The first post of each season:

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

More miscellaneous cruise info

I think of things every night AFTER I publish my blog posts, and try to remember to mention them the next night, and then forget again, and so on, so I've started just typing things whenever I think of them, to jog my memory later, kind of like a blog To Do list (I cannot get away from them, can I?). The list right now looks exactly like this...

Drink packages
Sanctuary
Pillows
New CC host
Tender tickets for Princess Cays
Cancellation of Southwest flights 

...and I'll take some time now, while listening to the Emerald Princess orchestra, to expand my thoughts. 

Drink packages

We've heard for two cruises now that the unlimited drink packages for $49 pp per day will be offered on the Emerald Princess, but we keep hearing "next cruise, next cruise". Several people have emailed me about this, so I'll answer en masse here: it's imminent but not currently offered. 

Sanctuary pricing

I've also had a few emails on this. It's still $20 per day on the Emerald Princess.  From the Patter, but you probably can't read it, so just know it says $20 per day, $135 for the full cruise (counted as 9 days). 



Pillows (and mattresses)

I've received a couple of emails about pillows (and I could include mattresses in this too). There are some new ones on board and some old ones on board. The new pillows and the old mattresses are firm, the old pillows and the new mattresses are soft. Which you'll get is really anybody's guess. Even if I check your future cabin on turnaround day and tell you what's there, it could change. Our pillows were changed mid-cruise. G hated the new pillows and still has old ones. So our cabin, for example, has a mix and I suspect many others are the same. If you don't like what your cabin has, ask for a change. 

New Captains Circle host

Amanda has returned home and Patricia from Romania had replaced her. Nothing more to add here. 

Tender tickets for Princess Cays

For a couple of cruises in January, when the number of Elites on board was especially high, we were asked, instead of going directly to the tender loading area, to stop by the Explorers Lounge for Elite tender tickets. We did, and it never slowed us down. We would simply collect the tickets and were told to go directly to the loading station. They've since abandoned even that requirement, as the number of Elites has started to drop. 

And, on a personal note...

Cancellation of Southwest flights

Well, it's started. You may remember that I've mentioned that we have flights booked to return home on five different dates. The first one was last turnaround. I woke up in the middle of the night before in a panic...what if I forgot to cancel them?  I was feeling around in the dark for paper and pen, and wrote the word CANCEL in big letters and placed it on the floor. When I turned my iPhone on yesterday morning, I saw I needn't have stressed. I had set it up as a To Do before I even left home.


Is anyone besides me surprised about that?