"Live" Sapphire Princess, 32 Days, Buenos Aires to LA, 3/5/23 to 4/6/23

[LACruiser88]

3 hours ago, Happiest when cruising said:

Not that I will ever get there, but how do you know the cut off number?
I don’t see it on the invitation. 

I asked the Loyalty & Events Mgr when I returned the rsvp.

[LACruiser88]

Today we had a fantastic day in Paracas and Pisco (Peru).  We took the free shuttle bus into Paracas, a 20 minute ride.  The landscape made us feel like we were on Mars!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Upon our arrival in Paracas I arranged for a private guide, Nestor, to take us to Pisco.  We had our friend Beth with us and picked up a fellow passenger, Alan, from London.  The total for the 4 of us was $80 USD.

 

The ride to Pisco was about 30 minutes long.  As of the 2020 census, Pisco's population is 700,000.  Nestor took us to the central square and showed us various parts of the city.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nestor also arranged our own Pisco tasting and Pisco Sour experience.  This was awesome!  We were also treated to fruit infused Pisco.  This consisted of Pisco in apples, plums, cinnamon, mango and oranges.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Upon our return to Parascas we enjoyed a very good seafood lunch of fried whole fish and fish milanesa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then we semi-staggered back to the bus!

 

Paracas from the top of the ship, across the bay.

 

 

 

 

[waltd]

4 hours ago, LACruiser88 said:

This morning we are docked in San Martín, Peru, on the Paracas Peninsula surrounded by desert dunes.  This is the port for visiting Pisco. 

 

Princess is providing a free shuttle to the town of Paracas, about 20 minutes away.  Pisco is another 30 minutes away from Paracas.

 

We are planning on taking the shuttle to Paracas and then hiring a taxi to visit Pisco.

 

This is also the starting point for passengers doing the Macchu Pichu excursion from the ship.  They will return in 3 days when we are in Lima.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for the photos.  This is one of the ports we by passed due to the political unrest in December.   At least now I know what I missed.

[Thrak]

22 hours ago, suekel said:

A few more thoughts.  The Sapphire,  at least this sailing is very old school.  Elite amenities,  everyone dresses for dinner..no jeans,  t-shirts or ball caps sighted, tuxes on formal nights for some and the old menus. My favorite thing? When I order a drink with lemon, I actually get lemon.

 

I'm sure some won't find this a good thing but I love it. Thanks for reporting that some cruises are still how they used to be. Wish this was the case more often.

[LACruiser88]

2 hours ago, Darkingnj said:

Thanks for taking us along.  Those windmill blades are huge.

They are huge!  I would like to see how they transport them.

[suekel]

Just received a call.  Chef's table. Sunday night!

[LACruiser88]

50 minutes ago, suekel said:

Just received a call.  Chef's table. Sunday night!

They had one last night too.  They are being held in the Savoy MDR.

[waltd]

Just now, LACruiser88 said:

They had one last night too.  They are being held in the Savoy MDR.

Our favorite dining room.   We were lucky to have Bella who was our head waiter and her crew.   Perfect dining. 

[LACruiser88]

12 hours ago, waltd said:

Our favorite dining room.   We were lucky to have Bella who was our head waiter and her crew.   Perfect dining. 

The Savoy Manager is currently Boris, our Asst Manager (Headwaiter) is Asif. Our waiter is Annie and her assistant is Don.  They are all FANTASTIC!!!

[LACruiser88]

 

 

[LACruiser88]

The view from our balcony this morning in Callao, the port for Lima.  This is a very busy commercial port and we are not allowed to walk off the ship.  Princess is providing a complimentary shuttle to downtown Lima, a 40 to 60 minute ride depending on traffic.

 

 

 

 

[beg3yrs]

3 hours ago, LACruiser88 said:

The Savoy Manager is currently Boris, our Asst Manager (Headwaiter) is Asif. Our waiter is Annie and her assistant is Don.  They are all FANTASTIC!!!

We sailed the Sapphire Princess from January 4, 2023 through February 6, 2023. We too had a window table for two in the Savoy and Asif and Lawrentiu seemed to be battling to be our headwaiters. Both were great.

 

Anyway, please tell Asif that Scott and Charlie say hi. And, if you get a taste for Indian food, Asif will put together an amazing meal for you.

[LACruiser88]

We had a great day in Lima today!  We hired a guide right off the bus when we arrived at the Miraflores Mall (really a park).

 

 

We toured various Lima neighborhoods.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lover's "Lock" Wall

 

These photos are of the main government square downtown.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Presidential Palace

 

We enjoyed a great seafood lunch on the pier.  Seabass and shrimp in a Pernod cream sauce with mashed potatoes served on a giant abalone shell.  It had a thin pie crust over the top that the waiter sliced open to make a "rose."  It was delicious!

 

 

 

 

 

The view from the restaurant.

 

 

[CruzeQueen2]

Thank you for sharing your photos and information @LACruiser88 about ports, activities, food adventures and everything. It's also nice to read about some of the great crew members that you have met. I will be on the Sapphire in the fall; taking note of some the names. 🥰

[LACruiser88]

 

 

 

[san diego sue]

This is the Best Live I have ever seen on Cruise Critic. Thank you for taking us along with you.

[LACruiser88]

19 minutes ago, san diego sue said:

This is the Best Live I have ever seen on Cruise Critic. Thank you for taking us along with you.

That was very nice of you to take the time to give positive feedback!  That makes it worthwhile. ❤️

 

 

 

 

Edited March 25, 2023 by LACruiser88

[LACruiser88]

 

 

 

[LACruiser88]

On 3/24/2023 at 10:16 AM, beg3yrs said:

Anyway, please tell Asif that Scott and Charlie say hi. And, if you get a taste for Indian food, Asif will put together an amazing meal for you.

@beg3yrs  During the day Asif is the Sanctuary Supervisor.  I showed him your post and he remembers you guys.  He sends his warm regards!

 

[alfieisgod]

On 3/11/2023 at 3:32 PM, LACruiser88 said:

 

 

OZ!!  Glad to see he’s been promoted to CD.  He was a lot of fun on the Sky over Christmas 2021 - with his tricky trivia and co-hosting the Wake Show.  Hope he will still be onboard for my cruise at the end of June.

 

Don from Halifax

 

 

 

[LACruiser88]

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 27, 2023 by LACruiser88

[LACruiser88]

Arriving in Manta, Ecuador, this morning.  It is 80°f and raining.  It is supposed to clear up by noon?  We were scheduled for an arrival of 10:00 am.

[LACruiser88]

Another fantastic day today in Manta!

 

It stopped raining shortly after docking.  It was 85°f and 95% humidity!

 

We hired a cab as soon as we exited the cruise terminal and proceeded straight to the town of Montecristi, about 30 minutes away.  My goal today was to buy a couple of high quality Panama hats.  

 

This photo pretty much captures the Panama hat district.  There are numerous "hat factories" on the street.

 

 

At several of the shops they demonstrated the process of making the world famous hats.  It was interesting to learn that the quality of the hat is determined by the number of woven knots within a square inch.  The softness or stiffness of the hat has no bearing on the quality of the hat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our two salespersons and our driver, Luis (far right).

 

 

We beat the tour buses as they were just starting to arrive when we left to return to Manta.

 

In Manta we had our driver drop us off near the cruise terminal at "restaurant row."  We enjoyed a great lunch of baked black clams and fried grouper.  Each dish came with fried plantains (known as tostones in my homeland of Cuba).

 

 

Here is the grouper before and after.

 

 

Views of Manta.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We ended up with four high quality Panama hats, one for Debbie and three for me.  I finally came out ahead of Debbie in a shopping spree! 😜

 

 

 

 

Edited March 27, 2023 by LACruiser88

[Carnevale]

What a fabulous blog!  Many thanks for sharing all this information.  Getting photos and the daily events is great.

 

We just booked a Sapphire cruise from Buenos Aires to Santiago next February (2024) and found this info so helpful….makes thinking about being on board much more exciting.  We have a few questions that we hope you can help us with:

 

- if you can post any wine menus (by the glass) that would be great.  We will have the premier pkg and are wondering what wines we can get.  We are mainly interested in what Vines and the MDR have but seeing a recent menu from any location will be helpful.

 

- have you noticed any ballroom style dancing in the piazza?  We love to dance but the canned music in Fusion most nights might not work (on Regal in Oct few people went to the canned music dancing as it was boring but we enjoyed the occasional opportunity to dance in the piazza)

 

- is there any dancing in the Wheelhouse?

 

Many thanks in advance for any of the above you might be able to help us with!

 

[LACruiser88]

7 hours ago, Carnevale said:

you can post any wine menus (by the glass) that would be great.  We will have the premier pkg and are wondering what wines we can get.  We are mainly interested in what Vines and the MDR have but seeing a recent menu from any location will be helpful.

 

I'll take a photo of the Vines wines later today.  However, they are out of about half of the wines on the list.  About half of those, they have not had since boarding.  The MDR has about 100 selections by the bottle, a few more by the glass than Vines.

 

Who knows what the wine inventory will be in the future.  It can't get worse!

 

7 hours ago, Carnevale said:

to dance but the canned music in Fusion most nights might not work (on Regal in Oct few people went to the canned music dancing as it was boring but we enjoyed the occasional opportunity to dance in the piazza)

 

- is there any dancing in the Wheelhouse?

There is no dancing at all in the Piazza, that is only on Royal Class ships.

 

We are dancers and have done so most nights.  They have had a really good husband/wife duo in the Wheelhouse.  The party band has been playing in Explorers Lounge and Club Fusion.  Every few nights they have had DJ "Ballroom" music in Club Fusion, not for us.