Am thinking about traditional dining

We are just recently off the Grand and were pretty disappointed with the availability of getting a table at anytime dining at a decent time for dinner. Sometimes, we don’t mind sharing but say no to that when we notice a lot of people coughing and sneezing or a lot of heavy perfume / cologne in those in line with us.

If we didn’t go to dinner at 5:15 PM, we were told that they couldn’t get us a table for two. That would have been ok if we were able to make a reservation for 6:00 - 6:30 PM, but they won’t take a reservation for this time. To make matters worse they switched the early dining from 6 PM to 5 PM so many passengers assigned to traditional dining were miffed and using the anytime dining room, with success, I might add, making the lines even longer and availability of tables even less.

This is the first time we’ve experienced such a hard time in getting a table for dinner at this time and have seriously considered swithcing back to traditional dining after many years of enjoying it. Granted, we used to like to eat later but due to a medical condition, my DH has to eat earlier, just not at 5 PM. 6:30 PM would be ideal as then he can still eat at an hour that works for him and I am not hungry again by 9 PM. But, if we wait at a table at that time, we talked to people that waited 90 minutes for a table, many of which gave up and ate at the buffet. If we could make a reservation, problems might be solved, but we can no longer make those arrangements.

On a future cruise on Princess, we are thinking of swithcing to traditional dining and on the personalizer, I see I can choose the 5:30 or 6:00 PM option. I would go for the 6 PM option but only if they don’t pull a switch and assign us to a 5:00 PM time like they did to others we spoke to on my last cruise.

Does anyone have any experience of how they are doing the traditional dining on the Royal lately? Is there really a 6 PM dining time as they claim or are they swithcing it to an earlier time and you find out when you board?

And has anyone noticed if they are allowing traditional diners to use the anytime dining room?

We are just recently off the Grand and were pretty disappointed with the availability of getting a table at anytime dining at a decent time for dinner. Sometimes, we don’t mind sharing but say no to that when we notice a lot of people coughing and sneezing or a lot of heavy perfume / cologne in those in line with us.

 

 

If we didn’t go to dinner at 5:15 PM, we were told that they couldn’t get us a table for two. That would have been ok if we were able to make a reservation for 6:00 - 6:30 PM, but they won’t take a reservation for this time. To make matters worse they switched the early dining from 6 PM to 5 PM so many passengers assigned to traditional dining were miffed and using the anytime dining room, with success, I might add, making the lines even longer and availability of tables even less.

 

 

This is the first time we’ve experienced such a hard time in getting a table for dinner at this time and have seriously considered swithcing back to traditional dining after many years of enjoying it. Granted, we used to like to eat later but due to a medical condition, my DH has to eat earlier, just not at 5 PM. 6:30 PM would be ideal as then he can still eat at an hour that works for him and I am not hungry again by 9 PM. But, if we wait at a table at that time, we talked to people that waited 90 minutes for a table, many of which gave up and ate at the buffet. If we could make a reservation, problems might be solved, but we can no longer make those arrangements.

On a future cruise on Princess, we are thinking of swithcing to traditional dining and on the personalizer, I see I can choose the 5:30 or 6:00 PM option. I would go for the 6 PM option but only if they don’t pull a switch and assign us to a 5:00 PM time like they did to others we spoke to on my last cruise.

 

 

Does anyone have any experience of how they are doing the traditional dining on the Royal lately? Is there really a 6 PM dining time as they claim or are they swithcing it to an earlier time and you find out when you board?

And has anyone noticed if they are allowing traditional diners to use the anytime dining room?

I switched back to traditional dinning on my last cruise for all the reasons you stated above.

the negative was 5pm dinner (even though personializer said 6pm)

that said I've booked traditional for my next 2 cruises

I loved having the same waiter and assistant each night

our table mates were wonderful and I feel like we really got to know them

I think the food and service was better

Shows how subjective food tastes are. The food is exactly the same prepared by exactly the same crew in exactly the same kitchen as in the Anytime Dining Room.

In the past few years, I have always picked 6PM traditional when booking through Princess. I have NEVER gotten 6PM. 6PM no longer exists. On my last few cruises, 6PM has meant mostly 5:45pm with an occasional 5:30pm. Luckily I have never run into a 5PM dining time!!! That just is way tooooo early!

On my recent Royal cruise, my 6PM traditional time translated into 5:45 pm. Saying all this, now I book where and when I can a WS or CC mini so that I can get the best of both traditional dining and anytime dining. So worth it if price is not a major consideration when booking. Even though it is anytime dining in CC, you can sit the same location and have the same wait staff.

Didn't notice about traditional going to anytime, but I did have one ship tour where getting to dinner at set time was impossible and night before I just spoke to dining mgmt. and got ok to do anytime dining that one night. And since it was later, didn't have to wait.

Pooh

"Everyone" wants to eat at 6:15. The MDRs aren't big enough to handle that, no matter how they slice/dice it. As I see it, you have six options:

1) TD early seating.

2) TD late seating.

3) ATD prior to when ATD capacity fills up.

4) ATD at/after the point when ATD capacity begins recovering.

5) ATD during the time when capacity is full (this results in a waiting period until capacity recovers).

6) Other venues as desired.

They've had enough request for early TD that they commit about 2/3 of their capacity to this. However, if you ask me, Club Class Dining was an excellent way to slice up the third MDR in a way that decreases their TD capacity and augments their ATD capacity, even if it is at a lesser saturation rate than regular MDR ATD. Nonetheless, this is why reservations aren't available, and I understand it and respect them for doing it as it improves the ways in which they can turn the tables more effectively.

They don't do reservations in ATD after doors open until the point when capacity begins recovering, because those reservations require holding a table open.

Think of the 6 PM as just a placeholder for early traditional until the cruise staff knows the demand for early traditional and can set up the number of dining rooms and times for that seating.

I like the fact that Princess will accommodate all early traditional request by converting all or part of a second dining room to an early seatings. Of course, this usually results in that seating being earlier than the other traditional dining room so that that same dining room can also be used for open seating later in the evening.

We always do TD because we like the same table, same staff, and same time every day. It makes planning the rest of the day simple. We never have to wait in a line for 30-90 minutes just to be seated. Of course, I see your issue as the time you need to eat. We do the 8:15 TD that has been changed to as early as 7:45...that works really well for us...just enough time to get back on the ship, freshen up, and have a martini (or two) before dinner. :)

Princess needs to change their web site regarding TD times to make them accurate. There are basically three times on every ship, very early, early and late. Very early can be 5:00, 5:15 or 5:30. Early can be 5:30, 5:45. Late is usually 7:30 or 7:45. Dining times and table sizes are requests, not guarantees. Peak dining times vary by itinerary, for example South America and Europe cruises have a more even demand for tables, with many passengers preferring late dining times. Caribbean cruises tend to shift demands earlier. Alaska normally has lots of families which makes getting a table more difficult.

On most ships the maitre'd will allow reservations for ATD, but those reservation times are usually fixed, for example 5:15, 5:30, 7:30, 7:45.

If you sign up for TD and don't get what you want see the maitre'd on boarding day afternoon. His times will be in the Patter. Arrive early.

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.............. To make matters worse they switched the early dining from 6 PM to 5 PM so many passengers assigned to traditional dining were miffed and using the anytime dining room, with success, I might add, making the lines even longer and availability of tables even less.

 

 

 

 

 

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Too bad the Head Waiters didn’t have the cajones not to allow this. Assigned pax should have been sent to the buffet.

Too bad the Head Waiters didn’t have the cajones not to allow this. Assigned pax should have been sent to the buffet.

Yes, but......

You said assigned Pax. They were assigned to 6:00 and signed up to eat in the MDR.

If your assigned dining time changed by an hour, what would you do? Especially if you had excursions, etc.

Also, does AT have a sign up limit? I mean if everyone signed up for AT from the get go, would they eventually place them in Late TD?

We stopped doing ATD because of the wait times. TD works OK. We usually get the second early seating, which is usually 5:45, has been 5:30, and I don't think it's ever been 6.

We did a Club Class mini and loved that ATD!! It was great!! Yes, we usually ate around 6:30 or 7. It worked perfectly for us. When we can afford it, that's the route we will take!! However, for the time being, 2nd early traditional it us for our current bookings.

what a cluster ! myself and the countess (aka d w) are gonna give the late traditional a try this next go round. I have a feeling especially after reading these posts that 8 o'clock will be turned into 7 o'clock. If we're on a outing and it's running late on returning, I don't want to run into this mess.

Has anyone ever done the 8:15 and shown up early, let's say at 7:30, and been accommodated and seated? In other words, how fixed is fixed? In seems to me that if the early diners are now 5 or 5:30 the dining room should be mostly cleared by 7:30. Am I incorrect in this assumption?

Thanks for the responses. If I was a assured a 6 PM dining time, i would go traditional but if they change it to 5;00 or even 5;15, it doesn’t give me time for the lounge before dinner ... so that wont do ... may as well go with anytime dining if that is the case.

We heard that he late dinner was switched from 8:00 to 7:30 on our last cruise. We met some people that still chose to go at 8:00 ... said their table mates didn’t mind waiting. Well, we couldn’t do that ... my DH couldn’t even eat that late. We were almost set to go in early, he could eat and I would have a happy hour cocktail while taking up the table and order at 6 PM. Not really serious about that becuase it might reflect poorly on the waiters but it seems like the only way we could make our point.

It sounds like Princess is in the habit of just changing the dinner times to meet their needs and not those of their passengers. I understand that they don’t have the capacity to make everyone happy so not sure what choices we have. I would book Club Class regularly, if I could afford to do so. I do have that booked for next cruise on the Grand and so it was the Royal in particular I was curious about....but sounds like tinkering with their dining times is fleet wide.

Thrak

(y)(y)(y)

Has anyone ever done the 8:15 and shown up early, let's say at 7:30, and been accommodated and seated? In other words, how fixed is fixed? In seems to me that if the early diners are now 5 or 5:30 the dining room should be mostly cleared by 7:30. Am I incorrect in this assumption?

You are incorrect.

The 8:15 dining will be in a dining room that has an early traditional dining seating that allows time for that seating and time for the waitstaff to reset the tables.

You will not be allowed into your dining room until 8:15 PM.

Also, does AT have a sign up limit? I mean if everyone signed up for AT from the get go, would they eventually place them in Late TD?

Princess puts limits on Traditional dining and assigns overflow to Anytime.

Carnival puts limits on Anytime and assigns overflow to Traditional.

If you think some Princess people who want Traditional get upset when they get Anytime instead, you should see the very upset people on Carnival who get assigned to a fixed traditional time because the Carnival version of Anytime is full.

I do traditional early dining, ask for 6 p.m. and my last 2 cruises, 6 p.m. was 5:30. A half hour difference isn't a big deal to me, but some people were trying to switch to another seating on my last cruise.

We always do TD because we like the same table, same staff, and same time every day. It makes planning the rest of the day simple. We never have to wait in a line for 30-90 minutes just to be seated. Of course, I see your issue as the time you need to eat. We do the 8:15 TD that has been changed to as early as 7:45...that works really well for us...just enough time to get back on the ship, freshen up, and have a martini (or two) before dinner. :)

I agree with you concerning the benefits of Late TD. The Personalizer posted 8PM has only varied +/- 15 minutes as you've stated, for me, which is easy to take in stride.

One tip is to arrive 5 or 10 minutes late on the very first night: my experience is that the doors never open on time and there is a mob waiting for the doors to open. Passengers are shown to their assigned table the first night, slowing the seating process as everyone learns where to find their table.

Other nights, the doors open on time and guests find their own way to their table.

Dinner seems more relaxed at the late seating, as there's no rush to turn the table for another seating.

Yes, OP, I know medical reasons rule out the late seating for you, but perhaps there are others with flexibility that are looking for an alternative to the long ATD waits. My observations have been that late TD is never a full room.

I just want to say this was a very helpful thread to follow. My wife and I will be on the Royal for our first cruise at the end of November, and had no idea that ATD could potentially lead to eating so late! After reading all the posts on here, and then double checking our excursion times, we switched to the early traditional slot. I think it'll be fun getting to know our table mates, and it will be nice having the same wait staff.

Thank you all, and thanks to the OP for starting it 😀

My wife and I were on the Grand last month as well. We chose ATD. We have had TD in most of our 50 plus previous cruises. We usually entered the dining room between 6:30 to 7:30. We rarely had to wait. Most nights we agreed to share a table. We met some very interesting and fun fellow cruisers.

We observed that the people in line with you are the people you will probably be dining with if you share a table. On a couple of occasions, we noticed heavy perfume or we recognized a cruiser who was at a neighboring table the night before and was unable to stop talking or let others speak. We simply got out of line and returned in a couple of minutes.

We chose ATD for our next cruise.

Cheers.

My wife and I were on the Grand last month as well. We chose ATD. We have had TD in most of our 50 plus previous cruises. We usually entered the dining room between 6:30 to 7:30. We rarely had to wait. Most nights we agreed to share a table. We met some very interesting and fun fellow cruisers.

 

 

 

We observed that the people in line with you are the people you will probably be dining with if you share a table. On a couple of occasions, we noticed heavy perfume or we recognized a cruiser who was at a neighboring table the night before and was unable to stop talking or let others speak. We simply got out of line and returned in a couple of minutes.

 

 

 

We chose ATD for our next cruise.

 

 

Cheers.

I love that methodology! I will have to try it next time around.

After reading these comments to my DH, he said he wants to stick with the anytime dining for this next cruise. I may regret that decision but if our wait is just too long, we'll just eat in the buffet. It's our first time on the Royal and heard their buffet was far superior to those on the Grand Class ships. Plus, the weather will be a bit warmer being in Mexico vs Alaska, so we may even eat out by MUTS some evenings. I am assuming they have MUTS on the Royal. It will be nice to actually just try a newer ship. The following one, we booked a suite so will be in Club Class so that shouldn't be an issue.

If no improvement in their anytime dining, we may switch to another line. The Grand is set to leave San Francisco in May 2020 and as of right now, they don't have any plans in place to put another ship here when she leaves, although, they may rethink that.

Plus, the weather will be a bit warmer being in Mexico vs Alaska, so we may even eat out by MUTS some evenings. I am assuming they have MUTS on the Royal.

Yes, the Royal class does have MUTS

I have never cruised on Princess before, mostly NCL where we had anytime dining, although my last cruise was on RCI and we had Traditional. I picked ATD for my Princess Cruise because I really didn't enjoy the Traditional dining. Although the people we sat with were very nice, I prefer sitting with new people most nights as I like the variety. As well, I found the wait staff in Traditional were really fawning all over us and, honestly, I don't want to develop a personal relationship with the staff. Friendly and courteous is one thing but this was over the top. So, my question is, were are on the Emerald and will probably want to go to dinner between 6:00 and 7:00 pm. Will this be a problem? Can we expect long line ups and wait times?

...and folks ask why I do Club Class dining? :halo: