We woke up early and we were both very excited. After showering, a quick breakfast, we packed
up, cleaned up a bit and we were on our way.
The tram arrived right when we got there and a five minute
ride later we were at the station.
We board an earlier train that what we had planned (half
hour earlier) but it goes to Civitavecchia too. The total cost was 12 e for the both of us.
We arrive at 11:07 am and what is great is our train stops
on the track right by the road, so no lugging the bag down the stairs and under
the track and then back up.
There is a bus right there that will take you to the port if
you wish. But for us we are going to
walk and get something to eat.
We stop at a nice restaurant right on the water and enjoy a
pizza.
In the end we arrived at the port gate at 12 noon. Here you have to take a shuttle to the ship.
You can walk but trust me this port is very deceiving. It is a true maze and the ships are quite a
distance away.
So we wait about 20 minutes for a bus to arrive and then we
load up and it takes about 10 minutes just to get to the ship.
But once we arrive at the ship it takes no time at all. Apparently there were 800 in transit staying
on for the crossing so that may explain why the check in was so darn easy. In fact I think it was the fastest check ins
in a long time.
Also the port building is stunning. It is not the port building that we have
usually used. This is brand new, very
modern and the flow works. The last time
we check in at basically a shed, and last year we returned to the same shed
building.
Well we are on board the ship. And this is where everything feels odd. It is not crazy. I can actually get an elevator. That is not normal for embarkation day. The Horizon Court is not a zoo, the
International café has seats in it. Even
our luggage arrived within two hours.
WHAT – oh Princess you are spoiling me!
Muster Drill is in the Princess Theater and they lead us in
and lead us down the stairs to take up a seat.
We know that they want us to fill up rows and not leave spaces from past
experience but today it Is very hap hazard.
Lots of empty rows and the staff seem to have trouble controlling the
passengers. But I will add that these
passengers are not the “normal” passengers.
What do I mean by that?
Well almost 95% are past passengers and we have been told there are over
1800 Platinum and Elite alone. And a
heck of a lot of high end elite passengers.
The Platinum Elite Lounge is being held in Club Fusion from
5-7 every night. There will be four
Captain Circle Parties and even on the nights of the party they will be holding
the Elite Lounge but up in Skywalkers.
That is impressive.
Oh and I got to see Deb and Al of Debs Crafting blog. Nice to catch up with her again. We first met on the Caribbean in August and
her cruising style is just like us. We
so love how great they are with the crew as well, they sure deserve it.
Tonight we actually dined in the dining room. OH and the new dining times have not gone into
effect this voyage. However they are
changing to the new times starting November 17 for the first Caribbean cruise.
Also Juan and Victor are on board too – another couple we
met on the Caribbean.
We ended up buying the wine package – the Silver 10 bottles
and we started with getting four bottles delivered to the cabin. If you want to read more about the wine
package I have a great blog all about it that I will link to later.
I will blog but not like I have in the past. This trip I have a lot of work to do with the
Port Lectures and the 250 minutes we each get will need to be saved for some
research when necessary. So I will try
and write off line and post quickly to the blog but I will not be proofing and
adding pictures and links at this time.
Once I get home I will go back an update.
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