December 12
What Food and Beverages are Included in your Cruise?
What beverages are included in your cruise price? Regular coffee and tea, iced tea, lemonade, milk, water and juice at breakfast. If you want espresso or lattes or specialty teas, they are extra. Bottled water, soda, red bull, alcoholic beverages are extra. There are several different drink packages you can purchase. The most common are Plus and Premium, but you can also buy a zero alcohol package, a straight drink package and probably some others.
Coffee/Tea
The Plus and Premium are the most common packages. They both include your gratuities for the cruise, but that is the only commonality. Gratuities run from about 17 dollars to 20 dollars per day per person, depending on the type of stateroom you have. On this cruise we have the Plus package. The Plus package is 60 dollars each per day. The Premium package is 80 dollars a day per person. You can buy onenof these packages prior to your cruise or upto 48 hours after boarding.
WiFi
With Plus you have wifi for one device; with Premium you have wifi for 4 devices. With Plus you can connect multiple devices, but not at the same time. If I want to connect on my laptop I have to sign off on my phone.
Beverages
All the speciality coffees, teas, juices, red bull, soda are included in both packages. With the Plus package you can have 15 alcoholic drinks a day upto 15 dollars each. With the Premium package you can have unlimited alcoholic drinks per day upto 20 dollars each. I have never gotten close to 15 drinks a day; even having a mimosa for breakfast, a Baileys in my mid morning Vanilla Bean Latte, a glass or two of wine at lunch a couple of beer in the afternoon reading on the balcony, two or three glasses of wine with dinner, perhaps and after dinner Spanish coffee or something like that, then maybe a drink or two during the evening show. And truth be told, I never have all of that in one day, usually some combination there of. But it still doesn't hit anywhere near 15. And if Pat has one double Dalwhinnie in the evening that's a lot for him.
Food
The Plus package covers two casual dining venues each per trip. So if you are in a 7 day trip, that is 2 for the 7 days; if your on an 18 day trip, that is 2 for 18 days. Right? Not fair. Anyway. The casual dining venues vary with the ship. On this ship there is only Alfredos that is a pizza place. You get an appetizer, a main and desert. It is generally 15.00 if you don't have it in you package.
The Premium package includes unlimited casual and specialty dining. Again, the specialty dining varies per ship and is about 40 to 60 dollars per person. Specialty restaurants on this ship include The Catch (fish and seafood), Harmony (Chinese), the Crown Grill (steak house). Other ships have a Japanese steak house, an Italian restaurant with a gazillion courses, a meat place (Dario's), and I'm probably missing some.
More Food
There are pop up restaurants too. They've had a crab shack, a pub lunch and a Tuscan lunch on this one. These are usually an extra charge.
Chefs Table
This is a special dinner for 12 people designed and prepared by the executive chef on board and includes wine pairings. We've done it several times in the past, but not.for about 10 years. When we did it, you had a tour of the galley and had 6 appetizer that were consumed as you toured and learnt about the galley. They were all caviar and crab and lobster. I'd try to choke them down, but after awhile I just didn't even take them. But post covid, you don't go to the galley, you just have the appetizers in a private area of a venue, then go to your table. The food is always exceptional and the wine pairings excellent. I believe the cost now is about 135.00 per person. Back in the day when we did it, we got a picture and a cookbook. I have a stack of about 6 Princess cookbooks, because both Pat and I would get one! I'll grab some pictures if they have another one. Our dining room table is right by the Chefs Table area.
Wine Makers Dinner
This is similar to the Chefs Table but it usually features different wines from one vineyard for the entire meal and the food isn't as gourmet.
Food Venues Included in Your Cruise Price.
The Main Dining Room has breakfast and dinner each day and lunch on sea days and this is included in your cruise fare. The International Cafe, is a 24 hour cafe where you can get items like donuts, croissants, egg muffins, yogurt, etc. for breakfast; sandwiches and soup at lunch; cookies, sweets etc. This is also one place you can get specialty coffees and teas. The Buffet is open from about 6 am to 10 pm and serves breakfast, lunch and dinner and snacks. The Burger and Lobster Grill is on the pool deck and servers burgers, hot dogs, sausages and the best fries. Lobster rolls are available for an additional cost. Swirls, the ice cream place is free, unless you get one of those ice cream monstrosities. There is the Noodle Bar also. Both Swirls and the Noodle Bar are on the pool deck.
This ship doesn't have as many food venues as the newer ships do.
Back to the Panama Canal
Frank Gehry designed the Biomuseo in Panama City. Apparently he is married to a Panamanian and wanted to do something in Panama. It is very colorful and you can see it from quite a distance. From Wikipedia - Biomuseo is a museum focused on the natural history of Panama, whose isthmus was formed very recently in geologic time, with major impact on the ecology of the Western Hemisphere. Located on the Amador Causeway in Panama City, Panama, it was designed by renowned architect Frank Gehry
Current Location
Lima
We have no excursions booked in Lima since we will be touring there as part of our land tour. We will probably take the shuttle into town, wonder around the Inca market where the shuttle drops us off and find an ATM to get some Sole.
Magic Asian Man
The Magic Asian Man did a matinee show this afternoon. If you ever get a chance to see him, he is great!
How is Fred??
ReplyDeleteFred seems to have left me. Not sad to see him go. Took my last antibiotic this morning.
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