jeromep

The roots of Solvang are then very genuine, having been established by Danes. That is really quite remarkable. I really liked the place. We didn't get any history on it when we visited. In fact our port day was a Sunday, Easter Sunday. When our bus arrived the whole town was just about dead. There was one tourist shop open, and the restaurants were open. We really needed that tourist shop because we had our then 22 month old daughter with us and the bus ride hadn't been good for her and my wife needed a new shirt. You can fill in the blanks. Leavenworth becoming Bavarian was almost totally to save the town from oblivion. The small towns and cities that dot the Cascade foothills, especially on the eastern side of the range, existed due to the logging industry, coal mining industry, (yes there is coal in the Washington Cascades, it isn't very good coal, but it was once economically viable to mine it) and railroad support. All of those industries are a shadow of what they once were, and so most of the towns have shriveled up and nearly died. In the 60s Leavenworth got the idea to convert itself into a tourist town, it had been a logging town, it sits in a narrow valley carved by the Wenatchee River and has high cliffs that surround the town, so it is rather Bavarian looking, at least environmentally. The city's name was good for pretending to be a German town, so all they had to do was to enforce building appearance standards on the central business district, create a plaza or two, put down brick pavers in the intended tourist areas, and then schedule the various typical Bavarian seasonal events and voila, you have a tourist town. I make it sound simple, but it wasn't. Now it has little hotels or pensions that sit on top of little shops and restaurants on street level, it has a very expensive and extensive resort/destination spa hotel, a number of 3.5 star non-chain/franchise, hotel properties, a number of near town campgrounds and quite a few adventure sports concessionaires. We usually visit a couple of times a year considering that it isn't a terribly long drive from home. You get a couple blocks away from the touristy area and business district and residential Leavenworth looks a lot like other former Cascade industry towns, like Cle Elum. Thanks for the insight on Solvang. I certainly didn't get any from the cruise line. And I didn't notice on our port day many historical markers. I must not have been looking close enough. I kind of guessed that was the distance it was from the dock. The drive in the coach felt like the time on board matched up with what a 35 mile drive would feel like. I guess for me, in response to the OPs original question, if a local says there are plenty of Ubers to get you back to the dock then great, but it didn't feel that way 5+ years ago.

A number of years ago we did the Solvang on your own "tour". Yes, it was a coach from the dock to Solvang and back. I can't imaging trying to do it via Uber or Lyft. The drive on the bus was rather long and Solvang feels pretty remote and far away from Santa Barbara. We are glad we did it. The first thing we did in town was visit the Solvang Restaurant and have Aebleskivers, the ball shaped "pancakes", or rather quick bread, that are supposedly Dutch. There is a regional chain in the Spokane and Pullman, WA area called Old European that also makes Aebleskivers. The ones at the Solvang Restaurant were as good or better than the ones from Old European. Nice place, a little dated inside, but the product and service were good. It was kind of charming. Felt like a place the locals go. Solvang reminded me, in principal at least, of Leavenworth, WA, which is a Bavarian themed town. Solvang feels much bigger than Leavenworth, but both cities work hard to enforce building rules that keep the structures Dutch or German in appearance and keep up the tourist vibe. Oh, and if anyone is into movies, Solvang is the central city in which the movie "Sideways" takes place. The restaurant the main characters are seen eating at in many scenes is an actual restaurant in Solvang. Watch the movie before you go if you want to see some of the sights before you end up there. It is a kind of funny movie too.

Possibly one of the best reviews in the forums. Nicely structured, covers just about everything we ask about, and includes great photos. It has been a pleasure to read.

Seattle Express is an excellent service, and if you really want to shuttle with others, that is great. I've done price comparisons lately and have not found Seattle Express to be much more competitive, if any more competitive than just using a careshare service. No matter the purpose of my travel, I almost exclusively use Uber or Lyft. Depending on the type of Uber or Lyft you select (XL, black car, etc.), A SeaTac area hotel to Pier 91 will run you between $45 and 95. You'll be in the 65-95 range for black car or XL service. You can do estimates on both Lyft and Uber web sites. Prices are similar. Check out https://seattleexpress.com/ if you want to shuttle with others. We've shuttled in Seattle to the port a time in the past and frankly I found the process exasperating. Various stops, other people that weren't quite ready to go. Loading and unloading of luggage, being squished together in a van. Nah. I'll take a carshare service any day.

This question might be better answered in the RCI forum because the embarkation process is up to the cruise line. It really isn't dependent on the embarkation port. As a Princess cruiser I can tell you that embarkation group times are just a suggestion, they are never enforced. But Princess and RCI are very different cruise lines. As the same question over with the Royal Caribbean board and you'll get a much more accurate answer.

Excellent question. First off, your observation of no hotels near Pier 91 is totally correct. It is a very industrial area, and accessed by a bridge. Not all hotels advertise park and cruise packages, which are identical to park and fly packages. A good way to handle this is to call the hotel direct and speak with their front desk. The local management knows better how they handle park and fly/cruise packages. It doesn't matter if you use a park and fly package for your cruise, the hotel won't care, but they do want to know when you will be back to retrieve your car and your package price will be based on the number of days the car stays at the hotel. We also drive to the port when doing Alaska cruises. We don't try to be near downtown, no real need if our goal is to drive in the night before, get some sleep, leave the car parked and get transportation to the pier. I highly recommend the Ceaderbrook Lodge. It is in the Seatac area, but is more secluded and is a much higher end location. They do offer a park and fly package. It isn't the least expensive, but the location feels more secure than other airport hotels which offer the park and flys and the accommodations are better than a regular hotel. We use Uber or Lyft to get to and from the pier. We aren't much into regular taxis and the pricing of Seattle Express shuttles isn't better than pricing from a carshare service.

Lots of services will do delivery. Instacart, Drizly, Doordash, Grubhub, Postmates. Any of them will do the trick. You'll probably get better pricing if you choose to order direct form Total Wine and have them conduct the delivery. Note, the delivery services, all offer a "white box" offering to various other companies. So, when you order food delivered from Taco Bell, KFC, McDonalds, from their app or web site, they are using one of the above services to actually get the order to you. The last time I did order delivery from a fast food joint, the order was tracked through their app, but it was a DoorDash driver that got it to me. I suspect that Total Wine is doing similar. If you have specific tastes, then Total Wine is probably the way to go. Otherwise, heading to SeaTac Liquor and Wine might be just as satisfactory without the delivery overhead. Or you could just get an Uber or Lyft and go to Total Wine on your own and meander the aisles on your own and pick out what you want. No delivery fee or mark-up, but you have the cost of the Uber ride. The delivery services will deliver anywhere so long as they can drive there. When I've been on business trips and have used Uber Eats or DoorDash for food, sometimes they will go directly to your room, sometimes you are staying at a place where guest accommodation elevators and areas of the property are off limits to non-guests, so you have to meet your driver in the lobby. Either way, they will deliver to whatever hotel you are at.

Congratulations on your first cruise. I hope you have a great time. How much you enjoy cruising is really up to you. You have many questions, I may provide multiple posts. Pack a small med kit. Pack in it typical OTC medications you would normally use in your regular life. The onboard clinic is very capable, but also very expensive. Your normal medical insurance at home will likely cover little or nothing of a visit to the doctor on board. Travel insurance will reimburse for your visit to the doctor, but you'll be paying out of pocket on your onboard account until you can file the paperwork with your insurance and get reimbursed. You are only going to go there if something is really wrong with you, otherwise "doctor, heal thyself." You'll want OTC stuff for cold and sinus issues, seasickness and nausea, gastrointestinal malaise, pain relief. A couple bandages wouldn't hurt, and some antibiotic ointment. Basically pack whatever OTC meds you'd normally use in a typical year. You are unlikely to need any of this, but you'll definitely need it when you need it, so pack it anyway. Hand sanitizing wipes are a good idea to carry, however the active ingredients in your typical Wet Ones and Purell and the knock offs are ineffective at protecting you from Noro. So, wash your hands frequently and wash them prior to every meal or eating occasion. It is a ritual for us to wash our hands in our cabin and then gingerly make our way to the dining room without touching anything with our hands. You can do it. It is just one of those things that you get used to when cruising. Also you'll want to pack a package of sanitizing wipes, the kitchen and bathroom type. We tend to wipe down all cabinetry handles, door handles, drawer knobs, telephones, TV remotes, faucet handles, toilet flush handles, and such once we get on board and to our cabin. Sounds weird, but it is piece of mind for us. Power strips with surge suppressors are verboten and will be confiscated by your cabin steward. They require a type of ground which the ship doesn't have. You can bring along power strips or blocks which do not have surge suppression, but I'd recommend just bringing along power bricks that lean toward USB charging, so you can power all of your devices. We have a power adapter with 4 USB outlets on it and we charge all of our devices from it. It has never been questioned by staff. There aren't a lot of wall outlets in a regular cabin on the Grand, so be prepared to do a bit of device swapping unless you get a USB power charging station of some kind. External batteries are just fine. They don't care about things like that.

Princess has a nice walk through on the app, but it goes like this. Visit the muster station to check in. They will scan your medallion and that counts for knowing where you would go in an emergency. Then you can watch the safety procedures video on the cabin TV or on your phone. Either one will count for you and your party. And at some point before departure they will make the safety announcement test message over the PA. You are basically done with the muster check in once you have checked in at your muster station and watched the video. You can do this in any order, watch the video first then go to the muster station to be scanned or vice versa. I've read that a number of people will turn on the safety video in their cabin on the TV while they are unpacking. So, kill two birds with one stone.

I'm curious, too. Have you joined your role call for your sailing?

Tell me the programming is being done offshore without telling me the programming is being done offshore.

Basic telephone customer service at Princess has been severely lacking through the restart. It has been pretty bad. While I'm not a huge fan of the call centers blatantly misinforming callers, I also encourage all of us to consider the difficulty of handling a cruise line call center where you have all types of calls coming in and the quantity of data about ports, itineraries, ships, embarkation, disembarkation, and such is highly variable different for every port. The embarkation at one port may not look anything like the embarkation at another port. Cruising is a highly variable product and all the documentation in the world can't solve for what an employee in a call center needs to know do to their job effectively. We don't always get it right here. Read some of the other threads and you'll see varying levels of accuracy of information, heated disagreement amongst posters, personal opinions that are "sold" as fact and some folks that are just as blatantly inaccurate as some of the call center staff. I'm glad you believe you have been properly informed.

The cruise director and staff know the age makeup of who is on board the ship. If they notice a significant contingent of post-teens that are in the odd gap between being adults and legal to drink, they may arrange some young adult meet-and-greets. If they offer that, it will be listed in the patter. Otherwise, hanging out at the pool or hot tub and not being shy is the next best way to meet people. Also, check in with the teen club leader and see what they know about ages of passengers on board and if they know of anything going on for the post-teens. They can always get a word back to the cruise director staff that there is an interest in a meet-and-greet

Princess uses Pier 91 (Smith Cove). The only reliable way to get there from anyplace is via taxi, carshare (Uber/Lyft), or shuttle van. I would encourage using a carshare service before any of the others. Easy to determine where they are as you are waiting for them to pick you up, plus you pick your exact end point and the carshare driver knows exactly where you need to be dropped off. Your travel party size will probably require an UberXL or equivalent. Boarding groups with Princess are a suggestion, not a rule. You don't really need to pay any attention to them, because port staff and Princess certainly don't. If you are in the waiting hall and they are boarding the ship, you'll be queued up to go on board. If you are in a suite or Elite with Princess you may have priority boarding. But if you arrive at or before 11, you'll flow through security and then into the waiting hall, and if they are boarding the ship, right onto the ship. They service two ships at a time on Pier 91, typically a HAL cruise is also embarking while Princess is embarking. The porters and staff will be asking if you are Princess or HAL and point you in the right direction. The passenger terminal at Pier 91 is a newer facility, but not brand new. It is quite large, and the waiting hall is very open. There will be a lot of background noise. I think it is worse than the airport, but that is just me. I've always felt that boarding cruise ships is a bit chaotic, even if it is organized. I don't envy your need to try to pre-communicate to your child what is going to occur, because, honestly, there is no good way to do so in this kind of environment. Princess will only start boarding the ship after every passenger from the previous cruise is off the ship. While Princess provides a nice and relaxing cruise, that last morning on board is a lot like the "Bu-bye" skits that were on Saturday Night Live in the 90s; they want you off the ship and they make no bones about getting you off the ship as quickly as possible; "Cruise is over, go home!" So, while I don't really enjoy the cruise embarkation process, I find the disembarkation process even less hospitable. Don't make dinner reservations through the app until you are on board. And you can always call the dine line from your cabin to do that. While the Medallion is very cool and is just a sophisticated replacement for the old cruise card, with some additional on board "geolocation" technology, the app is both a bit spotty in terms of its reliability, and its functionality on shore is pretty limited to what it can do until you are on board. I think the app works fairly well on board for its intended purpose. I would recommend ensuring that you have the most recent version of the app on your device before you get on board. As for dining, if you need a secluded corner of an MDR, they will do their best to accommodate you, but as others have said, you'll be dining later to get that kind of accommodation. I find that MDR service is much better if you dine later in the evening rather than earlier. You won't starve on board and shouldn't feel attached to a dining schedule. Free food and small bites are always available at the International Cafe, 24/7. You might find the buffet more to your liking depending on the evening and how everyone is feeling. There is a lot of dining space in and around the Horizon Court (or is it the World Fresh Marketplace on the Royal?). It wouldn't be hard to find a corner and take it over. Specialty restaurants like Sabatini's and Crown Grill often have secluded spaces, if you are up for a cover charge meal that is a bit elevated over the MDR. And don't forget, pizza, burgers and dogs are available at the pizza stand and grill on the Lido deck near the main pool. Assuming that the Medallion and app are working properly and the ship is not understaffed, you can also order "room service" from the app and they will deliver it to wherever you happen to be, not just in your room.

Journalists ask questions of people. If they are doing their job right, they will ask others questions and present different viewpoints of others and let the reader decide. I have no issue answering a few of your questions. There is way too much food on board to have just one or two favorites. My wife considers most MDR cruise food, especially on Princess, "continental". It leans on the tradition of western European multi-course meal presentations. Things you'd typically see in what is now the UK or France. It isn't very "Americanized". For me, cruise dining is about trying out foods which are unlikely to be on a menu at home. However, after a week or two on board you do get tired of chilled soups and dishes which have been constructed vertically. The good news is that when you are tired of MDR food there are always a lot of other options. A lot of Princess loyalists will tell you their favorite appetizer is the fettuccine Alfredo. The biggest issues with that dish is that is has been absent from MDR menus on most ships since the restart and ramp up. A few of the threads here indicate that it has appeared back on the MDR dinner menus on some ships, but it doesn't seem to be a universal change. Many have requested it off menu and have been served the dish, but a lot of us feel a lot better when we see that on the menu every night. So, as an appetizer the fettuccine Alfredo is excellent and I"m hoping it will be back on all the menus very soon. You don't find Beef Wellington at Applebee's; or anyplace else in the states, unless it is a high end steakhouse that likes to specialize in "old school" dishes. Otherwise, you have to make it on your own. It isn't especially hard to make, just involved and time consuming. Of course, a beef roast like Wellington is great for cruise dining rooms because, in reality cruise MDR food is basically served banquet style. There are a lot less menu items on an MDR dinner menu than on the menu at Applebee's. This points to the unique nature of cruise dining. 1. You have limited kitchen and pantry space to stock up for a cruise, which will limit the number of dishes or different foods you can make. 2. When you have 3000 people to feed 3 times a day or more often, you have to streamline your kitchen so you have a limited number of dishes to prepare with each meal and you can maintain the pace of feeding all those people... just like banquet service. So, Beef Wellington remains one of my favorite main dishes on a cruise. As for deserts, Princess has had this chocolate mousse desert called the Love Boat Dream around forever. It used to be a firm chocolate mousse that is formed into a heard shape by a mold, kind of like jello, and then popped out on a plate and garnished with some fruit sauce, a mint leaf, and sometimes some kind of chocolate construction. It was very good, very rich. But there are lots of photos of it online from recent cruises, and it seems to have changed a lot or has a lot of different pastry chefs making odd interpretations of what it is supposed to be. It is still one of my favorites, however it may be going the way of the fettuccine Alfredo. My favorite cover charge restaurant on board is Sabatini's. Excellent Italian at a competitive price relative to the service and presentation. Crown Grill is also good, but it can vary greatly depending on the quality of the steaks they are acquiring. There seems to be less variability from ship to ship in Sabatini's. What publication do you write for? Is this a freelance gig?

First thing I'd say is that I have no reason to doubt your experience. These are all plausible observations, and certainly real from your perspective. I've shared this before on the threads, but the most difficult thing for any service provider to provide is consistency, and this your experience doesn't match with my experience with Princess, but if you troll the boards enough you'll find that Princess still seems to be restarting after emerging from the shut down. I also believe that Princess has a staffing issue. If you are sailing on one of the more recent new builds, like the Discovery, Enchanted or Sky Princess, you'll likely not experience this. They seem to put their "A" teams on the new builds as there is both demand amongst cruisers to be on the newer ships and they want the newness of the ship to dovetail with the service experience. But that also means that the older ships will either operate with staff shortages or less experienced staff, resulting in the experience you had. I feel bad that you had such an experience, I would also be dissatisfied if I had your observations of the cruise. Another observation of late is that service and food vary greatly on the older ships. It feels like the perfect storm of under staffing and less experienced staff on the older ships, again going back to the line having limited human resources and wanting their best foot put forward on the new builds. I also suspect there may be an on board leadership issue. If the leadership on board a ship is top notch, you'll have happier more motivated staff who will make the experience excellent. If the leadership is lackluster or downright negative, that passes through to the staff and service. I really like the Ruby Princess. We sailed on her many years ago for a Caribbean cruise. This was just before the Royal class ships had been introduced and the Ruby was the newest ship in the fleet. At the time they had their "A" team on board and you could tell. I suppose the only thing I can say is to give Princess another chance in a couple of years. The farther the shutdown is in the rear view mirror the more likely that more ships will be more consistent with each other as staffing and provisioning ships stabilizes out.

Hawaiian formal. I like that. Formal nights aren't what they used to be. I'm not mourning that change. Sure, they call them formal nights, and depending on the itinerary and the type of cruiser, the evening is either filled with sparkly dresses and a lot of dark suits and tuxes or... not. If you show up clean and presentable, pants without holes in them, no shorts, maybe a decent pair of shoes that doesn't show your toes, you'll be admitted into the dining room.

Wasn't the Ruby suffering from some recurring noro on board during the early spring? I'm sure there is a thread on here that I ended up commenting upon. That may have impacted your experience. Galveston is also a "new" port for Princess. They have come and gone from Galveston over the years for a number of reasons. I think their fleet is large enough now, and there is demand for shorter transits to ports to get to cruises, that putting a ship in Galveston and doing Western Caribbean cruises has a good amount of demand. While consistency in service is the holy grail of any service industry, especially travel, it is incredibly difficult to achieve. I've read the boards and been on enough cruises to know that in any fleet and any given cruise season there is "that ship" in the fleet that isn't doing so well, for whatever reason. While it had a negative impact on your cruise, the "that ship" torch may have been passed to the Ruby. It has been held by a number of other ships that I can think of. For the longest time it seemed that the Crown was "that ship" that was getting negative reviews. And for a while it was the Caribbean Princess, mostly due to the engine issue it suffered from that required an extensive dry dock to address. I'd love to know what you disliked about this cruise?

60x75 is an RV Queen. I'm intimately familiar with this size as that is what I end up sleeping on for most of the rest of my vacations. I always wondered why Princess' queen bed seemed a bit short. Oh well, at least the beds have improved since my first cruise a number of years ago. I've got to get a new mattress for the RV, it is much worse than what is on a cruise.

Those Rivera deck balconies are narrow, but wide. However, being somewhat amidship you'll be in about the a good position to avoid excessive ship motion. But remember, you are on a ship, if the sea is rocking, the ship will be too no matter where you are located, it is a matter of how much motion you feel. Those suites are mid-ship aft, not really in the amidship location. If you must have a midships located cabin, look for the ones that are underneath the seawalk area. A few of those cabins have larger balconies which follow the shape of the seawalk. Those get snapped up pretty early in a booking because they are either balcony cabins or mini-suites, so they aren't as expensive as full suits. You'll have very nice furnishings on the balcony, even though it is a bit narrow. You'll have wooden, presumably teak, loungers, and a wooden table and chairs. On the larger balconies, especially those aft corner balconies you'll have more space than furnishings. With the Rivera deck suites the furnishings are squeezed into place but suite balcony furnishings are much nicer and much more comfortable than what you get in a regular cabin. You'll also have great glacier viewing, no matter what side of the ship you are on, they turn the ship about halfway through the visit to the glacier face. Typically port side will view the glacier first and then that will flip to the starboard side for the remains of the glacier visit. Being so close to the concierge lounge is a huge benefit. Not only are snacks and beverages easy access, but the concierge really can take care of just about anything for you and you don't have to stand in line at guest services, even if you are only standing in line on the suite/Elite passenger side of guest services, and you don't have to wait on the phone with the dine line, either. Also, if there is a pastry, snack, or beverage you'd like to see in the lounge, just let the concierge know and they will get it stocked the next day. Most of the benefit of being in a suite are all the extra perks, but the cabins are very nice. Lots of storage, lots of closet space and drawers, and the bathrooms are wonderful. I hate the shower curtain in Princess regular cabins. No shower curtain in suites, you have both a tub and a glass enclosed full stand up shower. The laundry perk is great. We send out a bag of laundry every day, it comes back pressed and clean. We've sent everything from casual clothing to items that need to be dry cleaned, like formal or business wear, woolens, etc. We have never had any issues with how laundry is done or the condition it is returned in. We have also not experienced any issue with the washing of delicates by the ship's laundry, however your own experience may vary. Maybe our delicates aren't that delicate. I've had great cabin stewards over the years on Princess, however the cabin stewards that take care of suites are especially accommodating and friendly. You'll probably enjoy all the dining perks. Suite breakfast in Sabatini's (or another specialty restaurant on board, they will tell you where in your welcome letter that is in your cabin when you arrive). Full suites are part of the Reserve Collection cabins (formerly Club Class mini-suites). You'll have access to the Reserve Collection MDR dining option. No reservations necessary and it is unlikely that you'll have and wait to be seated when you are dining in the MDR. This is for all meals offered in the MDR. They also offer suite passengers a complimentary specialty restaurant meal on embarkation night. The concierge can get you reservations or you can call the dine line when you get on board. Once you book suites, it is very difficult to go back to regular cabins. Even a Reserve Collection mini-suite is a bit of a drag.

Suite breakfast is always offered on every sailing, on all ships, and typically it is in Sabatini's, however it can be offered in any dining venue that the food and beverage management on board want to use. If Sabatini's wasn't available they would move the suite breakfast to another dining venue, like the Crown Grill. I've not experienced suite breakfast being anyplace but Sabatini's, but I've read a number of threads where the poster had suite breakfast on their sailing in a different specialty restaurant.

Yes, the prices are higher than I think all of us would expect at home. I see you list the Philippines as home, so the 10 to 20x ratio you mention may actually be the case there. Compared to domestic U.S. prices, even prices in an urban area, I only see a 3x or maybe a 4x difference in pricing on board compared to prices at home, but I stand by my statement that prices on board are only marginally more expensive than resort spas on land. As for the product pitch, I hope that @Sunshine42794 and @Cindy12 are still following the thread as I have a bit of advice. There is an on-boarding form they give to folks visiting the spa. It seems similar to the on-boarding form you would fill out with a typical massage therapist you'd go to at home if you were visiting them for the first time. At home those new client/patient forms are pretty much just a legal boilerplate requirement, mostly focused on any recent surgeries, lingering injuries, ongoing medical conditions, and such which might be something a massage therapist needs to know to do their job. At the spa on board that form asks minimal questions about your medical status and focuses on "problem areas" of your skin. The whole point of the form is to give the practitioner material to work with to pitch you product at the end of the session. I learned very early on that you don't fill anything out on the form about your skin condition. You don't have oily skin, you don't have dry skin, you don't have dandruff, you are perfect. That then doesn't give the practitioner any material to work with. All those check boxes line up with individual products they will pitch to you after the treatment. On top of that all you have to do is let them know at the very beginning of your treatment that you know they try to sell product to you at the end of the treatment and that you won't be buying and would prefer not to have anything sold to you. I've not encountered a practitioner which will do a pitch after a treatment if you have asked them not to prior to your treatment. You don't have to be rude, you just let them know that you are a regular cruiser, that you visit the Lotus Spa on almost every cruise and that you just aren't interested in buying anything that is offered.

More of a treat for my wife and I than a thrill. I have a regular massage therapist at home who's prices are easily 1/3 what you pay on board, so yes, you really do overpay for spa services on board. However, the prices aren't too out of line compared to what you might pay at a Las Vegas resort spa or a big brand day spa and the style of service is more in line with Vegas resorts or destination day spas. My home town medical massage practitioner has a small studio room in an office space dedicated to massage and esthetics practitioners. It's comfortable, but not particularly spa like. She rents her room much like a hair stylist rents a chair in a salon, and shares a common space, waiting room with the others that are renting space there. Anyway, the spa experience is more involved on board, just like a destination spa or a resort spa. You'll book your treatments with the front desk. No need to book ahead of time on the web site or through the Princess app. Just call them from your cabin, or visit the spa front desk and they will get you scheduled. If you visit the front desk when they aren't particularly busy they will gladly give you a tour of the spa facility, show you treatment rooms, tell you what kinds of treatments they do in each type of room, make recommendations, etc. The spa manager has financial targets they need to meet, just like any business. This has quite a bit to do with the fact that the Lotus Spa is not run by Princess but is run by Steiner International (or Steiner Leisure, they may have gone through a minor name change). They operate the spas on most cruise lines out there. Canyon Ranch, the fancy destination spa in Arizona, has a division that operates on cruise ships, but they only serve a cruise brand or two and only on the lux lines. All that said, the spa manager has sales targets they need to meet to pay the practitioners, cover the overhead of being on the ship, (staff, staff living expenses, materials, etc.), so if the spa isn't getting the quantity of business they need you'll see ads and specials in the Princess Patter. Most of the spa services I've purchased over the years have always been on special. The service charge is basically an enforced tip. You'll see this practice at most destination day spas and resort spas. In the destination and resort spa world that service charge, whatever it is, goes to the practitioner or into the tip pool that is split amongst the spa staff. It depends on how they handle tips and who that spa considers tip eligible. In some spas only practitioners get tips, in others the locker room and sauna attendants participate in the pool. Either way, that is up to the business and their business model. If you get a massage or scrub or something on board and you feel it was done particularly well, then a couple extra bucks on the tip line above and beyond the enforced service charge is a nice gesture. Of course, I would only recommend doing that if you are already familiar with a particular service and know what you like out of that service. If you are not familiar with a service and are getting it for the first time on board, don't feel compelled to tip extra. I will say this, some of the best massages I've ever had have been on board ship. The second best ones (close second) have been at destination day spas or resort spas. What I can get locally are all very good, and serve their purpose, but day spas and resorts do attract a different caliber of practitioner. In short, look out for on board specials, typically on port days, don't book too far ahead, but if you are interested in services, get a spa tour, and talk with the spa manager or whomever is running the front desk. Let them know what you are curious about, and ask them for recommendations. You'll have a fine time.

When are you going? That has a lot to do with balcony weather, or the odds of the kind of weather you will get. And odds are all you get with the weather in Alaska. Averages indicate that you'll find warmer weather, think spring in the lower 48, from late June through July. But you'll experience a bit of everything. We arrived in Juneau one morning to a cool mist, fog over the fjord, and jacket weather, by mid-day it was 75 going quickly toward 80, the fog was gone and the open pool on the Lido was full of kids and adults and many others had changed down into shorts and t-shirts and were soaking up the sun on the loungers. In Glacier Bay we experienced tremendous cold when the side of our ship was facing the glacier, then when it turned for the other side of the ship to see the glacier, we had full sun and 75 degrees of warmth, and we hadn't moved, just turned 180 degrees. Huge daytime temp swings are very normal and should be expected. As for your exact questions, you can request a robe in the cruise personalizer. I always do when booking so it has been a while since I've done it. About half the time the robe is there when we embark, have the time no. Just ask your cabin steward for a robe and they will get one for you. Same goes for extra blankets. Remember, pack layers for Alaska, because most days in port you will start out bundled up, and as the day goes by you will be stripping them off and trying to figure out where you are going to store them while you are meandering around in port.

Woah, $6! That is way over the top. If it was a half gallon of ice cream that showed up at your lounger, that might be acceptable, but a tiny container? I suspect that this whole Tyra Banks ice cream initiative has gone away. Instead, replaced by the ice cream "nightmares" that @AtlantaCruiser72 mentioned.