Sydney - Venice - Sydney - Overview

I suppose that having been just over two weeks, it is a good time to look back at the cruise and see what has stuck in the memory.  Time is a natural filter, (of the good and not so good), so what follows may just reinforce what has gone on before or put it into perspective.

 

Apart from friends and relatives, plus a couple of travel companions, I obviously have no idea who has been reading the blog – or why.  Hopefully, some future cruisers may have dipped in for a bit of info about the ship, though the ports are covered far better by other blogs – links on the right.

 

Deciding to do a long cruise is very daunting  the first time you commit, but when you have a few cruise sectors behind you, the focus changes.  For us, there was no anxiety at all regarding spending so long on the Dawn Princess again, because regardless of the more modern or larger options now available, it is like a second home to us now and we have a great fondness for the ship.  Compared to the Royal Princess, launched in 2013, the Dawn is a fair bit smaller and having been launched in 1997, obviously shows some signs of aging, that no amount of fresh paint can hide.

 

We know that a ship like this has a lifespan in front line service of some 25 years, so it is now two thirds of the way through its commercial life.  If you wanted to be picky, you could compare it adversely with any modern ship, but if you accept it for what it is, then it still stacks up pretty well.

 

The Staff

 

Regardless of the physical structure, it is the staff who make it, and there is no doubt that the Dawn’s reputation for topping the customer satisfaction tables is well deserved.  With a total staff of around 900, it is inevitable that one or two may not appeal to everyone, but that is often a matter of personal taste.  Nowhere is that more obvious than with the Entertainment Staff. Whilst we may really like a specific member of the team, others may not and vice versa.  We generally try and get on well with them as we see them around quite a bit, by virtue of attending morning and afternoon quizzes and the occasional other activities and shows they host.  Other cruisers may not see so much of them, but all bar maybe one, were great to deal with and we developed a good rapport.  If you have read the earlier posts you may have worked out who that was.

 

Next in line would be the bar/coffee staff. Again, overall, fantastic.  Most seemed quick to learn what we wanted and we found that it paid to use the same bar and therefore saw the same staff whenever possible.  The day we left, there was a major staff reshuffle so even though we usually went to the same bar, had we stayed on, I am not so sure that we would have continued to do so!

 

Food

 

As food is important, (as you may have gathered from the blog!), you make up your own mind as to where and when you eat and what you eat.  All I can say is that the buffet isn’t to everyone’s liking and I understand that, but we have no complaints and in fact, at times, we thought the options available were better than in the dining room.

 

Although the dining room food is generally pretty good, (portion sizes vary) there is a degree of luck with your allocated dinner waiter and assistant.  Many are just fantastic but when passengers talk, it is obvious that one or two were less than impressed with their service.  We had less fun with our guys this time than on previous cruises and they were not quite as efficient, but they weren’t exactly bad waiters.  We have been spoiled in the past.

 

People

 

Our cabin steward was just brilliant.  He usually spotted us going for a meal and it was almost as if he slid into the cabin as soon as we’d left as whenever we returned, the cabin had been refreshed.

However, the most important aspect of cruising is now the other passengers and with so many sea days, you either isolate yourself and sunbathe or you take part in some of the ship’s activities and meet other cruisers.  We opt for the latter as neither of us are sun bunnies.  Our group of acquaintances and friends just keeps growing!  A lot of that is due to the tireless work of the Cruise Critic group leaders, in this case, Ros, ably backed up by Jo, Edie and a team of deck angels delivering messages about forthcoming events.

The dynamics of longer cruises is substantially different from that of short cruises.   Simple things that just add to a sense of community.  The favourite examples are when a passenger in the fairly full theatre, tries to attract the attention of a partner across the far side who has entered later.  The usual is to wave and call, so when a lady calls out and waves, “Graham! Graham!”, almost as one, everyone else waves and calls out to Graham!  Silly, but fun.   The other was a growing sense of fun at trivia, where the answer was known, the rest of the team would “shush” whoever blurted it out, no matter how quietly.  It wasn’t long before all the adjacent teams, who generally sat in the same area each time,  were also “shushing”...  This did not escape Alex’s attention and very soon we were identified as shenanigans corner.

 

Generally, 99.9% of passengers are either fun or you just don’t see much of them, but that 0.1% can be a problem.  Fortunately, we didn’t witness any problems first hand, but one lady certainly ended up with a very poor reputation.  Some passengers were not at all happy when the Egyptian ports were dropped and there was some mumbling, but Princess had no influence on that, so not their fault.  We always work on the assumption of a 4% hiccup rate anyway so if you expect a 90 day or a 100 day cruise to go 100% to plan, then your expectations are probably unrealistic.

   

Entertainment 1 - Musicians

 

There are always going to be differences of opinion here and that includes the resident musicians and also the guest entertainers.  The resident entertainers start with the Dawn Princess Orchestra, led this time (as last year) by the amazing  Sarah Dyer.  This diminutive pianist and keyboard player has to cope with not only the Princess Orchestra, which is composed of session musicians, but also the scores of the Production Shows and the scores of individual entertainers.   Occasionally, they may only have 45 minutes to rehearse with a new performer, but you’d never know to see them in action.  At one stage, the bass guitarist was indisposed so Sarah played the bass part on the keyboard with her left hand, whilst still playing the melody on the piano with her right hand. Few people even noticed that the bass guitarist was absent.  On other numbers, she appears to be playing the melody on both instruments at once!  If that wasn’t talent enough, she was also involved in judging “Dancing With The Stripes” (very witty!) and played the part of a deranged fan in the “Danny Dangerous” murder mystery.

One of those under her command was lead guitarist Matt “Bleeding Gums” Smithies who wowed the enthusiasts with two Blues Shows.  In fact the back line was Matt on Guitar, Matt on drums, Matt on bass guitar, which led to Sarah saying it was Matt. Matt, Matt and Rugg...

The party band(s) swapped half way and both had a strong Caribbean leaning and certainly appealed to some.

The husband and wife “Crimson Duo” also had their fans.  From our perspective, the biggest disappointment was the night-time atrium music.   Ninety days of a pianist singing show numbers to an almost empty atrium (certainly after 10pm), was a sharp and sad contrast to the great evenings we had in the past with Alan and Alana, where we quizzed, socialised and danced until 11:30pm most nights.

 

Entertainment 2 – Guest Entertainers

     

Again, much of this is down to personal preference.   I am not too keen on straight singers or classical musicians, no matter how good they are.  I enjoy entertainers, so that means I am more interested in good comedians, impressionists, magicians, illusionists and ventriloquists.

There were some stand out acts as mentioned in the earlier blogs where I endeavoured to rate them.  One of the major problems for repeat cruisers is that some of the entertainers are not only repeats, but seem to think we have the memory of a gnat, by foisting on us identical shows every time they appear.  Whilst I can accept that it may cost $1,000 to get a new musical score written for the orchestra, there is no excuse for the same tired old jokes each time.  Sadly, one of my favourite entertainers the first time I saw him, now doesn’t rate at all, simply because of it.

My real favourites are those that get me laughing or are so off the wall, you often don’t see what is coming next.  David Copperfield is in a class of his own here, but even he needs to watch out and bring in new material.  Phil Cass, the illusionist still has us baffled (Dominic’s cut tie).  Danny MacMaster – impressionist was brilliant, but will he change his act if we see him again?  British ventriloquist Steve Hewlett had to try and manage with only half his props and did a fantastic job.

Stand-up comedian Ivor Richards was so quick-fire that you needed time to recover and as mentioned before, Pearson and Harvey were funny, but their act was a repeat of last year’s.  No matter how good, material has to be freshened up.

Several musicians impressed and top of the list was probably violinist Vov Dylan with a touch of the Andre Rieu about his music.   Jim Coston’s banjo playing is very much to my liking but the most popular act was probably “The Beatles Celebration” – again!  Read the earlier blogs for a greater coverage.

A couple of acts died the death and if there is any act that is going to really die, it is a poor comedian. One was dreadful and the other’ second show had passengers walking out.

 

So what is left?  Judging by the distinct lack of comments, no one has asked for extra info, so time to draw a line under the cruise.  It is a great ship but as I have said before, cruising is just as much about the people as anything Princess does.  Sure, they could improve their communications and get some consistency, but on board, they are top notch.

 

We now look forward to 2014’s Princess cruises and will keep in touch with our friends as to what happens after 2014!  Somehow, I can’t see us NOT travelling in 2015, we just have to see what the options are.

 

I may add a bit to this blog before the end of the year as we may well catch up with other cruisers, either here or in Australia.