Just back today from the Emerald Princess E.Caribbean 5/30-6/6

[thekidsrcruisin]

Just ended a fabulous cruise aboard the Emerald Princess today! I've been inspired by Hollybelle to write about our trip and include some pictures for all those eagerly anticipating their turn aboard the Emerald, but first I've got to unpack! For now, I'll leave you with some of the good and bad points that we experienced:

 

The Good

 

-Food: Almost everything we tried was good. The buffets were pretty varied and there was always something available no matter what time of the day/night. The pizza was great and the gelato was our favorite!

 

-Ports: We originally booked this cruise because of the ports, and we were not disappointed. Really enjoyed Princess Cays as well as the other ports and were delightfully surprised by Grand Turk.

 

-Ship: The ship was beautiful, definitely the most beautiful I have been on (and this was my 7th cruise). Beautiful decor and very well maintained. The rooms were designed well enough to fit belongings for 4 people in 1 room for a whole week!

 

-Movies Under the Stars: We loved this! Great program to let the parents chill out and keep the kids occupied. You must get there early for a seat! They had a pretty good lineup of movies also.

 

 

The Bad

 

-Kids Program: More on this later, but this was much more "babysitting" than a "Kids Program". As two working parents who do not live near family to rely on for help with the kids, we took a cruising vacation specifically so that we could have time to ourselves as well as time with the kids. The kids program did not allow this, as the kids hated it and only spent time in there when we made them, and then we felt so guilty that we only left them in there for an hour or two at a time. Very disappointing.

 

-Service: While the service was not really bad, it was not exceptional either, definitely not on par with what I've experienced from other lines. Everyone was friendly, but for the first time ever, I came home from a cruise without being able to name one service person who really went out of their way. I can't say that I had a bad service experience, just not what I expected.

 

 

Come back for more, I hope to be posting at least one detailed review this week!

[Colo Cruiser]

Thanks for the comments. :)

[lovn2liv]

I'm really sorry that the kids did not have a good time. I'm anxious to hear what the problems were. How old are your children? We'll be on this ship in a couple of months and most important, we want our child to enjoy this too. We've been on the Crown and they had an excellent program, and she couldn't get enough of it.

 

I hope they were able to enjoy the cruise in other ways.

[Clutterlady]

Welcome home, anxious to hear more:)

[thekidsrcruisin]

I'm really sorry that the kids did not have a good time. I'm anxious to hear what the problems were. How old are your children? We'll be on this ship in a couple of months and most important, we want our child to enjoy this too. We've been on the Crown and they had an excellent program, and she couldn't get enough of it.

 

I hope they were able to enjoy the cruise in other ways.

 

lovn2liv - Yes, the kids did have a really enjoyable time on the cruise. They were able to make a few friends at the pool and enjoyed spending the days at sea there. My children are 7 and 9, both girls. Just to give you some background, both kids go to an afterschool program for 4 hours per day and love it. They are both in summer camp all summer long and love it. So they are very used to being in kids programs and enjoy it. We were on another cruise line about 3 years ago and they loved the program there. So it's not like they are not used to being in a program and just didn't like the experience - they just didn't like this particular program.

 

The girls are very close and it was important to them to be in the same program. The way Princess splits up the kids groups are ages 3-7 and 8-12. Before I booked the cruise, I asked the reservation agent whether they would be able to bend the rules and she said "probably" but I would have to check once on board. The counselors would not bend the rules at all and would not even consider putting the girls together (my youngest is only 2 months away from age 8). Ok, rules are rules, we were disappointed, but understood. So my youngest went into the Princess Pelicans and the older one went into Shockwaves.

 

Princess Pelicans

 

Of the 4 times that my daughter went into this program, they watched movies every single time. During the movie, they were not allowed to play or talk. Perhaps it was a coincidence that we just hit "movie time" every single time? They did have different events scheduled throughout the day according to the Patters, but it seemed that those events were very short-lived and then it was "movie time" again. I remarked to one of the counselors that the kids watch a lot of movies and she said that they had just finished coloring a few minutes before the movie started. To me, coloring and movies are babysitting activities, not kids program activities. I stayed for a few minutes myself just to see what was going on. On this particular night, a girl had gotten sea sick and the counselors had to move the younger kids into the Shockwaves room in order to clean up. I watched them form a line, they were told not to talk, went into the Shockwaves room and told to sit on a couch and not talk, and there they stayed for the 10-15 minutes before it took me to pull my daughter out. From what I observed, the counselors were really big on "no talking".

 

Shockwaves

 

This was probably a little better planned than the Princess program, but again was more babysitting than anything else. The room is designed very well and there are computers, air hockey, foosball, wii, cards, etc., lots of things for the kids to do on their own. So my daughter was kept busy on her own, but this is because she found things to do, not because they organized any activities. As an example, the last evening they had a pajama party which she was excited about going to. The "party" was that they all showed up in their pajamas and did their normal activities that they did all week. Another activity that they had was a Wii tournament. The tournament, which I watched, consisted of 2 people coming to the Wii set to play 3 frames of bowling and then being told to set the remotes down and find something to do, and the next set of 2 people were allowed to use the Wii. The counselor sat on the couch and watched Wii the whole time. Not my idea of a "tournament". There were activities that she enjoyed - one night they had a disco and went up to the lounge and had snacks and music, and one night they did something with science and built planets out of clay.

 

I don't want to get too down on the kids program as perhaps we just weren't there at the right times. During the course of the week, they both went in 4 times for a total of 1-2 hours per time. However, my kids are very used to kid programs and neither one liked their program at all. I stayed and observed both programs to see for myself and after that, I didn't make them go when they didn't want to. That being said, there are lots of other fun activities on the ship to occupy the days at sea. We played bingo, got board games out from the library, went to the art auction, they made friends at the pool and swam, and we went to Movies Under the Stars. So I guess the bottom line for future passengers is that I would recommend bringing your children, but only if you are prepared to make minimal use of the kids program.

[DaKingfish]

I was on the Emerald a few weeks back, and I agree with everything you said, except in regards to the service. Our cabin steward was exceptional, and in general I felt the service everywhere was very good. I guess it all depends on who you have assigned to you and who you run into on the ship.....of course I think you can say that for most all of them.

 

-DK

[vickie_bernie]

not having any kids it is great to have such a detail review of the kids program.... thanks

[Woobstr112G]

Just ended a fabulous cruise aboard the Emerald Princess today! I've been inspired by Hollybelle to write about our trip and include some pictures for all those eagerly anticipating their turn aboard the Emerald, but first I've got to unpack! For now, I'll leave you with some of the good and bad points that we experienced:

 

The Good

 

-Food: Almost everything we tried was good. The buffets were pretty varied and there was always something available no matter what time of the day/night. The pizza was great and the gelato was our favorite!

 

-Ports: We originally booked this cruise because of the ports, and we were not disappointed. Really enjoyed Princess Cays as well as the other ports and were delightfully surprised by Grand Turk.

 

-Ship: The ship was beautiful, definitely the most beautiful I have been on (and this was my 7th cruise). Beautiful decor and very well maintained. The rooms were designed well enough to fit belongings for 4 people in 1 room for a whole week!

 

-Movies Under the Stars: We loved this! Great program to let the parents chill out and keep the kids occupied. You must get there early for a seat! They had a pretty good lineup of movies also.

 

 

The Bad

 

-Kids Program: More on this later, but this was much more "babysitting" than a "Kids Program". As two working parents who do not live near family to rely on for help with the kids, we took a cruising vacation specifically so that we could have time to ourselves as well as time with the kids. The kids program did not allow this, as the kids hated it and only spent time in there when we made them, and then we felt so guilty that we only left them in there for an hour or two at a time. Very disappointing.

 

-Service: While the service was not really bad, it was not exceptional either, definitely not on par with what I've experienced from other lines. Everyone was friendly, but for the first time ever, I came home from a cruise without being able to name one service person who really went out of their way. I can't say that I had a bad service experience, just not what I expected.

 

 

Come back for more, I hope to be posting at least one detailed review this week!

 

lovn2liv - Yes, the kids did have a really enjoyable time on the cruise. They were able to make a few friends at the pool and enjoyed spending the days at sea there. My children are 7 and 9, both girls. Just to give you some background, both kids go to an afterschool program for 4 hours per day and love it. They are both in summer camp all summer long and love it. So they are very used to being in kids programs and enjoy it. We were on another cruise line about 3 years ago and they loved the program there. So it's not like they are not used to being in a program and just didn't like the experience - they just didn't like this particular program.

 

The girls are very close and it was important to them to be in the same program. The way Princess splits up the kids groups are ages 3-7 and 8-12. Before I booked the cruise, I asked the reservation agent whether they would be able to bend the rules and she said "probably" but I would have to check once on board. The counselors would not bend the rules at all and would not even consider putting the girls together (my youngest is only 2 months away from age 8). Ok, rules are rules, we were disappointed, but understood. So my youngest went into the Princess Pelicans and the older one went into Shockwaves.

 

Princess Pelicans

 

Of the 4 times that my daughter went into this program, they watched movies every single time. During the movie, they were not allowed to play or talk. Perhaps it was a coincidence that we just hit "movie time" every single time? They did have different events scheduled throughout the day according to the Patters, but it seemed that those events were very short-lived and then it was "movie time" again. I remarked to one of the counselors that the kids watch a lot of movies and she said that they had just finished coloring a few minutes before the movie started. To me, coloring and movies are babysitting activities, not kids program activities. I stayed for a few minutes myself just to see what was going on. On this particular night, a girl had gotten sea sick and the counselors had to move the younger kids into the Shockwaves room in order to clean up. I watched them form a line, they were told not to talk, went into the Shockwaves room and told to sit on a couch and not talk, and there they stayed for the 10-15 minutes before it took me to pull my daughter out. From what I observed, the counselors were really big on "no talking".

 

Shockwaves

 

This was probably a little better planned than the Princess program, but again was more babysitting than anything else. The room is designed very well and there are computers, air hockey, foosball, wii, cards, etc., lots of things for the kids to do on their own. So my daughter was kept busy on her own, but this is because she found things to do, not because they organized any activities. As an example, the last evening they had a pajama party which she was excited about going to. The "party" was that they all showed up in their pajamas and did their normal activities that they did all week. Another activity that they had was a Wii tournament. The tournament, which I watched, consisted of 2 people coming to the Wii set to play 3 frames of bowling and then being told to set the remotes down and find something to do, and the next set of 2 people were allowed to use the Wii. The counselor sat on the couch and watched Wii the whole time. Not my idea of a "tournament". There were activities that she enjoyed - one night they had a disco and went up to the lounge and had snacks and music, and one night they did something with science and built planets out of clay.

 

I don't want to get too down on the kids program as perhaps we just weren't there at the right times. During the course of the week, they both went in 4 times for a total of 1-2 hours per time. However, my kids are very used to kid programs and neither one liked their program at all. I stayed and observed both programs to see for myself and after that, I didn't make them go when they didn't want to. That being said, there are lots of other fun activities on the ship to occupy the days at sea. We played bingo, got board games out from the library, went to the art auction, they made friends at the pool and swam, and we went to Movies Under the Stars. So I guess the bottom line for future passengers is that I would recommend bringing your children, but only if you are prepared to make minimal use of the kids program.

 

Thanks for taking the time to post your thoughts. Sounds like your family had a good cruise.....:):):)

 

Bob

[BalconyGal]

Looking forward to your more detailed review!

[thekidsrcruisin]

Ok, this is my first detailed review with photos, so here goes...

 

Some background info on our vacation and family so that you can put in the right perspective. I was traveling with my husband and 2 kids, ages 7 and 9. My husband and I are in our mid-30s. This was my 7th cruise and his 5th. I previously had sailed on Carnival twice, Royal Caribbean twice, Norwegian once and Disney once. This was the 2nd cruise for the kids, having sailed previously on Royal Caribbean. Overall, we had a great time. The weather was wonderful and it was a much needed break for all of us!

 

Day One

We left for Ft.Lauderdale the day after school let out for the summer. We had a smooth flight and landed around noon. We went to pick up our pre-rented car and found a horribly long line. After an hour of waiting just to get up to the counter, we found that they had committed to too many reservations and didn't have enough cars to fulfill. :mad: We got the car on Priceline and had already paid, otherwise I would have just left. But not wanting to waste the price of a rental car, we could do nothing but wait until someone returned a car. Two and a half hours after our arrival in Ft.Lauderdale, we were on our way to Boca Raton for the night before our cruise - not a great start.

 

We stayed at the Waldorf Astoria in Boca Raton and had a really relaxing evening swimming in the pool and visiting the beach. It was a very nice hotel but I was not prepared for the excessive charges for everything - including $4 for a can of soda!!:eek: Nevertheless it was a great way to unwind from the flight and car rental fiasco and really begin our vacation.

 

The next day we returned the car to the airport and took the free shuttle from the rental car center to the cruise port. We arrived just before noon and were surprised at the very long line already queued. Embarkation was handled very well and the line moved along quickly. Within an hour, we were onboard the Emerald! :D

 

Our room was ready and we were able to unpack before we even set sail, a new record for us! We had one quad room and I was dreading trying to keep everything organized for the week. But the room was so well designed that we actually had room left over! We headed up to the "boarding buffet" for a bite to eat. I must say that upon entering the buffet the phrase "controlled chaos" that I have seen other posters write about came to mind. That phrase does capture it all! It was not layed out as well as it could have been and it was a bit aggravating. The first buffet was the most crowded of all the buffets during the week. I've read online that the Princess servers bring your silverware and drinks at the buffet. The silverware was on the table but there were no drinks to be found. Eventually we got up and got our own from the serving station. It was probably the 3rd or 4th day of the cruise before we actually got served our own drinks. Not that I mind getting my own drink, but the serving stations are not very convenient to allow for that and it became very annoying.

 

We toured the ship for a bit and as I mentioned previously, it was a beautiful ship. Very well maintained and everything was very clean. Soon we headed to the bow to await our departure from Ft. Lauderdale. The captain announced that another ship had just been cleared and we would follow as soon as the ship was on course. We watched the Carnival Freedom sail out of port and could hear the music and bon voyage party going on...

 

 

Once the ship was out to sea, it was finally our turn :D! We slowly left the dock and towered over the small boats in the waterway. We heard people on the boats yelling goodbye (through a bullhorn) and saw people on the beach and on hotel balconies waving and yelling "Have fun!" There was a plane flying overhead that actually stopped in midair and the people yelled "Have a good cruise!". I've never experienced a sendoff like that! It just added to our excitement as our cruise got underway...

 

Leaving Ft.Lauderdale

[lovn2liv]

Thanks so much for the information. My daughter is like your girls in the sense of being exposed to some excellent after-school and camp programs. We'll be so disappointed if she doesn't have the same "great" experience that she had on the Crown a few years ago. It was a blast. You know it is a blast when your child is looking at the clocks to see when she can get back to the kid's program. i hope she meets up with a couple of girls and just hang out if the kids program is not up to par. It sounds like they are really lacking in getting the kids involved. The last thing we want is a "classroom" environment on vacation. I'm not warming up to that at all. I really appreciate your assessment and the heads up. Thanks again.

[thekidsrcruisin]

Clutterlady - thanks, I'm anxious to re-live! :)

 

DaKingfish - I agree, on most vacations it is hit or miss, just depends on who you get. We've gone on Carnival and had amazing service and a waiter that we still (12 years later) remember and laugh about. The next time we went on Carnival the service was terrible.

 

vickie_bernie - Not sure if you realize this, but you are welcome to skip over the parts of the review that you are not interested in. ;)

 

lovn2live - Your daughter will have a great time, I am sure. There were lots of kids at the MUTS pool and my kids made friends very easily there (and even came home with email addresses). You may have a much better experience with the kids program, who knows, there may even be different counselors by the time you sail. But even if she doesn't want to go to the kids program, there are so many other activities going on that she will have a good time.

 

OneStarTattoo, Woobstr112G, Colo Cruiser - Thanks for the nice comments, we did have an awesome time, stay tuned for more! :)

[thekidsrcruisin]

Day 2 - Princess Cays

 

We docked early in the morning and took the tender over to Princess Cays around 10am. Princess had everyone organized in a designated waiting area and then board a tender when their number was called. To me, this was way better process than having everyone wait in line. By the time we arrived on the island, it was pretty packed. I don't want the kids in the sun too much, so we were looking for some shade and it was very difficult to find. We walked to the far end of the beach, by the private cabanas, and found a little spot of shade underneath a palm tree. It ended up being a great spot as we had a nice view of the ship just in front of us:

 

 

 

We rented two floats and spent the majority of the day being lazy in the water. There were quite a few people snorkeling. The water was fairly deep not too far from shore, so it was really ideal for snorkeling or swimming. A view of the shore from the water:

 

 

 

We had the buffet for lunch and it was pretty good, typical beach fare like hot dogs and burgers and salads, etc. We took a little walk around the island and climbed to the top of the crow's nest for a view:

 

 

 

After our last dip in the water, we walked around the shops on the island and got the girls' hair braided. The woman braiding hair was very nice and this was a great experience for the kids. She finished up just in time for the last tender ashore. We spent the night exploring the ship and swimming in the pool and of course eating! Dinner, late night snack, late late night snack, etc...:o

[Clutterlady]

Great pictures, would love to see more:)

[Nanatravel]

Since we are sailing on Sunday, I am finding your "family" review very interesting. I look forward to more as the week progresses.

[Esprit]

Great pictures. We'll be there in two week time (twice as it's a B2B).

 

If you have the time I'd be interested to know if there is any ballroom/latin dancing taking place in the evenings. The Wheelhouse bar was great for the latin stuff when we were last on Emerald two years ago.

 

How "dressy" is the formal night tonight too please?

 

Cheers

Peter

[BballinQT24]

Thanks for taking the time to write the review and post the pictures. It's great so far!

[Hunwolf]

We also just got back from the same cruise as the OP on this thread.

 

Honestly, our experience/comments were pretty much in line with this persons. We had a very nice time overall, and this was our first cruise on Princess. In the past we had cruised on Carnival (once) and Royal Caribbean (three times).

 

Our daughter (age 8) enjoyed the Shockwaves program for the most part, but thought it was not quite as educational or group oriented as the program on RC from the year before. Also, the after 10 PM program (which she begged to go to last year) she hated this year. She also had a friend that was just shy of 8 years old that was stuck with the Pelicans until the last night. This young girl was very upset about the whole situation since she was a bit older than most of the kids.

 

The funniest part was that there was this 12 year old girl that looked about 16 (according to my wife) that had to beg and plead to get moved up to the next age group. She would have been way out of place with the Shockwaves.

 

Otherwise, the food and entertainment was pretty good and varied for a 7 day cruise. We enjoyed the Movies/shows under the stars as well as the nightly entertainment in the mail showroom/theater as well as the offerings mainly in Club Fusion. The entertainment staff was very good I thought.

 

The only other thing that bothered us (and really caused some problems throughout the cruise) is that they moved our cabin from the Dolphin deck down to the Plaza right by the International Cafe (literally). That made our cabin extremely noisy, especially on the last night with the farewell party on the piazza. It would not have been a problem except for our 8 year old who just was worn down by then. They never gave us a reason for the last minute change of cabin and in fact the names on the door didn't get changed until the 2nd day.

 

All in all... we had a very nice time but if the itinerary is favorable on RC we would probably lean a bit toward them next time. But with them (Princess) moving all of their ships out of Florida next summer it's a moot point for us anyway.

 

I hope this doesn't come off as too negative (especially as a first post) because we really did have a fun time on Princess.

[caribill]

The only other thing that bothered us (and really caused some problems throughout the cruise) is that they moved our cabin from the Dolphin deck down to the Plaza right by the International Cafe (literally). That made our cabin extremely noisy, especially on the last night with the farewell party on the piazza.

 

I hope this doesn't come off as too negative (especially as a first post) because we really did have a fun time on Princess.

 

Comes across as an honest account of your voyage.

 

Was the cabin change considered to be an upgrade by Princess?

[Hunwolf]

Comes across as an honest account of your voyage.

 

Was the cabin change considered to be an upgrade by Princess?

 

Yes (I think)...and I should have mentioned that. We initially had an inside cabin on the Dolphin deck (D234 I believe). And then we ended up with P336. If you look at the diagram of the EP it's the first outside just past the International Cafe. While it's nice to have the window (we've been fine with inside or outside staterooms before) the noise was pretty bad.

 

The worst was just after then cafe was closing down at night and early in the morning when it opened, you could here all the carts/pans/etc. in the kitchen. It was not a cabin for much sleeping. ;)

 

And the last night they have the farewell thing at 11:30 PM on the piazza. I can understand having it there though as it's the most open space on the ship (other than the pool area). I guess the cabin change happened very late though as they didn't change the names on the cabin until the 2nd day and even our cabin steward didn't know. It took them several hours to find our luggage and we missed the first night's dinner seating.

[themerle]

I'm enjoying your review and I'm looking forward to more! Thanks for sharing your observations!