Europe - Northern Europe Cruise Reviews

We had a great cruise on the Serenade.  The cabin was comfortable and clean.  The food was great and the service attentive.  Had dinner at 2 of their specialty restaurants: Chops and Giovanni's.  Both had excellent food, however, service at Giovanni's was lacking.  The ports of call were very interesting, except for Rostock, Germany.  (We did not take the option to go 6 hrs round trip to Berlin)

The shore excursions to St Petersburg, Russia is a must. 

Most of the staff very average, breakfast, lunch and dinner the Windjammer was unimaginative. Really disappointing in quality, taste etc. The better food was in the specialty restaurants. The entertainment also fell short. There was maybe one headliner worth attending his performance. 

I was expecting more from Royal Caribbean, I like the cruise line. 

Regent exceeds expectations. This was my fifth with Regent.The all inclusive aspect with first class service is perfect for my inner snob that wants pampering. The clientele is well dressed and sophisticated and my teenagers can get away from me onboard, but i know they are safe! They learn about fabulous food and table manners, too, without me nagging.

Hard to pick a favorite thing about the cruise. Everyone was great and there was always something fun to do! We enjoyed the piano bar sing alongs and the wonderful staff all over the ship.

What an interesting itinerary to an area of the world I never thought I would go to.

Royal Caribbean made it easy and enjoyable to visit all the exciting ports of call.

The food in the dining room was consistently cold.  We advised our server and the head waiter and basically nothing was done until I dropped a note off at the Customer Service desk.  That evening things started to change and were fine for the rest of the cruise.  I wonder what the other tables were experiencing if they did not complain????? Food presentation was not like I have experienced on other Royal Caribbean ships.

My husband and I had a lovely cruise on Voyager that spanned 10 days and visited France, Spain, Ireland and Wales. The ship, service, food, excursions were all wonderful. My only hesitation for booking with Regent again would be dealing with their Air Services department who don't seem competent to schedule the appropriate time for connecting flights.

We have a great time on board Princess Cruises.

Very good cruise, very friendly staff and awesome places to visit...

Best vacations to take with your family. 

We stay at an interior room that was perfect for us, have enough space for us and the baby crib.

I would totally recommend this cruise.

Outstanding starting with LINDA ETHRIDGE our agent. She handled every question and change. She got us the best cabin location and and was help us in every way. I will call and recommend her.

The Princes Cruise was outstanding in every way, enertainment, food, service ect. I will recommend Linda, your agency and the Princess Line.

This specific cruise was perfect.

We took this same cruise 4 years ago on the Ruby Princess.  The ports of call are terrific but beware - do NOT buy the "Best of Stockholm" shore excursion.  It's a total waste of time and is galactically boring.  Take the bus to Vasa yourself and then see Stockholm on your own.  However, the 2 day excursion in St. Petersburg was exceptional in every way - lunches and dinner with entertainment, champagne hosting at Catherine's Palace, the canal cruise, etc.  Far better than our excursion there 4 years ago.  The ship is the flagship of their fleet and is new/nice.

It just seemed that everything was a level below our last cruise on Riviera. Started with being given incorrect pier information (and had to walk to correct one pier). When this information was shared with appropriate folks, there was no apology and wonderment about what they were supposed to do with this information. Many of the more administrative types (concierge, reception, etc) were younger and seemed to not quite understand what good customer service looks like. Food was not quite as good and the dinning room staff seemed to be out of sync. Food portions in the special restaurants seemed skimpy. Ordering a simple cocktail often took three conversations with wait staff and then took a long time to get the drink. Entertainment not as good. Shower handle broke off from the wall and took two days to fix. Lots of little things that made us question whether we really got what we paid for. Will consider another cruise line before going back on Oceania

Excellent food and entertainment. Very clean. Outstanding crew, very polite.

Among our 8 cruises this is the best one. This cruise is more recommended for people 50+.

Venue as expected and most enjoyable

cleanliness of room not to expectations - couch filthy - towels grey - coffee stains on furniture tops

Food very good but not exceptional

The ship is very large and beautiful and the staff was plentiful and friendly. but the time in port at most of the stops was way too short.  For example in Stockholm, we arrived at 7:00 am and had to be back on the ship at 1:30 pm, and it was frustrating because the Hop on Hop Off boat didn't start until 8:00 am and most places didn't open until 10:00 am.   We thought it was very poor planning on the part of Princess to always arrive so early in the morning before the attractions were open. We thought the ship should have arrived later in the day and they should have let the people have more time in port. Tallin and Helsinki were also very short days. It's way too stressful to try and navigate around an unfamiliar place and have to worry about getting left behind.   (Note: On port days, they started their non-stop announcements at 6:30 am, and most were about "better be back on time or we will leave you") Princess offered no suggestions or travel tips to those going ashorte unless you bought one of their shore excursions.   Their shore excursions were very pricey, and we found the exact same tours for half the price on our own.  

We experienced long waits for elevators most of the time.  It was very crowded.

The food was the biggest disappointment.   In the Horizon Court Buffet there were never enough seats so you had to stand around waiting for someone to finish eating, then stand around waiting for them to clean the table before you could start getting your food.   They selection was lacking too. We couldn't find any salad that didn't have dressing on it.  The quality of the food was average, except for the desserts, which were terrible.  They made them look pretty, but they didn't taste good or have the right texture. We couldn't cut the crust of the apple strudel with a knife!  We have cruised several times before and we thought it was worse than on previous cruises.   We eventually discovered the Symphony and Concerto Dining rooms which were quieter and offered table service.  The serving staff in the dining rooms were excellent and friendly.  On port days we opted for the limited room service menu because that was the only way you had enough time to eat before leaving the ship to go ashore. 

We also found the ship activities and entertainment lacking.   There was a huge emphasis on selling high end products.   They listed "activities" in the Princess Patter (the daily schedule) that were really only sales presentations. They sold expensive jewelry, high end artwork,  Russian dolls, clothing and services such as Spa Treatments, Acupuncture treatments and Thermage Facial rejuvenation.  

Additionally, there were Princess photographers stationed all over the ship to take glamour shots of the guests, which were conveniently available for sale in the huge photography section.   I have never seen so much blatant commercialism.  They set up "sales" tables all around the public areas of the ship to display all the stuff they want you to buy.   It blocked the walkways. 

On the plus side of the activities, they did have Zumba and exercise classes and a nice fitness center, but it was always full to the brim with people waiting. There wasn't much to do for senior citizens in the way of activities.

There were two production performances which were pretty good, and a magic show, (which we did not see) and one cooking demonstration which was okay.  The highlight of the entertainments was the String Quartet was excellent and gave about 10 performances during the cruise.     

Lastly,  the cruise director was really annoying.  She was phony and overly perky.  The assistant cruise directors were not much better.  It will be a long time before we consider Princess again, if ever.  

I enjoyed every aspect of the cruise.  I saw cities I have always wanted to visit.  The one city I think we could have missed was Berlin.  Two and 1/2 hours to travel to the city is a long time.  I would rather have seen Riga, Latvia.  Also we could have by-passed Berlin and gone to Hamburg, Germany, which was also part of the Hanseatic League. (I don't know whether cruise ships go to Hamburg).  My favorite city was Copenhagen.  It is a place I have always wanted to visit since I was an exchange student in Hamburg, Germany.  My German parents had a sailboat, and we sailed up the coast of Denmark (Jutland) but never went to Copenhagen.

The Port talks each evening were extremely informative.  I enjoyed hearing about the different excursions even if I wasn't going on them.  The enrichment lectures were very good.  I especially enjoyed Mr. Goodness.  The enrichment lecture on Amber could have been earlier so people knew what to look for when buying jewelry pieces with Amber.

Thea weather was excellent.  It was warmer than I expected (low 70s).  However I felt I had appropriate clothing.

It is a wonderful part of the world to visit.  I feel that I got a jump start on seeing the Baltic.  It has become a very popular area of the world to visit.

We enjoyed the trip and the ship and scenery was wonderful.   We wished we had more time to explore more ports than the 7 days.   Well worth the experience. 

The ship was beautiful and new.  Wintergarden and spa area were outstanding.  Food was fine, but not as good as Oceania.  Have free self serve laundry was a nice plus.  Bathrooms in the cabins were perfect and had heated floors.  Storage in balcony room was insufficient even for a relatively small amount of clothes.  Free tours were excellent and well organized.  A train was purchased by Viking to take 600 cruisers to Berlin.  This day the the epitome of what a tour should be like. If you like to drink the included wine and beer with lunch and dinner was ok.  The drink package for unlimited drinks during the cruise was reasonable.  Wifi worked most of the time and was faster than some ships we've been on.  Not enough to do on the ship.  Lectures were good.  Entertainment just ok and didn't really get started until the 2nd week.  The dress code is very casual.  Gym was ok but not enough elipticals.  Good ports and nice staff.  Glad we went, but probably won't go on Viking ocean ships again.

ONE OF OUR BEST, COULD HAVE USED ONE OR TWO MORE SEA DAYS.  DO NOT BOOK AFT BALCONY ON 8 DECK.  IT'S ABOVE ONE OF THE LOUNGES AND VERY LOUD.  MY BAD, I SHOULD HAVE LOOKED CLOSER.  LOVED THE SHIP, STAFF WAS THE BEST.  OUT WAITER ALWAYS GREETED US BY NAME. 

(At the risk of plagiarizing a line from Tale of Two Cities.)  We truly enjoyed ourselves.  Service was great.  Waitstaff in the restaurants were wonderful.  Room steward was excellent.  We had plumbing problems.  Our toilet failed several times (no it wasn't clogged - it simply wouldn't flush).  Each time it was fixed very promptly - within minutes of us reporting it - but that shouldn't happen. 

We were a group of 9 Americans, and fortunately, we all get along very well.  None of us is bilingual, and that makes it tough to have casual conversations and make new friends on the cruise.  Don't get me wrong, everyone we met was friendly and tried to engage in conversation, but it was not easy.

The food was very good, but I'm used to seeing midnight buffets on cruises, and not being nickeled and dimed for every little thing.  My son in law was actually charged 38 cents for a glass of ice that he requested. 

Communication was a challenge.  During disembarkment on the last day of the cruise, no announcements were made in English - only Italian and Spanish.  And, a full 30 minutes past our scheduled disembarkment time, no one had been called to leave - only the excursion people were being addressed.  At that point, we had a plane to catch and simply left on our own, ignoring the schedule. 

The shows were fair at best, with the crew's presentation being the best of them all.  Nightlife was limited by our preferences (Italian karaoke is not my idea of a good time).

In summary, the ports of call were fine, the food was fine, the service was fine.  I would probably seek out a different cruise line that catered more toward my American tastes next time. 

the ship was nice. But the staff? Outstanding. Literally everyone was outstanding. The dining room food was above average, the buffet was not very good. The Italian specialty restaurant was not very good at all! But the Pinnacle Grill was outstanding!