anniegb

Many thanks for all your reports. Litter is rare as it is culturally unacceptable to eat food on local transport and in public streets. May I enquire what was your favourite port of call?

Temperature wise Princess cruise will be warmer as the cruise does not visit Hokkaido. I would opt for the longer trip and probably add on a land trip to catch the Autumn colours. Neither cruise spends much time in Kyoto but that city can be very congested. Enjoy whatever you decide.

Question: Which month? It can make a difference temperature wise as both cruises don't cover the same regions.

Very impressed that you managed to see all 3 sites in a 10 hour shorex. With my experience of the Kyoto local rail network and the Shikansen system, that would have been very difficult to achieve going by rail. Japanese guides should come with an advance notice, their walking speed is very fast.

On the Koningsdam, I missed the steamer chairs on the promenade deck. In fact there were very few places to sit on that deck.

I have several 25 day cruises under my belt. However this cruise lacked a certain energy during the last stretch of sea days - JMO. The CD and again JMO was disinterested and that permeated. On my long Dec cruise, we had 4 different lecturers per day and I only had 1 hour 'down time' between 0900 and 1800. You shouldn't compare but inevitably you do.

I have also completed this cruise and in comparison to another cruise line, different itinerary, HAL's daytime activity schedule on the return leg was very light. I think we had 8/9 consecutive sea days. JMO the Headline Acts in the World Theatre in the 1st half of the itinerary were of a higher quality too. My advice is be self sufficient wrt to entertainment. FWIW, I realised that an itinerary with a cruise length of more than 25 days is too long for me.

Hi Cheryl IIRC it was Grant who mentioned Emma was his boss. Apparently she was visible at the crossing the Equator ceremony, Also if I further recall correctly, Grant mentioned that Mikey another boss Mikey ?? joined in Honolulu. So by my count, there were 3 personnel who delivered most of the classes and 3 supervisors/managers ?? It is possible that Emma was not i/c scheduling but was name dropped by Kristen??

Hi Cheryl Kristen disclosed in her conversation with me, that Emma was i/c scheduling. As I understood it, Emma was Grant's line manager. BTW how many managers does it take to run that department ? I reckoned that Grant had 3 line managers 😉 Grant, JMO, had such a heavy workload - he could have done with an assistant 🙂

Interesting and your POV is at odds to those of other cruisers on this thread.. FWiW the general consensus on my cruise and I accept it is based on anecdotal evidence Kristen was not perhaps the 'best fit' for the role. Delivering a presentation on useful apps when travelling, why select London as an examplar when the next ports were based in Hawaii ?? Curioser and Curioser.

To be fair, it was said this cruise was her first cruise as a cruise director. I lay more blame at those who assigned her to the vessel. She had previously worked at Microsoft amongst other employers.

The cruise director was Kristen Hickman. She was observed leaving the ship, complete with luggage, at the end of the cruise, FWIW I raised the schedule/room allocation with her on Day 2 of the cruise. She replied, it had nothing to do with her. As has been stated before, the public venues on the vessel are far too small for the size of the passenger list.

I hear you. However as a visitor from overseas, the poor infrastructure coupled with a very poor attitude displayed by some employees/contractors at the port speaks volumes. Cruises and cruise passengers are not wanted by San Diego. I hear you and I will not return

No chocolate offered

Only 30 minutes early? You were lucky!