Lammy23

I'm glad this was posted! My husband and I are set to cruise in July, I just booked the cruise 2 days ago and will definitely be purchasing USAA's travel insurance, but I'm undecided on which level. Any medical emergency should be covered by Tricare Prime as my husband is active duty..so I'm thinking we just need the cheapest plan that covers leave revocation and a call to military duty? They range from $98 to $232. What do people usually go with? I'm new to the travel insurance thing.

My husband I sound just like you two! We are in our late 20s, definitely not partiers but enjoy some drinks and good entertainment. We were very hesitant about taking our first cruise, but we are currently living outside of Seattle and decided to take advantage of the super convenient roundtrip to Alaska out of Seattle that Princess offered last fall.

We were easily a couple of the youngest people on the ship, by at least 30 years. But we did see a handful of couples our age. Very few kids (it was September). But honestly, that's what we were hoping for! The demographic did not bother us in the least. And the ship (Golden Princess) was not a snoozefest, we enjoyed MUTS, the comedians on board, the little dance club was fun. Not the most exciting nights of our lives, but we were satisfied.

As for the food...meh. We were not expecting much considering it was a cruise. We are admittedly snobby about what we eat..organic, local, not processed, non-GMO, yea..that sort of snobby! But at the same time it's gotta be delicious! The buffet was ok, the MDR was better, the specialty dining in the Crown Grill was the best meal we had on our cruise. Overall it wasn't terrible food by any means, but we were feeling the bloat and crumminess by the end of our trip.

I think you would enjoy Princess judging from your post. And I think you'd enjoy the older ships from what I know of them. Cruising is not our preferred method of vacation, but we think it's a great option to see a little chunk of the world that we wouldn't want to take a whole week to stay in one place in. I say go for it! We are going for cruise #2, again with Princess, in February to the Western Caribbean and are anxious to see how it compares to our first experience.

We didn't do any strenuous hikes or anything in the ports so I was fine in my Nike Flex sneakers (excursions included helicopter tour where they gave us boots, a tour into the Yukon where sneakers were fine, kayaking where boots/bulky shoes were not recommended, and walking around Victoria where my sneakers were again fine). My husband wore his Nike Free Runs and was comfortable.

On board I lived in my Tieks flats.

Hubs in his sneaks or Sperrys.

I hear ya! My husband and I are NOT crowd people (I mean, who really is? But some deal better than others). We just got off our first cruise and it was with Princess to Alaska. I believe there were 4 ships altogether at each port, but we took private excursions (less than 10 people total on each one) that got us away from the tourist trap shops and crowds. I would definitely recommend doing that or renting a car to get out and about. In Ketchikan we did a kayak tour with Southeast Sea Kayaks which I highly recommend. They were fab! We were only in Ketchikan for 4 hours anyway so the tour ate up most of that and then we browsed Creek Street and some of the town and headed back to the ship.

We did a September cruise and had fantastic weather. Sunny and high 50s/60s (people blow my mind when they say to avoid May and September because of cooler temps..you're going to ALASKA. It's not freezing, not even close. Throw your North Face on and slap a smile on your face!) except for Ketchikan where it was raining but it's one of the rainiest spots on the planet so we expected it. It was pretty foggy out at sea so even if it was daylight until 10PM it wouldn't have mattered. We enjoyed our balcony comfortably every single day and getting dark at 8PM did not bother us or affect our trip at all. We chose September to avoid family travel time (summer) and for the price.

I say go for it and enjoy it. Get out of town for most of the time in port and you'll be fine. Even when we got back into town after our excursions it didn't feel terribly overcrowded, but perhaps we missed most of it while we were out.

LOL!

I suppose I could try a white noise app on my phone. We are lucky to live outside of Seattle and don't need to fly anywhere, so packing the fan wouldn't be too much of a hassle. Hm, I'll have to think on it. Thanks for the reply though!

We are boarding the Golden Princess tomorrow and I have an odd question…I know there is no ceiling fan, but is there a A/C unit that has the fan inside..you know where you can just have the fan on but not necessarily the heat or A/C?

We are used to sleeping with the noise of a fan and I'm wondering if I should bring a small portable fan with me…

Either that or is it possible to keep your balcony door cracked to get the noise of the ocean?

We can't sleep in silence! :) Thanks!

Which day are you leaving, we are leaving out of Seattle on the Golden Sept 6th

We jump on after you get off. :) We're on the last sailing of the season, September 13th.

Thank you for posting this review! My husband and I will be on the Golden in September and it is our very first cruise. I was happy to read about your experience viewing Glacier Bay from your balcony. We booked a balcony on Caribe and, while we do plan on going up on deck for some of it, were really looking forward to spending time on our own balcony, as we are not really fans of being crammed and fighting for deck space (just how I envision it, maybe it's much more lax!).

Crossing our fingers for no little ones disrupting our cruise. I get it, families need vacations too. But it doesn't change the fact that a constantly crying baby is downright obnoxious when you're trying to unwind (for others as well as that family, I'm sure). And, as a nanny, I am very much looking forward to NOT hearing any children. :)

I hope this isn't too much of a hijack. But I booked our upcoming September cruise a few months ago and have confirmed 6:00PM traditional dining, I requested a table for 2 when I made the booking. Does this mean a table for 2 is confirmed or is 6:00PM the only thing that's "confirmed"?

Thanks for the pics and review, Heather! They're awesome! We may just spring for the glacier walk…for now I have the landing booked but will think on it over the next couple weeks. It's good to know that even with the walk you had time to poke around Juneau and eat, that's what we'd like to do too. We are in port from 11AM-10PM so that's plenty of time. Can't wait for our cruise!

Born and raised Mainah here!

The Lobster Shack in Cape Elizabeth is sadly a tourist trap but it IS a great lobster roll and the views are wonderful, if you can't find a picnic table there's always a rock by the water's edge to sit on.

The Bite of Maine food truck found at Portland Head Light is easily one of the best lobster rolls I've ever had.

Portland Lobster Co. is good and near the ship as well as DiMillo's. Although DiMillo's (owned by a family friend) is also a bit of a tourist trap but the food is good…I mean it's hard to get a bad lobster roll in Maine for the most part.

If you really want to eat like a local go get yourself a real italian from Amato's. :)

ETA: Holy cow, did not realize how old this thread was! Sorry! It was linked in another recent post and I happened to click it.

My husband and I are planning on a helicopter tour in Juneau. We are torn between simply doing a landing and the 20ish minutes they give you to explore. Or should we do the landing and a one hour walk? The price difference would be an extra $80 total. We just don't know if the walk is worth it in order to get the full glacier experience? Thoughts?

Also, we may book through Princess for this. Are the times pretty accurate? When they say 11:30-2:45 do they stick to that or is there a high likelihood of having to wait an hour or two to get the excursion going? I just don't want to lose a huge chunk of our time in Juneau waiting around.

Thank you!

Wow, while it's unfortunate that you didn't exactly get the cruise you expected, it was still a vacation of sorts with a stop in one of the ports, 100% refund for that experience plus 25% off your next cruise is an incredibly generous offer. I wouldn't be mad at all.

Does anyone know if you are allowed to bring your own travel coffee mug and have it filled with brewed coffee?

If you have the card, where exactly do you get this brewed coffee…just at the Horizon Court? I see it's not available through room service or in the dining room, which is odd to me.

Since it is applied to your balance due at the end does it really matter how it is kept track of? If you spend the $100 on clothes and do not take an excursion then it applies towards the $100 balance.

 

It therefore would make no sense to keep it separate.

…yes, that's exactly my question. If it applies to our final balance or if it applies only to a shore excursion. It's listed under the OBC but it is listed specifically as a "shore excursion credit". Hence my confusion.

Our cruise is in September on the Golden. We'll see what happens!

Oh, really? I guess I should have looked through the board before posting.

Hmm that's a bummer if it's not really an OBC. It's a little confusing as it's listed under the "OBC for this booking" section and there's a little blurb about "At the end of your cruise, these credits are applied to your final balance due." But I wasn't sure as it's listed specifically as a "shore excursion credit".

Nothing is catching my eye as far as an excursion through Princess, we might just let that $100 go to waste. :rolleyes: I guess we'll just see what happens at the end of the cruise, if it applies to the final balance then great but if not, oh well I guess!

On our upcoming cruise under the payments & credits section we have $100 worth of "shore excursion credits". It was part of a special Princess was running when we booked the cruise. Can this credit ONLY be used for a shore excursion or can it be applied to whatever our balance is at the end of the cruise even if we did not take an excursion through Princess?

As of now we booked only private excursions and don't really wish to book one through Princess, but I suppose I might if that's the only thing that $100 can go towards.

Thanks!

My husband and I are both 27 and will be going on our first cruise with Princess in September. I know we'll be in the minority as far as age group but it doesn't bother us in the slightest. I wouldn't let your age stop you at all, go and enjoy!

Formal dress is only be required on formal nights in the dining room, from what I've read most men choose to wear a tux or at least a suit and tie. If dressing up doesn't suit you you can always opt for the buffet or room service on formal nights.

Love your review! And what an incredible moment to swim in the wild with that whale! Looks like you and your husband had a great time. Makes me want to book a Caribbean cruise, but we will see how we feel about cruising after our very first one to Alaska in a few months. :)

Also, love the bacon plate pool guy (living the dream, I see) and the fact that Captain Phillips was the MUTS. Hahah

Yeesh…reading through this thread is just giving me another reason to feel super hesitant about our first cruise coming up in September. I know there's rude people everywhere, but it sounds like there's a big percentage of jerks all crammed into the close quarters of a cruise ship. Ick.

Fingers crossed we don't have any run-ins with the negative, miserable people on board. It all just sounds so silly and juvenile…with the cards and the colors and "oooh I'm elite, bow down!". I mean, get over yourself already.

Re: the age question. My husband and I are 28 with no kids and will be cruising Alaska this September with Princess (on the Golden). I'm sure we will be in the minority as far as age group, but it doesn't bother us. We still enjoy some fun late nights on occasion but when we booked an Alaskan cruise nightlife wasn't what we were looking forward to. As others have pointed out (and I'm glad to see since it is what I had assumed) an Alaskan cruise is about the scenery and the adventure. I wouldn't let your age stop you from going on whatever type of vacation you'd like to go on :)

It is absolutely ignorant to believe that the Fukushima disaster is not impacting our ocean and air quality in a negative way. There are legitimate studies that have found incredibly high percentages of radiation in the fish being caught in the Pacific. Among many other concerns.

As a PP said, you can find information on the Internet to support whatever you believe is happening. But to think that such a colossal disaster is only impacting Japan, I mean…come on.

Sorry for the delay, I don't get on here as much as I should. But thank you all for the replies and recommendations! After A LOT of research we decided to actually do a kayaking tour with Southeast Sea Kayaks. We'll get to see Creek Street from the water as we pass by and then do a nice long 2 hour kayak tour at Orcas Cove, very excited! All we have left is to figure out what we are going to do in Juneau, that's next on my to do list. :)

We will be in Ketchikan on 9/18/14 on the Golden Princess from 7AM-12:30PM.

We are torn over that to do here.

1) Bering Sea Crab Fishermen's Tour - I see this comes highly rated. However, my concerns with this are that it will take up basically our entire time in Ketchikan. Also, it is being sold as an excursion through Princess. How many people does this tour take? I fear it will be jam packed and, therefore, unenjoyable.

2.) Flightseeing tour of Misty Fjords with Michelle at Island Wings. This will only take 2.5 hours and also comes highly recommended. Is MF and a sea plane worth it for $239/pp? Includes a 30 minute stop within MFNM.

3.) Creek Street is something I really want to see, for whatever reason. A walking tour (on our own) is also something that is interesting to us. We are much more of a do-it-yourself excursion type of couple.

For those who have been and experienced any of these, what do you think? I wish we had more time in that town to explore.