LIVE from the Enchanted Princess: April 6-13, 2024 - Eastern Caribbean

[Host CJSKIDS]

On 4/2/2024 at 9:08 PM, PMGS247 said:

it’s just a separate lounge (elite, platinum, suites) from the general boarding groups and is the first to board after B2B. On my Halloween cruise this past year they offered pastries and coffee but I gather from some other discussion that’s not a guarantee. If you don’t arrive before boarding starts there isn’t really any “priority”. Green lane vs blue lane is just that, loyalty status doesn’t come into play at all. 
 

do be sure as you enter the waiting area that the agent sees your platinum medallion so they direct you to the priority lounge. If they don’t know they’ll just give you a general boarding group number.  

 

Isn't the lounge itself just for elite and suites?  Or has this changed?

[PMGS247]

41 minutes ago, Host CJSKIDS said:

 

Isn't the lounge itself just for elite and suites?  Or has this changed?

In Fort Lauderdale last October on the CB it was all together. 

[Host CJSKIDS]

@talkorpi have a great cruise.  We are doing this on April 20th so I will be looking forward to following you on your sailing. 

[talkorpi]

Good (early) morning from the airport!

 

Edited April 5 by talkorpi

[talkorpi]

Looks like the picture isn’t loading. But it’s just the airport, y’all aren’t missing much

[talkorpi]

So I just checked my Princess app and a reservation at The Catch is showing for the first formal night??? Neither my mom nor I made the reservation so I have no clue why it is there. Guess I will ask once we are onboard. Weird

[talkorpi]

Just made it to the Ft. Lauderdale airport. Holy cow, this place is a MADHOUSE. They also lost my baggage at the airport so it took a while to get that sorted out. But at least we made it to Florida!

 

Regal Princess, Disney Dream, Jewel OTS, Liberty OTS, and Oosterdam are all in port today. Even with my dirty plane window, still feel like I got a good picture!

[talkorpi]

Walked down Las Olas boulevard. Very nice shops but not exactly in my price range. It’s a beautiful day - 70° and not a cloud in sight!

 

Getting some lunch at our hotel (Riverside Hotel) while we wait to check in. 
 

Fun story about the hotels - when I was booking our room for the night before, everything was so incredibly expensive. Like $700-1200 a night average price. I finally found a room at the Riverside Hotel for less than $250 on a third party site and thankfully when I checked in it was legitimate. 
 

Turns out, there’s a massive three-day music festival called Tortuga going on. The entire town is practically shut down for it and hotels are so expensive as a result. I’m glad I booked a flight and hotel early!

 

Trying to do the water taxi this afternoon but I have gotten conflicting information - they told me it’s closed and being used as a shuttle for the festival but my hotel said they told them they are operating as normal. I guess we will find out in an hour or two…

[The_Force]

9 hours ago, talkorpi said:

So I just checked my Princess app and a reservation at The Catch is showing for the first formal night??? Neither my mom nor I made the reservation so I have no clue why it is there. Guess I will ask once we are onboard. Weird

If you end up going to The Catch, I'm curious about your experience. My wife and I tried it twice on Sky (separate sailings) and it didn't meet our expectations based on what we heard from other cruisers. 

Edited April 5 by The_Force

[Host CJSKIDS]

3 hours ago, talkorpi said:

Walked down Las Olas boulevard. Very nice shops but not exactly in my price range. It’s a beautiful day - 70° and not a cloud in sight!

 

Getting some lunch at our hotel (Riverside Hotel) while we wait to check in. 
 

Fun story about the hotels - when I was booking our room for the night before, everything was so incredibly expensive. Like $700-1200 a night average price. I finally found a room at the Riverside Hotel for less than $250 on a third party site and thankfully when I checked in it was legitimate. 
 

Turns out, there’s a massive three-day music festival called Tortuga going on. The entire town is practically shut down for it and hotels are so expensive as a result. I’m glad I booked a flight and hotel early!

 

Trying to do the water taxi this afternoon but I have gotten conflicting information - they told me it’s closed and being used as a shuttle for the festival but my hotel said they told them they are operating as normal. I guess we will find out in an hour or two…

The festival is down on the beach and there are street closures. 

 

The water taxi is open to everyone and they do encourage people going to the festival to use it due to all the traffic and parking issues.  It will be much more crowded than normal.  I do know they were selling $35 3 days passes to encourage people to use it.

 

The last act today starts at 8:25 pm so expect it to get crowded about an hour after that.

 

Enjoy Las Olas.  There are so many places to go within waking distance a lots of great restaurants.   

 

Louis Bossi is a great Italian place for dinner and happy hour and within walking distance.  

 

Enjoy your night.

[Retired-N-Happy]

11 hours ago, talkorpi said:

Looks like the picture isn’t loading. But it’s just the airport, y’all aren’t missing much

The picture loaded OK.  It was a preliminary picture of the eclipse.

[Wishing on a star]

About the boarding waiting area/lounge.  I do not know the current situation...

I believe that Platinum used to also be able to board with Elite?

Last time, it seemed like the area for the most exclusive was only for Elite and Suites.

We were standing and ready to move the minute those began to pass by and Platinum were able to board!

[martinitime1]

We're on her the 27th, please try to keep her in one piece for our cruise. 😆

[nhkroozer]

As I said earlier we're on the April 13th cruise and are also staying at the Riverside Hotel. You probably already discovered the Hotel happy hour deals as well as up and down Las Olas Blvd. We hope you we're able to take advantage of them.

[PMGS247]

13 hours ago, Wishing on a star said:

About the boarding waiting area/lounge.  I do not know the current situation...

I believe that Platinum used to also be able to board with Elite?

Last time, it seemed like the area for the most exclusive was only for Elite and Suites.

We were standing and ready to move the minute those began to pass by and Platinum were able to board!

In October on the Caribbean princess it was one “Elite Lounge” which had plat/elite/suites. Either that or the agent made a mistake sending me (plat) there.  It was packed to the gills tho and that was a much smaller ship. It would not surprise me if it’s handled different today. 

[talkorpi]

Good morning and happy embarkation day!

 

We had a great evening yesterday. I was going to post last night, but we had been up since 2:30 AM central time so we fell asleep as soon as we got back to the hotel. 

The Riverside Hotel is perfect - great location. Right on Las Olas Boulevard and also is its own Water Taxi stop. The walk along the river walk is beautiful. The hotel is one of the oldest in Ft. Lauderdale - very quiet, has a lot of charm, and a great little complex with a great deck on the roof to look over the city. Plus, they’re about to do a complete renovation to make it even classier. 

 

Managed to get water taxi tickets at 5:00 and spent the evening doing a water taxi tour. Y’all, I did not realize how much wealth there is in this area. 100+ million dollar homes, yachts EVERYWHERE… If you’re from Texas and know where Port Aransas is, this place makes that look like a slum! 😵‍💫

 

Had an incredible late dinner at the 15th Street Fisheries. Some of the biggest shrimp we have ever seen, and had some sort of seafood skillet thing that had an amazing sauce. Oh my gosh, what a great way to start the trip - 10/10 recommend. 
 

Heading to the port at the top of the hour. Another beautiful day here in South Florida. Excited to get onboard soon!

 

Also, for some reason, like 2/3 of my photos won’t attach… not sure what is going on but they’re all just black screens. Will try again in a separate post.

[talkorpi]

Scenes from last night. Other images are all black. Trying to compress them and will post when I am able to

[talkorpi]

GOOD MORNING!!!  ☀️🌊😁

[Host CJSKIDS]

Bon Voyage!!  So looking forward to following along.

[PMGS247]

I am in the priority lounge right now. It is indeed combined platinum/elite and I assume suites as well.

[richsea]

Looking forward to your report! Have a great cruise!

[memoak]

19 hours ago, Host CJSKIDS said:

The festival is down on the beach and there are street closures. 

 

The water taxi is open to everyone and they do encourage people going to the festival to use it due to all the traffic and parking issues.  It will be much more crowded than normal.  I do know they were selling $35 3 days passes to encourage people to use it.

 

The last act today starts at 8:25 pm so expect it to get crowded about an hour after that.

 

Enjoy Las Olas.  There are so many places to go within waking distance a lots of great restaurants.   

 

Louis Bossi is a great Italian place for dinner and happy hour and within walking distance.  

 

Enjoy your night.

Agree with Lou Bossi also there are often good sales at Tommy Bahamas

[talkorpi]

On board before 11 AM. So fast!

 

Enchanted Princess is such a beautiful ship!

[talkorpi]

Got our specialty dining reserved very easily. Sabatini’s tonight and The Catch tomorrow. MDR for the rest of the cruise after that.
 

Muster is finished and we are ready to go. Of course the cabins aren’t ready because we got onboard so fast - not a problem at all. 
 

We are allegedly on a sold out sailing. I’ll try to find the full passenger count a little later and also take photos of the officer board for those who are interested.

 

Felt a little too early to have a dirty banana so I just got a basic rum and coke… let’s get this vacation started!

[talkorpi]

Already off to a weird start. We walked into our cabin and found that someone’s stuff was already all over the place. Suitcases, purses, jackets all over the furniture and mini bar already had items taken and placed throughout the cabin. 
 

I guess someone came in here when the rooms were not ready and open for the stewards to clean and went in the wrong cabin? 
 

Finally got a hold of guest services and they’re sending someone up to figure out what to do. What a way to start the cruise… lol! 😂