Island Princess Panama 2/6/08 Quick Look Report

[ccrain]

Charles,

 

Sorry that you and Judy were sick. It can be a downer on a cruise. We were on the Coral in Sept. We had one of the aft cabins on Emerald - completely covered. May we see you on another cruise.

 

Sally

 

Judy's still got the cough. If its not gone in a couple of days shes going in to her doctor.

 

Are you still on the Star this year out of SFO?

[ccrain]

This review was very useful to us and we thank you. In fact you even answered one of the questions that I couldn't get a response to a couple of weeks ago. Namely about the dance bands! We're traveling together with two other couples from our retirement community and we're all quite vigorous Latin dancers (Salsa, Samba, Mambo, Merengue etc.). What you said about the "Prestige" band in the Wheelhouse sounds promising. We're not much into ballroom dancing anymore, except some of us do like Argentine Tango.

 

Do you remember what time Prestige usually came on? How big is the band?

 

Prestige has 4 members, base guitar, keyboard, drums, lead singer.

 

They alternated with Luis and Darme in the wheelhouse. Since Luis and Darme have now gone to the Royal, I suspect another duo or a trio that is primarily ballroom or modern in music. Some of best trios we've danced to were from Eastern Europe and there are a couple of good duos we've cruised with that do mainly modern to a ballroom beat.

 

The wheelhouse bands alternate between a 5-9 shift and a 9-11 shift. The alternating days are pretty much random. The bands play a 50 minute set per hour and take a 10-15 minute break. Note that on some days they have trivia at 430 in the wheelhouse, which may delay the first dance for a while.

 

There is also a Mexican Fiesta night in the Explorer's Lounge in which Prestige takes over for Take 5 and does mainly Latin music. They do take requests and they are a Salsa band so you should get all kinds of good dance music out of them. They will do a Tango, a couple of couples knew Tango, but their Salsa, Samba and Merengue were quite good. Their Cha Cha was pretty good too.

 

Take 5 does a pretty good reggae, and great Island/Jamaican music. They will be in the Explorer's lounge, but they will also do the deck party. Once the obligatory Macarena/Electric Slide and all the games, the cruise staff and Take 5 gets real jiggy with reggae and Island music. It gets real intense as the band tries to wear out the cruise staff and vice versa, so much so that the cruise staff ended up in the pool to cool off.

 

The wheelhouse has a nice dance floor and good sound. In the early evening, it can be quite vacant, which is the best time to dance. For us, we tried to catch a dance before dinner and then right after dinner. Around 730 to 8 it started to crowd up as people waited for the Princess theatre show to start. When that started, anytime between 8 and 845, it was pretty empty again for a little while.

[mauiedin87]

That is great information about the dance bands and I know others will be interested as well, not just our little group of VERY active seniors (we're all in our 60s, 70s and in one case 80!) :D

[jrobinso]

Your information has been such a big help to those of us on the 4/21 cruise. A few more questions?????? by any chance did they happen to have $15 laundry special?? What about onboard lectures...anyone interesting..good subjects??? thanks again

[ccrain]

Your information has been such a big help to those of us on the 4/21 cruise. A few more questions?????? by any chance did they happen to have $15 laundry special?? What about onboard lectures...anyone interesting..good subjects??? thanks again

 

Judy is presently scanning the patters which may give you a better idea.

 

No $15 laundry special on this cruise. We did do laundry once, in Aruba, while everyone else was gone. Trying to do laundry on the sea days were a zoo everytime we walked by the laundromat.

 

There were lectures on board, but I fell asleep during most of them. IMHO they dumb them down a bit too much and some of them can't help but inject a little personal opinions here and there - even when they inject opinions that agree with mine (Global Warming for example), I can't help but cringe. Lecturers are supposed to inform via facts, not opinions.

 

I know that most people in the audience were a also lot more worldly and educated than the lecturer gave them credit for. Face it, on a 15 day cruise you have a lot of 50-70 year old people who were better educated in the basics (geology, geography, history, biology) than the younger generations are today.

[Cruisin Sal]

Charles,

We are on the Star 10/31/08 and 4/27/09 - same cruise rt from SF.

[ccrain]

Charles,

We are on the Star 10/31/08 and 4/27/09 - same cruise rt from SF.

 

The 4/27 date is pretty good. I need to start filling in 2009 cruises, but I will price watch the 10/31 date as well.

 

Tell Jack Hi!

[aphishboy]

Sorry to hear Judy was sick...

 

We are getting ready to cruise the Panama Canal in April, And we wondered if the cabin doors/walls are wood or metal? My DW has ideas for decorating.

[ccrain]

Sorry to hear Judy was sick...

 

We are getting ready to cruise the Panama Canal in April, And we wondered if the cabin doors/walls are wood or metal? My DW has ideas for decorating.

 

A fiberglass type wall or vinyl wall paper? Hard to describe. Mirrors on one wall and an aluminum ceiling. Some wood like trim.

 

But we've never had a problem with double sided tape sticking if cleaned well with alcohol first.

[Aroseinwintr]

I am going to be on the Island Princess in April and have heard that people like to decorate their doors to make finding their room easy... I was thinking of a magnetic frame with a picture of my DH and I in it. Are the doors to the room metal or fiberglass or what?

Thanks for your help

Christie

[ccrain]

I am going to be on the Island Princess in April and have heard that people like to decorate their doors to make finding their room easy... I was thinking of a magnetic frame with a picture of my DH and I in it. Are the doors to the room metal or fiberglass or what?

Thanks for your help

Christie

 

Its a fiberglass product, although I've never tried a magnet, it probably won't work. A paper printout laminated or on Matt poster paper is what we normally use with double sided tape.

[gertrudegardener]

Magnets work fine on the doors of the staterooms on Island Princess (presumably on the other ships as well). I had a memo board with magnets on the back on our door. Worked great for leaving messages for my traveling companion! Magnetic paper is another thought--you could print your own photo, or whatever.....

Enjoy!