Northumberland

We've sailed with Princess, RCCL & MSC and have another Princess cruise booked for March 2020. Haven't done Carnival or NCL. So, I can't compare those ones, but we really enjoy Princess. It generally attracts an older crowd looking for leisure time. RCCL, also a great cruise line is developing into a more family oriented line with water slides, zip lines, surfing simulators, etc. on the newer larger ships and added to some of the older ships. MSC was a one time trial that we won't repeat. 

Opinions are subjective based on your needs and expectations.

Can't speak for everybody, but we've never been disappointed by Princess.

I would like opinions about the best mini suite location and deck for the Emerald Princess.

Our first cruise ship was the Ocean Princess back in 2000 on a 7 day southern caribbean cruise out of San Juan. She now sails out of England as P&O's Oceana.

We are booked into the Best Western San Pedro Hotel & Suites for a spring 15 day cruise. We booked long term parking at the hotel @ $10.00 per day.

We are sailing from San Pedro for the first time at the end of March. We booked into the Best Western Plus San Pedro after reading some good reviews on Trip Advisor. We have also booked the long term parking at the hotel. It seemed like a good choice considering it's proximity to the port and the free port shuttle service. If you've stayed there before, I'd like to hear your thoughts about the hotel and the area around the hotel.

When we were working, we would plan a 7 day cruise and another week exploring Florida. Now that we're retired, we like to drive to the port and explore along the way. We're about 2000 miles from either Florida or California. So, instead  we take our time driving to and from the cruise port we are sailing from. We did that early this year as we sailed from Fort Lauderdale on a 21 day land/cruise adventure. We planned different routes down and back in order to see more on our road trip and we will be doing another trip at the end of March on a 28 day trip driving to Los Angeles and sailing to Hawaii.  

1 hour ago, baldilocks said:

 

I agree with that. We travel by our own vehicle to the port when ever possible.

I have often envied those that live close to the Florida ports and the convenience and economic benefits it provides for cruising. Living 2000 miles away definitely adds to the cost. On the plus side. Now that we're retired, we get to see a lot more of the USA by driving and as we're in the centre of the continent, the distance to Florida or California is almost the same.  So, now we also take cruises from the west coast.

I can't think of a scenario that would stop me from cruising as long as my health allows me to travel.

We've done 9 cruises with a 10th coming up in less than 5 months and never gotten sick while traveling on a ship.

However, I've gotten sick while being on a plane.

Now that we are retired, we choose to travel to port by car and avoid flying.

I think that improves our odds of remaining healthy.

Now that we're retired, we no longer fly to cruise ports. We live in the centre of Canada and choose to rent a car and drive to the port we will be sailing from. It's a more enjoyable way to travel. You have the flexibility to make side trips and see the sites. 

We can go where ever the wind blows us. 

Cruise Raider,  Thank you for your explanation of the wine pricing. That will definitely help us with our decision as to whether or not to bring our own wine and pay the corkage fee.

Does anyone know if Princess has a published list for the Silver/Gold wine list available for purchase in the MDR. We are considering bringing our own wine and paying the corkage and trying to compare the pros and cons.

As we only book one cruise at a time, we usually will book 9 to 12 months out. Don't think I could be patient enough to book further out than that. 🛳️😉

8 hours ago, Colo Cruiser said:

Best mini's on the ship. Fully covered balcony.

Have never had any noise issues from CF below.

Better mark your booking "no upgrade" or you may find yourself moved to a higher cat uncovered balcony mini on Dolphin deck.

Great review which makes me feel more confident about our choice. Also, thanks for the suggestion about the "no upgrade". I'll get on it.

We are booked on the March 30th cruise to Hawaii and chose a mini suite in order to accommodate 3 adults.  We'll be on Emerald deck 8 port side near the stern of the ship which is above Club Fusion. Looking for anyone who has been stayed in this part of the ship that may have thoughts positive or negative.

Thank you for your review. We've never sailed with Carnival, but are contemplating a spring cruise to Hawaii on Miracle. We've done 5 cruises on RCCL, 2 with Princess and 1 with MSC. We originally only considered Princess for our Hawaii cruise, but since reading reviews like this and some Youtube videos, we feel more comfortable with Carnival. Also of course, you can't ignore the price comparisons.

Just now, Bee Guy said:

Did you get an email confirming that you were registered? 

Yes, we did get an email saying that the minimum of 25 people had registered and we were on the list.  

Unfortunately, by the time we realized something was wrong and we enquired with guest services, it was too late.

Just now, sxphil said:

you get an invitation left in your stateroom

 

Well, that's what we had expected, but we never received one even though we were registered.

I'd like to know what the normal procedure is for being advised when a Meet & Mingle is going to take place on RCCL ships.

We recently returned from a RCCL cruise. We had registered for the M&M, but never received a notice of when or where the event was going to take place. When we checked with guest services the evening of the second sea day, we were told the event had already taken place. We've been on 2 other cruises with other cruise lines in the past 18 months and we received notices to our stateroom advising when & where the M&M would take place. So, how does RCCL do it?

On 1/24/2019 at 10:58 AM, dacf said:

We're thinking of an 8 day Southern Caribbean cruise with RCCL Adventure of the Seas next winter (Jan or Feb 2020).   The itinerary looks like this:

-Embarkation: Ft. Lauderdale

-2 days at sea

-next 3 days, 1 day at each of the ABC islands

-2 days sailing back to Florida

I was speaking with a friend and she told me because the ship is leaving Florida and those islands are so far south, the ship is really bootin' it to get down there.   So much so that the pool deck is so windy, nobody can enjoy laying out by the pool deck and also the pools are shut down.

So I would like to hear from anyone who has done this particular cruise.  Is this true?

Thanks for any help you can offer

Denise

We were on the Royal Princess last April with a 2 day return from Curacao to Fort Lauderdale. We didn't experience an adverse wind around the pool deck. That area on most ships is fairly sheltered and you shouldn't experience any abnormal wind unless you happen to hit really bad weather. We are also going on Serenade of the Seas in March for an 11 day Southern Caribbean cruise which includes other multiple sea days and don't expect any problems.

3 hours ago, rlawson084 said:

 

They do have a predetermined price for upgrades available to everyone.....it is listed on the website where you made your booking. 🙂 that shows the price of the cabin that you would like and it is available to everyone right from the start. 

 

Life isn’t fair. Why all of a sudden do we all expect to be gifted things from companies?

I think you have misinterpreted my post. I was definitely not expecting to be gifted anything. My point was that if a company like RCCL doesn't want to offer free upgrades, that's fine. However, why play games and start this bidding war and only invite a select few to duke it out. Why not just set the upgrade price and offer it to everyone.

7 hours ago, LB_NJ said:

 

 

This is a business.  RCL, the other cruise lines, hotel chains, airlines, etc.  offer frequent traveler programs because they believe it will improve the bottom line.  I assume they get out their spreadsheets and figure out just how much they have to give away for free to get return customers.

Oh, I get it. I was in sales for over 40 years and I understand how companies try to up sell products and services. I just have a hard time understanding companies that have loyalty programs and then cheapen them by creating an auction system that they only invite some to participate and not everyone. Also, if their not going to offer free upgrades then why not offer upgrades for predetermined price to everyone.

On 12/22/2018 at 8:55 AM, Lionesss said:

Just curious

 

Let's say RCI is unable to fill some GS and JS by this upsell system.  Do you think they will let the cabins sail empty, or what do you think their solution would be.....................free upgrades at pier??

 

The reason I wonder is we did a land vacation to Disney and booked the Contemporary for Halloween week.  For months the Contemporary was booked out,  or at least that is what it said on the Disney site.

 

Well when we got the text to our room (Disney uses those magic bands) we were upgraded to a Castle view at no cost.

Had we originally booked this room it would have been around $900 for the two of us.

 

So at Disney we got a free Upgrade, not an upsell at check in time

 

Later

We've done 7 cruises. 4 have been with RCCL plus 1 coming up in March.  Our most recent cruise was 9 months ago with Princess, which was our second cruise with them.

We had the good fortune to receive a free upgrade from an interior to a balcony along with our best friends who had an adjoining room. The value would have been around $1100.00 had we booked it originally.

I don't expect a free upgrade every time we sail, but I do find it somewhat offensive that a cruise line that tries to promote loyalty would create basically a lottery system to get people to upgrade their accommodations. 

We may have to rethink who we want to be loyal to.

5 hours ago, torpeedo said:

We are in the we don't like it camp.  I wish we could get Jersey Boys but I see it's on NCL..

We were on Oasis 2 years ago and went to Cats. A lady from New York was sitting beside us and said that she had seen the original Broadway show, but didn't like it. She decided to give it another chance. Well, she fell asleep before the intermission and were left before we fell asleep. Jersey Boys would be great.

We were on Oasis about 2 years ago.  Never saw a bee, but we did see a Gecko. 

We will be on Serenade in March and we're really encouraged by most of the positive responses on this thread. Based on a few of the negative ones, I guess we can conclude that most positive and negative reviews are subjective. Some have commented about fewer options based on her size compared to the larger ships. We've been on Oasis and I found it less appealing because of the overwhelmingly large crowds. We had 6300 people on our sailing and although it is a beautiful ship, we found it very uncomfortable in the common areas. Especially the MDR. We almost needed a shoehorn to fit into our table. Our favourite ship was Navigator. Although it's a larger ship, it didn't feel overcrowded and the staff were fantastic. We anticipate Serenade will have a similar feel even though there are fewer activities on board.