We enjoyed a quintessential cruise day today, with calm seas, perfect weather…and the knowledge that we have another cruise the immediate offing. It doesn’t get much better than that!
First though, I need to solve the mystery about the necklace being fished out of the drain when we returned to our cabin last night. As I expected, steward Robert knew exactly what had happened. I have a small glass on my nightstand into which I place earrings and necklaces that I wear often, so I don’t have to put them away every time (still in that jewelry holder I made years ago from a pot holder and small ziplock bags). Well, when I took off a particularly meaningful (but not valuable) necklace before going into the pool yesterday, I placed it not in that glass but in a half filled glass of lemonade water, also on the nightstand. Robert came in to service the room, went to discard that glass of lemonade water, decided there was too much movement on the ship to just place it with its contents into his tray, dumped it out in the bathroom sink and realized too late that there was something in it. Because who expects to find a necklace in a glass of lemonade water? He immediately contacted a plumber but had finished up for the night before the plumber arrived. The first thing he wanted to know this morning was if I had gotten my jewelry back. Yes, I did, a little worse for wear but I used a lens wipe to scrub it down real well. Welcome to my world, where I do things like that all. the. time.
After breakfast in Sabatini’s this morning, I got in my pool time and spent the rest of the morning writing thank you notes and preparing extra tip envelopes. I believe we will be saying goodbye to our special breakfast and our wonderful lunch wait team of Nyoman and Peter, but will be seated at the same dinner table in the Michelangelo Dining Room with Libres and Sulton. Lucky us!
G stopped in to the interdenominational church service held in the Vista Lounge and led by Captain Ravera. At least he picked up the “bulletin”, an old Catholic teenager trick to verify Mass attendance to the folks. 😉
So we went to our final lunch in the Botticelli Dining Room with the wonderful waiters who took us under their wings on that first day (and located my roll aboard in the dining room lobby), looked for Voice of the Ocean on the afternoon’s list of activities but apparently they’re not having one this cruise, finished up yesterday’s blog post while sitting on the Promenade Deck, and chose to watch football (specifically, the Chiefs v Raiders game) in our cabin. We couldn’t leave before the exciting end of that game, but made it to the Elite Lounge for a couple nibbles before dinner in the Michelangelo Dining Room. That was followed by a classical music set by the Waves string duo in the Piazza and a Princess Theater performance by vocalist Drew Pournell. We had missed his show earlier in the cruise due to Captains Circle parties, so it was nice to get a second chance to see him.
With not much else to report today (and not wanting to resort to “sea day sidebars” quite yet), I thought I would share my thoughts about the 28 year old Grand Princess.
Simply stated, we love the ship. I was, honestly, more than a little worried about the ship’s condition given its age before we came on board, especially since G was kind of unhappy with the condition of the Emerald Princess last winter. Specifically, it was the number of non-working public toilets and sinks sporting “We’re on it!” signs on the day we boarded that were still in place 52 days later. I kept reminding him that the Grand was ten years older than the Emerald was, and to set his expectations accordingly. I needn’t have worried. I haven’t seen a non-working public toilet yet on this ship, most of the automatic soap dispensers work and the overall appearance is the ship is excellent.
In the interest of full disclosure (as I do get emails telling me that ships/places/meals I liked were found to be absolute $hitshows), we have been admittedly blessed on this cruise. Our cabin was in perfect condition. I haven’t been able to say that about any cabin the past couple of years except for the Star Princess, which one might expect it to be, given its young age. While I would enjoy another couple of feet of closet space and more lighting in the cabin (especially when I drop a small earring on the floor as I did this morning), our inside cabin is very livable.
My mattress has been extremely comfortable. G drew the short straw this time and his was broken down on one side. It wasn’t an issue until the seas got rocky and he felt like he was going to slide out of bed. We rotated the mattress 180° and now, if he rolls, it will be against the wall.
My over the door shoe rack wouldn’t hang on the outside of the bathroom door, which is where we’ve had it on many, many cruises. I used four magnetic hooks and hung it on the wall at the end of a bed and we’ve decided we like it even better there.
Our cabin’s AC, toilet, sink stopper and faucet all work fine. We have seen a few buckets around, in the Horizon Court and also in the Vista Lounge where the AC was dripping water due to the high humidity we had in Mexico. And there was a large floor fan in our corridor a few days ago. We know what that means, but it was gone after a few days. Bottom line, this ship is in as good a condition as ships 10 and 15 years newer.
The WiFi has been passable. We don’t have a super high speed package and I’ve been unable to Zoom. I have Zoom sessions both of the next two days, so I’ll see if that was a one-off or a persistent issue. G has been streaming video successfully every night, so it’s not abysmal. But it would be nice if, for over $1000, we really were getting the “best internet at sea”. Actually, I’m just thrilled to be able to upload pics to this blog
The food has been good if not especially memorable. Princess knows that, and wants to charge extra for memorable. We don’t need memorable. We need decent, healthy meal options, and we have them.
But where this ship shines, and what keeps us returning to Princess time and time again, is its very friendly crew. We never encountered even one person who wasn’t a stand out. That’s notable even for a company with a reputation for having a great crew. I love how Captain Ravera thanks them, in every single announcement, for their efforts and shows them such respect.
We’re excited to be starting a further 28 nights on the ship, excited about the itinerary, and happy to be cruising with new friends we’ve met on board.
