beg3yrs

I just completed payment in full for the Sun Princess on June 1. Gave my TA an encrypted spreadsheet with 29 gift card numbers and pins. Thought it would be 30 but he only needed 29.

Not far from the truth. In January of 2023 we rounded Elephant Island on the Sapphire and went from nice weather to greater than 100 knot winds and 9 meter swells just like that. Captain McBain tried to make headway towards Admiralty Bay but had to eventually settle for pointing her into the wind and setting a speed enough to maintain steerage. However, the Sapphire still rode comfortably even though now and then you had to grab a handrail. Her wider beam over the rest of the Grand class (except for the Diamond of course) makes her a much better ship to sail in rough seas!

If the original delay was due to water contamination, they would have debarked all crew living on board. Can't have people staying on board with bad water.

Sounds like it's very possible the water contamination was found at the last minute, probably as part of the normal testing procedures. Yes, it is a big deal and must be dealt with immediately and canceling the current sailing is definitely a last minute thing. I wouldn't fault Princess management for a technical issue like this. IMHO it's likely water testing has been going on since they started using the system for human consumption and this is a brand new issue. Would love to have @chengkp75 chime in here.

^^ This! ^^ If you had to cruise within 60 days you'd be paying in full!

Yes it is. 😱 If DW and I play both sea day sessions of bingo with the full package of electronic bingo games it doesn't take many sea days to incur a large folio charge. We personally know three Fortunas now! Nice kids once you get behind the 'corporate' personality. No refunds involved. As @KarmaCruisers said, games are charged to your folio, winnings are added to your casino account.

I once went to guest services and added $7,500 worth of gift cards to my account. Of course the account was already "in the hole" from playing too much bingo so we ended up with a net balance of around $700.

I believe that's for before you embark. Ran into that once.

I sincerely doubt the aft exterior stairs are normally available to passengers. Mostly for crew only and definitely available in an emergency. However in a week or so we'll find out for sure.

IIRC, cans of soda are not included in the packages.

Yes, they will be charged, if there are any. I recall before being Elite that there were at least soft drinks in there. I also recall having a second cabin with grandchildren and they were charged for sodas from the fridge. That was over a decade ago though.

It is not by number of days but is by cruise. However if the cruise you've booked as a single booking can also be booked as a series of bookings, it is considered to be multiple cruises for the mini-bar perk regardless as to how you booked it. If you look at your cruise history (your upcoming cruise will also be listed) and that cruise gets more than one credit, you'll get multiple setups.

Seems unlike Princess Cruises, they won't start using this until ALL the bugs are worked out.

IIRC we had to produce written evidence of our flights. It wasn't sufficient to show GS the schedule on your laptop or a phone. This was some time ago and may have changed. Just so you're prepared.

Similar kind of math used for purchase of beverage-only packages versus the Plus or Premier bundles.

Or you're like us and have many more bags than you want any of your fellow cruisers to see ... Last two longer cruises we came back with more suitcases than we left with. 😱

Heck y'all, it might not have even been a software problem. Could have been a hardware problem on a server or a network router/switch or whatever.

And if you can't fix it, feature it!

I have heard of high-demand excursions getting extra buses allocated and new reservations being opened up. It is rare though as many stars and planets have to align for this to occur.

A ship being scheduled into the future is no guarantee that it won't be sold before those dates. Princess will simply cancel any bookings that are past the "sell by date". They've done this before. I had a wonderful cruise scheduled on the Pacific Princess that was cancelled due to the ship being sold.

Thanks guys. You are absolutely right and the posts causing your response continue to show that many people do not read much of the thread before they post. I'm sure within a day yet another poster will say their data transferred from the old app to the new one with no problem ...

We'd rather book onboard too. Then you can pay for them with Princess Gift Cards purchased from AARP. However with the more popular excursions selling out and excursion prices going up as the sailing date approaches, we find ourselves booking more and more in advance. It is possible to pay for excursions in advance using Gift Cards but it's a PITA. You have to book without paying and then call inside the grace period, hoping and praying you get a competent rep on the phone that knows how to pay for excursions with Gift Cards.

Deck 6 traditional dining with two seatings. Deck 7 more like Anytime Dining with reservations allowed. Deck 8 no reservations, walk-ins only.

Thanks @Outerdog. I really wanted to comment on that post as well (retired electrical engineer here). Seems to me the only way an outlet can "smoke" something is 1) the device was defective in the first place or 2) someone plugged a 110v device into a 220v outlet.

I can verify that Uber is available in Southampton. Used it multiple times in the Fall of 2022. Don't know about Lyft.