Grand Princess Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Our vacation on the Grand Princess was very enjoyable, except for the boarding  in San Francisco.  We had an hours drive up the peninsula to the Grand Princess Pier.  There was a very long climb up a long ramp to board the ship.  A long wait for an elevator. We finally got to our room.  Our steward grabbed our life jackets and headed us out our door. People were asking me if I was an  " A."  I had no idea what they were talking about.  The process was very confusing, but we finally got to the correct place to muster.  I had needed a restroom for the last hour.  My husband and I are in our 90's and 80's and were both tired and needed to sit down for a few minutes.  I was very upset and my husband was even more upset.  We have been on several cruises and never had been rushed so much.  We boarded the ship just after 1pm.

The entertainment was great in the Princess Theatre and the other venues, although the theatre was so cold and needed a warmer jacket.   The dinning rooms were also too cold to wear summer clothes.

Our steward, Norman, was exceptional.  One waiter, Victor, at the Di Vinci dinning room was the fastest, most accurate and nicest waiter I have ever been served by. All the people we met that are employed by Princess were very nice. 

I did have a problem at the Art Auction understanding the auctioneer.  Her accent was impossible and she talked way too fast.  I never could figure out what was going on and what the paintings had sold for. I've been to other shi;p auctions.

I bought a photo and we don't have wrinkles.  Great photographer!

We had a wonderful time. 

Sincerely,

Bill and Charlotte Siebert

This cruise was my wife and I's honeymoon and it was the perfect choice. It was the perfect balance of available entertainment and adventure with plenty of relaxation. It was definitely a perk to have room service included in the price of the tickets, so you don't have to pay again each time you use it while on the ship. 

The majority of the service staff are very, very helpful.  Interestingly, the front desk staff were not as friendly or helpful.  We enjoyed all of the onboard entertainment and the food was very good.

I ordered the unlimited soft drink and mocktail package for my boyfriend and he thoroughly enjoyed it.

I would definitely recommend this cruise to anyone who enjoys cruising, but not the stress of having to make arrangements to go out of country.

Overall the expectations were met...the ship seams a little dated and the creaking was a little loud along with a few leaks hear and there causing a little angst for first time cruisers. Two foot waves in the pool didn't help the situation. It would have been nice to have been warned of the rough seas. Otherwise the staff was great for the most part only one or two missed the mark.

Crews and food server were courteous and nice except one server  from the fine dining that was a bit rude but over all it was another good experience.

People in the shore excursions are also great, had a very smooth tours.

I had prearranged certain requirements, and was promised that I could get a pitcher of water for the medications I take in the morning and evening.  They told me that it wouldn't be a problem, however once on the ship no one was able to assist me, not the cabin steward, or room service, or even the manager at the front desk.  I could not believe the lack of customer service for a cheap picture of water so I could take my medications.   Our cabin was lovely but the furnishing were outdated, the sofa bed looked like it was 20 years old.  The cabin steward was nice, but I never found any towel arrangement's and I was in a mini-suite.

Lastly, and worst of all the cruise ship appears to put my luggage out where people can walk away with it, and I've been on 10 cruises in the past and never experienced a problem, but this time someone apparently walked off with my main suitcase.  The ship had 2 formal nights on a week-long cruise, I actually hate dressing up when on vacation, but I did nevertheless.  I had my formal accessories, dress shoes, ties, belts cover-buns plus specialty items that I like to wear like nautical themed pieces, all lost with my luggage, some items can't be replaced, but the cruise ship will only pay out a maximum of $250 for lost luggage.  That barely pays for the suitcase, my dress shoes alone are worth that amount.  This was my worse cruise experience ever, and may have me rethinking if I will ever go on another one.   I used to rave and promote cruising to my friends, however I don't think I'll be doing any promoting of my last cruise experience, even-though it was based out of San Francisco and it required no plane ride for me.

They have a few more days to find my lost luggage, but I kind of doubt that it will ever be found, UGH!     

We enjoyed our cruise.  The overall service was good.  The quality of the food needs improvement.  The price was quite reasonable.  Having the cruise leaving San Francisco and returning back to San Francisco was a big plus for us because we live in the bay area.  This makes it very convenient for us.

First time we sailed from our "home port" of San Francisco. Not flights involved! Sailing to and fro the Golden Gate is pretty special. The stops along the way are ok for a Californian, had been to them all - but the leisurely way the boat traveled was nice.

This being our first Princess cruise, but the 8th overall, we were somewhat disappointed.  The ship was clean, the staff friendly and professional for the most part, but the buffet food was C- at best, and sit down dinner venue B- to C.

The ship is old and it shows.

Perhaps its not fair to judge the entire line by this one ship, but its hard not to; especially when you consider the food quality.  Quantity was not the problem; it just didn't taste any different than what you would find at your local Denny's restaurant.

We won't be using Princess again.

  Loved the evening entertainment acts - Impressionist ( can not remember his name), Carl Strong, and Steve Morris.   

It would be nice if the Casino had end of cruise gifts for those of us who over use the facility - instead of saying $650.00 in spending money if you book within 30 days for a cruise within 6 months.  I can only afford a cruise every 2 to 3 years. This is what makes them sooo special.

We have been on the Grand Princess several times in the Caribbean and she is getting old, but still a Grand Ship. Had a great sailing over and back. The Islands are beautiful and the excursions allowed us to see most of them. The food was excellent and only topped by the service. The staff and crew made it a very enjoyable cruise. I had doubts about San Francisco traffic, so we used Princess transportation that worked very well.

Despite a leaky fire sprinkler that dripped during one of our nights - and carpeting that needed to be cleaned, we still very much enjoyed our cruise.

As usual, most Princess crew members we came into contact with were very nice/helpful.

Probably my only complaint is the commercialization aspect of the cruise: too many photo ops & ridiculously high pic prices, and absurdly high-priced wifi service which was spotty at best :(

Our travel agent, Linda, did a great job in arranging the last minute cruise for us.

I loved the sea days.  This came as a surprise to me.  I had never been between ports for more than two days.  There are many great lounges and decks where you can relax on the Grand Princess.  I enjoyed most

Because there were few children the grand kids had the pools and hot tubs virtually to themselves.  They spent hours daily at the pool.  The fitness center and adult pool and sauna were great.  I exercised and used the aduit pool and sauna 10 days.  In spite of eating everything in site I gained only 4 pounds in 15 days

Overall we all loved the cruise.  I might take it again.  Not sure it would be on this ship or on Princess for that matter.

everyone provided great service & were very helpful  we enjoyed the pool near the gym that was for adults only & provided a sauna & steam room. Watching the movies on the big screen outside was awesome & during the day time you could enjoy the picture with no problem. The entertainment on board was excellent we especially enjoyed the Trumpet player Dan Delgado. The comedians related to our age group & were hilarious to the point of laughing so hard I had tears running down my face.    

This was a wonderful, relaxing, vacation.  After leaving San Francisco there was 4 days at sea.  Lots of fun things to do on ship or just relaxing.  Weather windy but not too cool.  Food was good.  Entertain was just fair compared to many other cruise lines we have sailed.  However, Princess has this "Movies under the stars" daily showing recent movies.  It was like an old fashioned drive-in only you were in a lounge chair with blankets.  Islands were great.   We had a pre-arranged tour to Volcano Park in Hilo but picked up fairly inexpensive tours at the pier on other islands.  We could not get tickets for Arizona at Pearl Harbor.....apparently you have to get them 6 months in advance from government web-site.  

For my First Cruise, I found it to be an experience. The staff on the boat were Great.  When first getting on the boat there was a request made for some items and it took over 5 hours to get a response. When finally getting the response to our needs, the issue was still not resolved. When calling the front desk of the ship and asking over and over for our request they had no answers.  

It also became a nightly occurrence of banging noise above us. Finally found out that it was a storage unit for Art work. This would go on for a couple hours after 10pm.

We did not have a memorable time on this cruise.  The Grand Princess is in dire need of repairs and replacement of furniture throughout the ship.  Our air-conditioning in the cabin did not work properly for 5 days.  Even though maintenance people came to "repair it" 3 times, it still didn't cool the room properly.  We had the temperature at the lowest setting and it was warm in the cabin.  We sat down on a loveseat in the Explorer's Lounge one night and we felt like we "fell into a hole."  It was like we were sitting on the floor it was so low.  We had a difficult time getting out of that loveseat.  The weather was stormy when we left San Francisco and the ship was "rocking & rolling" from the waves.  We returned to our cabin after a show to retire for the evening and we noticed that the door to the balcony was open.  We thought the cabin steward had left it open.  I closed it and after a minute or so, it slid open as the ship "rolled" in one direction.  I went and closed it again.  Well, a minute or so later it did it again.  This time I checked the lock and it didn't work.  We called maintenance and someone came up in a short time to look at it.  He could not fix it and called in 2 other men.  They could not fix it either and called another maintenance worker.  He came and "said" he fixed it.  This happened around 10:45 PM.   The sliding door seemed to stay closed and we went to bed.  Shortly after our breakfast was delivered to our room in the morning, the door slid open again.  We reported it to the maintenance department and the lock was replaced.  We wondered how long it had been broken and why weren't things like this checked periodically.  The food on this ship/cruise was awful.   We have been on 15 Princess cruises and this was the first time we ever had such a bad experience with the food.  The food on the dining room menu was not up to what we experienced on past Princess cruises so we ate in the buffet.  Well, the food there wasn't any better.  The selections were awful and looked like "slop" in their serving dishes.  Mac & Cheese was offered EVERY AFTERNOON AND EVENING.  I was looking for pasta with Alfredo sauce like we had on the Island Princess in Jan. when we went to the Panama Canal.  The food on that cruise WAS THE BEST EVER.  The chef on the Grand should take lessons from the chef on the Island.  Our cruise was during Lent and we do not eat meat on Friday's during Lent.  Well, apparently the chef was not aware of this and only had 1 fish selection on Fridays of this cruise.  On another week day there were 2 or 3 fish selections.  There were a lot of Asian passengers on this cruise and it seemed (to me anyway) that the menu was catered to them.  The salad bar was terrible.  There were only a choice of 6 toppings.  Some nights there were 8.  On the Island Princess there must have been 12.  The lettuce was just plain Iceberg, no Romaine at all.  There was another bowl of mixed greens.  We look forward to the wonderful meals on Princess but this cruise was the worst.  We sailed with my husband's brother and his wife and they have sailed with Princess twice as much as we have.  They were not happy with the food either.

The entertainment was very good on this cruise.  We especially liked the magic acts.

We were Elite level on this cruise and was very happy to have the mini-bar stocked and have the laundry service for FREE.  We had a thought about the mini-bar.  We know that Princess offers 4, 5, 7, and 8 day cruises.  There are also 10-day cruises and longer.  We understand that the mini-bar is only stocked once on any cruise.  This seems a bit unbalance to us.  How do passengers on a 5 day cruise get their mini-bar stocked once and a person on a 15-day cruise (like ourselves) get their mini-bar stocked once?  What do passengers on cruises for longer than 15 days do?  They only get their mini-bar stocked once?  We know that people book back to back cruises so they get their mini-bar stocked at the start of each cruise.  This just seems unbalanced.  It takes passengers many days and cruises to reach Elite status.  It would be nice to reward these passengers that sail on cruises lasting 10 days or more to have the mini-bar restocked mid way through the cruise.  I can't imagine passengers going on a world cruise and only having their mini-bar stocked once.

My first time on this Princess route, I truly enjoyed it, everything went as planned, super easy embarkation , and room and luggage ready almost as soon as we boarded the ship. Our room was great, roomy, with a very nice big window

(Thank you Benesha for finding it for us).Service on the ship as good as usual with Princess, lots of good food, good entertainment and we had wonderful people for dinner. As usual too wait staff was as its best, very helpful and kind, my friend was a first time cruiser and they treated her like a queen, she came very convinced that cruising is the way to vacation. Thanks again Benesha.

We are frequent cruisers and travel on various cruise lines. We thoroughly enjoyed this cruise. Food was excellent and the entertainment was great. Dance music was very good however dance floors were small as usual on all ships. The Cruise Director and staff were outstanding. 

Cons... The first day of the cruise was overwhelming, for having been the first cruise. I realize people that have experienced cruises, know what to expect, but being a first timer it was overwhelming. I was disappointed that there weren't people directing and asking how they could help. The expense of extra things were exorbitant. We are not big drinkers, so having to pay for a glass of wine at $7-8 plus 15% gratuity, was excessive. A bottle of wine that we can get locally for $6 was $28. Our first day at sea we pampered ourselves to the spa, our gift to each other. The $119 for a 50 min massage was a little steep but was very disappointed to find that there is an automatic 15% gratuity on top of that and then you are encouraged to pay a tip was frustrating. We then had an appointment for a manicure and pedicure. I knew the prices would be a bit higher than the average salon so I knew going into it that it was, but again just hadn't figured for the gratuity. Lesson learned... But on day 3 of cruise the whole nail came off as I was eating, I was very disappointed the gal that had originally did them repainted it but then that evening while in the hot tub, 2 others came off. I then just pealed them all off, I have never had this happen,  I never needed any nail polish remover. Not sure what product they used to have this happen, but growing up in a salon ( my mother is a salon owner and stylist)always using top of the line products, this was a very big disappointment especially for the money. Lesson learned was that you can get a very good hour massage at the ports for $25. The other exorbitant expense was the pictures. It was fun to get pictures done on the formal nights with nice backgrounds and the random photographs taken throughout the cruise. Since this was a special occasion for us I would have liked to have the photos but just the 1-8x10 formal, 5x7 formal dining, and before cruise picture 5x7 on 8x10 sheet we paid $65. Yes 3 sheets for $65. While I'm grateful to have them the affordability was impossible. Doing the math it doesn't make since, the stack of photos we had to go through was therefore going to be destroyed, when we didn't take them. When had they just charged a package deal if you took them all, that was reasonable, I imagine everyone would purchase them. The only other complaint i would have is a little more time at ports, but if you know that ahead of time, you just adjust. 

Pros.... The food on the Grand Princess was excellent and I can't give them enough of a compliment. The wait staff went above and beyond. I never met a single staff member that wasn't kind and helpful. The movies under the stars where very enjoyable. The staterooms were more than adequate. The room cleaning and service was overwhelming. Everything was clean at all times the hot tubs and pools clean with fresh towels always plenty of sun bathing chairs and spaces for everyone. Overall I felt the cruise was a great, much needed get away for our 25th anniversary celebration. With lessons learned, I would do it again!