Caribbean Princess Review

4 ladies, 1 cruise ship... a whole lot of fun!

Review for the Southern Caribbean Cruise on Caribbean Princess
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KrysyGT
First Time Cruiser • Age 40s

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Sail Date: Jan 2009

About us: 4 fun loving professional young women in our mid to late 20's from the New England area. We have one experienced cruiser who has never cruised Princess prior to this cruise, and 2 one cruise wonders, one of which has sailed Princess, the other not. And the last of our group had never cruised prior to this. We booked directly through Princess with no issues. Flights and pre-cruise we took care of on our own.

Pre Cruise: Jet Blue flight from Boston to San Juan Friday before the cruise. No problems what-so-ever, loved the extra roomy seats and the individual TV's. We flew in 1 day early and stayed at Da House in Old San Juan. Great place to stay, but don't expect to get to bed earlier than 3. The hotel is surrounded by clubs, and some rooms are very loud. Worked for us as we were out late the night before the cruise! The hotel is gorgeous, very artsy, almost what you would expect a hostel to be like, but very well taken care of, clean and beautifully appointed decor. Would love to stay there again, but not for any length of time unless you really couldn't care for sleeping much on the weekends. Rooftop hot tub was a surprise bonus with beautiful views of the city of Old San Juan. We self toured the city, making it to El Morro, and most of the shopping points. Lunched at - and dined at Barrachinas. Barrachinas never disappoints. Amazing Pina Colada's and food was fantastic. A little pricey, but still great!

Embarkation Day: Since the Caribbean Princess was just out of dry dock we were to embark at the Navy Frontier Pier. Seeing as we had spent a whole day in San Juan we figured to go straight to the ship to get settled and have lunch. Took a cab to the pier and arrived around noon. This is where the fun began. We arrived, turned in our baggage and went to check in only to be told that the ship was not going to be ready till 5pm for us to board, and that they would be busing everyone to the convention center to check in, for lunch and to wait. Arriving at the convention center, for us, check in was swift as we were early. We got return boarding tickets of #1, which meant we'd be the first group out of the convention center to the pier. We got right in line and got typical convention center food, fried chicken strips, burgers, hot dogs, soda, cookies etc. All free. Sat and watched a bit of a movie and then walked around outside. As 5 pm approached the convention center was very crowded, but most people seemed to be in good spirits. Staff began to line us up to go back to the pier in number order, however some people began paying taxis to take them back regardless of their number. Things from here turned a bit ugly as far as Embarkation goes. On arriving back to the pier, we discovered our #1's meant not much of anything as a line of several hundred swirled around the parking lot and it became a free for all. People began running off busses to clamor into line, some bus drivers would not let their passengers off which caused near mutiny on some busses including ours. People began to question the Princess reps who dodged the questions so well I was impressed that none could give a straight answer. Either that or they "went to speak to their supervisor" and never came back. We waited in line for 2 hours before we finally reached the inside to collect our room keys and board the ship. All in all, a SEVEN hour experience for embarkation. A bit much for anyone, and a wasted day of relaxation. All that was comped to us was a free glass of wine at dinner. A bottle would have been better :) **Later in the cruise did we find out the following information as we befriended some of the 50 or so contractors working on the ship: Caribbean Princess dry dock was scheduled for 3 weeks for what the contractors said was a MAJOR refit, and should have been much longer. They worked 24 hrs a day in 12 to 16 hr shifts to get the ship ready for us. On Saturday the ship was in no condition for passengers to board as rubbish was piled to the ceilings on almost every deck. The main priority was getting the casino done so it would at least be open on our cruise. All night and all Sunday was spent clearing the ship of debris and cleaning up what was told to me as a bloody nightmare. The crew wasn't even sure they were going to be able to get it done in time to board passengers at 5pm.

Cabin Review

Cabin FF

E518 - Obstructed View Ocean view. Right behind a lifeboat, we still got plenty of light in the room and could see a good amount. Away from any real public areas, though ocassionally you could hear music from one of the lounges in the evening. Nothing horrible though!

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