nattie

Wow! So much great info, thank you! Unfortunately for us, we are stuck with beginning of August travel due to work and school reasons. The ship we are on offers an excursion to Pompeii and the hike to the summit of Mt. Vesuvius. I really want to do this one, but now I am concerned about the heat. Google says that average high is 86 F, which significantly cooler that August in MD. Am I crazy to attempt the hike? Should we just stick to Pompeii/Archeological museum instead? We do have a decent amount of time in port (7am to 6pm).

Thank you everyone for amazing suggestions! I have switched from my original reservation at Hotel Artemide to Albergo del Senato. $200 less for better location! Question, has anyone stayed in Junior Suite in Albergo del Senato? I am wondering what view of "roman rooftops" from the small balcony actually mean? Also, I like the idea of private transfer from airport, but I would actually like taking the train to Civitavecchia I think. Being from Eastern Europe, I miss train travel :). From Albergo del Senato I assume we will need to take a cab to the train station to catch the train to Civitavecchia? Or should I just scrap the train ride idea?

Was anyone successful in ordering the included in Princess Premier package Medallion Accessory with actual Medallion in the app? I cant figure this out. The app wants to charge me for the accessory I am picking out. I guess I'll just have to get the accessory once on board?

Bumping this. Researching Prima for April cruise from NYC and a single queen in 2nd bedroom would be a "no-go" for us. Anyone with experience?

Before settling on Princess 10+ years ago as our favorite line, we have tried almost all mass market lines (RCCL, Carnival, NCL, Celebrity) and we have been revisiting them occasionally over the past years. The reasons on why we switched to Princess initially are very in line with what you stated - wanting a less of a "party" crowd as well as more overall relaxed and higher end experience. We have done 2 Princess cruises this year, one Carnival (awful) and one NCL (Haven was amazing, regular parts of the ship just meh). Things I love about Princess and reason why we are coming back: I actually really like Medallion technology and find it a huge plus of not carrying cruise cards around. The benefits Medallion offers to me far outweigh occasional glitches (especially boarding and disembarking) overall set up of the ships, especially positioning of smoking areas (including Casinos). I do not want to smell smoke anywhere near the main pool area. Here I would also include size/variety/positions of pool areas, especially on newer Regal class ships For my family Princess Plus is the best deal for not being nickle and dimed to death. Neither of Carnival and NCLs packages lived up to the value it offers (this year's comp) Passenger mix. Hands down Princess attracts more "civilized" crowd. That includes children. Alfredo's pizza restaurant (Regal class ships). If you tried their veal ravioli, you know what I am talking about... Are there things I would prefer Princess to improve? Absolutely! Some of them: Main entertainment. I might be just getting tired of what Princess has being frequent cruiser :). I felt that Main Theater entertainment was superior on NCL. "For fee" restaurant choices. Again, here NCL wins. I do appreciate Princess trying to expand in this area Choice of departure ports. Both Carnival and NCL offer ports much closer to me with no need to fly. Om another note, I am not a gambler so I dont know about casino rates. I thought Carnival had the best ones. My friend booked the cruise we have just been on for $100 pp (w/o taxes, so total was closer to $300) when I paid $600 pp.

My faves on regal are actually obstructed view balconies on Emerald over the promenade below. I have sailed in them several times and bigger balconies are awesome and the price is normally great.

The cabs are right next door, literally as you walk out of the building. We took a cab on the way back from the cruise and it was $65-70 to the airport area hotel. I believe driver said it was $60 to airport. I might be wrong on $ though.

We didnt have any issues with stuff. Bartenders were busy, but wait times for drinks were normal (or at least they did not seem excessive to us). Buffet was busy at peak times, but we were always able to get seat after a bit of searching. Dont know about Chef's table, sorry!

Not sure if Enchanted has it, but Discovery (and I think Sky) now has a Concierge Lounge for Suite guests. I have not been in one, so cant report, but it sounds like a worthy perk.

Same issues here, called Princess and waited on hold with no results. Gave up on that log in and I am using our other log in now (mine vs DHs loyalty number).

There has been a lot of negativity lately from seasoned Princess cruisers on these boards. I dont want to minimize their valid complaints, but would like to report that this cruise (second for us this year on Princess) was great. The weather might have helped, we have not seen a drop of rain the entire 10 days we were in WA and AK. We were using the pools and sunbathing the entire cruise too. We are seasoned cruisers, both DH and I are Elite on Princess and have sailed a number of other lines (most recently Haven on NCL) and DS just turned Elite after this Alaska Cruise. On to the review: Seattle: We flew in 2 days ahead of time (never know with airlines these days) and enjoyed amazing weather in Seattle as well as "Air and Boat" show weekend. The Mountain was out the entire time, weather was better than what we left on East Coast. We lucked out! On advice from our friends that moved to Seattle are 2 years ago, we stayed in Bellevue instead of downtown Seattle. Very safe and nice area, about 20-30 min ride to downtown. Embarkation: Somewhat more chaotic than what we are used to in FLL where if you fill everything online and get your medallions ahead of time, you just walk onto the ship pretty much. However, absolutely not as bad as NCL's disaster in New Orleans. Worst part was huge queue for medallions that no one tells you can bypass if you already have them. Also, had to show all the docs (passports, covid vaccinations and tests) even though everything was uploaded to Medallion app ahead of time, in FLL you just tap your medallion and if everything is there, they will let you through. Another minus point for Seattle embarkation is that the ride share lot is at least 5 full minutes walk from the ship (10 with luggage). Port authorities are pretty much forcing you to take overpriced cabs. But that's not Princess's fault. Sidenote Medallion App: The app worked just fine for me, from dining reservations to ordering drinks, I could not report any issues. I personally quite like the app experience, all of us wear it on the wrist and it makes life so much easier vs constantly misplaced and demagnetized cruise cards. Now Princess is rolling out a program where you can pay with Medallion off the ship at select merchants. Personally I have not tried this, but I am not opposed to it. Sidenote Internet: BAD, especially comparing to Caribbean. On par with what we had in 2019 in Baltic. I was able to check emails daily (after letting them load forever), but no streaming or actually logging into work stuff. Ship: Just gorgeous, it still kind of "smells new" :). We liked certain improvements made comparing to Regal (same class, our favorite ship on Princess) : sports court positioning and additional space around it, removal of fountains in between 2 main pools and addition of seating area and hot tub there, overall more spaciousness of interior on decks 7, 6 and 5. Not sure what was removed, but extra space was nice. We did not like the reversal of Princess Live to more of a lounge seating, but I think everyone else liked that. Also, the free pizzeria on 6 is called Gigis and while menu is the same, the vibe and decor are distinctly not. Now it looks more like a diner vs Italian bistro. Again, personal opinion. This sailing had a full ship, which we have not experienced this year yet. We did not feel crowded at any time on Discovery even with the ship being full. Room: We had a quad mini suite on Riviera. I am glad I have insisted on quad, so DS (13) could have a bunk bed and a place to lounge around during the day, vs only the couch. My only issue with the room was balcony size, but that's the same on all ships of this class. We normally book a mini, so no surprises there. Dining: Most of the evening meals we ate in the dining room. I dont know why but consistently the 6th floor aft dining room (Ketchikan on this ship) that used to be reserved for traditional dining has absolutely the WORST service. It was like that on Regal in Jan and same here. I have prebooked most of our times before we sailed in that dining room and cancelled all of the reservations after first night. We did not have to wait more than 10 min or so when we came to any other dining room with or without reservation (we made some friends and sometimes wanted to dine together). It did help that our preferred dining time is around 8 pm. One thing we absolutely hated this cruise was the Bistro Sur La Mer. Never again. But this is purely personal choices because of the food served. Quality of the food was fine and ambience was nice, we simply did not like the food presented. I LOVE escargoes and what is done to them in that restaurant is a travesty. We did like Alaskan twist on the regular dining room menues, my DS especially loved the Alaskan Berry Soup. Breakfasts and lunches we normally had in the buffet or Gigis or from Salty Dog on the pool deck. No surprises at any of these places, we liked the food and the variety offered. Drinks: I was fretting a bit about not getting Premier package, but it turned out to be not necessary for us at least. Variety of wines on board was quite limited anyways, but the Pinot Noir they carried as "house" variety was quite good and included in the package. Somehow the Strawberry Daiquiri was way better in Alaska than in Caribbean :). Also, bartender at Take 5 turned my son onto mojito zeroes (mojito sans booze), I believe DS was solely responsible for the lack of mint on the ship by the end of this sailing (kidding!) Entertainment: Did not do any of the shows in main theater. Alaska itinerary is quite brutal with early risings most of the time, so we were pretty much done after dinner. We did see some game shows in Princess Live and enjoy live music (LOVE that about Princess) in various lounges. Especially liked the band in Take 5 and guitar player in Wheelhouse. We also did a lecture on Alaska by the onboard naturalist and while we did get some useful info, the gentlemen himself was quite insufferable (non stop ponderous quotes and boasting). Again, probably a personal opinion. There was only one production show, Rock Opera. Seen it before, so didnt go. Ports and excursions: I normally try to see what cruise line offers and compare to what I can find independently. I was very pleasantly surprised this sailing with quality and price points of Princess excursions, we ended up with ship tours in almost all of the ports. - Ketchikan. Did the wilderness cruise and crab feast tour. Very nice, the only somewhat negative is that it is not "all you can eat" now (it was at the time of booking), but we were full after what was offered and blueberry cheesecake was absolutely the best! To the point that DS wanted to make cheesecake when we got home. - Glacier viewing tour. We were bumped off that tour originally and waitlisted. I came directly to excursion desk upon boarding and was lucky enough to get our tickets. This is absolutely a MUST if you can afford it (expensive!). There was only one boat going to glacier from the cruise ship (so 50-75 people out of 3000 pax) and glacier and wildlife put on the show just for us. Huge chunk of the glacier (300 ft tall per captain) fell off, we have seen an eagle fish for salmon, several whales and otters as well as distant bear sighting. The weather was also perfect, not a rain drop in sight and clear skies. The crew of the boat was absolutely amazing and my only regret is that I completely forgot to grab a wallet when we left the ship at 6:30 am (yes you read that correctly), so I didnt tip them. They had free coffee/hot chocolate/tea and donuts available for everyone as well as made several Alaska themed snacks (smoked salmon and kelp pickle anyone?). There were food and beverages for purchase too. Captain and his crew of naturalists narrated the whole tour, pointed out wildlife, gave TONS of interesting info. Absolutely the best tour. - Juneau. We did the dog summer camp tour. I still dont get the whole point of Iditarod, but I very much like the explanation give by our musher "very expensive hobby" :). This was the most disappointing tour of the cruise. Loved the ride and all the dogs, but "play with puppies" time was absolutely not as advertised, we only got one puppy to hold for like 5 minutes. More puppies, please! - Sitka. We were informed ahead of time about the port change, so I prebooked the excursion online before we even departed. We did the wildlife cruise, bear sanctuary and eagle sanctuary. Our driver was Sitka native and clearly loved her city. The boat ride was great and we have seen a lot of whales, momma and bay seal and relaxing sea lions. At the bear sanctuary bears put up a show too. Sitka ended up being my favorite port of the entire itinerary! - Victoria. Because of substituting Skagway for Sitka, we were able to dock in Victoria at 5 pm (thank you Captain Tim for negotiating an earlier port time!). We ended up taking a shuttle into the city and just walking the streets for couple of hours. Debarkation: Very smooth. We took fool advantage of port valet program, so easy! While on board we have booked our next adventure - 2 weeks in Med on Enchanted next year. We are certainly coming back to Princess.

We just came back from Discovery princes Alaska cruise. Being Alaska, there was no functioning internet really anyways :). DS is 13 and has been cruising with Princess for a long time (he just got elite status), so he has tried all of the kids club levels on Princess. Sounds like this is your teen's first Princess cruise? The teen lounge on Discovery is very nice and is modeled after cool "hang out" area for teens to get together by themselves or with counselors. The lounge does have multiple gaming systems with decent game choices. On our last cruise though my teen did not spend any time in the lounge besides first day visit to sign up (in case he wanted to go later). Our free time was spent in the hot tubs/open deck watching movies on MUTS, playing various games on the sports court (we really liked how Discovery court is positioned, vs other ships of its class), going to game shows in Princess live (DS loves them) and just hanging out listening to live music/chatting. Being in Alaska, there were only 2 sea days, so we didnt have that much "free" time. There are plenty of activities you can do as a family, just depends on what your teen is into.

I am sorry to hear about your bad cruise. Not necessarily an excuse, but I wanted to point out that most of the senior management stuff from Regal (also my favorite ship!) is now on Discovery princess, including captain, hotel director, interior services director (might be wrong title, his name is Constantin and he is in charge of the entire interior services), customer services senior reps, etc. I know that Ralph (hotel director) is heading back in Sept/Oct. We were just on Discovery and I was surprised at how much I immediately loved it until I met the senior crew. They brought the vibe from my favorite Regal 🙂

Correct, we had to buy 2 individual passes for Discovery Princess' Enclave for the cruise this Sunday.

We are on Discovery next week and excursions for Sitka (substitution for Skagway) have been posted to Personalizer.

Not sure if anyone can answer here, but if a minor is getting tested also, do they need a different eMed account?

We are on Discovery boarding this Sunday (YAY!) and have received notification over the weekend that we are rerouted to Sitka instead of Skagway. They already have posted the excursions available on Personalizer and there are some decently good ones available.

I am sorry you are experiencing all these issues and completely understand your decision to try other lines. However, normally you have a PVP (or whatever they are called) assigned from Princess if you book directly with them. Most of the issues you are experiencing (not payment for services though) I have resolved with email to my PVP. I have used gift card successfully by waiting to board and just adding them to my onboard account. Not defending Princess here, hold times are abysmal AND I normally know more about rules/system than agent answering the call too.

The bunk is very well hidden in the ceiling, you would never see it unless it is pulled down. 😀

When you look at the deck plan (try site different than Princess.com, I use crusedeckplans, but almost any other site will be the same) cabins with upper berths are marked with a circle and the opnes with couch only are marked with triangle or T I am in R521 on Discovery (same layout as Sky) and it for sure has upper berth

Having the same problem on one of our accounts since yesterday. I cant even update the info it says "Something went wrong, please try again later". Weird thing is that the app login with that log in ID works just fine.

Capriccio, thank you for posting this! We have recently tried NCL's Haven and loved the "ship within ship" concept. We are Elite on Princess so hopefully can status match on MSC too. Was that hard obtain and how do you do you go about this?