I am not sure if there is enough space to tell about our awful experience on this cruise. We were told by a couple of people that this was a great ship and we would have fun. Obviously these people took this cruise before they changed their policy to be as unaccomodating as humanly possible.

The only great staff were the room stewards. I would say 90% of the crew were rude and so not interested in making this an enjoyable trip. The front desk people(or whatever they are called), were so bothered by all questions, it was amazing. Their answers were short and abrupt. Don't expect that they will go the extra step to give detail. The casino people were the most unfriendly we have encountered to date. They were snappy to the people at the table. There is a way to tell someone something without it coming out mean. And worst of all were the dining staff. At the buffet, nobody stopped to clear plates and forget about getting a drink. When we were fortunate enough to catch someones attention, they would roll their eyes, say it wasn't their job but they would get someone, or just mumble a reply. Half the time we would get the wrong drink. When we went to a dining room, the wait staff got frustrated with any questions. They wanted to take the order, serve the food and get you out as fast as possible. There was no enjoyment to be had. Forget it if you had special requests or needed refills of something. I couldn't get chicken fingers for my young son unless we were in the main dining room. Even if they didn't serve them in room service, get them to make us happy. We heard "no" way too many times. In customer service you do what you have to to make people happy, so I thought.

Room service was another treat. We called at night for dessert and after an hour of waiting I called to cancel. At which point they abruptly told me that it was on its way... It never came. When cruising, you leave a gratuity based on what the ship has figured is fair compensation for services rendered. We tipped less than was suggested and specifically wrote how we wanted it devided, with the majority going to the stewards. It was not done as we wrote. They still put it into a pool, to be divided as Princess saw fit.

I wrote a lengthy letter to the cruise line to tell them that I wanted our gratuities refunded (other than those of the stewards), as tipping is based on service provided. Since we got really bad service, why reward bad behavior. We got a letter back saying our request is denied, sorry you had a bad time and we look forward to your next cruise with Princess. At the very least they should have honored our wishes and given us back the gratuities for the really bad servers, not to mention an incentive to entice us back. We got nothing!

The shows were fair and Princess Cay was Awful-don't bother getting off the ship. The water was rocky, the beach was filthy with trash, and the chairs were lousy.
Needless to say, We do not recommend Princess and will spread the word as much as we can. We were not alone with our opinion of this cruise. Every day we heard the same comments from several people. This was not our first cruise, but it will be our last with Princess.

Positives- there were a couple. I got to spend a week with my family, some of the staff was nice. The other two islands were very nice. When you go to St Thomas, there are tour buses lined up. Look for the one that is painted like SpiderMan. The driver was great and we went to Saphire beach and it was beautiful. It was $25 each and our son was free.

Heed our warning, Princess does not care about your satisfaction. Just your money. By the way, everything is extra on this ship, even ice cream. The horrific service is what gives the ship the 1 rating. If you want more info feel free to contact me via email -tissner@yahoo.com

Irene & I have never taken a cruise that we did not enjoy and this was no exception. We have enjoyed some cruises more than others but have always had a good time. Although we have been on multiple cruises this was only our second time on a Princess ship. The other time was the Golden Princess with the GGC2003.

I have always like assigned seating over non-assigned seating but I am slowly enjoying the non-assigned seating the more I use that choice. We opted for the Personal Choice and ate in the Coral Dining room 5 times and in the Cafe Caribe buffet on two nights. I agree with the opinion that when non-assigned seating is chosen by most, if not all of the people in a group, it is more difficult to get to meet new friends. When there is a group cruise with assigned seating usually there is a "meet and greet" time slot at a given lounge and people from the group will meet there and it is easier to meet new friends. The time slot is such that it is before late seating and after early seating. Usually there are at least a few minutes when both groups are there.

I found the service in the dining room was good even though we did not have the same wait staff every night. The Cafe Caribe buffet was all set up for the evening meals with table cloths and silverware and the food was very good.

Irene was in a cast for the last cruise that we took. This time she was out of the cast and she was able to test her foot snorkeling and had no problems. We did a lot of walking and everything went well. We have been to these islands before so we didn't do much for touring but did a lot of relaxing and enjoying the ship when most of the people had gone ashore. We went to Princess Cays and did a little snorkeling. As far as the other ports we simply went ashore and did a little shopping and then headed back to the ship. So I can't comment on any tours.

My only complaint I have is that in the buffets they have platters but no trays. It is not possible to get all your drinks and food in one trip. It is not a big enough of a problem to stop me from going on Princess again. I know other cruise lines do this also and I write it as one of my complaints every time.

We had planned on enjoying a big screen movie during the evening but we never made it. The movie was either one that we had seen or one that we did not want to see. Most nights there was more than enough entertainment to keep us happy. There was the show in the theater every night. There usually was a comedian either in the theater or one of the lounges. I must commend the comedians in that they all made me laugh but not one of them had to resort to four letter words to accomplish this. The show could be enjoyed by all ages. Of course Bert Stratton was one of the entertainers in the lounge. He was in one of the smaller lounges for 5 of the evenings and had a longer show in the larger Explorer lounge one evening. The first night he did not perform in any lounge. We had seen him on the Golden Princess in 2003 and enjoyed him then as well.