First Impressions of Emerald…Not Great :/

[brynmelyndavid]

We've just come back from a 12 night P&O cruise and there were 4 different production shows in the theatre, all of which were good and one of which was West-End/Broadway worthy. 

[mamamusings]

3 hours ago, startedwithamouse said:

There's a lot of pre cruise information on the Princess website, or what your TA should have directet d you towards. Sounds like you went in blindly.  

 

When you order specialty tea on the app, you choose To Stay or To Go, and they put the tea bag in the cup (to go) or pot (to stay) for you.  International Cafe will have tea selection. If you order for delivery to the piazza, it comes directly from there. 

I specified to stay. We were in our stateroom. And they didn’t send the correct tea.
 

Why are you so determined to make this my fault?

[Cruise Raider]

1 minute ago, mamamusings said:

I specified to stay. We were in our stateroom. And they didn’t send the correct tea.
 

Why are you so determined to make this my fault?

 
All coffee and tea ordered recently seems to be delivered in to go cups now.  While we can and do order our coffee extra hot (there’s an option for that one the app), it really is just never nearly as good as when ordering it at the IC in a porcelain cup.  I liken it to drink a fine wine out of a plastic solo cup vs a Riedel wine glass.  Even if we get the hot water from the buffet in those plastic mugs, the tea has lost some of its pizzaz.  

Sad they sent you the wrong tea.  We’ve been pretty lucky with our room service orders on Princess, but I did order a vegetarian pizza and did get a pepperoni pizza.  To me, it’s not that big of a deal because I just picked the pepperoni off and it was delish.  But, I wonder how the other folks that got the vegetarian pizza felt about it?  
 

 

[startedwithamouse]

1 hour ago, scottca075 said:

 

So a quick review of Patters I have from past cruises, 10 Days or longer. It seems we always had at least three different production shows.

 

On the Star, a 15 Day cruise we had Motor City, Stardust and Born To Dance. You can argue if The British Invasion is a production show, but I call a show with dancers and additional musicians a production show.

 

On the Caribbean, a 10 Day we had Born To Be Wild, Welcome Showtime and Broadway Ballroom.

 

On the Royal Princess, a 17 Day we had Encore, The Secret Silk, Sweet Soul Music and Colors of the World.

 

Looking through all the 14+ cruises we had we never had less than three production shows.

Yes, they call British Invasion a production show as it's rehearsed on land in Santa Clarita. 

 

We don't take our patters off the ship, other than the stray one or two that found their way home in a suitcase.

 

 

[startedwithamouse]

19 minutes ago, brynmelyndavid said:

We've just come back from a 12 night P&O cruise and there were 4 different production shows in the theatre, all of which were good and one of which was West-End/Broadway worthy. 

Which Princess ship?

 

[startedwithamouse]

19 minutes ago, mamamusings said:

I specified to stay. We were in our stateroom. And they didn’t send the correct tea.
 

Why are you so determined to make this my fault?

 Are you still onboard?  If yes, go enjoy your cruise. Lots to do instead of being upset at strangers on CC. 

Edited May 23, 2023 by startedwithamouse

[memoak]

4 minutes ago, startedwithamouse said:

Which Princess ship?

 

They are referencing P&O cruises not Princess. That would be like comparing Princess to HAL or Carnival

[AtlantaCruiser72]

@mamamusings it seems many of your concerns stem from use of the medallion app and related medallion technology.  Unfortunately this is one are where Princess consistently over promises and SIGNIFICANTLY underdelivers.  The expectations you had pre-cruise based on their marketing are not meeting the reality of what is being delivered onboard.  Some of this is down to staff not fully embracing the technology on top of a buggy tech platform.  You are justified in your disappointment.

 

I do find the amount of daily activities and entertainment offerings to be on par with what I expect from Princess.  Comparing to NCL mostly illustrates that the NCL offerings better suit your preferences for future travel.  The two brands are designed to appeal to different market segments.

 

As far as food, NCL does the "food thing" in a vastly superior way overall, especially on their newest ships like the Bliss.  Princess has always been ho-hum in this area and travelling on an older ship design like Emerald will only highlight the differences between the brands.  Again - different products aimed at different market segments.

 

Please try to enjoy the rest of your cruise, and maybe avoiding using the app will improve your experience.  Since it seems you now know that Princess is not the right "fit" for you I hope you are able to continue cruising on a line, like NCL, that seems to better suit your preferences.  The marvelous thing is that we as consumers have choices.

[startedwithamouse]

1 minute ago, memoak said:

They are referencing P&O cruises not Princess. That would be like comparing Princess to HAL or Carnival

Thanks. Just looked it up. 

[brynmelyndavid]

51 minutes ago, startedwithamouse said:

Thanks. Just looked it up. 

I was responding to whoever it was that said no cruise line puts on more than 2 productions shows. Clearly some cruise lines can.

[Skai]

5 hours ago, mamamusings said:

As first-time Princess cruisers, how were we supposed to know to go to the MDR reservations area (or even that there *was* one)  to find out about “held back” times? Princess didn’t provide that information. 

 

It appears that you've been a Cruise Critic member for 15 years.

Perhaps doing a bit of research and perusing the Princess Board here before your cruise might have provided some helpful tips/pointers.

 

Most people are surely not going to know the majority of the 'ins-and-outs' of any cruiseline on their first sailing.  I.E. -- Not knowing that choice of condiments(Mayo) needs to be selected separate from one's club sandwich order on the app, or that the buffet is always open on one side during service hours, or being asked to provide one's cabin # when ordering is to reconfirm that the person ordering is the person being charged. 

 

I'm sure a first time cruiser on NCL wouldn't know most of the 'ins and outs' compared to a person that has had more experience sailing with them a few times.

 

Edited May 23, 2023 by Skai

[memoak]

50 minutes ago, brynmelyndavid said:

I was responding to whoever it was that said no cruise line puts on more than 2 productions shows. Clearly some cruise lines can.

I find Princess to have a good balance of show between at least 2 production shows on a 7 day cruise plus magicians, guest singers and guest musicians etc.

[Buckeye10640]

On 5/22/2023 at 3:17 PM, mamamusings said:

Okay, y’all—to clarify, I was not comparing the ships so much as I was comparing the overall experience of the trip. (And we didn’t have a lot of options for ships on this itinerary. )

 

What this reinforces for me is that, as seemed to be implied at the meet and greet, Princess doesn’t seem to place a priority on services and entertainment on these “short” 7-day trips. 
 

It’s still early in the trip, though, so there’s plenty of time for me to change my mind!

 

(Thanks for the explanations on the room number thing—that makes a lot of sense!)

I would consider a 7 day cruise to be a 'normal' length cruise. 3/4/5 days are 'short'. 10+ is 'long'. Of course this is my reference point. Looking forward to when I have the time to cruise for more than a 10-day. 

[Guest ldtr]

On 5/22/2023 at 8:15 AM, Roberto256 said:

I think it's fair to evaluate any cruise a cruiseline offers.

 

I was always suprised before the pandemic, when carnival kept around old ships like the ecstasy ... which was horrible compared to their newer ships.

 

Same with Princess, passengers are free to (and do) evaluate a cruise line based on the cruise they are on.

 

You almost never see posts here warning prospective cruisers away from older ships...

The biggest difference between grand class and Royal class ships is the buffet layout.  Much better or Royal class.  Though some might say the promenade which is better on the grand class.

[Mississippian]

A couple of thoughts. My experience is that the buffet on all ships tends to be slammed for the first 24 or 36 hours. After that, it's a bit easier to get food and a table. I would advise anyone, regardless of the ship, to spend a good 15 minutes or so early on just walking around the buffet to see where things are. There are so many nooks and crannies that it's easy to miss things that the buffet offers. I think the OP is on Day 4. Is the buffet still unreasonably crowded? Maybe the MDR could be an option.

 

Second, a ship's officers are people, too. If they are used to doing cruises of 14-30 days, a switch to 7-day cruises is going to present some challenges. I think they were just sharing a problem that they are having to deal with rather than signaling that your 7-day cruise isn't worthwhile.

 

I was pretty unhappy with a recent NCL cruise, but I still had a good time. Make the best of things, and if you aren't happy either strike Princess from your cruise list or else move them down a few notches.

[startedwithamouse]

29 minutes ago, Buckeye10640 said:

I would consider a 7 day cruise to be a 'normal' length cruise. 3/4/5 days are 'short'. 10+ is 'long'. Of course this is my reference point. Looking forward to when I have the time to cruise for more than a 10-day. 

The officers in question were probably trying to remember the last time Emerald Princess did a 7 day voyage. They are usually 15 nights.

[startedwithamouse]

Who are the entertainers in the Princess theater? (Not production show cast).

[KeepCalmBearOn]

On 5/22/2023 at 12:17 PM, mamamusings said:

What this reinforces for me is that, as seemed to be implied at the meet and greet, Princess doesn’t seem to place a priority on services and entertainment on these “short” 7-day trips.

 

I think you misunderstood/misinterpreted what was said.

 

Princess has plenty of entertainment on "short" cruises that are 7 Day trips. They have two production shows in their main theater, just like NCL, on a 7 Day cruise. They have entertainers in every venue, every night, just like NCL. They have entertainment every night in the theater, even when it isn't a production show, just like NCL.

 

Other than the Bliss (for example) having more entertainment, because they have more venues, because the more than 30% higher capacity. I didn't see a difference in quality. I've never had a hard time getting seated in the theater on Princess. I have on NCL. There are gives and takes.

[startedwithamouse]

Discovery has LA as their home port and all the Princess corporate events and launches are held on the ship. It sails 7, 5 and 4 night voyages. Entertainment is very well done. If anyone has seen the newer Magic show, it's pretty mind blowing. 

[mrmarklin]

16 hours ago, memoak said:

They are referencing P&O cruises not Princess. That would be like comparing Princess to HAL or Carnival

You do realize that all the cruise lines you named are all owned by Carnival Corporation, right?

[KeepCalmBearOn]

14 minutes ago, mrmarklin said:

You do realize that all the cruise lines you named are all owned by Carnival Corporation, right?

 

I think that possibly was their point. Just because CCL owns HAL, P&O, Carnival, Princess, Cunard, etc does not mean every line has the same everything. Each line is very different.

[Outerdog]

On 5/22/2023 at 10:37 AM, Roberto256 said:

This is obviously a very important issue to you.

 

I mean, you brought it up...

 

[Roberto256]

22 minutes ago, Outerdog said:

I mean, you brought it up...

And, received some intelligent replies including that princess is changing the name of one of them.

There are a lot of idiots on the interenet.    Who has time to argue with all of them?

 

And, if one were to continue in most arguments here, the thread would simply disappear...

Edited May 24, 2023 by Roberto256

[sunviking90]

18 hours ago, Cruise Raider said:

 
All coffee and tea ordered recently seems to be delivered in to go cups now.  While we can and do order our coffee extra hot (there’s an option for that one the app), it really is just never nearly as good as when ordering it at the IC in a porcelain cup.  I liken it to drink a fine wine out of a plastic solo cup vs a Riedel wine glass.  Even if we get the hot water from the buffet in those plastic mugs, the tea has lost some of its pizzaz.  

Sad they sent you the wrong tea.  We’ve been pretty lucky with our room service orders on Princess, but I did order a vegetarian pizza and did get a pepperoni pizza.  To me, it’s not that big of a deal because I just picked the pepperoni off and it was delish.  But, I wonder how the other folks that got the vegetarian pizza felt about it?  
 

 

This is why we call to order our tea. We don’t get the plus plan and the only tea thru the app seems to be through it IC with a charge. I also don’t like my tea in a paper cup (and am becoming more and more put off by the waste of all the paper cups, but that’s another issue). 
When we call to order it comes in a carafe and is piping hot. (And free)

[Poulsbo Cruisers]

We are platinum cruisers with Princess. In February 2022 we took a 10 day Panama Canal cruise on the Emerald Princess. If that had been our first Princess cruise, we would never have made it to gold status. It just about caused us to give up on Princess altogether. Then we decided that we’ve had so many great cruises with Princess that we shouldn’t judge them on that one terrible experience. 
 

You may decide to give up on Princess, but I’m sure you would find a completely different experience on one of their other ships.