We had never cruised in Asia and my husband was a little leery of taking this cruise. But then he did a complete turnaround and decided we had to do it. We loved the cruise itself and our destination port. Beijing we were not enthralled with. Not a beautiful city. Too many people. Crazy drivers. Our Marriott hotel had hardly anyone working there who could speak English. However we were glad we got ...
After a few days in Beijing at the Grand Mercure (very nice quiet room and great buffet breakfast) and a transfer to the port (Both not booked with Princess) we were onboard without too much waiting and straight to our cabin, which was clean and comfortable with and excellent steward, The following day we had our CC meet and greet so were able to arrange several trips ashore with fellow ...
I have recently returned from the Grand Asia tour from Beijing to Singapore. After a tiring day embarking we were informed that our ship would not be calling at Nagasaki or Shanghai due to super cyclone Yongpong heading in south of Japan. After initial disappointment we realised it is better to be safe than sorry, Later in the cruise after rounding a corner off Taiwan we had a small taste of what ...
We boarded in Tianjin on Friday May 03 without problems and the cruise through China, South Korea and Japan was very enjoyable in calm conditions with fine warm weather. The ports visited were Dalian (China) Busan (Sth Korea) Osaka and Yokohama (Japan) The only Princess excursion we took was a Temple and Market one at Busan and this was not well run and ended up at the famed ? Fish Market. Really ...
Stayed 2 nights pre curise at the Mariott City Wall Beijing, lovely hotel. Did Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City and Great Wall at Mutiyanu all the same day. On reflection we probably should have stayed an extra night, doing the Square, Forbidden City, etc on one day and the Great Wall the next day giving us more time at the Wall.
Tianjin the port for Beijing is about a 2.5 hour coach journey. We ...
What a fantastic experience! Flew Heathrow - Beijing on KLM, via Amsterdam - excellent service and comfortable-ish for long haul cattle class. In Beijing, stayed at the Marriott City walls, which was lovely, although the food was poor value. Princess offered us several trips, which we took, as they seemed good value (I have reviewed the trips separately on Trip Advisor if you are interested.) ...
EMBARKATION & DISEMBARKATION Princess deserve a gold star for the smooth embarkation and disembarkation -- we received an email when we were in Beijing before the cruise advising that embarkation had been delayed until 6pm rather than the 12 noon as planned. We were able to alter our travel arrangements (bullet train) and arrived at the port at approximately 5.45pm -- it was so easy to check in, ...
The princess package included flights from the UK, 1 night pre and post cruise hotel in Beijing and Bangkok. The excellent ports of call and a reasonable price attracted us to this cruise. We added a further 2 nights hotel in Beijing, and wish we had done the same in Bangkok!
The Doubletree in Beijing was great. Nice room and good facilities. It was easy to get around Beijing using ...
Asia was our next destination after cruising/vacations to Europe/Mediterranean and Middle East. We chose Princess based on a successful Baltic cruise on the Crown Princess. We chose to use Princess Air, Princess Pre/Post Hotels/Tours/transfers except for and extra night on our own at the Beijing Marriott City Wall Hotel which we had to make on our own since Princess could not accommodate us ...
Asia was our next destination after cruising/vacations to Europe/Mediterranean and Middle East. We chose Princess based on a successful Baltic cruise on the Crown Princess. We chose to use Princess Air, Princess Pre/Post Hotels/Tours/transfers except for and extra night on our own at the Beijing Marriott City Wall Hotel which we had to make on our own since Princess could not accommodate us ...