Ruby Princess California Coastal Cruise Wrap-Up

Hello from Vancouver, Canada! We stepped off the Ruby Princess yesterday and will be heading onto the Royal Princess today. Before I start thinking about the Royal, I'd like to wrap up our Ruby Princess trip.Even though I didn't do a "live from" during this past week's cruise, I did take notes about things happening around the ship. In no particular order of importance, here are some things to know about the Ruby Princess and the 5 day Los Angeles to Vancouver voyage:

Itinerary:

This was a repositioning/California Coastal trip that was just 5 days long. The ship started in San Pedro, went to San Diego on Day 2, had two sea days, had a full day in Victoria, Canada, and then arrived in Vancouver the last day. 

Pricing: 

We got a cheapo casino fare ($149 per person + port fees and taxes), paid $67 each for airfare, and received $175 in casino cash that we turned into $216. Our $100 loyalty credit plus our onboard credit from future cruise deposits left us only owing $5 in gratuities by the end of the cruise. We also received a free dinner in a specialty restaurant and two free drink coupons. (More info on that below.) Throw all those things in together and the trip was a pretty darn good deal.

Cabin:

We had booked an IF guarantee cabin and were upgraded to an IA cabin. We don't mind the inside cabins, and the way the weather turned out we wouldn't have been able to use the balcony anyway so I'm glad we had the cabin we did. Except...that cabin was hot. Like no air circulation. Maintenance fixed it - kind of. It still remained hot all week, but at least there was a small bit of circulation after they made their repairs. I guess better a super-warm cabin as opposed to the super-cold one we had on the Grand.

There were a couple surprises in the cabin we were pleased about. The ship now has the huge TVs in the corner. But unlike the other ships that are transitioning from the old TVs to the new, beautiful TVs and still have the same sucky TV programming, on the Ruby they now have the on-demand programming. Woo hoo! It was awesome. 

Something else we hadn't seen before is a light on the bottom shelf of the desk. It stayed off, but as soon as you started to walk by the corner, the light turned on. It was great to have a motion sensor light in an inside cabin for those night time bathroom runs.

Food & Drink: 

We ate our embarkation day lunch in the dining room but didn't eat any more meals there. The lines, especially for sea day lunches, were unbelievably long. Pub lunch was a super-crazy line, too. We don't do lines if we don't have to so we stuck to the buffet. It was the same old buffet layout and food, but they had a ramen station every night for dinner. Hubby was particularly happy about that. The buffet wasn't too busy and we never had problems finding a table to ourselves.

Since this was a short five day cruise, there was no Captain's Circle cocktail party. Instead we were each given a free drink coupon. Worked for us! There also wasn't a Most Traveled Guest Party. We received a letter in our cabin congratulating us for being one of the most traveled and the option to eat one night at Crown Grill, Share, or Salty Dog for free. We've done Salty Dog a couple times before on this ship during past cruises, Crown Grill a bunch of times on several ships across the Princess fleet, but had never ventured into Share. So guess what we chose?

Share was amazing! So much better than I had expected. The multi-course meal (6 courses!), the service, the atmosphere, the flavors, and the view? 

Oh, yeah. Even though I'm a steak girl and that's why we do the Crown Grill so much, I do believe Share will be taking its place when it can. (It's not available on all ships.)

I'm planning on doing a separate write-up on Share so if you're interested, keep an eye out here as I'll add a link right here.

Activities:

With only two sea days and two full port days those sea days were crammed full.

Other things:

*There was only one formal night.

*We ran into a waiter and his cabin steward wife who we hadn't seen for a few years. She even sent flowers to our cabin once she found out we were onboard. So sweet, right? It's always nice to see - and catch up - with crew members.

*The Internet was horrendous. It was supposed to be the super-fast MedallionNet, but I can tell you after having spent the month on the Caribbean Princess with MedallionNet, what we had on the Ruby was definitely not speedy, fast, or reliable. I don't know if they haven't finished the wiring or what, but I couldn't get anything to load while we were in our cabin. I burned through my 150 minutes and hubby's in just two days of trying to check email. No blogging, no doing anything with photos, no surfing anything. It was a bit better in the public areas, but here's how bad it was in the cabin...I tried to do a speed test. Here's the download speed:

And the upload speed? Wouldn't even register!

Until they get whatever issue they have going on fixed, they should be embarrassed to say this ship has MedallionNet.

*Free black coffee (not the crappy-from-syrup kind) was available for free in the International Cafe from 2 am to 6 am. It was self serve. Since hubby couldn't find his old coffee card before we left for this trip, he was up every morning at 5 am for his fix.

*The new carpets in the hallways aren't color-coded. Carpets aren't going to help you figure out port v. starboard when you get off the elevator anymore. At least on this ship, that is.

*Within the first hour onboard, I witnessed some downright mean people when it came to the elevator. Yelling, pushing, and even more yelling. I just stood in the corner with my mouth shut, but geez people are so angry these days. It's a vacation, folks.

*I left my Cruising with Confidence book in the library (this one right here, but the paperback version) like I've been doing on ships lately. I put a book label on the inside cover stating it is donated by the author (me) and asking them to return it the ship's library when they are finished reading it. But as of disembarkation time yesterday the book still hadn't been returned. Guess that's the chance I take.

*I left Encouraging Word Money Pockets all around the ship and I also left them in the Wake Show Box. Our cruise director, Micca, read them on the Wake Show a couple different times. Compared to my 30 days on the Grand where they were only read just twice during all that time, it was nice to have the cruise director on the Ruby read them twice in our short stint on the ship. I've got a whole stack for the Royal, so we'll see if the good vibes continue.

*The Ogden Point Shuttle in Victoria that takes you from the port to the city is now $15 in both US and Canadian dollars. If you have Canadian on you, I suggest you pay with that. With the exchange rate it's a better deal.

*The weather was cool most of the way. Rain, wind, and chilly temperatures. It was quite a bit warmer (and sunnier) in Victoria and Vancouver than in San Diego. Go figure.

Now, off to Alaska on the Royal Princess. While I won't be doing a live from there either, I will be posting the Patters as I go along. Stay tuned.

Ruby Princess California Coastal Cruise Patters

We've got a brief five day cruise here.

Here are the Patters for the trip:

Embarkation Day

San Diego

At Sea 

At Sea 

Victoria

Disembarkation Checklist
Log of the Cruise

Sew a Spring Flower Placement - Tutorial Tuesday

It's Tutorial Tuesday and today we are sewing up a project fit for spring, a flower placemat. The measurement below make one placemat.

Looking for more sewing and crafting projects? 

Click here to see all my tutorials!

For each placemat you will need:

• 15" x 20" piece of backing fabric
• 13" x 18" piece of batting
• Heat 'n Bond UltraHold Iron-On Adhesive (paper-backed), one piece 7" x 7" and one 3" x 3" 
• 8" x 8" piece of fabric for the main flower - I'm using orange
• 4" x 4" piece of fabric for the flower center - I'm  using yellow
• 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" pieces of green fabric for the corners, cut two - I'm using dark green
• 2 1/2" wide fabric strips for the border - I'm using light green
• Template downloaded from here
• 9" x 14" white background fabric
• Basting spray
• Iron
• Pins or Clover Wonder Clips
• Sewing machine
• Matching thread
• Rotary cutter
• Cutting ruler
• Cutting mat

Disclosure: Deb's Days is a participant in affiliate advertising programs designed to provide a means for me to earn fees by linking to affiliated sites. This means that, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a small commission if you click through and make a purchase. Your purchase helps support my work in bringing you new sewing and crafting content.

You can find the step-by-step how to tutorial for the spring flower quilted placemat sewing project right here:

Sewing for Good Sunday

Well, that wraps up my quilts for the Quilts for Kids Organization. Before they go, I had to take one last picture of them all together. From start to finish it took me longer than anticipated, but they are now heading out the door. (The shipping cost just about knocked me over. Yikes.)

I'm going to skip Sewing for Good Sundays during the month of May (need to give these arthritic hands a rest) but I'll start back up in June with another round of Sewing for Good projects.

5 Things to Keep in Your Cruise Carry-On

It may be obvious to keep your travel documents, money, electronics, and medication in your carry-on, but have you considered these other musts carry-on keepers when you're cruising?

1. Antibacterial hand cleaner and spray or wipes. When you get into your cabin you'll want to get things cleaned up a bit. While the cabin stewards work hard at prepping cabins for you, they can't always get to every single spot the former passengers may have touched. And what about the steward himself? While the supervisor keeps him out of cabins when he's really, really, sick, stewards do continue to work when they are a little bit sick. Start off with a clean cabin to help with those germs. And use that anti-bacterial hand cleaner generously as you move about the ship. Not every handrail and chair back was cleaned before you touched it.

2. Chargers for the electronics. When you drop off your luggage at the port the porters load it onto a cart. The luggage is then scanned to check for weapons, alcohol, and other prohibited items before being delivered to your cabin. This process takes time so your bags won't arrive at your cabin until the afternoon or evening. What if your phone is dying and you need to make last minute calls before the ship sails? Keep those chargers with you, just in case.

3. Medical devices. Sure, you could pack that CPAP in your checked luggage so you don't have to lug it onto the ship, but did you know your luggage might not arrive before bedtime? Sometimes tags fall off or aren't placed on the luggage at all. If you rely on your CPAP for a good night's sleep, you might not want to risk it. While you'll eventually get your luggage back, it'll most likely require a visit to the Passenger Services desk to track it down. Better safe than sorry on this one.

4. Swimsuit. Get in a swim or work on a tan before Muster Drill? Yes, please! Change into your swimsuit to start that relaxing vacation right away.

5. Anything else needed before dinner. Want to freshen up or change before dinner? Either pack those things in your carry-on or roll the dice and hope the luggage shows up in time. In most cases we've received our luggage before dinner but there have been a couple instances when we haven't seen it until afterwards.

What do you think? Is there anything else you'd add to the list?