Crown Princess Review

Finally saw some Fall Colors

Review for Canada & New England Cruise on Crown Princess
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PapaSchmoops
10+ Cruises • Age 70s

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Sail Date: Oct 2011
Cabin: Balcony

I am Platinum with Princess. I was on the 4 Oct New York-to-Quebec sailing on the Crown Princess. This was our second time on this itinerary on Princess - the first time (four years ago on the Grand Princess) we were too early in the season and this time we thought we were, too, until we got to Quebec. The Ile de Orleans was awash in color! And the road was like a tunnel through a canvas of orange and yellow. We stayed over one night at the Chateau Frontenac and rented a car the next day to drive back out to the Ile de Orleans and take photos at our leisure.

Itinerary. The overall itinerary was great, but VERY port intensive. Although I am not a fan of sea days, it is nice to have an occasional break in the port sequence. In my mind, you could skip Sydney and not miss anything. As it was, there were seven straight days of port visits, which was a little much. Plus, three of those ports were tender ports. In a ship the size of Crown Princess, tender operations are sometimes hectic (especially if there are any delays upon arrival), so the fewer tender ports the better. An unexpected bonus on this cruise was, no rain for EIGHT days, unseasonably warm weather in Canada (e.g., 80 deg in Halifax), and no storms/extremely high winds. All cruises should be like that!

Dining. This was our first experience with Anytime dining. We do not like eating early - we want to enjoy as much of the day ashore as possible and not have to either rush back to the ship for early seating or not have a chance to relax and shower before having dinner. We ended up eating about 7:30 most nights and unfortunately, it was a "tweener" time as the ship's evening activities are oriented toward the formal seating times. Although on past cruises we have had some "difficult" table partners at second seating, I would take that over constantly getting to know somebody new at your table.

Cabin Review

Balcony

Cabin B4

Bad location. Can't see anything from the balcony except what is dead astern. LOTS of walking no matter where you went on the ship and since the gangways/tender pontoons were all the way forward, there was even more walking to leave the ship. Mobility impaired people should NOT book this cabin. Otherwise, the room was a standard balcony, except that it was rotated 90 deg. This means that in heavy seas your head and feet are rolling athwartships, which could be uncomfortable for motion sensitive folks.

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