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Published: June 24th 2008
The Grand Princess
A truly grand ship. The Skywalker Lounge that I talked about is on the very upper right--deck 17.Life on the ship is pretty much luxury. And that is what we experienced. The Grand Princess is truly grand. It seems to lack for nothing.
I guess that if I'm going to talk about life on the ship, I need to start in the morning. I mostly just know what I did but others did join me.
My normal routine is to get up early and go to the gym. I go to the gym for spinning at 5:30 a.m. before I get ready for school. Keeping that same kind of schedule seemed like a good thing to do but on the ship, the gym did not open until 7 a.m. so that those with staterooms below could sleep in just a little. So getting up at 5 was not necessary--thank goodness!! So I got up to be at the gym by 7 a.m.
Each evening before retiring, Pam and I left a room service order for melon, orange slices and coffee for 6:30 so that we could get to the gym at 7. We also set an alarm but it never went off. Room service was so very prompt and efficient. Our room service guy was
Sunrise from the ship
A reason to have a balcony or at least a room with a view. there 5 to 10 minutes before we had ordered it. They were never late!! I think this is absolutely amazing. With 2100 people on the ship, you would think they would be late at least one morning. They were great!!
Linda G, Pam and I got up most mornings and went to morning stretch with James. He is a trainer from England and led us in a great morning stetch which got the blood flowing. The gym was wonderful with 2 trainers, several weight machines, lots of weights, and many cardio machines. It was great to use the machines and watch the ship pull into a port or sail along on the high seas. Several mornings after stretch, we would use the cardio machines for 30 or so minutes before heading to the buffet for breakfast on the Lido.
Trying to stay as fit as possible, using the elevators was verbotin!!! We made a pact to use only stairs to get from one deck to the other. This was a good thing but sometimes I asked myself, "And I promised this why???" We lived on deck 10. The gym was on deck 15. Thank goodness that the whole
Just the girls!!
Here we are on the famous balcony of Linda and Tom. From l - r: Kathy, Linda G., me, Linda C., Deanie, Pam & Vicki. world believes in superstitions. There was no deck 13. It was only 4 double flights of stairs to get to the gym in the morning. It was a good warm up activity. It was always a treat to have to go downstairs to get somewhere. But then, you had to go up to get home!!! I know this burned several calories and helped with the overall fitness level.
I never did really learn the ship so that I could find my way around. I guess I am a really slow learner. Twelve days was not enough. Still on the last day of the cruise, I had to stop and try to find where I was headed. It is good that on each level at the staircases, they have a diagram of the ship. If you know where you want to go, you can look at the map and reorient yourself if you are headed in the wrong direction. Level 7, the Promenade is the only deck that traverses the entire length of the ship. You do have to wind your way through several attractions: photoshop, bars, boutiques, the chapel and on to the Princess Theatre. Amazing what they can
All but Tom
Besides the girls--l-r: Bob, Jerry & Steve in front. cram into one ship. The theatre was a huge auditorium with Vegas style performances.
In the afternoons, if we were back from a tour or just on sea days, we enjoyed going to play trivia in the Explorers Lounge. We did pretty well, but never won. We did meet lots of people and have a good time writing down the questions and then asking our dinner mates to answer them. There were many, many other activities planned for those who wanted to take advantage of them. There were cards a & games, ping pong tournaments, shuffle board, line dance and other dance lessons. There was something to do all of the time. One of our favorite things to do was to sit on the Lido deck, outside the Horizon Buffett and within reach of the hot dog, hamburger and pizza grill. There were always waiters around to bring drinks so you could relax forever. (Check out the photos.)
There were two days that were "at sea" days. There was no port so no tour. These days the activities are over abundant. There were health lectures, tours of the galley and backstage with the entertainers. These are very well
An Afternoon Snack
All the pizza you could eat whenever you wanted it. Is that a good thing??? attended activities. The favorite thing I did on the first sea day was to get a massage in the Lotus Spa. It was a deep tissue massage and oh so wonderful. Glad it was downstairs to the room from there after that was over!!
Another thing about the "at seas" days is they are the formal nights for dining. Everyone dresses up in all their fancy attire. Many people went really overboard, but being from Arizona being really dressed up and fancy is putting on a higher heel and maybe a little more makeup with a coverup. It is kind of nice to dress up a little fancier but it was not my favorite part. I am a little laid back desert rat at heart. One of the formal nights is when we attended the captain's cocktail party. (See photo)
If you can't tell from what I've said, I truly do love cruising. I love seeing many different countries and places and not have to schlep my luggage from room to room and onto and off of transportation. Having a hotel accompany me on my journey is wonderful. What is frustrating and you can probably tell from my
Wonderful Decorations
The dolphins playing by one of the many pools. blogs is the amount of time you are able to spend in each port. I would have loved to have spent more time in most of the places we visited.
I hope that you will check back because I am hoping that others from my group will send better photos of life on the ship. I know that Steve took a picture of all of us on the first formal night and I hope it turned out good. I hope he also took some from other vantage points on the ship. I would like to show you some balcony shots. I guess I should have taken my camera to the balcony of Tom and Linda. The infamous pre-dinner cocktail location!!
So when you read this, send them on gang. (Thank you Steve for sending me photos to add.)
More later, I hope.
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Mary
non-member comment
What a Great Ship!
Wow! I am so impressed with the ship! Sounds like being on board was as great as being in port, maybe even better in some cases. I don't think you were the only one who never learned their way around. When I went on a 7 day cruise on a boat much smaller than yours, I never learned either. Glad you had a great cruising experience.