem]

Thank you for your report!  We’re doing the same itinerary next October.  Nice to get a preview!

 

(And, as a Californian, sorry you had rain but YAY!  We had rain!!  Droughts are not fun.)

[jaycruising]

On 11/23/2022 at 4:29 PM, travelin.sisters said:

thank you for your report & the wonderful photos...Panama is a great cruise, just prepare yourself for a bunch of sea days

Thanks, it is an 18 gay one and seems to be well broken up, I’m really looking forward to it!

 

On 11/23/2022 at 4:56 PM, CruzeQueen2 said:

Loved your photos! Thank you for the report. Great information. Glad you enjoyed the ship!

Crown had so many poor reports this summer, I applaud you for going ahead and enjoying yourself. Will watch for your next report from your ocean to ocean trip. I hope you will be reporting from that sailing as well. Your pictures are fabulous!

thank you!  Yeah I was a little concerned about what I was reading, but I really liked the ports and tend to go with the flow if I can’t control it and luckily we didn’t have any issues!

 

I am currently planning on sharing that one as well!

 

On 11/24/2022 at 6:20 AM, disneyochem said:

Thank you for your report!  We’re doing the same itinerary next October.  Nice to get a preview!

 

(And, as a Californian, sorry you had rain but YAY!  We had rain!!  Droughts are not fun.)

Thank you!  Hope you enjoy it, we really did. 
 

Rain was ok, and very needed!

Edited November 26, 2022 by jaycruising