A lot of changes with Princess, and not for the good
Sapphire Princess Cruise Review to South America
17 Night Andes & South America (Los Angeles To Santiago)
Sail date: December 02, 2022
Ship: Sapphire Princess
Cabin type: Balcony
Cabin number: C300
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 1 year ago
Review summary
Elite members no longer have 250 free minutes of Internet. Instead they give you half off of an Internet package. In other words you are now forced to buy a package if you want to have any access to the Internet. In the past I used to use my 250 and my wife’s 250 (500 total) to get a thru a week of our Internet needs. Now I have to pay extra. And for what? The Internet stunk. Very, very, very slow, but that is to be expected when you have download speeds of 1.5meg and 2,000 people accessing the line. And everyone is trying to send pictures back home! Guest services. In the past guest services always had 2 lines, one for Suites and Elites, and the other for everyone else. If you were in the elite line, anyone of the 6 or so guest services reps would call on you, making it quite fast to get your issues resolved. Not anymore! Now there is a person at the end of the counter with a sign that says suites and elites, and he’s the only one handling it. All the other reps handle everyone else. There are no queuing lines so it’s a real cluster F as to who will get called on. Bottom line don’t get in the elite line as it’s the slowest moving. Wine: Previously on trips longer than 7 days, in addition to the full booze package, Princess offered discounted bottles of wine. They offered like 7, 9, 11 or 14 or more bottles. It averaged out to around $20 per bottle and you could select bottles from the menu, up to $30. There were typically at least 3 whites and 3 reds. If you saw a $35 bottle that you wanted to try, you just paid the extra $5 (or any price of $30). NOT ANY MORE! I was really planning on this for our trip to Antarctica because I’m not going to buy a 33 day booze package for over $2,100, but Princess no longer offers this. Booze package only, take it or leave it. And now if you just want to buy a bottle of wine, the cheapest red or white I could find on the menu was $40. That’s for Canyon Road which sells for $6.79 at Total Wines. You would be far better off buying a case and paying the $15 corking fee on each bottle! Television: Only a few channels available but much better than in the past. In the past pretty much the only news you could get was via BBC. On this cruise we had MSNBC, CNBC and Fox, and so I was very happy with that. They also had a number of good movies on demand.Embarkation
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
Onboard Activities
Entertainment
Children's Programs
Service and Staff
Ship Quality
Cabin / Stateroom
Ship tip
the Medallion app. Probably one of the worst I’ve had to work with. • Click on Journey and 9 out of 10 times the app freezes, can’t do a thing but force a stop on it. • Making restaurant reservations works ok if you do it way ahead, but wait too long and you can’t get a table for 2, your choice is only sharing. • Once you open the app you can’t close it. Back arrow in Android does nothing. • Elite members get half off Internet, but don’t wait till you get on board, if you do, it flips to full price. • The really big kicker about this app, Princess now wants you to do everything through the app, but you can only see your current reservation, nothing in the future. For me, I have another cruise after my current one that’s a couple months out, but here I am on ship and cannot start booking restaurants, Internet, etc. Imagine if you’re doing back to back cruises, you’re basically screwed.
Ports of call
San Pedro (Los Angeles), California
Ushuaia, Tierra Del Fuego, Argentina
Port Stanley, Falkland Islands