LIVE - Ruby Princess, Nov 6 - 20, 14-day Circle Caribbean

[cltnccruisers]

4 minutes ago, canadarocks said:

We have a stop in Guadaloupe next year on our Emerald Circle Caribbean. At this point, only 8 excursions offered and none of them have very good reviews. And not a single Death in Paradise one. How many do you have to choose from on the Ruby?

I'm not on Ruby.  I'm going by some research we'd done for possible trips including Guadaloupe and Martinique.  Also, the titles didn't say Death in Paradise.  Sometimes the details did, sometimes you could find out from reviews. 

Edited November 7, 2023 by cltnccruisers

[canadarocks]

Gotcha. Hopefully @aring75 will let me know if they've got more than 8. 

[aring75]

57 minutes ago, cltnccruisers said:

Guadaloupe is where Death in Paradise is filmed.  Pretty sure there are several excursions based on that.

Nothing about Death In Paradise that I’ve seen. Unless it sold out and I’m just not seeing it. 

[cltnccruisers]

17 minutes ago, canadarocks said:

Gotcha. Hopefully @aring75 will let me know if they've got more than 8. 

Titles might include Sainte Anne or Castle Point.

[aring75]

19 minutes ago, canadarocks said:

Gotcha. Hopefully @aring75 will let me know if they've got more than 8. 

We have a total of ten, but three are sold out (one of those was a “best of” highlights type tour that I signed up for the waitlist, but we never got it).

 

There’s a 4x4 tour, kayaking in the mangroves, a beach day & botanical gardens, and a few other things. Just nothing really appealed to us. Of course, I know sometimes the descriptions are lacking.
 

I’ll let you all know what we end up doing. 

[aring75]

Here you go. These are the ones that are not sold out as of right now. 
 

[cltnccruisers]

2 minutes ago, aring75 said:

Here you go. These are the ones that are not sold out as of right now. 
 

Botanic Gardens and Deshaies Beach is one of them.  Just confirmed with DW.

[schnapperin]

41 minutes ago, canadarocks said:

We have a stop in Guadaloupe next year on our Emerald Circle Caribbean. At this point, only 8 excursions offered and none of them have very good reviews. And not a single Death in Paradise one. How many do you have to choose from on the Ruby?

Otherwise look into an non ship excursion, someone on our cruise managed to set up a private trip 

[canadarocks]

Thanks all. Now back to @aring75 and the great review! 
 

[maggieq]

On 11/5/2023 at 8:05 AM, aring75 said:

Hello everyone! I’m Angela, and my husband Mark and I will be sailing with Princess for the first time since 2010. 
 

 

 

Our itinerary is the 14-day Circle Caribbean on the just-out-of-dry dock Ruby Princess. We depart tomorrow from Ft. Lauderdale (Port Everglades) and I am giddy with excitement!

 

 

We booked this cruise through our travel agent with the Plus Package, and she gifted us an upgrade to Premium and some OBC that we are really looking forward to using!

 

 

We’ve sailed with Princess, Royal Caribbean, NCL, Disney, Celebrity, and Holland America. 50+ cruises spread out over multiple lines. We are currently Platinum with Princess. 
 

Just so you know. We have never had a bad cruise. Never. We are very much go-with-the-flow kind of people and things would have to be pretty bad to ruin our vacation. I do really appreciate the LIVE threads with honest and up to date information, however, and I will do my best to return the favor here!

 

I take lots of photos. Menus, ship photos, food. Mark is even in the habit of pausing before his first bite so I can snap a quick pic of his dinner. 😂

@aring75  thanks for posting. We took our first cruise together on Princess on the golden Princess in 2004. Went on the navigator of the seas in later 2004 and never looked back and cruised again I’m Princess even though we had a great time. Looking at the British aisles in 2025 on the regal.   
 

we’ve been wanting to try Princess again so very much looking forward to your review 😊 

Edited November 8, 2023 by maggieq

[schnapperin]

Tonight the lines were even longer at 7 pm - took around 30 minutes after swapping to the unreserved line. Lots of table not been used inside, it seems that the system of having a specific table reserved is the reason for the delays for everyone else who hasn’t a fixed table 

[aring75]

Yes. Dinner lines were long for us too @schnapperin. Does one of the dining rooms provide “traditional dining” service? Or is it all Dine My Way?

[aring75]

MDR menus 2nd night’s dinner

 

 

 

 

Sorry about the phone shadow. Our table was in a little darker spot last night. 

[schnapperin]

2 minutes ago, aring75 said:

Yes. Dinner lines were long for us too @schnapperin. Does one of the dining rooms provide “traditional dining” service? Or is it all Dine My Way?

Seems like it is all dine my way - wonder how bad it will be tonight with the 15th birthday celebration and captain‘s champagne waterfall ending at 6.40 pm and everyone rushing to dinner 

[aring75]

Started off with a Caesar salad again. No pic since it looked remarkably like the one from Night 1.

 

But opted to try a small portion of the Fettuccine Alfredo since the pastas have all been nice. 
 

 

Than the herb-crusted strip loin. This was good, but it needed a little better knife than what they offer. It wasn’t tough, the knives were just dull. 
 

[aring75]

3 minutes ago, schnapperin said:

Seems like it is all dine my way - wonder how bad it will be tonight with the 15th birthday celebration and captain‘s champagne waterfall ending at 6.40 pm and everyone rushing to dinner 

We are in Sabatini’s tonight. I was kind of regretting missing formal night in the MDR, but considering the points you just made, I think it might work out better for us. We’ll see!

[aring75]

Desserts 😊

 

 

 

Mark said the New York style cheesecake was quite good. 
 

 

 

And I enjoyed the coconut crème brûlée. The little pastry sitting on top was weird and a little dry, but the brûlée was yummy. 
 

[schnapperin]

Adding the Caribbean flavors (also had the crème brûlée and agree) 

 

Portion sizes are a bit on the smaller side to be honest and not a lot of spices used, but which sharing a table I don’t like to order one more course (actually used to that on non us lines as 4-5 course dinners) 

 

 

[aring75]

Show in the theater was a vocal performance by Deli Rowe. She had a very powerful voice and did well. Songs included Respect by Aretha Franklin, I Wanna Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston, Rolling In the Deep by Adele, you get the idea. All very strong female vocals. 
 

I suggest stopping by a bar on the way to the theater if you’d like a drink for the show. Service is somewhat limited. 
 

Also the glasses are small and I find that annoying. Did they start using smaller glasses once the packages starting getting more popular?

 

These glasses are about 5 inches tall. 

 

[aring75]

Princess Patter Day 3 - Day at Sea

 

 

 

 

We had to turn our clocks forward last night. Hoping that was in order to match ship time to island time. I have been unable to reach our tour operator in Martinique to verify our meeting time. Fingers crossed. 

[aring75]

 

 

Hey Ruby! It’s your birthday!

 

[aring75]

Also. We received this list (2nd night’s in-cabin paperwork) of themes for the evening buffet. 
 

 

 

I am eyeballing that Pastry Extravaganza. 

[schnapperin]

I‘m not sure what the hanchen schnitzel is supposed to be - chicken is spelled different in German 😂

 

we did went forward to match island time - guess it’s easy to do it on a sea day then later tomorrow so people don’t mess up their excursions time

 

also love the IC - great coffee and the lines aren’t to busy. Breakfast option also looks great and they even have tray‘s

 

that will be my go to place during port days with some early starts.

 

drink wise sort of the same - got St. Germain Spritz (counted as two drinks) and will be seen if I can get a Limoncello spritz tonight at GS as they do have it on the menu for a specials Aperol Spritz.

 

glases are on the smaller side I do have agree with that 

[skynight]

"We had to turn our clocks forward last night. Hoping that was in order to match ship time to island time."

Princess always changes ship time to match local time. 

[banderboo]

On 11/6/2023 at 1:24 PM, aring75 said:

We drove the 3-1/2 hours to the port. Typical Monday morning traffic, but no real issues. We dropped our luggage off a little after noon, parked the car in the garage ($20/day parking), and got in line to enter the terminal. 
 

A man was there to direct eligible people to the green lane. This probably cut 15-20 minutes off our wait time. Through security, scanned medallions and passports, then on to the ship. Easy peasy. 

Do you need to make reservations or is it just drive in and park? Is handicap parking in the same place?