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Princess Cruise Line

MS Caribbean Princess

Your Rating:
Reviewed by: : Peter S.
# previous cruises: 10
Date of Trip: May 10, 2005
Itinerary: Caribbean

Overall, it was a great trip. Not the best weather, but lots to do and see, excellent service, good food and lots of fun. We are ready to go back!

Embarkation was a breeze. Got to the ship around 2:30 pm and was on board by 3 pm. Would have gone faster but was were traveling with newbie's to cruising so we did not go Platinum Check In.

Dis-embarkation was quick we were in the middle group and only waited an hour or so. Found that sitting by the pool is the best place to be out of the way and still get down in time. Platinum and Elite members had Club Fusion to wait in as well which is a nice touch.

My only negative was the Future Cruise Sales Representative was at best unfriendly to us as we are giving them $200 to book in the future. She came across very cold the two times we dealt with her although she did follow through, she could be a little nicer, especially to those of us returning for our 6th time.

The Ship is pretty similar to the other Grand Class ships with a few exceptions. First she has an additional deck of cabins and 500 more passengers. I thought that she would feel crowded, but never the case. On formal nights with the picture stations the Atrium was busy, but that was the only time I ever felt that way. The MUTS was nice, but really never used it. Nightly weather was not the best and during the day we were not really interested in the movies being shown. It was nice and the picture and sound very good with out being too much.

Food was good to excellent, even in the Horizon Court. We ate second seating in the Island Dining Room and had a great wait staff. Best part was my wife enjoys ( and I do too) the lemon tarts in the Horizon Court. On day 5 they still had not shown up so she said something to our Table Capt. The next night, we had a freshly made lemon merengue (sp?) pie for the entire table! It made our trip. . they truly went beyond the call of duty for us.

Two alternative restaurants are available on the Caribbean Princess. The Sterling Steakhouse which is excellent for a fee of just $10 and Sabitinni's which features an 8 course feast for $25.00. Also the Horizon Court buffet is open for dinner as well as a the Caribe Cafe buffet which offered a German dinner and Seafood dinners (lots of lobster) to die for.

Don't forget to make reservation each morning for dinner to get the best time, but even walk ups at peak hours only had 10 minute waits. If you don't like it you can switch to traditional dinning, but we did not see any open table in our dinning room after the first night.

Cafe Caribe was a nice addition. Offering different lunch and dinner items verse the standard fare in the Horizon Court. She was very quite and smooth, but did seem to have an air conditioner issue in the hallways, Horizon Court and the Atrium. It wasn't overly hot outside, but those area's were steamy inside almost all the time.

Staff was excellent on board. Talked with many of them. James our Cruise Director was great and I don't say that about many of them. I had the occasional bar tender that could have been nicer, but not everyone has a good day every day.

Of the 1,557 cabins on board, 1,105 are outside and 881 of those have balconies. In a typical outside cabin with a balcony you will find a nice use of wood, mirrors, fabrics and soft colors give it a homey feeling. Using every nook and cranny, there is just enough storage space for a 7 night cruise. There’s also some wasted space under the TV, between the TV and refrigerator, which could accommodate a good size shelf or small cabinets. The Sony TV’s have front cable plug-ins to make it easy to view videos you tape and/or pictures taken from a digital camera.

Activities and entertainment were fair to good. Kenny James should go back to Star Search, the english duo was excellent and BERT (with an E) had Crooners overflowing every night. Other trios and bands on board were very good and much better than the Sapphires.

Ports of call were St. Thomas, St. Maarten and Princess Cays. St. Thomas was nice, not too crowded and the shopping and beaches were excellent as always. Traffic was slow and only three ships were in port. New cruise terminal for two additional ships will be opening there in the fall. Fairly close to downtown. St. Maarten has done so much to Phillipsburg in the past few years. Just beautiful and Princess Cays was nice as always. Tender service even with 3200 people on board was very smooth and we only waited 10 minutes to get to shore. . very well done.

Other passengers were mostly first timers, some who really need to understand that formal night does not mean you change after dinner into shorts and then go to the show. But most people were friendly and having a great time. Ages ranged from 20 something to 60 something for most of the passengers. I will honestly say that this was the first cruise in a long time that I did not hear a lot of complaining. .which was very nice.