Emerald Princess Review (Kids, Spreading of Ashes, Debarkation Debacle, 2/11-2/15)

We just returned from a short four-night cruise to Grand Turk on board the Emerald Princess. This was our second Princess cruise, our first being a five-night to Grand Turk and Princess Cay on board the Crown Princess in December 2010.

Embarkation

We had arrived a day before and stayed at the Crowne Plaza Fort Lauderdale just outside Port Everglades. We had a nice breakfast at the buffet in the hotel and then called an Uber to take us to the Port. There were six of us (including two kids). The hotel offers a shuttle to the Port, but it was $8 per person or $48 total. We took two Uber XLs for a total of $26. The Ubers were readily available and arrived at the hotel less than 5 minutes after we requested them.

Upon arrival at the Port, we quickly made our way through security and completed the health information questionnaires. We waited in a reasonably long line for about 15-20 minutes before being sent to a shorter line in front of each check-in station. Although this line was shorter, we clearly got sent to the wrong one and what appeared to be a technical snafu held us up. The line moved very slowly. It’s hard to say how much of that was due to passengers versus staff, but our line was noticeably slower than the others. Eventually, we managed to get both cabins checked in and were able to walk directly onto the ship being delayed for an embarkation photo.

Once on board, we proceeded to the passenger services desk. My wife and I were booked in separate cabins because we each received a free cabin from Green Valley Ranch Casino in Las Vegas. We wanted to switch on-board (we had already tagged the baggage so her bags went to my balcony cabin and our friend’s bags went to his family’s cabin) so that their keys would operate the correct door. The line wasn’t terribly long, and we were able to make the request. They gave them two cards to use as keys for the night, and then told them to bring back the key card and cruise card the next morning and they would replace them both with a new cruise card. The next morning, the staff seemed a bit confused about what we were asking for, but they figured it out and the room switch was completed without any trouble.

The Ship

The Emerald Princess seems to be in great shape with the cabins and public areas all clean and showing only minor signs of wear. I assume the carpets and bedding were refreshed as part of the dry dock late in 2015. The atriums on board this class of ships remains one of those that we think most beautiful. The Piazza really is a lovely area and the soaring three-deck height is stunning, especially for our friends who were on only their second cruise. Nonetheless, having cruised on a Disney ship last year, the Emerald had lost some of the sheen that we experienced on the Crown. Not through any fault of the Emerald, but mostly because the atrium on the Disney Fantasy just seemed grander and more expansive. Regardless, the Emerald is a wonderful ship.

Stepping on board was like returning to the Crown. I was somewhat surprised (if only because I hadn’t studied the deck plans in advance) that the Crown and Emerald are basically identical. All of the lounges, dining rooms, and other spaces have the identical name. It really seems to take the concept of “sister” ships to that of fraternal—if not identical—twins.

The Food

Food is, of course, always subjective and personal. Our first Princess cruise was marked with fond memories of wonderful meals in the dining room. Being only a four-night cruise, we had dinner in the dining room on two nights and at the buffet for two nights. Part of the reason was some confusion over whether our cruise would have a formal night. The cruise was four nights (Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday). We had not expected it to have a formal night based on Princess’s documentation (http://www.princess.com/learn/faq_answer/onboard/dining_nightlife.jsp). Apparently though, it was a five-day cruise, so there was one formal night. As a result, we didn’t have the correct clothing with us.

The food in the dining room was good-to-very good. I enjoyed Curtis Stone’s pork tenderloin, but was confused as to why the “coconut sweet potato puree” was white. It was really good regardless. Sadly, I have been suffering from some gout attacks lately, which makes shellfish and beef off limits. This left a surprisingly limited number of menu options. I was disappointed about not being able to enjoy surf and turf. As it turns out, it didn’t hurt me that much as lobster was not on the dining room menu any of the four nights. The goat cheese soufflé was another standout dish that was a hit. My wife thought the fettuccini alfredo was delicious as well. The desserts were mostly middling. The cheesecake was only fair. The Norman Love chocolate soufflé was disappointing, and the “white chocolate” sauce that it was served with came across more as a crème anglaise than it did white chocolate. None of the four of us ate more than a bite of the one we shared.

We enjoyed tea in the dining room on two occasions. Once without the kids and once with them. The egg sandwiches were good. The cucumber sandwiches seemed wrong to us. They were served on mini-rolls that were much to big for the delicate sandwich, came with a tomato, and they were completely missing any sauce. A dill cream cheese or dill mayonnaise would have gone a long way to making the sandwich better. The pastries were fairly good. The carrot cake was a bit dense for my liking, but the cream cheese frosting was excellent. The chocolate cream puff was good. The vanilla cake was a bit bland but fine. The scones were surprisingly moist, but the currants lent them a slight bitter flavor. Combined with the provided whipped cream and jam though, they really were fantastic.

The pizza was a real standout. It comes in so many different styles, everyone may like something different, but we thought it was excellent. The crust was thin and crispy with good tooth and a slight char. The “margherita” did not really live up to the name as it missed the fresh basil one would expect. The pepperoni and four cheese were both excellent.

The buffet food was generally middling-to-okay. The breakfast food was generally good, but not great. The French toast was well-liked. The scrambled eggs were not. The fried eggs and omelets were good. Lunch and dinner was similarly a mixed bag. Dinner had a German theme on the formal night, and I enjoyed a pork loin en croute. They also had several German sausages available, which I did not try but people seemed to enjoy. I enjoyed the spetzle and other dishes as well, but none of them were truly great.

The buffet station set-up on the Emerald, like the identical set-up on the Crown, is a mess. There’s no natural flow, with people heading in all different directions within a small confined space. As a result, there are long lines, poor flow, and people doubling back. In addition, the distinction between Café Caribe and Horizon Court seems unclear at most times of the day. The food was usually the same with the exception being one night that they had a special crab boil available in Café Caribe.

My wife and our friends enjoyed several delicious coffee drinks at the International Café. We had two King of Cups coffee cards from our last Princess cruise in 2010, and they honored them. The crew seemed surprised to see them, but got permission from their supervisors to accept them. After the first time, it was never an issue again.

The Service

Our cabin steward, Rommel was top notch. He kept the room made up and put our son’s bed away every day. He kept the room clean and was friendly. That’s generally all we ask for.

Everyone on the ship was generally really friendly. Bar service often seemed overwhelmed. It could take 5-10 minutes to get recognized by a bartender. This led to several passengers becoming loud and obnoxious. There’s no excuse for that behavior, but the frustration was real as the bartenders did a poor job of recognizing who had been there the longest or even asking—often just taking orders from someone who just walked up while people were waiting. The dining room service was friendly and prompt without being overly so. On occasion, there seemed to be just a touch too long between courses, but not too bad. Drink service in the dining room was great with sodas being refilled promptly.

The Cabin

When we had last cruised on Princess, we did not yet have a child. Cruising with a child (the little tyke just went on his fourth cruise in four years) certainly is a different experience. The cabin setup on Princess is not conducive to travelling with a small child. We had a balcony cabin and our friends had an inside stateroom. Unlike Disney and Carnival, the balcony cabin did not come with a sofa or convertible bed. Our balcony cabin had an upper berth that folded down out of the ceiling. Our son was very excited to sleep up there, and he did fine. He never rolled out of the bed. The cabin setup though makes this far less than ideal. When booking our cabins, we were not able to request that the cabin be made up with a queen bed. Our cabin steward happily set-up the bed for us when asked, but you can see why the cabin does not accommodate it by default. The stairs to the upper berth are designed to come down into the space between the twin beds. We just lifted him up into the upper berth. In our friends’ inside cabin, the upper berths folded down from the side wall. Their cabin steward refused to combine two two beds into a queen because it would not leave any space for moving around in the cabin. I think it could have worked, but it definitely would have been tight as the beds when folded up take about 8” of space off of each of the two walls leaving little floor space unless the two lower beds are against the walls leaving the middle of the cabin clear. In either event, this makes any cabin below a minisuite less than ideal for a married couple (or other couple) travelling with a young child. I don’t know if this has been rectified on newer ships, but it is definitely a downgrade relative to our experience on other lines.

The bathroom was very small, but functional. The shower, though, was pretty tiny. I’m a big guy, and that made it challenging. More problematic was how short the showerhead was. The showerhead came out of the wall around my chin. This made washing my hair really challenging. I did appreciate that the bathroom included shower gel and shampoo/conditioner, although my wife wasn’t impressed with the quality of the shampoo.

The Casino

The dealers were friendly. The formal night offered a smoke-free casino experience, but the stench of smoke was fairly overwhelming regardless. We each earned $325 in casino cash on another cruise, but no discount on a cabin. My wife played mostly slots. I played blackjack. My willingness to play was definitely diminished by the use of continuous shuffle machines at all blackjack tables. At $25-100 per hand, I expect to have an actual shoe. The dealers seemed to be on fire the entire cruise, and I found 16 after 15 after 16. The casino host came and introduced himself to me at the table on the first night. We had a good time, and the crowd in the casino was fun. The drink service was a bit slow—the pit boss offered me a drink early on the first night and never again. My wife earned some 13 free drinks on her slot play, but left the ship with 9 remaining.

Princess Pelicans

My son and his friend are 4 and 5, respectively. They both participated in the Princess Pelicans program. They had a great time and really enjoyed the activities. They paged us twice in one night, once because my son wasn’t following directions. Based on what he said and our friend’s daughter said, it sounds like he was part of a group that did not want to play whatever game the counselor wanted them to. The other time was because he was sleepy. In any event, they had a great time. The club was open for 3 hours at a time, generally 3 times per day. They were open from 7-10PM on sailaway day, 9-12, 2-5, and 7-10 on the first sea day, 7-10 on the day we were at Grand Turk, and 9-12, 2-5, and 7-10 on the last sea day.

There seemed to be a mix of organized activities and free play. My son made a sock puppet, Princess Pelicans shirt, and Pelicans bag over the course of the cruise. They also had a Pirate dinner party for kids only. That was the only meal offered by the club during the cruise. We usually fed the kids before dropping them off in the evening and after picking them up in the mornings. All-in-all, he really loved his time there. When we would see the counselors around the ship, he would always say hello, and they would wave and say hi. They quickly learned his name, and made him feel special.

Spreading of Ashes

My mother-in-law passed away unexpectedly about 18 months ago. We had her cremated as she wished, but she never really expressed what we should do with her remains, other than saying that it was weird that people kept the ashes and she didn’t think we should do that. We had enjoyed having her on two cruises with us in the past, and she had loved being at sea. We had discussed the idea of spreading her ashes at sea, and decided to do it about a week before sailing. I appreciated all the information from Pam from several years ago, but wasn’t sure if the process had changed. I called Princess and asked how I make the request. They told me to send my name, ship name, sailing date, and booking number to ashesrequest@princesscruises.com. I heard back a few days later, and they confirmed that they would let the ship know. Upon reaching our stateroom, we had a letter from Eugene, the customer service manager, informing us that the ceremony would be at 12:30 on Friday, the first sea day. He called later that day to confirm that the time worked for us and to confirm my mother-in-law’s name and information. He asked us to meet him at 12:15 at the passenger services desk.

My wife and I arrived at the passenger services desk and Eugene took us to his office. I had to spell my mother-in-law’s name, because the name he had was incorrect even after I had spelled it for him the prior day. The service was not set-up, and we listened as he called and organized security for the event. We walked to the back of Deck 7, where we were met by the Environmental Officer to look at the biodegradable urn. Once he gave his approval, we were permitted to toss the urn into the sea. All told, it appeared there were about three security officers, the Environmental Officer, and Eugene present. They gave us the privacy desired, although someone was able to make it to the back of the ship just as we released the urn into the sea. They were quickly escorted away by security, but I was a bit surprised that the rear of the ship had not been properly secured as Eugene requested.

As an update to Pam’s wonderful post from over five years ago: the certificate we were given was more of a letter, printed on laser paper, in black and white. It was not suitable for framing. No flowers were provided for the ceremony. Although Eugene had tissues in the office, he did not bring any to the back of the ship with us or offer us any. While in his office, he seemed distracted and mentioned that he had a wedding to prepare for at 2:00 pm that day. Although we were pleased for the wedding couple, it did seem odd to mention in the context of our solemn ceremony. Despite the hiccups on board, we were satisfied with the ceremony.

Debarkation

In short, debarkation was a disaster. Port Everglades seemed to have five ships in port this morning. We docked at Terminal 4 and for some reason only one of the gangways was operational. As a result, debarkation was slowed dramatically. We were in one of the late disembarkation groups because our flight out of FLL wasn’t until 1:00 pm. Unfortunately, when we went down to the Michelangelo dining room at 10 am as instructed, we couldn’t even get into the room. No one was being allowed off the ship due to overcrowding in the terminal, and the dining room was full. We left and went back to the Lido deck after a crew member told us to try again in 45 minutes. When we went back down 50 minutes later, we were able to walk off the ship.

We quickly claimed our bags and stood in a long winding line for CBP. My wife, son, and I all have Global Entry. There was a GE line, and it had basically no wait whatsoever. We did not see any kiosks, it looked like it was just a dedicated line that was also being used for disabled passengers.

Our friends that we were travelling with did not have GE, so we waited in the line with them. It took about 30-40 minutes to make our way through the line. We made it to the airport about 30 minutes before our flight was to start boarding. We caught a break and checked-in curbside with no waiting. Our second break was when the security line was non-existent.

That about sums up our short cruise on board the Emerald Princess. I’m happy to answer any questions anyone has.

Very sad about your MIL.

Thanks for the review and the update to the procedure for spreading of ashes at sea. So sorry to hear about your MIL. :( Glad you had a good cruise.

Thanks for sharing your review.

Sorry to hear about your MIL, but thanks for sharing that experience. I didn't know you could do that.

Thanks for the report.

Debarkation

In short, debarkation was a disaster. Port Everglades seemed to have five ships in port this morning. We docked at Terminal 4 and for some reason only one of the gangways was operational. As a result, debarkation was slowed dramatically. We were in one of the late disembarkation groups because our flight out of FLL wasn’t until 1:00 pm. Unfortunately, when we went down to the Michelangelo dining room at 10 am as instructed, we couldn’t even get into the room. No one was being allowed off the ship due to overcrowding in the terminal, and the dining room was full.

I read on another thread that there were ICE delays throughout

the port.

That was probably more of a cause than just 1 gangway, especially

when you said disembarcation stopped because the terminal was full.

On the other hand, 5 ships in Ft. Lauderdale is a very small number.

Thanks for the review.

Thanks for the review and condolences for your loss. Someone on another thread reported a later than normal debarkation on the Coral Princess yesterday.

I read on another thread that there were ICE delays throughout

the port.

 

That was probably more of a cause than just 1 gangway, especially

when you said disembarcation stopped because the terminal was full.

 

On the other hand, 5 ships in Ft. Lauderdale is a very small number.

That's possible. I don't know anything other than what they announced a number of times. They started early in the morning announcing about the gangway problem. It wasn't until after 9:00 or 9:30 that they stated that the terminal was crowded and so they weren't allowing others off the ship. The terminal was not what I would call particularly crowded.

When we left Port Everglades on Thursday, believe it or not, the Emerald was the only ship in port.

Very sad about your MIL.

Thanks for sharing your review.

 

Sorry to hear about your MIL, but thanks for sharing that experience. I didn't know you could do that.

Thank you all for the condolences. It was a real shock. Time has reduced the pain, but she isn't forgotten. We think she would have liked being left in the Atlantic.

Thanks for the review and the update to the procedure for spreading of ashes at sea. So sorry to hear about your MIL. :( Glad you had a good cruise.

Thanks, Pam. Your post from several years ago was really instrumental in our decision to proceed. It gave us the starting point on how to move forward.

A few items I forgot to mention--

Balloons

Everyone loves balloons, right? No. Princess certainly does though. They love balloons more than any cruise line I've been on. They use them everywhere. Anyone celebrating a birthday or anniversary gets two balloons taped outside their stateroom door. Valentine's day? Pink and red balloons in the Explorer's Lounge, Club Fusion, Shops, International Cafe, and Vines. Captain's Party? Balloon drop. Princess passengers seem to love balloons too. After the balloon drop, they appeared throughout the ship--clung to tightly by middle-aged men and women as if they'd found gold. For my wife, a long-time globophobe, this was a bit of a nightmare. She has an intense fear of balloons. She knows it is irrational, but it doesn't change the fact that the sight of them make her panic, her heart race, and her breathing quicken. She was wearing a fit bit, and just walking down the halls to reach the elevators would cause her heart rate to jump 30-40 beats per minute. Globophobia isn't common, and we deal with it all the time in malls, stores, and other things. It will likely diminish the chance of our taking another Princess cruise though. It greatly reduces the enjoyment she gets out of the cruise. I just want to mention this should any other globophobes be considering a cruise.

Entertainment

We didn't get the chance to see much entertainment on the ship. By the time we were done with dinner, it was often nearly time to pick up the kids from Pelicans. We did very much enjoy Wayne Hoffman, the mentalist. His show was entertaining and impressive. We spent a fair amount of time discussing his show after the fact trying to figure out how he did the things he did. The last night of the cruise was the only night the comedian performed. Unfortunately, with Pelicans ending their pajama party at 10 pm, we were left with a choice of seeing either the comedian or MUTS (Bridge of Spies). We had wanted to see the movie when it was out and hadn't had the chance, so we went with that. The movie was at 7 or 10 (2 hr 22 min) and the comedian was at 7 or 8:30. It would have been nice if the comedian had a show that was after the movie ended, at say 9:30, so we could have caught 30 minutes before needing to pick the kids up. We could have paid for the babysitting service after 10 and gone to the late movie, but staying up until 12:30 to watch a movie when we have to be out of the cabin by 8 am seems harsh.

We did catch a show in the piazza by Oleg ? who performed a hand balancing show. He appeared to have six shows in the piazza over the course of the cruise, each lasting about 10 minutes. We took the kids to see him once, but they found it boring (we were more impressed by his ability than they were). Overall, there seemed to be few things to take the kids too during the days. There weren't many family friendly movies on the MUTS screen during the day. (There were some, but they would largely appeal to kids 8 and over, I would think.) Trivia, piano music, and steel drums are only so entertaining for a four-year old. If there are going to be several two hour breaks in the kids club programming (which my son really loved), it would be helpful if there were at least some activities during those times that would appeal to little kids.

I agree 100% with your assessment that any cabin below a mini suite is less than ideal for a family. My daughter, her husband and family (2 young girls) had one a number of years ago on the Diamond. The room was incredibly crowded. The younger child was afraid to sleep in a top bunk so dad had to climb up there. They switched to RCCL for subsequent cruises where the balcony cabins have sleeper couches. We have a family cruise to Alaska coming up in 2017 and as much as I think Princess has a great product I suggested Celebrity because of bed configuration. I think Regal and Royal have some better options now.