We were looking forward to this cruise on Sky Princess as one of the ports of call was Le Verdon. A short coach trip from there and then we would be at Soulac-sur-Mer on the Atlantic coast.
Day 1: Monday 8th April 2024: Southampton
This was our first trip using the new Princess Cruises app on our phones. Thankfully most of the personal data was mostly transferred over OK. However, trying to get ourselves cruise ready was a little more complicated. A couple of weeks before sailing we sat and followed every option until finally we were awarded blue channel status.
Previously we had been green status on earlier cruises but now this was reserved for passengers who had already their Medallions. UK customers still had to pick up their Medallions at the port.
We thought that we were arriving early for embarkation at the port. But the terminal building had long queues outside and similarly we had to queue to leave our car with CPS.
After the car drop formalities we eventually gathered our cases and carry on bags and made our way across the lanes of traffic to the Ocean terminal.
This cruise had had no set time for passengers to join the ship and this had had another unintended consequence about the luggage. There was now so much luggage waiting to be taken into the terminal building that piles of luggage were all along the pavement. We added our cases to one of the rather large piles and frankly we just hoped that we would see them again.
Once inside the terminal, checking in and getting our Medallions was very easy and even better, going through Security was quick.
Onboard Sky Princess
We had lunch in the buffet and then we headed off to our room to wait for our cases to arrive. On the way we registered ourselves at our lifeboat station.
Sky Princess left at 4 pm and after unpacking, we went down to the Vista lounge for the Captain’s Circle. The friendly bar staff from our last cruise on Sky must have finally gone home. We sat at the back and enjoyed a quiet drink after our busy day.
Finding somewhere to eat in the evening was as usual a bun fight (see our previous cruise on Sky Princess.) The Princess app showed that there were no reservations available so it was back to queueing in the “no reservations queue“ for 30 or more minutes.
We finally shared a large table with Americans, South Africans and other British couples.
In the Piazza
It was a relaxed meal and after 10 pm we went to the Piazza to see the new house band, Xtesea, perform. This band had been on Island Princess on our Baltic cruise in July 2023.
