Royal Princess - transpacific questions??

[cocosmum]

Booked on a 15 night cruise from Auckland to Hawaii April 2025. This is part of a longer cruise from Sydney to Vancouver and our first cruise with Princess so reading all I can about the ship 🙂

 

A few questions for our experts please!

 

1. Because we board on day 5 of the cruise, are we likely to have issues booking the Sanctuary for an occasional half day? I've read you can't book until you board and am guessing all the spots may be taken by the time we arrive?  Any work arounds??

2. Is smoking allowed in the Casino? I read somewhere that is it completely smoke -free on cruises out of Australia and New Zealand. Can anyone confirm please?

3. The Retreat. Would appreciate some info please.  I know it's adult only, but is it noisy, crowded, hard to find a seat etc. or is it a nice place to relax?  We don't always enjoy the party atmosphere at the main pools (fun sometimes though), so hoping the Retreat would be a good alternative when we still want to enjoy the pool and sunshine. 

Appreciate your help, thanks!!

 

[Yehootu]

15 hours ago, cocosmum said:

We don't always enjoy the party atmosphere at the main pools (fun sometimes though),

We just finished a Trans Pacific on the Majestic and the pool area was never a party atmosphere. The only day there was a crowd was for the crossing the equator ceremony. You could always get a pool side lounger.

[EDVM96]

16 hours ago, cocosmum said:

2. Is smoking allowed in the Casino? I read somewhere that is it completely smoke -free on cruises out of Australia and New Zealand. Can anyone confirm please?

 

Yes, it is smoke free on OZ and NZ sailings. But on the repositioning cruise, once we leave NZ waters, I'm pretty sure smoking will be allowed again.

 

16 hours ago, cocosmum said:

3. The Retreat. Would appreciate some info please.  I know it's adult only, but is it noisy, crowded, hard to find a seat etc. or is it a nice place to relax?

The Retreat isn't noisy, it's a relaxing area. It's a popular place during sunny days, but you will usually find empty loungers.

 

Royal Princess Retreat two months ago in SYD:

 

 

If you didn't find it yet, this is our roll call thread:

 

 

 

 

[elaine5]

Just off 21 day Royal SYD-JPN.

Retreat: Most seats in shade in were taken by 9am (plenty of seats around the pools until mid-morning or later, lots of seats 4pm+). Retreat has a smaller pool, 2 hot tubs, bar. Very nice area--very relaxing environment. You can book cabanas (fee) around that pool. 

Main pool: Agree with other poster--not a party atmosphere at the main pool, and very few kids on longer cruises. There were some silly games played (volleyball staff vs passengers, guests making cocktails competition, etc.). But not all day--usually midday. Band then played many days from 1-2 and they usually showed movies in afternoon. We enjoyed main pool and retreat area most sea days. We actually preferred the main pool for some activity as retreat was more sedate. An hour or so for band/games was fine for me. If it's too noisy, you could eat lunch or relax inside during that time. It's all posted in Patter to plan your day. 

Smoking:I only saw at designated outside places and zero in casino (I walked thru 5+ times)--so no smoking from AU makes sense. 

Sanctuary: didn't use. But, I walked in once and it didn't look full. I'd expect on a cruise with lots of sea days that you could snag seats. If not, the (free) Retreat is lovely (which is why I never used the Sanctuary). 

Edited May 17 by elaine5

[HotRoot]

This year on the Majestic casino remained smoke free until Vancouver.  That said, it still reeked of smoke though no one was smoking.  The smell is in the drapes, carpet, etc.