Live with Celine from Grand Princess Alaska May 25th - June 8th

[Buckeye10640]

On 5/24/2022 at 2:12 PM, Ricbr said:

Looking forward to your updates. 

We are taking the Grand but going Southbound at the End of July.  It will be our first trip ever to Alaska so we are excited to get whatever information we can from those that are in the know.  I would love to get your impressions of the WiFi in particular on your first 2 days.  When we are coming back we plan on using it for our Covid Test before we fly out of Vancouver.  A little nervous how that will be the day before we get into Vancouver.

 

Just disembarked in Vancouver last Saturday from Majestic and can speak to testing on the last sea day.  The 4 of us  tested with eMed proctored tests but wifi was iffy and it took about 4 hours of attempts to get all 4 of us tested. A test itself takes about 20 minutes but there were lots of failed connections or connections so slow the proctor could not scan the qr code or drivers license and we had to start over. 

[cruzin4us]

1 hour ago, nunuc2000 said:

First attempt at loading photos so I want to make sure this works before I invest a lot of time and energy loading a bunch more lol

 

after a couple of beverages, ordered the bacon cheese fries from the salty dog on the Lido deck, here’s a picture of the salty dog menu and said fries… They were delicious after a couple of drinks!!

 

please let me know if these photos turned out OK and then I will spend more time today posting photos of other things including the patters, and dinner menus, and our menu choices if there’s interest in those… oh what am I saying… Of course there’s interest in seeing the food photos! I always enjoy those too Hahaa!!

 

Yes, your pictures posted!    And from one foodie to the next, I enjoy seeing food pics 🙂

 

[victoriaj]

On 5/24/2022 at 11:34 AM, Thrak said:

 

Just off of Royal Princess Alaska cruise 12 days round trip from Vancouver. I can't imagine being able to do the proctored Covid test with the ship's Internet connection. It was very poor. You can pretty much count on lousy Internet connections on an Alaska cruise.

We just  returned from B2B May 3 -25th Grand Princess and have done many previous Alaska sailings. Do not depend on Internet connections for anything that is truly importaant, reports, work, school etc as very unreliable. Spoke to people who had arranged with Inernet Manager to get proctored Covid testing last night at sea by Internet as we were in the Inside Passage but unfortunately unable to give an update as to how that worked out for them. There backup was to have it done at airport for a price and hope they were not delayed getting to the airport to allow time for results.

Our trip was fantastic with beautiful weather all the way, Princess food and service not what we were used to but acceptable given what the industry has gone through. 

IMO they should throw out the Medallion program as it just does not work, (they can also take Padgett out ),  also hated that to hear announcements from the Bridge including noon Navigational and Weather updates or the Naturalist while at the Glaciers you had to be on the outside decks or in the companionways as  you can no longer choose to hear it on your tv or your balcony. as you could B4 Medallion. WHY!!!!! When I inquired they said they didn't want to disturb the guests,well it never did disturb guest as you chose to hear it be tuning into the station. Only good thing I can think of about the Medallion is ease of opening the door when you have your hands full !!!!!!

 

 

[nunuc2000]

Just finished a lovely breakfast in the da Vinci dining room, and in the theater now waiting for a naturalist presentation by Sandra Schempp. 

Enjoyed dinner at our pre-reserve schedule time at 5:20 PM in Botticelli yesterday evening, and everything was hot, very tasty, and served with grace and humor by the amazing crew. 

 

The Medallion app continues to be pretty iffy off and on, with orders getting missed or very long delays, but really, that is the only dull spot and what has otherwise been so far a great start to the cruise. (yesterdays pre-boarding security debacle notwithstanding). 

 

As we are still making our way up the inside passage, it has been smooth like glass so far… and even though our room is at the very back of the ship, there was basically zero movement through the night. That almost disappoints me, as I actually enjoy a lot of movement, it reminds me I’m on a cruise ship and happy to be here lol!

 

Here are the patters for yesterday, and today, along with the dinner menus from yesterday and our pictures… but I totally forgot to take a picture of the appetizer which was the garlic prawns… But they were delicious! 

 

Hubby had the cod for dinner, and I had the seafood stew. We both had the vanilla mascarpone For dessert, and it was quite delicious. 

 

We participated in the “good spirits at sea ~cocktail experience” and really enjoyed the cocktail creations we ordered… I had the Coco Cafe, and John had the Cartegena Cool… I included photos of the recipes for our two drinks and a few others too 😊

 

Later in the evening we had fun at one of the games StrikeOut, (I won a water bottle haha!)  then off to bed… and I have a funny late night story that I’ll share later. 😊

 

 

 

 

 

[nunuc2000]

[Senga]

Captain announced 1107 guests on board; capacity is 2600.

 

The Horizon buffet is FREEZING cold with staff and guests wearing winter coats.  🥶

[CynCyn]

12 hours ago, nunuc2000 said:

First attempt at loading photos so I want to make sure this works before I invest a lot of time and energy loading a bunch more lol

 

after a couple of beverages, ordered the bacon cheese fries from the salty dog on the Lido deck, here’s a picture of the salty dog menu and said fries… They were delicious after a couple of drinks!!

 

please let me know if these photos turned out OK and then I will spend more time today posting photos of other things including the patters, and dinner menus, and our menu choices if there’s interest in those… oh what am I saying… Of course there’s interest in seeing the food photos! I always enjoy those too Hahaa!!

So disappointed that the Triple Smoke Burger didn’t survive the pandemic! It was my favorite.

[nunuc2000]

24 minutes ago, Senga said:

Captain announced 1107 guests on board; capacity is 2600.

 

The Horizon buffet is FREEZING cold with staff and guests wearing winter coats.  🥶

I totally couldn’t understand the announcement today… thank you for posting that, and I will say that for the most part it has felt like we are way under capacity which is kind of nice to be honest 🙂

 

but now we are in explorers waiting for the 50s and 60s party to start, and it is actually pretty packed in here… and nary a mask to be seen 😬

[DougH]

44 minutes ago, Senga said:

Captain announced 1107 guests on board; capacity is 2600.

 

The Horizon buffet is FREEZING cold with staff and guests wearing winter coats.  🥶

Who is the current Captain?  Are they back to two shows a night in the main theatre and are both sides of the buffet open? I was on the Grand over Christmas and we had only 400+ so lots of services were changed.

[nunuc2000]

2 minutes ago, DougH said:

Who is the current Captain?  Are they back to two shows a night in the main theatre and are both sides of the buffet open? I was on the Grand over Christmas and we had only 400+ so lots of services were changed.

Yes, there are two shows at night, one at 7:30, one at 9:30… Totally forgot to take a picture of the staff board, I will try and remember to do that tomorrow 😊

[DougH]

1 minute ago, nunuc2000 said:

Yes, there are two shows at night, one at 7:30, one at 9:30… Totally forgot to take a picture of the staff board, I will try and remember to do that tomorrow 😊

Thanks, I do a B2B in 12 days

[nunuc2000]

 

 

So here’s a funny little story… at least I think it’s pretty funny, I’m still giggling about it hours later:

 

You know how the clerks start to circle around guests on sea days in the shops, particularly when it comes to jewelry? Well today was no different, and when we entered the EFFY shop, The assistant manager was particularly aggressive. Kept following us around, and suggesting to my husband that he should buy me something as beautiful as my eyes. Like we are talking he was really put the pressure on for a good two or three minutes and would not leave us alone. We kept telling him that we were just browsing, not interested in actually buying anything right now. He finally asked me what my favorite stone was. I replied “rolling?” And I think he really wasn’t sure what I said… So he just repeated “ya, your favorite stone?”

 

Very deadpan I said “oh I think probably Mick Jagger.”

 

He looked at me with an incredulous blank look on his face while my husband just about fell on the floor laughing uncontrollably! We left him standing there as we walked out and went to the good spirits bar to have a drink and laugh and laugh and laugh!! Still giggling about it this evening Hahaa! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ricbr]

Has the ships wifi been pretty good for you so far?  Love the pictures!!!

[nunuc2000]

3 hours ago, Ricbr said:

Has the ships wifi been pretty good for you so far?  Love the pictures!!!

Wi-Fi is not horrible so far, I am able to occasionally post on this page, and Facebook is actually working very well, and I am able to instant message and text family and friends. 

[nunuc2000]

On 5/24/2022 at 7:56 PM, DougH said:

I sail on the Grand in a few weeks so hope to hear your thoughts. Who is the current Captain?

Sorry it took me a couple of days to find the board lol 

[westcoaster]

17 hours ago, Senga said:

The Horizon buffet is FREEZING cold with staff and guests wearing winter coats.  🥶

We were on the Grand Princess May 11-25, and we noticed the same thing.  They kept a lot of the doors open in the buffet area and in the covered pool area.  I assume this is to improve the air circulation as a Covid prevention measure, which makes sense.  

[MsSoCalCruiser]

17 hours ago, nunuc2000 said:

Yes, there are two shows at night, one at 7:30, one at 9:30… Totally forgot to take a picture of the staff board, I will try and remember to do that tomorrow 😊

What are your main production shows?

[nunuc2000]

3 minutes ago, MsSoCalCruiser said:

What are your main production shows?

We personally haven’t attended them yet, partly because it’s just not our cup of tea… and partly because we end up doing other things. But if you take a look at the pictures of the patters that I am posting, you can see the production shows at 7:30 and 930 on there 😊

[nunuc2000]

Finally got to meet @Senga and her hubby!! Thank you so much for introducing yourselves, and please, feel free to chime in anytime on this post - as we both have noticed, sometimes it’s tricky to post successfully on here… So if any of us can provide good information and answers, I’m sure it’s very helpful to others. 😊

[westcoaster]

20 minutes ago, MsSoCalCruiser said:

What are your main production shows?

We were on the May 11-25 sailing.  The production shows were "British Invasion" , "Stardust", and "Sweet Soul Music".  It was nice being able to go to the theater 5 minutes before showtime and still get a good seat!

[nunuc2000]

 

Yesterday was formal day, and that means captains dinner in the dining room… but yesterday also included another meal in the dining room being that it was a sea day… LUNCH! I had the caramelized prawns and the red snapper for lunch, hubby had the Cobb salad. The prawns were excellent… The red snapper not so much… A little dry and overdone for my liking. But John said the Cobb salad was pretty good, other than the chicken tasted like it might’ve been way past its prime ha ha ha. 

 

For dinner, hubby started with the watermelon and goat cheese salad and thought it was pretty good, and I had the shrimp cocktail and then the kale Caesar salad, both pretty good… But that kale Caesar salad is quite peppery I find. We both ordered the wild Alaska sockeye seared salmon… And disappointingly, it was very dry and over cooked. I’m not sure how, but we both missed seeing the halibut which would’ve been preferable to begin with… We will order that next week as we are on the back to back.  For dessert, we both ordered the crêpe Suzette, but honestly it wasn’t very good… And I really wanted to like it. Insert sad disappointment here 😢 basically, it was a crêpe folded into fourths, and dropped into a bowl of syrup with a blob of ice cream on top. I’ve seen four-year-old use less syrup on a massive stack of pancakes. So that didn’t get eaten… but petit four was also available and that satisfied the Sweet cravings I get after dinner, and that left me extra room for calories in the form of liquid entertainment later on 👍🏼😂

 

 

The “pop rock band“ Static was playing again last night in explorers lounge, and while they do a good job of the type of music they play, it’s definitely geared towards the older demographics… Very soft rock, and 50s and 60s kind of music. But like I said, they are good at what they do, and I’m sure that this is the type of music that princess has contracted them for. 

PS… Posting to cruise critic is still kind of tricky, so looks like I may have to post text first and then my photos will follow…

 

 

 

 

[nunuc2000]

 

Yesterday was formal day, and that means captains dinner in the dining room… but yesterday also included another meal in the dining room being that it was a sea day… LUNCH! I had the caramelized prawns and the red snapper for lunch, hubby had the Cobb salad. The prawns were excellent… The red snapper not so much… A little dry and overdone for my liking. But John said the Cobb salad was pretty good, other than the chicken tasted like it might’ve been way past its prime ha ha ha. 

 

For dinner, hubby started with the watermelon and goat cheese salad and thought it was pretty good, and I had the shrimp cocktail and then the kale Caesar salad, both pretty good… But that kale Caesar salad is quite peppery I find. We both ordered the wild Alaska sockeye seared salmon… And disappointingly, it was very dry and over cooked. I’m not sure how, but we both missed seeing the halibut which would’ve been preferable to begin with… We will order that next week as we are on the back to back.  For dessert, we both ordered the crêpe Suzette, but honestly it wasn’t very good… And I really wanted to like it. Insert sad disappointment here 😢 basically, it was a crêpe folded into fourths, and dropped into a bowl of syrup with a blob of ice cream on top. I’ve seen four-year-old use less syrup on a massive stack of pancakes. So that didn’t get eaten… but petit four was also available and that satisfied the Sweet cravings I get after dinner, and that left me extra room for calories in the form of liquid entertainment later on 👍🏼😂

 

 

The “pop rock band“ Static was playing again last night in explorers lounge, and while they do a good job of the type of music they play, it’s definitely geared towards the older demographics… Very soft rock, and 50s and 60s kind of music. But like I said, they are good at what they do, and I’m sure that this is the type of music that princess has contracted them for. 

PS… Posting to cruise critic is still kind of tricky, so looks like I may have to post text first and then my photos will follow…

 

 

 

 

[nunuc2000]

Today is day three… Ketchikan, very early arrival of about 6:45 AM we were cleared to disembark, and 2:30 PM all aboard. A rather cool and gray day with just the lightest sprinkle of showers off and on… now for a menopausal woman from Canada, that meant just a really light jacket and occasionally even removing that lol

A high of 13 Celsius which is about 55 Fahrenheit. 

Having been here before, we just wandered around for a couple of hours and got in all of our steps… Watched the amazing bald eagles and float planes and a couple of other ships come in after us.. and then back on board for a casual lunch and relaxation on our balcony watching for Eagles and just enjoying the incredible fresh air. 

[cruzin4us]

I'm enjoying your LIVE thread......It's a very pleasant change to most posts.  Thank you!

[nunuc2000]

Today’s patters, along with photos from C304… Empty room that they are putting fresh paint in, it’s a handicapped room that they’ve also completely redesigned with new furniture… It looks very nice!!