If you have never been to a cruise with Princess Cruises, you miss out a chance to get pampered like a Princess.
(image credit to USA Today. This is a picture of Regal Princess from an article posted in USA Today)
Let us look at the joy of cruising with Princess Cruises.
Introduction to Princess Cruises (Princess.com)
Princess Cruises is one of the cruise lines belongs to the largest cruise company, Carnival Corporation & plc, in the world.
Carnival Corporation & plc is a listed company listed in both New York Stock Exchange and London Stock Exchange. You can view the home page of Carnival Corporation here.
If you are a shareholder of the company, you can get free money to spend on board all the cruise ships operated by the ten cruise lines, including Princess Cruise. This free money ranges from $50 to $250 per cabin.
That means if you and your spouse book a room, and you are a shareholder, you can get at most $250 to spend in shore excursion, spa, wine, and other luxuries on board the cruise ship.
Since the money is not refundable, you will have to spend it away.
Princess Cruise has a long history of serving passionate cruiser. It started in 1965, and it has been growing bigger and bigger for the last 51 years.
When it was celebrating its 50 years anniversary in 2015, it held a great promotion. We get free money to spend, and the gratuities are fully paid for.
The cruise ships of Princess Cruises
As of today, Princess Cruises has a total of 17 ships as of today.
The ships are Coral Princess, Caribbean Princess, Crown Princess, Diamond Princess, Dawn Princess, Emerald Princess, Golden Princess, Grand Princess, Island Princess, Pacific Princess, Royal Princess, Regal Princess, Ruby Princess, Sapphire Princess. Sun Princess, Sea Princess, and Star Princess.
There will be one new ship christened as Majestic Princess joining the fleet soon. It is especially built to cater to the huge Asia market, in particular the China market. The Chinese name for Majestic Princess is 盛世公主号 (Shèng Shì Gōng Zhǔ Haò). It basically means Princess of the Grand Spirit. I guess the Chinese travelers will feel like a very grand princess on board this new and big ship.
The smallest ship is Pacific Princess. It can accommodation only 672 guests and 375 crew members.
Even though a thousand people on board a single cruise ship sounds like a lot, it is considered as very little in this era of cruising. Someone has said that it is like a 5 stars country inn!
As of today, the newest ship is Regal Princess.
Regal Princess has the capacity to hold 3500 guests and about 1350 crew. That means when the cruise is at full capacity, there is a total of 4850 people on board the cruise ship.
(image credit to USA Today)
The special feature of Regal Princess is the Skywalk. In fact, this is a feature of both Royal Princess and Regal Princess.
You can take a walk on this covered glass platform, and you will look down into the deep blue sea.
(credit image to Cruisemaven.com)
Regal Princess has the largest atrium among the 17 princess ships.
It sure makes you feel like a princess as you walk down the stairs to welcome your guests.
Activities on board Princess Cruises
Many people who have never been on board a cruise think that they will get bored if they go on a cruise ship.
That is not so.
(image credit to Princess.com - you can download the complete version here http://www.princess.com/downloads/pdf/Onboard_Experience/Princess_Patter.pdf)
Princess Cruises have more than 50 years of experience in exceeding the expectation of a guest.
Princess will provide a Princess Patter to you every evening. This highlights the activities plan for the next day.
You can choose to join any of the activities. Those who are active can go for a golf game, basketball tournament, water volleyball, and they can workout in the gym anytime they want.
Those who are not that active can watch a movie under the star or in the air-conditioned theatre. They can go to various venues to listen to the performance of live orchestra or singers.
(image credit to USA Today)
(image credit to USA Today)
For those who like to enjoy the comfort of their cabin, they can call room service anytime for breakfast, lunch, dinner, coffee, tea, fruits, and whatever they fancy provided that the food items are in the menu.
The room service is free of charge, unless you order wine or food items that have a low covered charge.
An afternoon spent just lazing on the deck chair and watching the sea is another great way of relaxation.
(image credit to USA Today)
Many people take an afternoon nap in this way.
To be frank, most cruise itineraries do not allow you too much time to spend on board the ship.
The cruise ship will reach a destination around 7 am or 8 am, and it will sail around 5 pm or 6 pm.
(image credit to www.cntraveler.com)
You will have to get ready to go for your day tour booked with Princess Cruise or your own independent trip. By the time you get back to the ship, you will head to the restaurants for your dinner, and after that, a warm shower before you head to the theatre for live performance.
When you finally go to bed, you will sleep very soundly and you will wake up to see that the ship has reached the next destination.
Princess Cruises Itineraries
Princess Cruises cater for all the needs of the travelers.
Some people like to go for frequent short cruises near their hometown, and some people have time for a few months of travelling round the world.
As a result, Princess Cruises let you book anything from 1 night cruise to 102 nights cruise.
How do you find a cruise on Princess Cruises?
(image credit to Princess.com)
1. You open the browser, and type in Princess.com
2. There is a Find a Cruise feature which is visible (without scrolling down). You select either or all of the selections (Month/year, Destination, Departure/ending port and cruise length)
3. Once you make the selection, you will see a list of itineraries displayed together with the current price.
4. The total price you pay is the additional of the fare plus taxes. These are converted to your local currency. However, there is an additional gratuity paid to the crew which is based on US currency.
(image credit to Princess.com)
How to book a cruise
Once you have decided on a cruise itinerary, you can click on the Find a Travel Agent to book the cruise.
Princess Cruises has a list of authorized travel agents in a given country.
You can book the cruise with the authorized travel agent years in advance since Princess Cruises already plan for cruises up to 2018.
What are the advantages of booking early?
For one thing, cancellation is free if you are still many days away from the sailing date.
If for some reasons, you want to cancel, you can do so and get back your deposit in full.
Another reason is that the pricing changes from month to month.
Assuming that you have booked a cruise for 2017 at the the price of $2000 per person. A few months later Princess Cruises may run a promotion that reduces the price to $1600 per person, and give you free money known as onboard credit of $200 per person.
In this case, you just call the travel agent, and ask them to cancel your booking, and re-book at the new and reduced price.
You can get the same cabin that you want. Many cruisers book early because they want a particular cabin with great views.
Princess Cruises Loyal Program
Princess Cruises take care of all its passengers.
When you have traveled once with Princess Cruises, it will automatically enroll you in its Loyal Program known as Captain’s Circle.
You will get priority for boarding on your next cruise, and you are likely to pay lesser as a loyal member.
When Princess Cruises run certain promotions, it may give you extra free money to spend onboard the cruise. Perhaps you will get $50 more than the non-members.
There was a moving story about Lorraine Arzt. At the point of her death, she had sailed more than 5000 days with Princess Cruises.
