Caribbean Princess cruise - Day 2 of 7
Princess Cays, Bahamas
OK, so if you read yesterday's blog, you know that day #1 was a struggle. I can report that after a day of working out the kinks, nothing has gotten better. Wow.
The Caribbean Princess was launched in 2004 and based on appearances, nothing much has been done to it since. The sides are rusty with paint bubbled or missing and rust streaks all over the sides. Princess has not given this ship much love. A hand-washing sink in the buffet is broken, and one of the mid-ship elevators is broken. Today, we got stuck in an elevator. We got in and hit our floor. the door closed and nothing happened. We couldn't open the door. The alarm button didn't work. The emergency phone was taped into the box. Finally, someone on a higher floor called for an elevator and we moved.
Its stated capacity is 3,142 passengers and 1,200 crew. Based on what we are seeing, they are at full capacity and do not have nearly enough crew to handle the load. We have spent more time standing in line the last two days than we did for the entirety of the 163 days on Viking. It is actually sad. Here's a view of part of the line just to get a ticket for the tender to get to Princess Cays today.
Arlona waited in this line while I waited at Guest Services. Why you ask? MedallionNet. MedallionNet is Princess's wifi network and in simple terms, it doesn't work well. We regularly cannot connect to the internet. In addition, we can't get Princess's own online services on the ship to work. I had set up our onboard account with a credit card long before the cruise. I had listed Arlona as an authorized user, so we were all good to go. Once we got on the ship, all that went away, so nothing was set up. I tried to set it up again in the app, but it failed every time. Hence the visit to Guest Services. They took care of it, but still, it was a waste of my time. In addition, most of the features in the app just sat and spun. Not much worked. I had already rebooted my phone, uninstall the app, reinstalled the app, and logged back in, all to no avail. Guest Services had me do all that again and it mysteriously started working. Again, wow.
I mentioned getting tender tickets. Why? Unlike most of the other cruise lines that have dredged their private islands so they can dock, Princess did not. Therefore, we dropped anchor and had to be ferried to and from the island. Overall, a minor inconvenience, but certainly a step below Royal Caribbean, and Disney.
We ate breakfast in the buffet - that's where we discovered the broken sink, creating a bottleneck as everyone coming in needed to wash their hands.
Anyway, after eating and getting out tender tickets, we were off for a day on Princess Cays.
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| Caribbean Princess |
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| The photo doesn't do the water justice - the shades of green, turquoise, and blue were stunning |
We grabbed a couple of lounge chairs and headed out snorkeling. I didn't try to identify the types of fish. Suffice it to say that we saw a lot.
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| Check out the good-looking babe I was swimming with! |
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| It kind of looks like something from a spaceflight, doesn't it? |
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| Hey - there she is again! |
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| Does it look like we had fun? We did! |
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| This is after our first snorkel adventure - we took a break and then headed to the grill for chow. |
The following photo is what greeted us - three long lines to get food. It took nearly 20 minutes to get a plate. And, this is with just one ship at anchor today. Sometimes, they schedule more than one ship at the island. I can't imagine what that would be like.
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| I think Princess's new slogan should be: Lines - it's what your vacation is meant to be |
Arlona noticed something rather large flitting about. Moths! There were a bunch of these *huge* moths flying around near the food. They were quite something to see and pretty fascinating.
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| We guessed this one's wingspan at about five inches! |
After lunch, it was time for more snorkeling.
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| Check out that smile! |
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| The colors of the fish in the Caribbean always amaze me |
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| I think it was smiling at me |
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| A whole school of these went by |
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| A highlight was when this ray swam by |
After relaxing and having a drink, we headed back to catch a tender to the ship. Here's what greeted us.
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| Yes, that is a down, back, and down again cattle line to get a boat back to the ship - also interesting is that they ran you through a metal detector and x-rayed your bags, even though it is their private island |
We finally got through the line, got on a boat, and made the short trip back to the ship. The next step was a shower. Princess now ranks #1 for me. #1 in what? #1 in smallest showers. Our room, a balcony room, has the smallest shower of any cruise ship that I have ever been on. It is so small that I cannot bend over in the shower. I can barely turn around. I thought Carnival had small showers, but theirs look like conference rooms compared to this one. Anyway, we got in our showers, got dressed, and thought about dinner.
Our travel agent included one specialty restaurant dinner for us. We tried to book one in the app for any day we could, but couldn't book anything. I called the dining phone number at 4PM. It rang and rang and then turned to a recording that said they were closed and to call back between 8am and 5PM. I'm no clockmaker, but I'm pretty sure that 4PM is between 8AM and 5PM. I called Guest Services. They confirmed that there are no specialty restaurant reservations available FOR THE ENTIRE CRUISE! Seriously - every single reservation is booked for the whole cruise. In addition, there are no reservations available in the main restaurants either. So, the only options are to wait in line if anything is available in the main restaurants or eat in the buffet. What that tells me is that Princess seriously designed this ship so poorly that they cannot accommodate a full ship. Wow.
We went to dinner and waited to see if there were any openings. Luckily, there were two seats at an eight-person table We like meeting people so we joined the table. Overall, the evening was enjoyable, but the service was excruciatingly slow. We could not get anything to drink. It took 15 minutes or more in between courses. We eventually bailed on dinner before dessert as we wanted to catch the comedian tonight, Carlos Oscar. He was entertaining and the audience seemed to enjoy his comedy. The theater was packed.
After the show, we headed to the Explorer's Lounge to catch a game - Yes or No. The idea is that contestants are brought up and interviewed for up to three minutes. They cannot say "Yes" or "No" or any variations (Yeah, uh-huh, nope, naw, etc) for the entire interview. It is much harder than you might think and was fun to watch.
Bar watch (If the name is red, we have not yet been there. If it is green, we have sampled their wares.)
Good Spirits at a Sea
Vine Wine Bar
Crooners Bar
Grand Casino Bar
Wheelhouse Bar
Calypso Bar
Outriggers Bar
The Mix
Tradewinds Bar
The Reef Bar
Two bars on Princess Cays
After embarkation day and a full day, we are pretty firmly in the camp that this will be our first, and last Princess cruise. Service is lacking and the crew member's attitude shows that they don't really care as they are not customer-centric. The venues on the ship cannot accommodate the number of passengers on the ship. The technology on the ship simply doesn't work. The ship has some serious maintenance issues. We have yet to meet our cabin steward. Neither of us can remember a cruise where we haven't met the cabin steward on day #1.
Tomorrow is a day at sea. I will try to get some photos of the room and perhaps the ship. Let's see if tomorrow will change our perceptions. At this point, all signs point to "no". Does that mean that we aren't enjoying ourselves? Of course not. We find our own fun. It is just that Princess isn't participating.
