Diamond Review 9/25 Mexican Riviera Part One

[bcs819]

Welcome to my long and detailed review of the 9/25/04 sailing of the Diamond Princess. This is our 4th cruise, so we have a bit of experience and know what to expect and have reasonable expectations and comparisons. About us, I am 33 and he is 42, nonsmokers. We take 3-4 vacations a year and are pretty well traveled for our ages. Please be forewarned that this review is my opinion of my vacation and that it is explained as such. Since it is the largest ship sailing the Pacific it is quite possible and likely probable that your opinions may differ.

 

September 24, 2004

We left Philadelphia at 8 am on USAirways for our flight to LAX. We used frequent flyer miles for this flight and had reserved a car at Enterprise for one night. We chose Enterprise because they have drop-off in San Pedro. The price was $28 or so and there was a $25 surcharge for dropping off somewhere different than picking up. They told us this up front when I made the reservation. Our flight was long but uneventful. We had no trouble getting the Enterprise shuttle to an amazingly clean and well-run Enterprise location off premise at LAX. Everyone was upbeat, friendly and helpful. We took our car to Universal Studios for the day and arrived a little after noon. We pre-purchased tickets online and saved $20 over buying them at the park. Our plan was to stay at Universal and tour Citywalk but we were beat and decided to head back around 5 pm. We knew this was stupid but just wanted to get to the hotel. The freeways were crowded for rush hour, but not as bad as we thought and we arrived at the Marina Hotel in San Pedro around 6:30. We had gotten a room here through Priceline for $55. When checking in, I asked if we could have a room with a view of the ships coming in and was told it would be an extra $25. Ed loves the water and said to do it. It was a wonderful view, but a waste of our money as we were too tired to get up and see the ship coming in anyway. There is a restaurant off the lobby that has a Seafood Bonanza Buffet every night for $24.95. Just reading the posted menu made me salivate but we were beat and headed to our room. The Marina HOtel was nice, clean and very quiet. The pool area seemed a little small, but we didn’t use it. The hotel served its purpose for a night but I would not stay here as a vacation destination. We ordered room service which was prompt and hot and went to bed.

[bcs819]

Saturday, September 25, 2004

I got up on Saturday morning and ran to a local grocery store for a 12 pack of Pepsi, 12 pack of Diet COke, 6 pack of Welch’s Orange Pineapple Juice and a bottle of Absolut. All of these went into our luggage wth a bottle of Southern Comfort we brought from home. No issues getting onboard. Since I was out I stopped at McDonalds for McGriddles for breakfast. May as well start ignoring the diet ASAP :) Upon returning to the hotel I asked how to get to Enterprise to drop off my car and was told I could leave it right there, they would come get it. This was GREAT! I called Enterprise to confirm this at 9:30 and left the car keys at the front desk. At 10 am we checked out and were immediately given a ride on the hotel’s free shuttle to the pier. Our rental car was already gone from the parking lot when we left. The hotel runs a shuttle anywhere you want to go within 5 miles. You can not make reservations, it is first come first serve. I did see several shuttles waiting and we got right on.

Our driver took us to the pier and before we were even out of the van there were several porters waiting to take our bags. I tipped our driver and met Gary, the porter who won our bags. Gary was very clear and VERY loud when he said, “I got you folks, you take care of Gary and Gary will take care of you.” I found this very obnoxious and way too pushy, but didn’t want to wear the same clothes for the week and smiled and gave Gary a nice tip. Gary directed us to a door where 2 Princess reps had us sign forms stating we were healthy and had not had diarrhea in the last 48 hours. The 2 reps directed us inside where another rep handed us our ‘fake’ boarding passes and directed us up an escalator where 2 more reps directed us to the Dolphin check in counter. It was 10 am on the nose and there were about 5 passengers in the terminal before us. I had filled out everything online and we had our cruise cards in about 5 minutes. This was the most efficient embarkation we have ever seen. We sat down to wait until noon when they began boarding. There were plenty of people working and we never really saw lines to check in. While we were waiting we did notice a lot more kids than we thought we would see as it was late September and schools were open. Children were running rampant in the terminal which we saw as a bad omen :(

At noon, boarding began. We were the first group allowed to board after ELite and Suite passengers. We stopped for the obligatory photo (which would cost TWENTY bucks) and proceeded up the gangplank onto the ship. They were hustling people along quickly. They took our picture for the cruise card and then shuffled us right to the elevators. No one gave us a map of the ship. We were extremely concerned about dining and wanted to go to the International Dining Room immediately to make sure we had a table for two. We asked for a map and were given an irritated look when I said we wanted to go to the dining room before seeing our cabin. Upon arrival at the dining room the Maitre D’ and about 15 waiters were standing at the door. I walked in and asked if we could see table 56. I was told that the tables weren’t numbered yet and we could eat in the buffet. I explained that I just wanted to SEE my table. The waiter got the Maitre D’ who asked why I wanted to see the table. I told him I wanted to make sure it was a table for 2. He said that there were NO tables for two in the International Dining Room. He was very friendly and walked me over to Sabatini’s where he moved me right to the head of the line (I would have waited) and personally made me reservations for every night of the cruise at 8 pm at a table for 2. He ‘rotated’ the dining rooms so that we would try all of the PC rooms. I was given a printout so that I knew where we were going each night. While we were extremely disappointed about not having traditional dining, at least we had dinner taken care of, or so we thought. We then went to the pool and ordered 2 Dirty Bananas. Some discussion went on behind the bar before someone came back and said they can’t make a Dirty Banana, only a Chocolate Banana. We said, fine. After several minute, the bartender came back over and said he was waiting for bananas. Someone came running up with 2 bananas wrapped in Saran Wrap and we finally got our drinks. We sipped for a while and then headed up to HOrizon Court for lunch. We were so hungry, I truthfully have no idea what I ate. People were not skipping around, there was one long line. I tried to just get whatever I wanted but got dirty looks and felt like I was cutting in front of people who didn’t know any better, so I just got in line. After eating we finally went to our room. Our cabin was the infamous D737 mini-suite with the no tub, non-converting twins, huge balcony cabin. Much to our surprise, our non-converting twins were converted into one big bed. There was no couch, but we did have 2 tvs and a big balcony. We dumped our stuff and headed up to the Terrace Pool(where there is a sign that says ADULTS ONLY) and sat down to wait for muster drill. A few minutes after sitting down and ordering another round of Chocolate Bananas, there was aloud crash as a passenger fell over with a bucket of beer sending broken glass all over the deck near the pool. I am not sure if he just fell, or was on his second bucket, but the woman he was with stood off to the side with her head down the whole time a crew member helped him up and started picking up glass. The waitress who was supposed to get our drinks was picking up the glass so I went to the bar to pick up our drinks. They weren’t ready yet, they were waiting for bananas. Let me just insert here, because you will hear me say “waiting for bananas” a lot, this is not an uncommon drink, in fact, it was even a drink of the day one day during the cruise. I got our drinks and went back to sit down when a man and two boys went towards the Terrace ADULTS ONLY pool. All three climbed over the side and were sliding into the pool when the older boy saw the sign and pointed it out. He started to climb out when the adult male said “Let somebody come kick us out”. The boys got out on their own and he eventually did and followed. It was close to muster time so we headed back to our cabin. Aft cabins had muster drill in CLub Fusion. We waited till the siren and went immediately down. I was surprised at how empty the path was to Club Fusion and when we got there we found it was already quite full. There was a large booth with 10-15 people dressed as pirates. Now I thought that they were part of the kids thing until I saw the beers going around. They were loud but not obnoxious, till the Assistant Cruise Director Wenty pointed them out to the whole club. They got kind of rowdy then and were like teenage boys watching a sex education video thru the whole muster drill, giggling, trying to make each other make noise, doing lewd things with the whistles thru the whole drill. After the drill, we hustled back to our cabin to dump the life jackets. Our cabin steward met us in the hallway and introduced himself. I asked for robes and we ran off to the Terrace ADULTS ONLY pool again for sailaway. We ordered another round of Chocolate Bananas and had to wait (I bet you think I’m going to say for bananas, don’t you?) because they were out of chocolate. Sigh. There was a fun countdown thing and then we pulled away from the dock and sailed by the Celebrity Mercury which was also docked there. Just a comment about the Carnivalization of Celebrity...there were several girls topless on their balcony jumping up and down waving us out...oh, wait, we can’t blame that on Carnival, hmmmm....(please note that we are staunch Carnival defenders and love seeing things like this...)

We headed back to our cabin to get ready for dinner and unpack. All my stuff was on hangers so unpacking was a 5 minute job for me. Our first dinner was in Santa Fe. There was a line and I could hear a mantra “Do you have a reservation, no, um”. I had a huge grin on my face when I was able to say yes and we were led immediately to a table for 2. Almost all of the tables for 2 are against the walls. They are EXTREMELY close together in what I would say would normally be one table for 4 are four tables for 2. There were many tables available so I don’t know why people were being turned away, but they were. Luckily for us, there was no one on either side of us so we had some space. Our waiter was friendly but service was S_L_O_W. We sat down at 8:10, didn’t get a menu till 8:30 and never got our entree until 9:15. I know this because we went through 3 bowls of guacamole and chips and finally asked him to stop refilling it so we would stop eating it. This was the Sailaway dinner. When we were done dinner it was about 9:40 and we headed directly to the Princess theater to get seats for the Welcome Aboard show. We were a bit early, here’s where I really wish some Carnivalization would occur and there would be something going on before shows for the time you sit there. The show was good. Drink service was good in the theater and the little tables that pop our were convenient. After the show, we were beat and headed back to the room. We had robes and chocolates and Patters and so ended day one...

More to come later....

[bcs819]

Sunday, September 26, 2004 At Sea

We arose to a beautiful day at sea with nothing planned until dinner (the first formal night) until 8 pm. We were supposed to turn clocks ahead an hour today as we headed towards Puerta Vallarta. We headed up to breakfast in the Horizon Court and spent quite some time trying to find a table. We finally found one out towards the main pool. One of us sat while the other went to the buffet. Then we switched. While we were sitting at the tables in HOrizon COurt, we were approached by two different crew selling the wine tasting. I declined both times and was surprised at how puchy they were. The view and the weather was amazing. We went back to the cabin and I headed up for pool chairs while Ed stayed behind and lubed up. There were plenty of chairs available on deck 15 overlooking the pool. Desperately paranoid that I would walk away for a second and some Chair Nazis would move our stuff, I stayed put and waited till Ed came up to go get drinks from the bar. It was hot, damn hot, and I didn’t want to wait for no stinkin’ bananas so I ordered Peach Daiquiris. Imagine my surprise when they had to send someone to go get the milk carton of peach stuff. I also want to mention here that they were really pushing the bucket of beer, specifically the Dos Equis. The problem was there were no where near enough buckets available. On more than one occasion, I saw the bartenders sell a bucket of beer, and then tell the passenger they would hold them for them since there were no more buckets. We laid for a while and then I had to move around. Made my first trip to the Internet Cafe, grabbed a burger and headed off to the room for a smuggled Pepsi. All week long the TV played all of the AFI top 100 lists. DON”T WATCH!!!!!!!!!! You get suckered in and don’t want to go back out. Headed back to the pool to watch the pool games. Ed had given up on foo-foo drinks and ordered a beer. I sat for a few minutes and then headed to the Wheelhouse to check out the lecture on taking photos. In the chapel across the way was a PC photo editing course that I really wanted to do, but the description made it seem like I wouldn’t learn anything so I watched form the hallway for a few minutes and decided to save my $25 for an advanced class. At some point while I had been outside, my cruise card had started to melt in the sun and had a funky ripple in it. Infortunately, the ripple de-magnetized my card and I had to go to the purser’s desk to get a new one. We had left all of Ed’s shirts to be pressed as well as his suit for formal night and our Cabin Steward from Heaven, Paul, delivered everything at 5 pm on the button. We(I) was willing to pay whatever the cost was for this service as I spend way too much time on vacation waiting while Ed irons. Upon reviewing our room charges, I discovered that Paul never charged us for this. I don’t know if this is an actual perk of a mini-suite or not, but he did it all for free. Dinner on our second night, formal night, was in Sterling. We headed down a little early to hit the cocktail hour in the Crooner’s atrium area. They were walking around with tray of pre-made cocktails, but I asked a waiter for something else(Southern COmfort and COke) for Ed and it was made right away. There were many different backgrounds set up for formal pictures and it was interesting watching folks and the family dynamic as they did this. We headed down to Sterling at 8 pm where the line to get in was very long, I’d say about there were probably about 30-40 people ahead of us. Everyone that I saw was dressed appropriately. The line moved fast as many were turned away for not having reservations. We were ushered in immediately upon them finding our reservation. We had a very nice table for 2 along the railing so we could see all the comings and goings. Our waitresses were Magdalena and Zuzan from Poland. Magdalena was quick and efficient, but didn’t smile. Zuzan was the assistant, and she was bubbling over with smiles. Towards the end of the meal (Ed had the onion rings and asked for more), we were teasing Magdalena about not having teeth, she finally smiled and you could tell the poor girl was just exhausted. Tonight was the Love Boat Dream for dessert, if anyone wants to make sure they don’t miss it. Ed ordered one and I had the Grand Marnier souffle which was better, I thought, but I’m not really a chocolate girl ;) Piano Man was playing two shows this evening and this was where we headed after dinner. We were always 30-40 minutes early for every show, so we had no trouble finding seats. They did make announcements saying NO seats could be held in the first 3 rows, and only one seat could be held elsewhere. We have not been impressed with cuise ship porductions in the past, as we have seen shows in Vegas, London , New York, etc, but this show was AMAZING. Absolutely loved it. It was cleverly done and was all upbeat music that made you want to song along. Very well done. We wandered around for a little after the show and then let the sun do us in and headed off to bed.

[bcs819]

Monday, September 27, 2004 At Sea

A whole lot of the same from yesterday going on today. Pool chair hogs were out in full force. There were warnings about saving chairs. I was headed to the same chairs we had yesterday when a man took the foam cushions off them and walked away. I guess this was his version of saving chairs. I took 2 cushions off other chairs and settled in for the day. The sun here is hot. We used SPF 30 everyday and were still burned in some places. Don’t skimp on the sunblock, people, slather it on! Won’t go in to all the details of the day, but we decided to switch to an easy drink today, Pina Coladas. Dinner tonight was in Vivaldi. We arrived at 8 pm and were ushered right in. We were given a seat in the row of tables by the wall. All of the other tables were full. Here’s where you can see how close they really were. All of the men were on bench style seating and their elbows were just barely touching. When one man wanted to get up, the ones next to him had to lean away. The two tables to my right had started talking to each other, good for them. The men were so loud that we couldn’t hear ourselves speak. The people to my left had to keep leaning over the table to talk to each other directly in the ear. Ed had this look of pure pain on his face and when I asked him what was wrong, he literally, I swear, said “Shoot me, please, shoot me now”. They were finishing dessert so I was hoping they would leave soon. This is not how we like to spend our vacation. I looked around for other tables, but there were none. SO we waited. We sat for about 10 minutes before our waiter came to us with menus. At 8:30, he still hadn’t taken our order. At 8:45 we got our appetizers. When the waited came to take our plates, he realized he never put out the focaccia bread. We waited some more. He apologized for the delay and brought more bread. The people next to us were now loudly discussing cars, and how their plan would have kept Oldsmobile out of the toilet. The waiter had come to them and told them their bottles of wine had been saved, have a nice evening. They still didn’t move. It was now about 9:15 and we had only been served one course. At about 9:30 I was starting to panic, these people were still hogging their tables and we weren’t getting any food. Just then, our entrees came. I have no idea what happened to my salad, I didn’t even ask. It took us about 5 minutes to eat our entrees and then we got up to leave. We didn’t even ask for dessert. The windbags were discussing eating together Friday night, but they couldn’t decide where. I really wanted to know so we could be somewhere else. Ed was very upset, swearing to do the buffet for the rest of the cruise, never sailing Princess again. I was very upset. Dinner is my favorite part of the cruise and this was a disaster. We headed to the Explorer’s lounge for the comedian Kevin Jordan, who thankfully, was hysterical. He picked on several kids in the crowd and wanted to know why they weren’t i n school. Then he quizzed them and when they didn’t know the answer he reminded them this is why he should be in school. We really liked him and were glad for his calming us down. We had to be up early for the Pirate SHip Adventure in PV and headed off to bed.

[bcs819]

Tuesday, September 28, 2004 Puerta Vallarta

We woke up early to see the Diamond pull in to PV. There’s nothing like flying cross country to board a brand new ship and sail off into the horizon to see a Walmart. I cannot believe that they were allowed to build there. I had heard that you could see it from the ship, but I didn’t realize that it would dominate so much of the landscape. What a shame. Not the fault of Princess or any other cruise line but I wonder what the developers for PV were thinking. We could also see our pirate ship loading up with supplies. The Marigalante looked pretty big. I was was surprised that there were no announcements made about where to go to get off the ship. WHen you got to Promenade, there were arrows that kept directing you down to level 4, but an announcement would have been nice. We got off the ship quickly, were halted on the gangplank for a picture, got off the gangplank and were surrounded by folks in Mexican dress and were halted for another picture. The pirate ship people were waiting for us and we walked over. Everyone was very friendly and we were impressed with the pirate ship. They were very organized and when we got onboard we were stopped for another picture. A pirate took our stuff and escorted us to seat upstairs. He laid out our life vests as seat cushions and offered us breakfast (included int he price of the ticket). Ed went to get some breakfast (they had a little cafeteria set up down in the cargo area of the ship.) He said it was pretty good, eggs and some tortilla things. The pirates did a really good job getting everyone involved and as we sailed away they got all the women to come down and do a conga line and then a dance to the Titanic song. This was pretty funny as all of these pirates were lip-synching to Celine Dion and the dance mix. When I got back up to my seat, a pirate brought us some rum punch. This was not normal booze cruise rum punch from a jug. There was an actual bartender in the back making drinks. Rum punch made the events of the day a little fuzzy for me so I will point out what I remember in no particular order. You could go snorkeling if you wanted, although I hear the visibility in PV is pretty bad so I would not waste my time. The pirates did a show that was fun and upbeat with a few special effects and some surprises. We went to a beach where they had to tender us in. On the beach there was soda, beer, boogie boards, banana boat rides and they set up a volleyball court. These pirates worked hard. They had a volleyball game between the Pirates and the passengers that was pretty good. They also did some other games like tug-of-war. We were on the beach for maybe 2 hours I would say. Back to the pirate ship for the ride home. Lots of fun and games with kids on stage. A woman pirate was walking around with the pictures matching them up to people. What a hard job, put she was pretty good at it. Ours was nice so we bought it, I think it was $5 but I can’t remember. Rum punch, sun and Cerveza can effect your brain. Back on the ship there was a lunch served of chicken, ribs, rice, corn on the cob. There was always a pirate around to bring you another drink if you needed one. We thoroughly enjoyed this excursion and gave an extra $20 to the pirates on our way off the ship.

We strolled back to the ship and headed right to the Prego Pizza. Time was confusing all day today because ship time was not PV time and you were told not to change your watches. I think it was around 3 when we got back on board. After pizza we headed back to our cabin for a nap. Woke up in time for sail away at 6 pm. We kind of lounged around. Ed was making no move to get ready for dinner and this was our last night at Sterling. He mentioned rum punch, sun and dinner from hell. All the way to the buffet I cursed Princess and Anytime dining. I did find out that this was COntinental night, what used to be French night. (I forgot to mention that Monday night was Italian night). I brought my dinner back to the room and told Paul we would not be going out. I got some extra towels for the morning and relaxed on our balcony reading for the remainder of the evening. We had to get up early for Randi in Mazatlan so it was a nice relaxing night.

[Sheebah]

Thanks Bernie. I'm hooked on your review! Bring on the rest of the week and the photos!

I'm curious to see how the rest of your week turned out with the Anytime Dining ;-)

[cactusrose]

Bernie. . . thanks for sharing the good and the bad. I forget, was this your first Princess cruise? If so, I'm sorry it sounds like you had more bad than good. Princess is usually better than you discribed. This is one reason I love traditional dinning, but I'll also be trying PC dinning on my cruise in November. I've enjoyed your review so far and am anxiously waiting for more.

[bcs819]

Wednesday, September 29, 2004 Mazatlan

Woke up early to meet Randi at 8:30. Got off the shp and took the free mandatory shuttle to the terminal area. Randi had said we couldn’t miss her big pink sign. We did. We walked by it three times and I was getting ready to panic as it was now 8:45 and I was afraid we would never find her. We headed back to the shuttle and were wandering around in the terminal when Ed heard someone else asking for her. We followed them and found Randi, thank heavens. There were some other folks missing so we waited till 9 am. The RC Legend of the Seas was also in port and the place was mobbed. Between passengers getting off and vendors swarming you it was not the most pleasant experience. We followed Randi to the land taxi area where we were taken to water taxis. From the water taxis we were taken in a truck to the horses. We were matched up with horses and began our ride. Ladies, wear a sports bra. I could not believe that no one had ever mentioned the need for this item. On the ride back when the horses started to gallop, several of us were holding the reins with one hand and trying to keep from bouncing with the other. Everyone had a good time and Randi was as nice as we’ve heard. If you have specific questions about this, please ask.

We got back to the terminal around 2:30. We looked around a little but were tired of being harassed by vendors so got on the shuttle back to the ship. We headed right up to HC for food and then back to our room to shower and snooze. Around 4:55 there were announcements searching for 5 passengers. A minute or 2 later there were announcements for 3 passengers. I headed out to the balcony to see if there was anyone running to the ship. I called Ed out as a shuttle came zooming up to the ship with a lot of yelling. I heard a woman yelling WAIT WAIT and then male voices yelling YOU”RE LATE. Two people got off the ship and ran up the gangplank. There were some folks on balconies cheering. We waited a few more minutes and then they pulled up the gangplank so we could pull away. That third person never showed up so I don’t know if she was already on board or left behind.

Ed and I did a lot of discussing all day abotu our dinner dilemma. We met other folks on board at Victor’s and there was more grumbling about dinner than anything else. Alan and his family wanted traditional and ended up with personal choice “not by choice”. Desertnurse AKA Critter had traditional but had to move because he tablemates didn’t want her there. The Pacific Moon had the least appealing menu to us but we had heard it was the emptiest. I called and asked if we could move our reservation for the evening from Vivaldi to Pacific Moon and they were able to do it. Thank God! We were seated at a wonderful table for 2 (#436)and had the most amazing waiters and service (Joao and Bogdan). They were amazing and for the first time all week we enjoyed dinner. Towards the end of our meal I asked if they had this table every night. On our way out, we stopped and asked if we could have that table at 8 pm for the remainder of the cruise. We were ! Yay!!!!!!!!! A load of bricks lifted and full stomachs we headed off to the Princess Theater to see the comedian/ventriloquist. He was wonderful. On the way back to our cabin after the show, we saw the employee of the month picture and it was Bogdan, our new waiter!!!!! We were so happy about dinner I can’t tell you how wonderful it was. We felt exhilarated and ready to party. We eaded to Club Fusion where the Princess Idol competition was wrapping up. It was painful to listen to so we headed up to Skywalker’s. It was almost midnight so we expected the place to be hopping. There were 3 people up there. We found seats and sat for a while. We were there for over and hour and no more than 20 people showed up. There were two groups of kids that kept trying to get in, but were stopped at the door. We headed down and stopped at HC around 1:30 for fruit for me and chocolate for Ed and then headed to our cabin for the night.

[Sheebah]

Table 436, eh? Shh...I won't tell.

[bcs819]

Thursday, September 30, 2004 Cabo San Lucas

 

We were able to sleep late today as we had nothing planned. We were waitlisted for 4 different excursion but none of them came through. We got on a tender around 10:15 and headed to the dock. There is a little shopping area and once again you had to fight your way thru vendors to do anything. We had considered The Office and Cabo Wabo but had been advised it was too far to walk to either. I stopped at a time share booth and motioned for a map. The woman started her spiel and I looked blank and said “parlez-vouz francais?” She turned away and Ed and I tried to locate Cabo Wabo on the map. It was maybe a 10 minute walk and we found it easily. We stayed there until 1 and headed back to the tender launch. The lines were long for the tenders, and the last was supposed to leave at 1:30. We got on at 1:15 but there were still hundreds of people behind us. We got back to the ship and went to change into swimsuits and headed out to the Terrace ADULTS ONLY pool for sailaway. We hopped in the pool to cool off and then spread out on our chairs. A woman got into the pool with her toddler daughter. She was in there for a while and while no one approached her, many people were saying LOUDLY ,”I thought this was an adult pool”. She either ignored them or didn’t hear because she didn’t get out. Her daughter was hanging on the railing to the steps and getting in the way. I went to the bar for a drink and asked the bartender if someone could ask her to get out of the adult pool. He said there was “proper ranks” that were to do this and I had to call the Purser’s Desk. I did this and they said someone would come up but an hour went by and no one did. It was a shame because the child’s pool was 25 feet away and this woman just did her own thing. Many people got out or stayed in their chairs until the woman and toddler finally got out. The pool in this area is really not that large and a child splashing gets just about everyone. I headed back to the room around 5 to get ready for dinner (YAY!) as this was the last formal night. This was also the Captain’s Circle past guest party in Club Fusion. There were long lines to get in and they were checking for invitations so we skipped it and headed to Crooner’s for our pre-dinner drinks. Bogdan and Joao saw us coming and waved and the waitress who fixed our reservation knew our table number right away with a big smile. It was so wonderful eating here. I will say that many people ignored formal night this night. There were people coming in to Pacific Moon in jeans and no one said anything. Did I mention how happy we were at dinner? After dinner, we wandered the ship and then headed to Explorer’s lounge for the comedian. We really preferred the Explorer’s lounge for this over Prncess theater as it was just a very cozy place to be. I saw many people who had been dressed changed their clothes into jeans and sweaters or sweats as the public rooms were freeeeeeeeeeezing cold. The comedian was funny but kind of went off on a tangent and then the asst cruise director had to come in and flag him that his time was almost up. We knew this because the comedian said “Uh-oh, I’m in trouble” and said that he had to be done by the time the champagne waterfall started at 11:30. We headed with the masses to the atrium and though we couldn’t see the waterfall, they had some good dance music playing. We saw our waiters come out along with many others and they were dancing with the crowd. The crowd was really going for a while and then as it scattered we headed to Club Fusion. We tried several times to get to the WakeView bar but the stairs are right next to the stage/dance floor area and it was not possible to get down there without everyone seeing you so we never went. We hung out for a little while and then headed off to HC for late night fruit and chocolate.

[spingal]

Bernie,

 

How was the food in Pacific Moon?? I am on the Diamond next Saturday and am debating whether we should try it. We are planning on an early dinner (6ish) so getting reservations at the other dining rooms hopefully will not be a problem.

 

Thanks for all help you can provide!

Jamie :D

[bcs819]

Friday, October 1, 2004

 

Our last day onboard. Lots more lounging around, searching for pictures in the gallery and general laziness. I did learn one thing that I never read on these boards. I got hungry right about the time that the lunch buffet opened up and headed in. I had not ever seen it so crowded, not even on the first day. I waited in line and wondered what the heck was going on. As was spooning some ham onto my platter, a tiny Japanese lady elbowed me aside and asked the server where the rest of the lobster was. Hmmm. Apparently the leftover lobster (It should be a sin that there is even a phrase “leftover lobster”) gets served in the buffet and was gone already. Anyway, I roamed the ship and shops for most of the early afternoon and then headed back to pack. This was an extreme challenge for us as we had no carryon and found out that LA immigration does not allow you to walk off with your luggage as had been our plan. We had a backpack that I had used for Randi’s and we put all of our Friday evening clothes in to make sure they would fit, then packed everything else. We were really torn on what to do about tipping. We usually add tips in cash in addition to the auto tipping. There were tip envelopes at the Purser’s desk but the box was pretty full. We definitely were giving cash to Paul our cabin steward as he had been great all week. I commented on the survey that he was the best steward ever . We left him cash and a thank you note when we headed down to dinner. We sat down at our table and were trying to decide what to do about our waiters. We saw no one else handing out envelopes but truly felt these guys saved us from having the worst vacation ever. I was trying a new wine at Bogdan’s suggestion when we heard a familiar voice. I couldn’t quite place it and then I could see a look come over Ed’s face and I knew. The Windbags were at the table behind Ed. These tables were much further apart and yet we could still hear them ranting about their knowledge of winemaking and yada yada yada. They were so loud people kept turning to look at them. Thankfully, we were near the door and even people waiting to get in were watching them. The waiter from the door came back and very tactfully quieted them down. We thoroughly enjoyed our dinner and said goodbye to our waiters. We thanked them and told them they saved our cruise. I just didn’t feel right about not giving them anything so I walked into the casino to get cash, stopped and grabbed two envelopes and went back in. They were surprised to see me coming and very obviously grateful that they had been remembered on tip night. Both of them swept me into a hug and kissed me on the cheek. They were so grateful that it brought tears to my eyes. This is what I miss about traditional dining. I was a bit choked up when I came out so I popped into the ladies room before heading off to the last show in Princess theater of another comedian. We were both exhausted and had trouble staying awake until the show started. I was awakened by the smell of smoke and looked around to see a man smoking in the row in front of us. I forgot to mention that this man was dressed in denim cutoffs and a baseball hat on the first formal night and was trying to climb on the bar. Here he was smoking in the theater. Apparently everyone noticed him at the same time, and a crew member approached him. This classy gentleman ground out his cigarette in the carpet of the theater and then flipped the crewmember an unfriendly hand gesture. The show was enjoyable but we had a long day of traveling on Saturday and so decided to call it a night. One last trip to HC for late night fruit and chocolate and we turned in.

[marciemi]

Bernie - I've been following your "live" thread all week and am reading this one intently. Thanks so much for sharing your experiences. Am looking forward to seeing your Patters and especially your pictures!

[bcs819]

Final thoughts and Debarkation:

Debarkation was no where near as smooth as Embarkation. Despite 2 trips to the Pursers desk to tell them we had an early flight, we still did not get the correct tags. The line at the Pursers desk was ridiuclously long all day on Friday as you can’t check your account on the TV as we could on other ships. I would not have known we had the wrong tags if I hadn’t looked in other mailboxes and saw that everyone had orange. We finally got the correct tags after I waited in line unhappily. The CD made many announcements reminding people that crowding the gangplank only slowed down the process and yet people did it anyway. I heard no announcements being made that anyone needed to report to immigration. Early flight tags (red) were called off at 8 am. We got stuck in a log jam of people crowding the gangplank and didn’t get through customs until almost 9. We had no trouble finding our luggage. We removed the locks, jammed the backpack inside and headed out for a taxi. No troubles there and it was advertised as a flat rate of $40 to LAX. We were at LAX around 9:30 for our flight home.

 

Yes, we have cruised Princess before, last year on the Grand. We had an ok time and had dining issues then, too, but the cheerleaders here had me convinced that we were just unlucky and we should try Princess again. A good deal and a new itinerary for us sealed the deal and we booked this cruise on the Diamond. We will not be sailing Princess again. These dining issues were very stressful, and while we don’t nitpick, dinner is my favorite part of the cruise. Finding a good place to be in Pacific Moon really did improve the trip for us. I know there is a lot of criticism over the Carnivalization of Princess. We have done 2 Carnival cruises and we never had to wait at a bar for supplies. I actually stopped drinking during the day because it was such a hassle to get a drink that I wanted. Unless we ordered a Pina Colada, we had to wait for a supply EVERY SINGLE TIME. I had a glass of wine at dinner and that was it. We thought the entertainment on the Diamond was 1000 times better than on the Grand but it was timed so that you couldn’t do everything. Celebrity Showtime and Comedy Showtime went on at the same time so you could only do one. Maybe we could have had Celebrity showtime instead of Piano Man two nights in a row. For the first time ever, we both agreed that we just didn’t feel like we got our money’s worth out of our vacation, and we spent less money on board than ever before. We are considering trying Royal Caribbean just to see what it’s like.

 

I would be more than happy to answer any questions. Please don’t blast me as I have tried very hard to write a fair review listing good things and bad.

[kerrydee]

bernie, i have been reading all your threads with much anticipation as i had 6 clients who were on your cruise and they don't read crusiecritic. i sure hope they were not the ones that missed randi's. i made their reservations.

you gave me some unexpected information. i am personally taking the grand to the greek isles next may. because of the port intensive itinerary, i decided to take personal choice dining so we would not be locked into anything even tho i love traditional. in 17 cruises we've only had one couple we didn't care for and we always have a large table. after your comments, i scanned cc for other dining remarks. i just got off the phone with princess and changed to late seating traditional. thank you very much.

at randi's did you run into 4 people from san jose (early twenties)?

[Sillyjilly]

Thanks for the review!!!!!!!!!!

We will be on the Diamond this Sat. the 9th. I hope the service is better for us. So sorry for you. This is our first princess cruise and I hope it won't be our last:cool:

[tpmartin]

Bernie,

Thanks for your objective review.

I have been on Princess 3 other times and I hope that this is just something freaky. I have never seen anything that you mentioned about on any other Princess Cruise, everything bad we experienced was on the Carnival Destiny.

 

Thanks again

 

Tom

[Carquay]

Thanks for this well-written review that in many ways echoes our own Princess experience. I was also hoping that dining would be less of a hassle on a cruise ship, but I was wrong.

 

Now, it's definitely time for someone to start the leftover lobster thread! I can't believe that hasn't come up yet!!

 

carquay

[goblue]

Bernie,

 

Thank you for the detailed review.

 

May I ask what is 'Cabo Wabo' ?

[bottomfeeder]

bcs, I might have missed something but other than having to wait for them to deliver supplies when you ordered "foofoo drinks", and the fact that you were told you were booked for a table for 2 in traditional dining only to find out there were no tables for 2, and then having the tables for 2 too close together in Sterling...the rest of the things you were unhappy about were due to rude fellow passengers.

 

I wish you the best of luck on whatever cruise line you switch to, but I am not sure that you can avoid rude people! Your worst nightmare could be realized...the same loud drunks could be on your next Royal Carribean cruise! (Although I sure hope not, same as I hope they are not on my next cruise!)

[bcs819]

Cabo Wabo is a bar and nightclub owned by Sammy Haggar of Van Halen.

 

Bottomfeeder-

Thanks so much for your comments. I tried very hard not to let the many negative things cloud my review and make the trip sound worse than it was. I work with the public, so I see rude people every day in many many ways. With the amount of Carnival bashing that goes on here, I was surprised to encounter so much of it on Princess. I am not sure that not getting the correct tags for my luggage was the result of my fellow passengers. I am not sure that the Purser's desk failing to respond and enforce their own rules was the result of any passengers. I also forgot to mention that someone from the Purser's desk was supposed to make me copies of all the menus so that I could post them here. They told me they would be waiting in Churchill's 15 minutes after we hung up. I waited for 15 minutes and no one showed up. I called the desk and was told I wasn't allowed to have the menus. Not sure that was the fault of fellow passengers either. I tried several times to get the price of the golf simulator for a member of this board and was always either put on hold or told to call back. Don't know which passenger to blame there.

I have received plenty of information and help from these boards and wanted to give back. I have tried to provide names and places and tips that I learned that I thought would be helpful. While you may think you would not have reacted the same as I, this was not your cruise. When we were on the Pride, we met someone from these boards who was CRYING because her room steward was not leaving them enough ice. While I thought this was not enough reason to cry over a vacation, it was important to her and that was all that mattered.

 

I would be more than happy to answer any other questions.

[bcs819]

KerryDee-

I think the last of the people showed up for Randi's. She had a checklist and said she was expecting 30 people. We had 32 and I heard her mention something about not counting kids/babies (there was someone who brought an infant in a stroller) and another small child. The group was spread out most of the time and I didn't get to talk to many people.

[bottomfeeder]

Golly, BCS, I am sorry you found my post so offensive. I reread it and I don't see where I suggested that your complaints were unimportant or anything...not sure why it set you off. I'll stay out of your way in future.

[bcs819]

Bottomfeeder-

You didn't set me off. I was happy that you didn't see as many negatives in my review as we experienced on the cruise. I waited till today to post so I could calm down and give a fair view. Unfortunately, as I re-read it I get more upset at things that went on. No need to stay out of my way, I'm a pushover ;)

[vivalv66]

Thanks for the Great Review -- lots of details. We would love to have a copy of the princess patters that you said that you could scan. Please send to vivalv66@aol.com.

 

Thank you