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16 Day Moroccan Passage Cruise

Ft. Lauderdale, Florida to Southampton, England
March 12 - 28, 2022
Sky Princess

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If in this report you see any typos, misspellings, factual errors or other types of errors, please let me know. Please include the web address (URL) of the report in which you found the error. Thank you! Send your email to:

Bad News

Internet Problems

Barbara and I have been on three prior Princess cruises. Unfortunately, this was absolutely the worst of all of them. Even worse than the 28 Day Round Australia Cruise on the Sea Princess that was terminated on Day 8 due to the cruising suspension. All 3 of our prior cruises on Princess were wonderful, even the one that was terminated only 8 days into the 28 day cruise. We've enjoyed some things on this cruise, but if I had to pick one cruise that was the worst of all our cruises on Princess, this would be it.

On all 3 of our prior Princess cruises, we had very good internet service during the entire cruise. On our most recent two cruises prior to this one, the ships had the new high-speed MedallionNet. I found it to be quite fast. Maybe not as fast as the highest speed home cable or fiber internet offered, but it was faster than the old DSL service, and way way faster than the old dial-up internet, and magnitudes faster and cheaper than the internet that used to be offered on cruise ships.

On the prior two Princes cruises with MedallionNet, it was so fast that we were able to stream movies and live TV shows on our mobile phones and notebook computers. I was also able to upload all of my large file full size photos and even the video clips that I recorded on those cruises. MedallionNet uses a relatively new constallation of lower earth orbit satellites that have tremendous bandwidth making ship internet both fast and cheap. Princess only charges a flat $10 per day per person, but is often included at no extra cost in many cruise packages, as it was on this cruise. For an extra $10 per day you can upgrade to a 4-device package that will allow you to keep 2 mobile phones and 2 notebook computers connected all the time without switching from one to another.

When we were on the Carnival Splendor 28 Day repositioning cruise from Los Angeles to Singapore, they installed one of these new high-speed satellite systems just before our cruise departed. This new system provided us with great internet for our 28 day cruise. During the almost 2 years cruisig was suspended, Princess upgraded all of their cruise ships to the new high-speed MedallionNet.

Princess cruise ships also feature the MedallionNet App. On our prior cruises, we were able to do everything from this App. We could make dinner reservations, book shore excursions, look at all the events of the day including bookmarking the ones we'd like to attend, look at a map of the ship and get directions to any location on the ship, look at our account status, and much much more.

But on this cruise, there was a serious problem with the internet. It basically didn't work at all. Once in a great while it a delayed text message or email might get through. But trying to compose or reply to a text or email seldom would get sent. It was impossible to bring up any web pages or click on any links in an email. So, basically, there was no internet. Even when the ship was in port, the internet was very poor or non-existent.

Because of this, they refunded everyone the cost of the internet for the entire cruise, including the 4-device upgrade that I had paid extra for. They even refunded $10 per day per passenger to everyone that had the internet included in their cruise package as a complimentary benefit at no cost.

The problem with this is one of the major reasons we picked this cruise is that we knew we would be at sea for the first six days and had planned to spend that time completing a lot of projects that we had pending on the internet. But with no internet for these six sea days, which turned into eight sea days when we skipped our first port stop. Other than going to live music at night, wine tastings, and shore excursions, we usually don't do much on a cruise. Thus, those eight sea days without internet put us way behind on projects we had planned to catch up on.

Even on our 28 Day TransPacific Cruise from Los Angeles to Singapore where we spent most of the time way out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, we still had excellent internet. We did two prior TransAtlantic cruises, one on the Queen Mary 2 and one on the Carnival Horizon, and did not have a problem with the internet. So we had no expectation of problems with the internet on this cruise, especially knowing it had the new high-speed MedallionNet.

Medallion App Problems

The internet was not the only technology on this ship that was not working properly. Most of the functionality of the Medallion App was also not working. This was not just on the Medallion App on our mobile phones, but also the features on the TV in every cabin, and on the special display boards around the ship. All the Medallion features throughout the ship were not working properly.

We could not bring up the map of the ship on our Medallion App, we could not book dinner reservations, we could not book shore excursions, and we could not view the events of the day on the App. This was very frustrating as all the instructions on the ship said to use our Medallion App for these functions. You could sometimes book dinner reservations or purchase shore excursions via the in cabin TV, but not always. You could sometimes see the menus on the in cabin TV, but not always, and never on the Medallion App. Sometimes when you made a dinner reservation on the TV, they'd have no record of it when you got to the dining room. Maybe most important, you could not check the status of your account on the Medallion App nor on the TV. You had to go to Guest Services to get a printout of your account status.

For the most part, the ship had gone paperless. So without a functioning Medallion App, a lot of information was not conveniently available. Fortunately, before the cruise, we had requested that a paper copy of the "Princess Patter" be delivered to our cabin each evening. We did not request any other paper flyers be delivered to our cabin, so we got no announcements about shopping sales, Effy jewelry sales, Spa specials, or any other promotions.

Since BOTH the internet and all Medallion based technology was having problems on this cruise, I suspect the source of the problem was something with the computers on this particular ship. I don't think it was a problem with the capability of the MedallionNet high-speed internet technology. It has worked perfectly on all our prior Princess cruises. I think there is something really screwed up with the computer systems on this ship blocking both the internet and Medallion features from working properly. Almost all the Medallion features have no need for an external connection to the internet. Dinner reservations, shore excursion bookings, viewing menus and a map of the ship, are all provided from the onboard ship computer servers. They don't need an internet connection to work properly. So even if for some reason the ship had poor internet, most of the Medallion App based featuers should still have been working fine. The WiFi throughout the ship was working perfectly. It was just that the WiFi was neither connecting very well to the internet nor able to bring up most of the Medallion App features.

Dining

The next really bad feature of this cruise is that only about 20% of the buffet was ever open at dinner time. 80% of all the stations at the buffet were closed at dinner time. The selections were extremely limited for dinner. There was a huge number of buffet stations, just like on all our prior Princess cruises. Just that on this one most of them were always closed at dinner time. We had been impressed with the vast array of buffet offerings on our prior Princess cruises. We were once on one Princess cruise where the buffet was divided into two huge sections with a long walk between the sections. Many passengers didn't even realize there were two sections to the buffet offering completely different selections. Many would pick items from one section and then sit down to eat without even realizing there was an entire other section just as large with another huge set of selections.

Not on this ship. There was only just one or two small sections open with a small number of selections for dinner. Because cruising it just starting to recover, and this was a less popular repositioning cruise from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean, I think this ship only had less than 60% of its maximum passenger capacity. It probably also had quite a smaller crew than normal. Thus, I guess with the limited crew it was not possible to offer a full buffet at dinner. Plus, with the lower number of passengers, they probably did not want to cook an excess of food. Every time we wandered through the buffet, there were not that many tables occupied. We've been on many prior cruises where it has been difficult to find an available unoccupied table. Certainly not on this cruise!

Note: We rarely went through the buffet area at breakfast or lunch time so at first were not aware of the amount of selections at that time. When we did finally visit the buffet for breakfast and lunch, we found that many more sections of the buffet were open and there was a much better selection. I guess a lot more people go to the buffet for breakfast and lunch but not as many for dinner. Thus, that could account for the better selections at those two meal times and less of a selection for dinner. It did appear that most people do go to the main dining rooms and specialty dining rooms for dinner and not that many go to the buffet for dinner. Just the opposite is true for breakfast and lunch. Only a few go to the main dining rooms for breakfast and lunch, and most of the specialty dining rooms are closed for those meals. Most passengers go to the buffet for breakfast and lunch.

On the positive side, maybe, there was no problem going to either of the Main Dining Rooms and getting seated immediately at your choice of a private or shared table, even if you had no reservation. You could even go to any of the Specialty Dining Rooms most of the time and get seated immediately without a reservation. Whenever we passed by any of the Specialty Dining Rooms and looked in, they were usually pretty empty with only a few tables occupied. Service was quite fast as there weren't that many passengers to serve. There were always plenty of empty tables available even in the Main Dining Rooms.

On the positive side, there is this place just a few steps from our cabin called "Slice" open from 11 AM to 10 PM every day. They always have Pepperoni Pizza and Margharitta Pizza plus one specialty pizza that changes every day. Barbara and I both judged their pizza to be fantastic. For the first week of the cruise I had a hard time resistiing getting one or two slices of pizza every day for lunch. I'd usually get a slice of the specialty pizza, but skipped the day it had anchovies on it.

Also just a few steps from our cabin is The Salty Dog Grill that offers great hamburgers, hot dogs, tacos, chilli, french fries and more, and provides various gourmet configurations of them. We only ate there one time as we are not big into hamburgers and hot dogs.

Food, especially pastry and desserts, are availalbe from many other venues on the ship, including Gelato, Swirls Ice Cream Bar, and the 24 Hour International Cafe that offers sandwiches, pastries, and coffees.

Port Stops

Another huge disappoinment was the skipping of two major port stops on this cruise. First was the Azores Islands and second was Casablanca, Morocco. The second was the more important as this was promoted as a "16 Day MOROCCAN Passage Cruise".

Entertainment

Barbara and I really like jazz and classic rock. We decided Princess was one of our favorite cruise lines because it is one of the few that offer a lot of live jazz. This ship does have a devoted jazz lounge called "Take Five" that uusally has 3 live jazz performances every night. Unfortunately, it is the same piano, drums and base trio almost every night. We really like horns, especially the saxophone. The Princess House Band has both a saxophone and trumpet, but they only played once in a while in the "Take Five" jazz lounge. There is very little classic rock on the ship. I don't think they have a classic rock band on this ship at all.

One thing we really like on cruises is a "Piano Bar". Every Carnival ship we've ever been on has had a Piano Bar. The evening Piano Bar will usually go from around 9 PM until 1 AM in the morning and we would often stay until the end. We have never seen a Piano Bar on any Princess ship. They do have piano players, but that is not the same as a Piano Bar. A Piano Bar has a certain flavor to it. People request songs to be played usually along with a tip, and often the audience sings along to the songs. Sometimes they allow people to throw in a larger tip to request that a song not be played! It is all part of the fun. The piano players on this ship just play background music in the various lounges and main plazza. Nothing like a Piano Bar at all.

We really miss the Piano Bar and the live classic rock bands on Carnival. The only problem with Carnival, is they rarely go anywhere we want to go. They mostly do the Mexican Riviera, the Carribean, Alaska, Australia & New Zealand, and sometimes the Panama Canal. We've been to all of those places, some of them multiple times. We'd like to do more of the Mediterranean, Northern Europe and The U.K., Asia, Africa, and South America. Carnival rarely cruises in these areas.

Summary

Having such a disappointing cruise, we are now questioning whether to cancel our 2023 111-Day World Cruise on the Island Princess, and are ready to explore other cruise lines to see if we might like one better than Princess. We are thinking of exploring the Royal Caribbean to see if maybe they have some of the features like Carnival, but serve areas of the world that Carnival does not.

Personally, I would recommend that people not consider cruising until it is back in full swing and cruise ships are being booked closer to capacity. Until that happens, the buffets may be pretty low in staff and selections. The number of entertainment and live music offerings might also be less for now until cruising is back into full swing.

I would think that Princess really should have offered a lot more than just a refund of the internet for this cruise. Princess heavily promotes their MedallionNet High-Speed Internet and many people book Princess with the assumption they can get work done on the cruise (especially on a cruise with so many Sea Days), and keep in touch with family and friends. Also, this cruise was promoted as the "MOROCCAN" Passage Cruise. If we aren't even going to stop in Morocco, that also was considerable misleading promotion of this cruise.

I do know that all cruise lines lost billions during the suspension of cruising with some even going into bankruptcy. Princess was very generous to passengers on the first cruises that were cancelled, but at that time they had no idea that cruising wouldn't be back up to full speed for over two years. I can understand that they can no longer be so generous in credits and refunds for cruises that fall far short of expectations. But, the bottom line is that we are more likely to hesitate and wait before booking our next cruise. If many others think the way we do, it is going to take even longer for cruising to get back up to level it was at prior to the suspension of cruising.

If in this report you see any typos, misspellings, factual errors or other types of errors, please let me know. Please include the web address (URL) of the report in which you found the error. Thank you! Send your email to:

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