A Suggestion to Princess Concerning Cruise Itineraries

[Cruisin' Chick]

You West Coasters must think you are the only ones who like 10-14 day cruises. LOL!

I'm sorry Princess saw fit to change the 14 day Southern Caribbean cruises to only embarking from Barbados and Jamaica. When they started one leg in FLL and the second on Barbados, it was a wonderful cruise. And it seemed to fit the needs of both US and British pax. But that didn't last, and I am sad.

The Southern Caribbean is a much nicer part of the Caribbean than the overcrowded Western, and a bit nicer than the Eastern, which seems to be getting more crowded.

Besides, I dislike having to fly to the west coast for the best cruises. Let's split it up so both sides of the country get some benefits. ;>)

 

Why do you need longer crusies, don't you two just string a bunch of them together anyway? :) (hope that doesn't sound like I'm too jealous!)

 

Hope you're both doing well, it would be great to run into one another again. I sail on the Star on 1/17 but don't have any other Princess booked his year. Where are you headed next?

 

Doug

 

The reason many of us are clamoring for more cruises (and longer ones) on the West Coast is that the itineraries are pretty limited. Especially during summer time. It gets to the point when my hubby and I are talking about going on a cruise and it's so been there, done that (MR and Baja cruises).

 

We haven't been able to go on vacation for a few years so it's going to be important to select the right cruise for our next one. And since we live so close to a port, it would be nice to be able to avoid having to fly. So we're waiting to see the December 2010 schedule, but I'm guessing if we do book one, it'll be the Hawaiian one again because hubby is now spoiled after going on a 15-day cruise (hoping the Kona stop gets added back in).

[Sea Day Cruiser]

Since I'm in the middle of the country I don't care which port I cruise from but I won't go through the hassle of flying to any port for a 7 day cruise. I want at least 12 days and 14 would be better. I've done the Sea Princess 14 day and I've done B2Bs on the Caribbean Princess. I want something new and I'd love to see Princess offering longer cruises from either coast.

[mr green]

I agree, that seven day cruises are a waste of money if flying is involved, in fact my wife refuses to fly any more, so, we are reduced to round trips out of Vancouver, [a 6 hour drive for us], or using Amtrack.

As it stands we can't cruise at all, until my wife has an operation on her back, but we are making plans.

One problem is however, unlike most port terminals, round trips from Vancouver are few and far between. HAL does ONE it seems every second year to Hawaii, a nice 19 day cruise, while Princess used to do the odd 14 day round trip to Dutch Harbour, OK look it up, if you don't know it.:)

Other than that its a B/B to Whittier. Land/sea cruises are of little interest since the involve packing and unpacking.

I well understand that the 7 day cruise is great for those with children, or folk who live where the action is, where a 7 day is not an inconvenience.

Come on cruise lines, come up with some ideas!!!

 

john

[spongerob]

One of the nicest cruises we had was an 11, yes that's "eleven" day New Year's cruise out of Galveston which included a visit to the Panama Canal. They took what was normally a 7 day western Caribbean cruise and added extra days to/from Panama and Costa Rica to convert from longer holiday sailings back to a Saturday-Saturday 7 day cycle...We've found we really like the 10-12 day cruise length, especially when this can be accomodated within a two calendar week period, enabling good use of our limited vacation time.

I couldn't agree more. We were on that same 11-day cruise. I think mixing in a couple of longer cruises within a schedule of 7-day cruises made for a nice change. The crew sure appreciated it because they loathe the turnaround days. It certainly was an attraction for us. It was one of the very few opportunities we have had to enjoy a longer cruise without the need to travel by air. No one since has done anything similar out of Galveston, and we won't consider the currently available choices from that port in spite of its convenient location because the itineraries are too short.

 

Unfortunately, the experts tell us that we are anomalies in the cruising world, in spite of evidence to the contrary.

 

It is not so much that they are so smart, but they pay millions to consultants and polling companies to give them incredibly reliable information for their inventory planning. Their success rate in planning financially successful itineraries is quite remarkable.

It's still statistical analysis based on past trends and assumptions about the future. I'm not belittling the effort - I've done it myself, and will go through another round of it in a couple of week when we set our objectives and make forecasts for 2009. I appreciate that regardless of the business it is a huge task and tremendously difficult. I also know that the people who succeed are those who don't just follow the herd.

[BigTimeCruiser]

Why do you need longer crusies, don't you two just string a bunch of them together anyway? :) (hope that doesn't sound like I'm too jealous!)

 

Hope you're both doing well, it would be great to run into one another again. I sail on the Star on 1/17 but don't have any other Princess booked his year. Where are you headed next?

 

Doug

 

You are correct Doug...We try to put cruises together (B2B) when it's possible. Seven days is way too short. You barely get settled, then it's time to disembark. Our next cruise is this month to the Mexican Riviera, B2B2B on the Sapphire.

 

Hope to catchup with you on one of our future cruises.

Curt and Cindy:):)

[LARGIN]

Wondering if you get a better class of people on longer cruises? :confused:

[RickEk]

I'd like to see a 14-day Alaskan cruise out of Los Angeles. I think that itinerary would have many takers from this area.

[DougH]

Our next cruise is this month to the Mexican Riviera, B2B2B on the Sapphire.

 

Hope to catchup with you on one of our future cruises.

Curt and Cindy:):)

 

 

And you wonder why I'm jealous? :) Have fun.

Doug

[zaddict]

We agree that more west coast origin cruises would be nice. However we have been able to sail on the Star 10 days RT SF- Mex-SF and 18 Days on the Star SF - Valparaiso in the last 2 months. We leave on the Golden in a couple of weeks RT LA - Hawaii - LA. RT SF - Alaska - SF in June and SF - FLL in Sept.

 

It would be nice to have more options.

[3GR8Sons]

I don't know if it's a case of what people can afford, versus the generally low levels of vacation time people in the US have available to them when compared to people in other parts of the world.

 

I think this is very true. Many folks can afford the longer vacation but do not have the vacation time.

[3GR8Sons]

Wondering if you get a better class of people on longer cruises? :confused:

 

What makes a class of people better?

[hubofhockey]

What makes a class of people better?

 

How they treat others.

[Philip217]

I'd like to see a 10 night out of San Diego to Acapulco, Zihuatanejo/Ixtapa, P.V., Cabo and Manzanillo. Princess does need more 10 night cruises out of US ports.

 

One of the more esoteric bits of information we get from our Yield Department is onboard spending habits based on departure ports. Onboard spending is a major part of cruise line profitability.

 

Passengers who sail out of San Diego spend on average just a bit over $10 LESS per day than passengers who sail out of San Pedro. Hard to believe with these ports so close to each other, that the demographic would be so different. $10 per day doesn't seem like so much until you multiply it by 3,000 or 4,000 passengers every day of the week. So a big ship sailing out of San Diego would lose somewhere between a quarter million and a third of a million every 7 days by not sailing from San Pedro. That's a loss of between $12 and $15 Million a year !! Frightening, no?

[cherylandtk]

Frighteningly high numbers, but fascinating statistics. Although I do like the 10 day itinerary suggestion by Lady Jag.....

[spongerob]

One of the more esoteric bits of information we get from our Yield Department is onboard spending habits based on departure ports. Onboard spending is a major part of cruise line profitability.

 

Passengers who sail out of San Diego spend on average just a bit over $10 LESS per day than passengers who sail out of San Pedro. Hard to believe with these ports so close to each other, that the demographic would be so different. $10 per day doesn't seem like so much until you multiply it by 3,000 or 4,000 passengers every day of the week. So a big ship sailing out of San Diego would lose somewhere between a quarter million and a third of a million every 7 days by not sailing from San Pedro. That's a loss of between $12 and $15 Million a year !! Frightening, no?

I find things like this fascinating. Is there a difference because there are more locally-based people sailing from SD, versus San Pedro, older crowd, or something else? Thanks for the little insights.

[Jamiebearr]

[quote name='RickEk']I'd like to see a 14-day Alaskan cruise out of Los Angeles. I think that itinerary would have many takers from this area.[/quote]
It would be great if it stopped in Astoria too!!

[Philip217]

[quote name='spongerob']I find things like this fascinating. Is there a difference because there are more locally-based people sailing from SD, versus San Pedro, older crowd, or something else? Thanks for the little insights.[/QUOTE]

Spongerob,

I have no idea why this is the case.
Florida cruises have a very similar demographic - except they spend even less per day.
This helps to explain why so many ships have pulled out of Florida and San Diego

[Sunsailor]

Perhaps the reason FL cruisers spend less is that we've been to the same islands SO many times. We live in South Florida and are able go on a few cruises a year. While Princess is by far our favorite line we went on a 10 day HAL cruises - itinerary was different. We are going on the Crown in Feb with friends but the itinerary is same old, same old. I would love to see some new stops on both the Eastern and Western for both 7 days and 10 days. (HAL was nice but a little boring. Princess is much more fun!)

[rdsqrl]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS][COLOR=indigo]I completely agree -- more 10-day itineraries would be welcome, no matter from which coast they departed. I'd also love to see Princess stop stuffing every ship they can spare into Alaskan waters (seen one cube of ice, seen 'em all!) and send some down to sail out of FLL or LAX, I don't care which. Or at least mix up the current 9-day sailing out of New York with rotating different itineraries: even a New England/Canada itinerary during July would be a nice change from the same old, same old Grand Turk/St. Thomas/SJU/Bermuda rotation. [/COLOR][/FONT]

[easykruz]

Would love longer cruises from the left cruise coast.

Why can't Princess have a cruise that would go round trip over 2 to 3 cruises. Let's say you start in L.A. and go to Vancouver, stopping in SF to pick up new passengers, One Cruise.

From Vancouver to Hawaii. Second Cruise.

From Hawaii to L.A. Third Cruise.

Etc.

[OCruisers]

GOOD POST!

We'd be extremely happy if Princess would have a ship (same ship) out of Ft. Lauderdale doing 7 night East Caribbean one week and West Caribben the next ... for the season. This would be so easy to make it into a B2B so easyl

[windsor26]

Howver on a similar subject you lucky people in USA have a great chance of short 2/3/4 day trips but in Australia there are two per year with Princess. One Syd to Melbourn in November and one Brisbane to Sydney earlier We need and want a chance to have shorter hops perhaps even syd to adelaide or vice versa or melbourne to brisbane HI PRINCESS GIVE US A BREAK (a short one) :confused::confused:

[cacy6893076]

10 or 11 day itineraries, is MY guess, involve non-convenient days of departure /return as to day of the week as the ship turns around alot of times in the middle of the week.......not as popular .................many folks base vacation on sat or sun departure/returns, the rest are tougher for those with less flexibility, 7 days ensures weekend departures. I would love to see more 10 day iteneraries, 7 days not long enough, but they(marketing) appeal to convenience and the majority.

[MGnut]

[quote name='BigTimeCruiser'][B][COLOR=blue]Agree Totally....More 10-day and 14-day cruises out of LA or SF would be ideal.:)[/COLOR][/B][/quote]

Or out of Seattle!

[MGnut]

[quote name='flamomo']You West Coasters must think you are the only ones who like 10-14 day cruises. LOL!
I'm sorry Princess saw fit to change the 14 day Southern Caribbean cruises to only embarking from Barbados and Jamaica. When they started one leg in FLL and the second on Barbados, it was a wonderful cruise. And it seemed to fit the needs of both US and British pax. But that didn't last, and I am sad.
The Southern Caribbean is a much nicer part of the Caribbean than the overcrowded Western, and a bit nicer than the Eastern, which seems to be getting more crowded.
Besides, I dislike having to fly to the west coast for the best cruises. Let's split it up so both sides of the country get some benefits. ;>)[/quote]

Princess has a 14 day "Caribbean Collection" round trip out of FLL that is a great itinerary. We took it in January this year and loved it. Too bad we had to fly RT from Seattle to FLL, but it was worth it.