Bliss Pacific Coastal April 17th

[ceilidh1]

If you are on this sailing, please feel free to add to the thread! I can’t promise a true “live from” as internet and CC issues have ruined those plans in the past! I will do my best…

 

Background: On this sailing is myself, DD(15) and DS (10). We are all seasoned cruisers and have done every Bliss Coastal thus far, among many other sailings on other lines. This will be the first post Covid cruise for the kids and the second for me, We live in Vancouver so this will be a trip back home!

 

Pre Cruise: I booked this trip last minute as I have had so many cancellations that this is the way to go right now. I was waiting on finding out requirements for Canadian sailings before I was willing to commit. As soon as Canada dropped the testing requirement, I was ready to book! We still needed to provide a negative test to fly to the US but the same test would be good for boarding too (I hope).

 

Since this was a last minute/cheap getaway I opted for a club balcony rather than our preferred Haven cabin! I managed to resist all the tempting upgrade emails but already having Haven envy! I am taking a leaf from @Sthrngaryand attempting Haven Light! I upgraded to the Plus beverage package, bought additional specialty dining, and upgraded to unlimited wifi. No interest in Vibe.

 

I pre booked dining at Cagneys and Teppanyaki but wasn’t sure what to choose for the third one. Currently have reservations for both ocean blue and Q so will decide on the ship which to go with, Not able to pre book shows for some reason- I believe Jersey Boys is still playing but not sure about Six. I hope so, as I LOVE it!

 

[ceilidh1]

Check In: I did this right at midnight the day it came available. I chose a 9am arrival - not sure what benefit this has as I’m thinking boarding won’t happen until a few hours after that?! Am I the only one wondering why I had to watch that darned safety video so much? Since I was checking in for my set and 2 kids, I was forced to watch 3 times before I was able to move on. Since then, I’ve received at least 9 emails reminding me to watch the video…

 

YVR to LAX: I was a little perturbed that the cost of my flight was more than the cost of my cruise, but I redeemed it a little by using reward points from my credit card to book a hotel for a night. Our flight on west jet left Vancouver at 8:30am on Saturday morning. Living in downtown Vancouver, we took the first train out to the airport and arrived at 5:30am. I expected the airport to be nuts, but it was dead! We were through security and immigration by 6am and were at our gate eating breakfast from Tim Hortons by 6:30am! At no point were we asked to show proof of negative Covid test! Flight was on time and we arrived in LAX at 11:20am. We only had carry on bags so made our way out of an extremely busy LAX. Hopped on the LAX IT shuttle and ordered an Uber. Price from airport lot to Crowne Plaza Hotel was $30.16. Within 5 minutes or arriving at the lot, our Uber arrived!

[ceilidh1]

Crowne Plaza: On arrival at the hotel, there were no rooms available so we dropped our bags with the bellman and went off for a walkabout. We walked up to CVS and the 99c store and then stopped for ice cream at Baskin Robbins. By the time we got back to the hotel at 3:30, a room was ready and we headed up to freshen up. We were on the 7th floor in a room with 2 double beds and a view of the water (ish). We could see majestic princess from our room. We booked the room with breakfast rate so will report on that tomorrow and will take some pics of the room. I did grab a pic of the pool.

 

[ceilidh1]

For dinner, we headed to San Pedro Brewing, which is just a block from the hotel. Food and beer was excellent! 

[ceilidh1]

After eating, we stopped at a convenience store and grabbed some beers and snacks then went for a walk down to the port area. The terminal is a very easy walk from the hotel and we will likely walk there in the morning. We checked out the USS Iowa and walked around the sea walk area enjoying the evening. We then called it a night and relaxed in the hotel room- tomorrow is cruising day!

[SenatorsFan]

Looking forward to following along! 😊 Have fun.

[YVRteacher]

Hope you have a wonderful trip (I also live in Vancouver!) and was just on the Bliss for Spring Break.  The Mexican restaurant Los Lobos is fabulous and so is Ocean Blue.

Edited April 17, 2022 by YVRteacher

[debenson0723]

Did this cruise back in 2019 and loved it.  Excited to relive it thru you. Have a great time!

[mopedmom1]

SO jealous! I love the Bliss. 

 

Have an awesome time!

[jbhcw]

Following!  Enjoy Enjoy!

 

[Shaded Lady]

So glad you are finally able to cruise with the kidlets!

[odie1024]

Have fun, look forward to your review as I have not been on the Bliss yet. 

[OrcaGirl]

I'll be on this cruise too, see you shortly! I was originally going to do a semi-live from the Bliss, but my 'work from cruise' workload just got ridiculously busy, so instead of starting my own thread, I'll just add on here every now and then if that's okay with @ceilidh1...

 

(I’ll also be posting lots of photos over on Instagram Stories; search for erin_braincandy)

[CaptainBazz]

Looking forward to following this post...we are on the Bliss in Sept to Alaska. Just recently sailed on the Escape and the Encore so it will be good to get a comparison.

[ceilidh1]

Had a great night sleep - very quiet room (and I’m sure the beer helped) and woke early enough to enjoy a leisurely buffet breakfast at the hotel. When I booked the room I was able to add to n breakfast for two for an additional $10. The price if you buy it at the hotel is $16.95 per person and $10 for kids. The buffet was fine for what we paid but I wouldn’t have paid the going rate for it! 
 

Standard buffet fare - waffle maker, fruit, cereal, pastries, oatmeal, sausage, bacon, eggs, potato. Definitely enough to start our morning!

 

It was pretty busy so I couldn’t get as many pics as I wanted, but you get the idea!

[ceilidh1]

Crowne Plaza Hotel

This hotel served us just fine for one night pre-cruise. Location is excellent, price was reasonable, and room was comfortable. I wouldn’t stay longer than one night personally, just because there isn’t a whole lot in the area! The hotel is less than a 10 minute walk from the Maritime Museum and USS Iowa, about 15 minutes to walk to cruise terminal. In the other direction, CVS, 99c store and lots of fast food options are a 10-15 minute walk. A block away from the hotel is San Pedro Brewing Company (excellent) and Green Onion Mexican restaurant. The restaurant in the hotel is open for breakfast, lunch and dinner and also has a daily happy hour. Nice pool on the second floor with small hot tub . Also a gym, but didn’t check that out!

 

The room had two double beds, microwave, keurig coffee machine, refrigerator and lots of storage space. Lighting wasn’t great, especially as one of the lamps didn’t work. Shower pressure was non existent but water was hot and it did the job! Plenty of towels, small individual bottles of shampoo, etc, hair dryer, and make up mirror. There was also an iron and ironing board! The room was very quiet and the beds were comfortable so I had a great night sleep! 
 

Apologies for the mess…I forgot to get pics before we started unpacking!

[OrcaGirl]

Just made it on board 15 min ago. I’m out of practice… one mojito and I’m tipsy. If you see a woman teetering about with a yellow backpack, say hi!!!

[ceilidh1]

The original plan was to walk from the hotel down to the ship but we got lazy and ordered an Uber instead. Total cost for Uber was $8 and took around 5 minutes. We did walk down last night and it’s a very quick, easy walk if you choose to do so. In port this morning is Bliss and Discovery Princess.

 

Our arrival time was between 9 and 9:30am and we got out of our Uber at 9:15am. We dropped our bags and then joined the line to wait for security to open. Just after 9:30am they called for Haven guests to come through for the security screening. There were probably around 50 people in this group and immediately afterwards the general line started moving. At security they checked our passports against a printed list - only 3 agents so it moved pretty slowly. The other interesting thing was that we were reminded many times that masks were required once in the security screening tent, yet all 3 passport checkpoints had agents with masks below their noses. This is a pet peeve of mine - if you’re going to require masks then require them to be worn correctly!

 

We were through security by 10:10am and passed on to check in. Here we were asked if we were latitude members - well, yes we are but not at the level that gets priority boarding…I was honest and let the rep know that we weren’t priority and we were handed a group 5 boarding card. There were many more people being funneled through to priority because the agent wasn’t asking the right questions! Check in was slow going as there were only 3 agents at the general check in side. This was also the first sailing into Canada and they requested the ArriveCAN receipt at check in. We had ours ready to go but others were downloading and completing it right there at the check in counter! For us, check in was quick and easy - showed passports, proof of vaccination, negative Covid test, and completed a paper health form. We were done and sitting waiting to board by 10:40am.

 

 

[ceilidh1]

Best laid plans… boarding did not start until almost 1pm!!!! Not too happy but now I’m on my second drink and things are getting better!

[ceilidh1]

35 minutes ago, OrcaGirl said:

Just made it on board 15 min ago. I’m out of practice… one mojito and I’m tipsy. If you see a woman teetering about with a yellow backpack, say hi!!!

Likewise! I’m 2 in and light headed! Lol. I have a surly teen and a 10 year old boy in tow…say hi if you see us!

[ceilidh1]

Day 1 dailies

[ceilidh1]

Club balcony suite deck 14

[OrcaGirl]

The ‘reservations required’ entertainment offerings… 

[ceilidh1]

Day one was a definite hit and miss kind of day! I will start with saying that I’m incredibly grateful that I’m in the position that I can cruise again so in that sense,  it was all a hit! Not complaining but a few “first world problems “ to note!

 

The first HUGE miss was sitting in the terminal for FOUR hours waiting to board! I get that things happen, but communication and information go a LONG way! In this situation there was neither. No one told us how long or why there was a delay. We just sat and sat and sat. My best guess is that since this was the ship’a first trip into Canada there was some kind of coastguard inspection or something. Still don’t know!

 

On boarding, we were funneled through to the muster station. No choice in this. Not a huge issue since we had to do this anyway at some point. Just as well get it over with. Cards were scanned and we were free to go. No more putting on life jackets or listening to the demo! Did I mention how I was forced to watch the video 3 times in order to check in for myself and 3 kids and then received 9 emails reminding me to watch the video? Guess what? Our tv in The room would not work until we watched the video…sigh!

 

Another miss - despite the delay in boarding, the rooms weren’t ready and the doors to the hallway were locked. We went and grabbed some lunch at the buffet and then headed back down to the room. It was 3pm by this time. Still all locked up. Uhhh what? Went down to guest services and sorted out a few things, grabbed a drink, made show reservations and headed back to room. It was 3:45pm. Door to hallway was still closed and had the sign that rooms weren’t ready. By this point I had enough and just opened the door and went go the room. It was ready. Sigh.

 

The hits: Everything else! Amazing dinner at Ocean Blue, good drinks at the bars, fun time at Sailsway and managed to win a tshirt and entry to Lasertag, family time in the arcade and bargain duty free shopping!!!

 

 

Ocean Blue

First specialty dining complete! Food was great overall! Scallops with pork belly were fabulous, as was the clam chowder and the tuna and avocado tower! DD had filet mignon which was perfectly cooked to medium rare. Sides were potato gratin and steamed broccoli. The broccoli was a miss - more raw than steamed. I had the tuna with potato gratin and Brussel sprouts. The tuna was disappointing- quite dry and pretty bland. Dessert made up for it - dark chocolate mousse, cheesecake, and lime meringue pie! Wow! Ended the night with a coffee that should have been covered with premium plus package but got charged. Need to get it removed at some point!

 

The app has been hit or miss. I wasn’t able to connect to internet or app so went g to o Internet cafe. The guy there told me to use login.com and I was able to connect and activate my free minutes and the upgraded wifi for DD. The app works sometimes and then seems to kick me out at other times. The onboard account is confusing- I have both kids linked to my account with my credit card but I can’t view their charges on the app. I can only see it on the tv. DS has $100 credit g do or arcade and it shows on my account as -$100 but doesn’t actually deduct the $100 and shows nothing on his account. My first drink at the pool bar got charged as $3.95 - when I questioned it I was told it was tax for being in port… pretty sure it shouldn’t have been that much? 

[ceilidh1]

Ocean Blue