All About the Food - and Drinks: Coral Princess

What we like about cruising is that it includes ALL the food, ALL the accommodation, ALL the entertainment, and ALL the transport. One can do as much or as little as one likes and there are so many places on a ship to do just that. So this blog is all about the food.

When we first get on board we usually head for an eating venue. We have our favourites on each ship, and of course it depends on what time one boards. On Coral Princess we headed up to deck 14 - Lido deck to Horizons Cafe. We were surprised that it was a self service buffet and it was at the front of the ship. We thought in these times that all ships had made their buffets like P&O and had staff serving the passengers. There was a variety of different foods and the beef patties looked really good so I made myself a cheese burger. I don't usually eat meat but it was the best burger I have had for a long time. Sadly, the next day the patties were not as nice, so back to sandwiches.

Our first drink once on board is a mojito for me and a beer for Peter.

At both entrances to the Horizon Cafe there are three washbasins and everyone entering had to wash their hands. I really like this better than hand sanitizer. We had this system on Ovation of the Seas and it worked really well. All passengers and staff had to wear face masks unless sitting down eating.

Breakfast is my favourite meal on cruises and I really look forward to it. We ate each morning in the Horizon Cafe as except for the first morning (and we decided to try the buffet), the main dining rooms were only open for dinner. Jonnie had his Asian breakfast, and Peter had an omelette each day. I started with scrambled eggs and tried the the first three days - they were awful. Also tried the fried eggs - rubbery.

The pancakes were hit and miss - good some mornings, dry and tasteless other mornings. Hash browns were good, as were the fruit and vegetable cups. Both fruit cups and vegetables were available all day.

I ended up having an omelette for breakfast the other mornings, which was ok. Such a shame the main dining room wasn't open. 

Breakfast started with the cereal station having a mixture of packets and open self serve bowls. By the last day the station was all open big bowls.

The toast, muffins etc were at the end of the Horizon cafe at Amuleto Sweets.

We didn't like the way the jams, butter and Vegemite was served. I understand the reasoning behind it, but really not hygienic and certainly a lot more waste. I always travel with my own small jar of Vegemite.

The drink station is also at the sweets area. Tea, coffee, water, available all day and juice for breakfast only. 

There was a good selection of hot and cold food available for lunch and pre-made sandwiches.

The sandwiches were always good. I like the tuna sandwiches on cruises and discovered the International Cafe was the only place to get them. The buffet had a small container of tuna salad, which I took half of to make my own tuna roll one day.

I'm not a dessert eater but tried what was called chocolate mousse one day - it was not! The chocolate mousse in the main dining room was great.

 We didn't pack any formal wear, and being Princess, we decided to eat at the buffet on formal night. Surprisingly there were prawn cocktails - and we had a few.

 Peter always finds something.

Every other evening we ate in the Bordeaux Main Dining Room. It was amazing every night. We like to eat at the same time, at the same table, with the same staff. It doesn't matter if it is a shared table or not. We had pre-booked dinner for 7pm each night as that allowed us time to eat and go to the show after. However with many of the staff in isolation, it became a queue and wait for a table. Not ideal, but it is what it is. The longest we had to wait for dinner was 20mins - but we had drinks 😊.  The staff each evening were great and the food wonderful. The menus were varied.

 

Prosciutto and Melon

Iced Peach Bellini Soup - my kind of soup. 

Spaghetti and Meatballs

Prawn Cocktail

 

Prawns Vol-Au-Vent

Princess Love Boat Dream - so good, real chocolate mousse. My favourite dessert.

Traditional Fruit Pavlova

Pan Roasted Chicken Breast and Breaded Pork Schnitzel

Slow Roasted Prime Rib

 Food in the main dining room was really good.

 

The staff at all the tables we sat at were really good. As I said, we like the same table, same staff each night, but that didn't happen due to staff shortages. This is Nestor, we were lucky to be seated twice in his section. He made a rose from a paper napkin.

We had room service breakfast only once. We do like a cup of tea and pastries to get ready in the morning before going to breakfast. Sadly there was no kettle in the room. We were disappointed with the room service breakfast. The room service menu is very limited. The egg muffins were ok, although a little cool. We didn't get the fresh fruit were ordered. There was no sugar for the cereal or the tea. The pastries were cold, stale and hard. A lot of waste in the breakfast menu. Conserves were in little bowls, which we didn't use as there was no butter, so toast and croissants also were left. A lot of waste. 

We had breakfast in the International Cafe on the last morning. The egg muffins were hot and much better. They also had chocolate crossiants, which were not available up in the buffet area - although they were a little stale. Still it was a good breakfast before departing the ship/

We tried the pizza on the Lido deck and it was good. Only three choices - margarita, pepperoni, and the daily special which on that day was spicy pepperoni. This is a margarita.

Princess includes drinks with their advertised fares, and I love trying different cocktails. A mojito is always the first drink on board, followed by a pina colada for sail away. 

After sail away there were very few people on Lido deck, so it was easy to find a table with a view. This was my first cosmopolitan of the cruise, it was so good. I did have another one another day on Lido, but it came in a tumbler with ice - not so nice. 

I do like chocolate martini's and couldn't find any in any bar or on any drinks menu. One staff member suggested a mint chocolate martini, which sounded good. It was - for half the drink. Imagine the lovely mint taste of a Red Tulip After Dinner Mint, that was exactly what it tasted like. How many after dinner mints can one eat? I was all 'minted' out about half way through the drink.

After trying a few other different cocktails I found a 'Milky Way' Cocktail. That was 'my' chocolate martini, so from day 3 I had chocolate martini's in the late afternoon / evening.

Over all we had a wonderful cruise. Yes there were some disappointments - no afternoon teas in the main dining room, no set time, same table dining, no breakfast of lunch in the main dining room - all due to staff shortages due to Covid. 

We loved the medallion, much better than using a card, but the Medallion App didn't always work on Peter's phone. I couldn't order as I have a iPhone 6, that the app wouldn't work on - I needed Peter's phone (iPhone 11) or Jonnie's phone (iPhone X) to see menus, except for the dining room. I wasn't the only one on board who didn't have the newest iPhone. 

Would we sail on Princess again? YES, in a heart beat!

Coral Princess - The Ship, and the Entertainment

We have always wanted to go on a Princess Cruise so when the opportunity arose and it was my birthday, we took it. It was only a short 5 night cruise and even though we tried to fit everything in and experience all parts of the ship, I'm not sure that we did. Guess we will have to do another Princess Cruise.

 

Ship Details:- Built in 2002 with 1000 cabins, Coral Princess' first cruise was in January 2003. The ship was refurbished in 2019.

Number of decks: 16

Guests: on our cruise it was just over 2000

Crew: 895

Length: 965 feet - Height: 203 feet

Interesting fact: Coral Princess uses gas turbine propulsion.

Its a beautiful ship - well, we have yet to be on a ship that we didn't like. Each space was beautifully presented and we tried to visit each space.

Deck 5 - Plaza Deck - had one of the main dining rooms -Bordeaux, the atrium, guest services (which had a long line most days), and Good Spirits at Seas. There were also cabins on this level.

The Atrium was beautiful. There were two glass lifts that went from Deck 5 to Deck 8.

I took so many photos. There were often musicians playing there.

 

The Good Spirits at Sea bar was often full, we did manage to sit there one evening while waiting for the dining room queue to lessen. Can't believe I didn't take any photos!

There were also seating lounges between the Good Spirits and the Guest Relations deck. 

Deck 6 Fiesta Deck, had the other main dining room, Provence, - we'll try that next time, the shops, photo gallery, casino (5 days wasn't long enough to try the casino), International Cafe, Explorers Lounge, Universe Lounge. There are also cabins behind the casino.

We walked through the casino a few times, and discovered the International Cafe late in our 5 day cruise. We had walked through it, and other than getting a latte and hot chocolate, we didn't notice any food until the last morning - more about that in the next blog - food. 

 

We spent a lot of time in the Explorers Lounge. 

A lot of the trivia and games were located there.

We didn't win anything, but it was great fun

The walk down the ship, past the photo area was lined with comfy lounges with ocean views on one side and the Explorers Lounge on the other.

We often had our morning coffee/hot chocolate here, as it was not far from the cafe and if there were seats available it was lovely to sit and watch the sea go by.

The interior of the Explorers Lounge was very interesting.

Our routine each day was: breakfast, daytime activities and lunch, dinner, show, games, bed. One night after dinner we were in the Explorers Lounge for a game and when it finished Peter decided to stay for the disco. I said I was going to bed, but walked past the Universe Lounge where a band was playing, so I stayed a bit, texted Peter to come down. The Pop Band Cruise Control, was really good.

We saw them later in the cruise in the Wheelhouse Lounge. When they finished we went back to the Explorers Lounge for the disco - no one was there except for the Entertainment staff. So we had a chat, and then Jonnie used his Medallion App to find us and came down for a dance. The Universe Lounge was also where the bingo games took place. and some trivia.

Here we are waiting for bingo to finish and Let's Quiz Again trivia to start.

Deck 7 Promenade - This is the deck we embarked on, and is the deck with the continuous outside walking deck. The front of the ship has the Princess Theatre, which was smaller than we thought it would be although every time we went there it was never full. Evening shows were performed twice, once at 7.30pm and the other at 9.30pm. The first night was a comedian, Andre King. He was very good as most of the jokes were new to us. He also played the next night in the Universe Lounge. The second night was a production show Encore, again very good. The singers were amazing, we were surprised however that the scenery never changed, only the lighting. Third night was an instrumentalist, but we chose to go Fill in the Blank Game Show (Blankety Blanks) and Motown Trivia. Fourth night was a soloist but it was also State of Origin, we chose football. The last show was another Production Show: Motor City. That was good also, mostly Motown songs. We really liked the little tables that came out between the seats for drinks. The venue was a 'Sip and Cover' venue, which meant mask off to sip your drink and mask back on. There was no bar service in the Theatre, one had to walk to the Wheelhouse Bar.

I went to the theatre one day for an Enrichment Talk, which was interesting. 

Wheelhouse Bar was next to the theatre and played music in the evenings. It was a good go to place before and after the shows. It was usually full before the show, and almost empty after the show.

We sat there often during the day just to read and look out the window, although the window seats are not as comfy as the other seats there.

 

There was, what we call, a secret room there that had a lot of history of P&O cruising. Really interesting,  and just inside Wheelhouse Bar near the lifts. 

We did play Jenga in the Wheelhouse Bar and Peter and Jonnie won a coaster each (which of course I got Peter's).

After Wheelhouse Bar is the Atrium again

and Churchill's Cigar Lounge - which is not a cigar lounge in Australia, and Crooners Bar, which we really liked. It is a piano bar and has really cool decor.

 The Crooners Bar was often crowded but we did manage to find a few seats one day and sat with a solo traveller who was on his second cruise of 5 back to back cruises. How we wish we could afford that.

Walking towards the back of the ship, just after the Crooners Bar, is this lovely seating for two area. Great to sit and read, and not far from the bar.

Next is the Art Gallery and behind that is the Chapel. We didn't get to the chapel for a look - just forgot it was there. Shame because we like visiting the chapels. Sabatini's Italian Trattoria and Bayou Cafe & Steakhouse, both extra charge, are on this deck. The Bayou Cafe was sometimes used for craft lessons. We have no idea what the crafts were as the 'Princess Patter (the daily news sheet) only listed 'Arts and Craft' Craft of the Day. Should have gone to one just to see, but there was always something else on at the same time.

Right at the back is the upper level of the Universe Lounge.

 

Deck 8 - Emerald, is mostly staterooms. In the centre is the Atrium and houses the Internet Cafe, Card Room - with games and packets of cards, and a quite substantial Library. The daily suduku, crosswords and name quizzes were also found there.

Deck 9 - Dolphin was all staterooms.

Deck 10 - Caribe, staterooms.

Deck 11 - Baja, staterooms.

Deck 12 - Aloha, our deck, has staterooms and the 'kids clubs':The Beach House Teen Lounge, The Lodge at Camp Discovery, and The Treehouse at Camp Discovery. We saw a couple of kids the first day, but that was it. This was a cruise with most people older than us - and we are old!! Deck 12 also has the Sanctuary Pool, which is an adult only pool and was closed while we were cruising. That would be the best pool in summer.

Deck 14 - Lido Deck (no deck 13) From the front of the ship is the buffet dining area, Horizon Court, including Amuleto sweets bar. More about that next blog - food. Outside the Horizon Court is the Princess Pizzera. We tried it one day, just to try it - it was ok. Lido Bar, Lido Pool were always empty of passengers. We sat at the Lido Pool at the first Sail Away. It was cold and not many people around, but the drinks were good.

The Lido Bar didn't have a lot of customers, and the staff were always ready to serve.

The pool looked beautiful, and it was July, the middle of winter, and it was way too cold to swim. However, there is a movie screen that shows movies most days. Jonnie went to a couple of movies and got pool towels to keep him warm.

  

The next area on the Lido Deck was the Lotus Bar, pool and Spa.

This was Jonnie's favourite area. Not only did it have the ice-cream bar, but it also had an undercover pool, which Jonnie used a couple of times. 

This is also an adults only area so it is strange that the ice-cream bar is located there.

The back of the ship is the Lotus Spa that includes the beauty salon, fitness center, and treatment rooms.

Deck 15 - Sun Deck. This is another deck that one can walk around. It is above the pool (Lido) deck and has a bar and grill, which was closed the whole cruise.

It also has the upper level of the Lotus pool area, and the upper level of the Sanctuary. I think the back end of this deck was also the smoking area as it was above our stateroom, and on port days we could smell the smoke. The Sanctuary looked beautiful but was closed. Would really like to enjoy that part of the ship another time.

Deck 16 - Sports Deck. I didn't go up there - should have, but I thought I had been to all decks, but I hadn't. It has a chess set, shuffleboard, and basketball court at the back of the ship. The front of deck 16 had a splash pool. Next time.....

The Coral Princess is really a beautiful ship and the staff are absolutely amazing. Everywhere in the ship was clean and staff always said hello and I'm sure they were smiling under their masks.

Next blog will be All About The Food & Drinks on the Coral Princess.