03/09/2025
Welcome to Wednesday.
Welcome back onboard Sky Princess.
I’ll try not to go on quite as much this week as last, I think I had missed writing so I got carried away. It may happen again.
This week we look at the provision of food & drink on board, those who prepare and serve it, and we will end with a few stories about some of the folk I met along the way including the already notorious Dirty Olive.
Sky Princess is quite a big ship and there are no shortage of places to eat but some of those eateries are quite exclusive and require extra payments.
Now for some people (who have paid quite a lot of money already to book their holiday) the thought of shelling out another $24 each for a plate of pasta in a ‘speciality Italian restaurant’ is about as popular as finding a rat in your toilet bowl.
The main restaurants are included in the price of your cruise, so if you don’t want to pay extra, that’s where you eat.
I include the buffet restaurant of course, where I always took my petit dejeuner.
I also took my big dejeuner there too.
Evening meals were hopefully going to be taken in the Cielo dining room. Well that was the plan.
In fact, planning a head, I even booked us a table for the day of our embarkation. We had a nice meal and so I asked the staff about returning the next evening.
But the best laid plans…because I hadn’t booked 8 months earlier there were now no tables available for us, not just for the next night, but for any night for the duration of the cruise.
Now I’ll be honest, I had been warned about this but I thought, no, surely you can just walk up and ask for a table and then wait…well you can do that but only at The Estrella restaurant.
A little angry with myself and also a little frustrated that you had to book a table so many months in advance, I went to discuss the matter with Guest Services. I wasn’t expecting miracles but I was hoping for someone to at least listen.
Without going into details, there are good reasons why we like to eat at around the same time each evening. There are good reasons why queueing isn't always possible.
Although we quite liked the idea of being in the Cielo dining room, I was sure that we might find accommodation in the other dining rooms.
Estrella we already knew was tip up and take your chances. Soleil it turned out was set times of 5pm and 7:30pm.
Too early and too late.
So back to Cielo which claimed to be 'reservable at any time’ - yes, but not once you’re on the ship!
Anyway, I’m at Guest Services and I’m explaining my dilemma to a young lady, resplendent in a crisply ironed and tailored uniform.
Her attention to her smart appearance was 100%.
Her attention to me was pretty much non existent.
There was no eye contact, just some muttering and shrugging of shoulders, but no real sign that she was listening or that she had any suggestions. Other than - why not book at the speciality restaurants…pay extra.
I came away from that meeting and did in fact book one night in a speciality restaurant. My thinking being that if I was going to have to queue every night for the rest of the cruise, we might spoil ourselves at least once. $96 well spent perhaps.
So, sitting on feelings that were beginning to fester somewhat, and feeling like Guest Relations needed a kick up the backside, I tweeted my displeasure at the situation and of course included Princess Cruises in that social media post.
I posted about how if you haven’t booked months in advance you start to feel like a second class passenger. I also added that the Guest Relations didn’t really give a toss.
Two hours later I get a message from Princess Cruises - they were looking into it.
The next evening, thanks to the fabulous app that allows you to track people onboard, I was tracked down by the Maître d’ of the Cielo restaurant. He apologised and said he was also now looking at what could be done.
The next day he phoned me and said they had managed to find us a table in the Cielo restaurant, every night, at our chosen time, for the rest of the cruise.
They were so sorry for the inconvenience and even waived the $96 fee for the specialty restaurant we had booked.
And I never had to raise my voice once.
Anyway, upon entering Cielo the next evening, it was like we were the most important people on the ship! Every member of staff being extra nice.
I wasn’t comfortable with this and it took me a couple of days to work out what I could do.
I sat and wrote a long note (I’m good at long notes) to the Maître d’ and his staff in the restaurant explaining that when I complained it was never about them, rather the situation we found ourselves in and the lack of empathy and attention by the Guest Relations staff.
The response to that message was a huge thank you from the Maître d’ and now the staff became even friendlier! But now it felt like I had earned it for being nice not a horrible complaining k**b.
It’s strange you know, all this effort to get a table in one restaurant, when all these restaurants are serving the same menu!
The waiters work flat out, many fewer staff than once there was, including no wine waiters! We were lucky to have Dewi and Narendra.
They helped make our evenings in Cielo very enjoyable.
There was the restaurant manager Domenico too - more on him another week.
I guess there’s some wisdom in this - you don’t have to shout and scream to get something done. You just have to press the right button! Good old social media.
Do I come out of this story looking too clever by half or really petty? You can decide.
I’d have happily tried queuing at Estrella, but it was that lack of care and empathy that bugged me. If your job is to listen, then listen.
I have an addendum to this tale.
Later in the holiday I had to return to Guest Services to sort out a very minor matter and this time Mrs B was with me. She witnessed the same behaviour again. No eye contact, talking to other staff, basically making you feel like you were in the way and just being bloody annoying.
I’m turning into a right moaning Minnie!
Let's talk about how nice the vast majority of the crew were.
Let me give you one example.
Dennis. The waiter in the International Cafe.
As we established last week, part of my routine is going for coffee and finding a good place to read and watch people.
The late risers (who don’t like beans), head to the International Cafe for a breakfast pastry…or six!
I can honestly say that in the two weeks I visited the cafe I never once succumbed. My runny eggs were sufficient.
I did, however, like my Americano with cold milk on the side.
Now there were two ways to get coffee.
You could join a queue and order at the counter and get your coffee in a cardboard cup….I think not!
Or you found a seat and hoped to attract the attention of a passing waiter. The coffee would then arrive in a lovely large coffee cup. Perfect.
And this is where Dennis comes into the story.
He, on that first morning, took my order and then delivered my coffee. Always with a smile. Always willing to chat for a while before he headed off to serve someone else.
Each morning, I’d walk in and find a seat and then Dennis would appear to take my order. After the third day he didn’t bother coming for my order, he just turned up with my coffee. What a lovely man.
And then the day came - Dennis wasn’t there! I sat and waited but I’d become the invisible man. Other waiters drifted by…I was bereft.
So, I left my book to guard my table - more on this manoeuvre in later editions - and joined the queue for coffee in a cardboard cup.
Before I could place my order, a tap on the shoulder.
I turn and see the smiling face of Dennis.
“What are you doing? Go sit down and I’ll bring your coffee”.
“Yes Dennis” I replied.
I loved Dennis.
I think Dennis loved me too.
Enough of these fond reminiscences - you’ve only turned up to hear about Dirty Olive haven’t you?
Picture the scene; the buffet restaurant, a busy lunchtime and people are rushing hither and thither looking for chips.
Or a full roast dinner.
What is it with the British and having to eat a full roast dinner in roasting hot weather.
Not for me when there’s a salad bar…and a grand selection of salads, a collation of cold meats, exotic cheeses, grated carrot, sliced peppers, cucumber & red onion. There were also various nuts, berries and tuna! I’m a great fan of tuna.
Here’s that routine again kicking in - some tuna, a little salad, a sprinkling of light Italian salad dressing and then on the side a few pines nuts and some olives. Tuna and olives - excellent together. Well I think so.
So, on the day on question, I’m standing at the salad bar, and I already have most of my food on my plate. Now I’m just needing those beautiful olives as a final adornment.
Blocking my passage…Dirty Olive.
Now I don’t know what her real name was and she wasn’t particularly smelly, but she earned the name.
Wearing a voluminous multi coloured sun dress, this lady of, well I would think late middle age, (she had no grey roots visible in her mountains of frizzy hair), this 'lady' was fi*****ng the olives.
The poor little darlings were sitting there in their bowl, their tiny purple toes shimmering with brine, when without warning a giant hand, bedecked with long painted nails, descends upon them and starts grabbing and squishing and poking.
What the hell gives a person the idea it’s OK to touch food like that?
Has the word hygiene been removed from their lexicon?
Has common sense and decency been drained from them through their brightly coloured talons?
Not only to interfere with, and overtly mo**st the olives, but then to leave them in the bowl, all used and unwanted; covered in human detritus and bacteria!
I was dumbfounded and was unable even to ‘tut’ loudly.
I was heartened to see that as I walked away, an olive-less plate of salad in my hand, the waiter behind the counter was informing the lady just what a dirty old cow bag she was.
My guess is he didn’t call her a dirty old cow bag.
Dirty Olive, the Cow Bag in the multicoloured sun dress whose fingers, I hope, will forever smell of brine.
May she go to her grave haunted by the screams of those tiny little olives.
That’s all for this week.
Next time…the debate about oat milk; ci******es and v**es, plus our old friend - the lifts.
Oh I might add a small section on pickle ball…and that isn’t a nickname for some fellow who shoved Branston down his budgie smugglers.
See you next week.
