Personal Reflections of This Voyage to South America

• I loved the itinerary and the different ports of call, the languages, the wildlife, the variety of climate, and the views

• Really enjoyed the port lecturer Joe May he was very interesting and helpful, he was always approachable no matter where you saw him on board.  He is an asset to this ship and itinerary.  Now there is another lecturer Wesley Smith who we have sailed with before who as soon as I heard him on this trip I recognized him.  He has some interesting stuff to say but his very very right wing political message comes out in every lecture.  In fact a lot of people walk out of his lecture because of his comments.  He even had the never to say that the tree huggers are overreacting and their slanted views costs billions of dollars to Nicaragua and Costa Rica.  Needless to say I walked out of his lecture.  He really needs to keep his lectures free of his political views.

• The ship is beautiful and love sailing the Star and would not hesitate to sail on her again.  Things I love about this ship are the new layout of Horizon Court with the dessert/bread/toast section separate from the main food area and the layout of the tables, I love the extra pool at the back of the ship on deck 16.  Things I dislike about this ship:  hard to think of one but wish that the Wheelhouse was larger.

• Found both specialty restaurants to be lacking in staff and this affected the service in the five times we visited them.  Often it took a long time for wine to be refilled, orders to be taken, plates to be cleared.  The staff that were there were run off their feet so I believe it is just a lacking of another body or two.

• Crew on board were pretty much all great, we did encounter a few boutique staff that we thought were not very helpful and had to pursue things that should have been taken care of right away.  For example Bernie bought a $700 watch but they did not have the correct manual for him they said they would get one for him, but it took us having to visit the store on two separate occasions for them to agree to get us the manual.  I did buy a few other items in the stores and found the staff were very helpful and friendly if you talk with them only. 

• Restaurants, food has been very good on board, not as good as it use to be – but I have found this to be true in the last few sailings we have done.  Now don’t get me wrong, I always found something to eat and it was always presented beautiful but the downside is I still find the foods overly salty (maybe it is just me) and often food in Horizon Court is just warm, and forget getting hot toast anywhere.  But overall the dining room food was very good.  Again staff appear to be understaffed and are run off their feet when the dining room is full.  And even when the dining room is not full service is lacking by some wait staff and then great with others.  When you find a good waiter stick with them.

• We did have incidents of Norwalk like viruses on board near the end of the first leg and right away the ship put in place measure to combat the spread of the virus.  We no longer had butter, rolls, salt, pepper, sugar, cream, on the tables and the staff handed out utensils rolled in napkins in the horizon court.  Tongs in the buffet are changed constantly.  Crew are constantly sanitizing areas throughout the ship, railings, walls, chairs, slot machines, photo gallery, computers, you name it.  Drink menus on all the tables have been removed, but you can still ask for one and they will hand you one and then sanitize it afterwards.  The big dining room sales like the Bijoux sale have been cancelled and the Chef’s table has been delayed until the alert has been lifted.  Hand washing is the best thing to combat the virus.  Hand sanitizers are all over the ship too and are a good alternative. It is a lot more work for the crew and dining room service takes longer. 

• I have to say that Captain Perrin has been the best Captain we have ever sailed with.  He faced a lot of obstacles this cruise with Ushuaia and then Lima, but his professionalism and his constant updates were appreciated.

• Room service is a nice treat and find the service very quick and efficient but often find we get more than we actually ordered, like two sandwiches when we ordered only one. 

• Since I used the doctor’s services twice on this voyage I can report that they have been very efficient and helpful and very professional.

• Haven’t taken advantage of the spa services on board, sometimes I do but this voyage I just haven’t felt like doing any services.  I have been to the sauna and steam room.  It was very nice but is in need of a face lift as many items in the sauna are worn down, broken, or missing.

• Mae our cabin steward is out of this world, she is so efficient and any request we have had has been met.  She is quiet and is hardly seen but that is what makes a great steward.

• I would like to commend Dou from South Africa, the head waiter from Amafi who has been so sweet and helpful and a joy to know.  It is so nice to see him and he is always so happy and helpful I know he is a definite asset to Princess.

• We love how diverse some of the activities have been on this voyage that we have never seen before – Kudos to Sami and her cruise director team – egg drop contest, whacky speed games, radio call in show, speed chest tournament, Sundowners Club (gather for drinks to toast the sunset), and a variety of other things.

 I would do this trip again in a heart beat

Two Glorious Sea Days

Captain Perrin with us at the Cruise Critic gathering

I have to say that as much as I love to travel and see the ports the best days are the sea days.  They say you are a true cruisers when you look at itineraries and pick the ones with more sea days. 

We have just had two port days and both were busy and now we have two days to relax, sleep in, read, enjoy coffee with friends, meals, drinks and overall just whatever we want.

We wake to beautiful hot weather, from now on we are in for hot temps and you have almost forgotten the colder temps at the bottom of the earth when we rounded the horn.

lots of turtles were seen from the ship

Bernie is up and he heads off to get me a latte and his tea and we relax in the cabin.  I head up around 9 am to get some fruit and a bagel.  Normally I love plain yoghurt on my mixed fruit but the yoghurt they are currently getting is from Chile and very runny.  So I only use a small amount on the fruit.

Today is our second meet and greet for cruise critic and the place is busy, I would estimate the numbers at around 200 and once again the officers attended.  It was nice to put faces to names and to reconnect with people we met on the first leg but haven’t seen much of. 

I decided to join Bernie’s team in the cruise long speed trivia contest, each sea day they will hold a session and for this ship it is usually at 12:15 in the Vista Lounge.  I feel we did very well (later found out we got 9 out of 10).

The sun is calling and we head back to the cabin to put on our swimsuits and lots of sunscreen – don’t forget the sunscreen, and make sure you slather it on everywhere and reapply cause a few people forgot and we had walking lobsters during formal night tonight.

I grab two slices of pizza and enjoy a little vitamin D.  It is warm, and the pool at the back up on deck 16 is very warm, almost like a Jacuzzi, so I head to the pool that is right down behind the Horizon Court on deck 14 and it is freezing.  No idea why such a different temperature for both, both are shaded because of skywalkers.

We last for about 2.5 hours and head back to the cabin where Bernie, Jerry and Craig are laughing on the deck and talking Vodka and the attributes of good Vodka so out come the glasses and they are sampling.  Us more civilized women head down to afternoon tea, which is the first one I have attended on board.  Love those scones!

Just as I am heading out of the dining room I run into Ernest and we sit out on the Promenade and chat, we had been chatting on facebook but we hadn’t had really met or chatted on board yet.  We had a great conversation and made arrangements for us all to have dinner together tomorrow.

Tonight we are heading back to Sabatinis for dinner.  Jan and Michael promised us dinner tonight we have a table for five at 8:30 but we work it out by heading for drinks in Alice’s cabin for 7:30.  Jan and Michael join us  and we have a great visit and we had a lovely view of the almost full moon shining down between the clouds onto the water, very pretty.

We arrive promptly at 8:30 and are sat rather quickly.  There are two other large tables and maybe two other tables of two and us.  We brought a bottle of champagne and a bottle of red wine but we have to wait as the staff are too busy.  We remind them about our bottles and wanting champagne first and I would estimate we got our glasses poured about 15 minutes after sitting down.

I went with the lobster again but just want the Risotto not the tail and they give a nice big bowl of lobster Risotto and I am happy.  The meal was very good, the company was great, but once again service in the specialty restaurants (our fourth time) is lacking.  They are just short staffed and they really need at least one more waiter.  We will not be going back to Sabatinis this voyage because of it.

We roll out of the restaurant feeling really no pain… and wander the ship for a bit.  There is a comedian but we are too late – his name is Al Brown.

We hit the hay.

Second Sea day and we both have a rough night, too much wine, too much food and this lovely cold but we don’t have to rush and we are slow to get moving.

I make it down to the Suduko Challenge at 9:30.  Meghan is hosting it, there are a lot more people participating this time and the puzzle she gives us is hard.  Only one person finished it.

I head off to find a quiet place to read and relax but seems every place I find ends up being noisy.  I end up outside Explorer’s Lounge with Bernie until he goes to trivia there.  I venture to the Vista Lounge and relax and finish my book and start another one – love my Kindle.

Speed Trivia again and we try our best will find out tonight how we are doing.

I want more sun so I head forward this time just above the Sanctuary Pool.  It is quiet but sadly one thing I dislike about this ship is the noise coming from the main pool spreads and forget about having tranquility in the Sanctuary cause all you hear is the band and the pool games.  But my Ipod gets rid of that and I enjoy the sun for about an hour and a half before heading back to the cabin with a light lunch and some more reading on the balcony.

But I can’t keep my eyes open, little sleep the night before is causing me to head in and take a nap and I now feel refreshed and ready to take on the night.

We are having dinner with friends tonight at 8 pm and we meet up in Vines prior for a glass of wine.  Dinner was very good, I had the strawberry cold soup with the scallops as my entrée with the grapefruit tart for dessert with a lovely Pinot Gringos to drink. 

After dinner we wander a bit and head to the show Los Gauchos that was shown last voyage but we didn’t get to see so we check out the 10:15 showing.  We have seen them before on a Caribbean voyage but didn’t see the whole act.  It was quite good, funny and loved the audience participation.

We are off to bed Lima is our stop tomorrow.