Island Princess Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Great ship, great crew, great itinerary!  Amount of time at some of the ports was too short.  Too many cruise ships in port in Athens -- way too crowded!!! Same situation in Rome at the Vatican.  Lots of walking to help fend off the calories from the yummy desserts. Loved the evening entertainment.

Loved the itinerary, but not the cabin location on this ship.  Being a European trip you expect to walk a lot, but did not need the additional walking to/from cabin for breakfast, lunch or dinner.  The Tour in Toulan was a waste, but those in Florence, Athens and Turkey were a must and worth the money.   We took the train into Rome (highly recommend it over booking a tour). r/t for four people was $48.00 directly into St Peters Square, paid $15 p/person for quick access to Vatican and taxis to Coluseium, treve fountain and Spanish steps.   Including all ticket costs, we paid less than $200.00 for four people while ship cost $229 bus tour per person.  We also paid bus transportation in Istanbul to major sites - no need to take tour here.  

Love this itinerary, will be great to stay overnight in one more big city - Istanbul, or Livorno.

Love to have movie under sky. Great move selection.       Good management and service people.

++++ for food court - great, food. 

Great trip.  Busy itinerary that was tiring due to long excursions at major cities.  We did want to see as much as possible.  The day five sea day was a welcome relief.  The ship was great.  Staff, food, service and entertainment were all good.  I will be traveling on this cruise line again.

Hi we are on the island princess from venice on the 9th july 2015 and i noticed that the island princess is having a fair large refit.

Does anyone know what that is covering as some of the reports on the ship are very negative at the moment about what a sorry state the ship is in

Due to not finding any porters to handle our luggage in the usual manner, my wife and I suffered in the heat and through long switchback lines to get to the ship. Upon stepping aboard the ship my wife fainted from dehydration and exhaustion.  The ship personnel gave good care but medical center insisted she go to local hospital to get checked out.  By the time she was declared OK and released from the hospital,, the ship had departed. The next port was over a week away.  We decided the cruise experience wasn't a good one so we flew back home. We have cruised on Norwegian, Carnival, Celebrity, and Holland America, some multiple times. We are experienced cruisers.  Princess was very attentive after the incident, but not before.  Attempts to arrange compensating cruise were unsuccessful.  Discussions  with Princess will continue, I hope with more positive results.  

Wonderful crew,activities and meal choices. embarkment In  Ft Lauderdale was not too smooth..long lines. Most of the passengers were experienced cruisers and showed up early for boarding causing long lines in the heat. In Barcelona my Cruise card was lifted (pick-pocket) and upon re-boarding, Princess did not have an employee (only sub-contractors) to handle my situation. It took a while to get recognized and get back on board. It would have been helpful to have a Princess crew member at the entrance to deal with my situation.

Other than that It was a great cruise on the Island Princess and we will be returning for another cruise with Princess.

Thank you,

Norman & Leticia

Wife and I are pretty experienced cruisers and this cruise was parade of highs of lows. First the highs:

Excellent staff, friendly, helpful, courteous. From cabin attendant to bartenders all were very professional.

Excellent food. We were never disappointed in the dining room or Horizon Court. Sabatini's was exceptional. The pizza for lunch was the best we've had on a cruise. The Crab Shack was a nice surprise.

Panama canal was awesome experience

The lows:

Due to a booking problem we had to choose Guaranteed mini sweet. No problem we were "Gold" members with princess having spent more than $30K with them over the years... our stateroom... D725 the LAST room at the rear of the ship, directly above the engines. The rattles, shakes, vibrations, and noise required ear plugs at night. Several complaints later we were offered $50 a night as compensation, hardly enough to get our loyalty.

Internet: In suite internet is not available. We logged on once, got kicked off and our timer kept going! At 79¢/minute! We complained and they restored our minutes. I asked what to do in the future and was told, and I'm not making this up, to sit outside our stateroom, in the hall, were we'd have better reception. 

Anytime dining. Kind of... from 5:30-7:30 its walk-in only no reservations, 7:30-10:00 reservations. Now here's the kicker, the reservations telephone number is ONLY available till 5:00pm. We had reservation at the Crab Shack (great by the way) for 7:00. At 6:00 wife noticed NO HOT WATER for a shower and would not be able to make our 7:00pm reservation. We called guest service to be informed, and I'm not making this up, that the Crab Shack had no telephone and we'd have to go their personally to change our reservation. I had a FitBit and its a .1 miles from our stateroom on deck 7 to the Horizon Court on deck 14. I said this was ridiculous as we had no hot water and was informed sorry that's the best she could do! Ugh.

Ports: Cabo and Costa Rica were wonderful. Half days in Cartegena and Aruba a waste. Nicaragua was a bust, a very primitive country with some real problems.

All in all a very crazy cruise experience. 

Our entire family were together to celebrate my husband's life and Christmas, Princess did an excellent job of planning and conducting our family service in order to have a burial at sea of my husband's ashes. Christmas was a grand affair complete with Santa arriving in the glass elevator, gifts for all of the children and egg nog and cookies. The entire ship was decorated for the season, 

We were on the Island Princess and although I love its size it is an older ship and I was glad to hear that it is headed for dry dock in April 2015 for a complete overall as it is beginning to show its age. 

The staff and crew was great and everyone was in the festive mood., I have sailed with Princess many times before and will continue to do so. I think it is the family and friendly atmosphere that makes me want to continue sailing with them. Thus I have another  cruise booked for July 2015.

I would definetly recommend Princess for an Alaska or Panama Canal cruise but I probably will never sail another cruise line as Princess is comfortable and works to make everyone happy.

This was our first time aboard a Princess cruiseline ship.  We have traveled extensively with other cruiselines, with one in particular.  We were very impressed with Princess from the time we got on board to the day the cruise ended and we disembarked.  Everything was run very orderly and in record time.  The ship itself was lovely and beautifully decorated for Christmas. There were plenty of activities if you cared to take advantage of them.  We enjoy dancing and the two Lounges that we frequented were perfect for us.  The shows/entertainment were first class, fresh and updated.  The waitstaff in the dining rooms were very attentive to your needs and very personable and professional.  They didn't entertain you as on other cruiselines.  All and all, we will definitely cruise with Princess again in the future.

Going through the Canal was wonderful.  That is why we booked this cruise and was not disappointed. If you plan on doing this cruise make sure you book the excursion that goes through the other 2 locks it is so worth the money.  There was one day that stormed which made the excursion a disappointment but was certainly not the fault of the cruise line.  The food doesn't have a lot of variety nor flavor but I always found something to eat that with a little salt and pepper was ok but still not flavorful as it would be if cooked with more spices. (but this is all in a persons taste and I certainly did not leave hungry) The ship itself is in need of repairs.  One the days of rain we found several yellow buckets around to catch the drips.  The crew for the most part was extremely nice and helpful.  The was one bar tender who used very foul language while watching a football game.  I would travel on the princess again and even go through the canal again but a different ship unless the Island Princess is updated first.  

food was great ! condition needed a lot of work, staff was great ! the activities were very bad, not enough fun and energy activities were planned, I have been on many ships and this was the least favorite as far as the activities and programs, watch movies , play games, shuffle board, slow and old music, yuk ! nothing around pool side for the sun bathers to watch or participate, music in and outside the pool and restaurants were barely there. Just very slow motion .

Very easy to get around. Not many lines and crowds. Could use some updating, however.

I had no complaints about the destinations. But the rooms weren't what I expected. So small. There was sewer odor in the room when we arrived. Four days later the shower overflowed. What a mess - they did get the mess cleaned up shortly. Several days later I was in the shower and the water just quit running - when it did come back on there was something BLACK all over the shower floor.

Ship looked pretty good considering it is not new

The ship was a bit worn. We understand that it is headed for dry dock in December, a little too late I'm afraid.

Our deck (Dolphin Deck) had plumbing issues. The first half of the week the ship smelled of raw sewage. One morning, from 9 a.m. to noon, the entire deck had water and toilet service cut-off so the plumbing issue could be fixed. In addition, many of the public restrooms had stalls closed for maintenance. Periodically during the rest of the week our toilet would stop flushing and we would have to call the steward to report an issue. Our toilet was not backed-up, just would not flush due to some ship malfunction. I really researched Princess and looked forward to such things as free fitness classes, the Lotus Spa menu, the Lotus Spa Thermal Suites, and the Scholarship-at-Sea program. These amenities were specifically why I chose Princess. My first day on the ship I went to the gym to get a fitness class schedule. No schedule was posted, so I talked to the female fitness instructor and was told that the fitness classes were $12 each and was shown the fitness class sign-up sheets. I was surprised that there were no free classes and I asked specifically if there were any free classes and again she said there were none. Much later in the week I found out from another guest that there were a few free classes. I was very disappointed that I was not informed about these classes. I was also extremely disappointed to find out after I boarded Island Princess that the Lotus Spa menu, the Lotus Spa Thermal Suites, and the Scholarship-at-Sea amenities were not available on this ship. I read everything on the Princess website very carefully, but it was not noted that these amenities were not available on the smaller ships. During the first two days of the cruise we were bombarded by staff trying to get us to purchase the wine tasting program and other amenities. We couldnt eat a meal in peace without being asked numerous times if we would like to purchase something. I think being approached five to seven times during a meal to be excessive. Also annoying was the pict

The ship was in great shape and the staff was friendly and courteous

I did the Alaskan cruise with my family on the Island Princess. We found the land portion of the tour to be hectic and our accommodations lackluster. Our rooms were what you would expect from any budget hotel, we got two double beds and a mini fridge. The sights were spectacular, but I don't really find this to be a reflection on Princess. All of Alaska is gorgeous, and we could have seen the same things on any other cruise line.

The cruise part of our vacation was equally average. We found that there really wasn't anything to DO on the cruise when you were in transit from one location to the next, the exception being of course the tour of glacier bay. Taking the cruise ship into glacier bay deserves a star in itself - it's amazing that a ship as large as the Princess is able to navigate the ice-ridden waters, and we got very up close and personal with quite an enormous specimen. However, other than that one day, we were left wanting for activities. This was due mostly to our age, I think. It was pretty apparent after a couple of days on our vacation that my parents in their fifties and my brother and I in our twenties were the minority. I say this as nicely as possible: Princess is an old person's cruise line. Most of the other passengers were 70 or older. As such, my family and I felt a bit alienated when it came to the activities, because trivia referred to events that we weren't alive for and BINGO is just not our thing. We ended up eating... and drinking... a lot.

That said, the staff on the Island Princess were phenomenal. They were very friendly (and young), energetic, and entertaining. One of the two stars are for them. We really enjoyed the personalities of our regular bar tenders and our waiter at dinner. The room keepers were also friendly and I enjoyed getting to know them - one caught me dancing in the hallway once and openly laughed at me, he said I reminded him of his daughter. Other than the staff, though, you're better off traveling with Carnival. There's nothing special about Princess.

We did the land tour with Princess and then the week long cruise and I recommend the whole trip.  It was very well organized on land and the lodging was enjoyable with great excursions.  The cruise was great as well.  Great service, food and accomodations!  Would travel again with Princess and recommend it.  It was the first time with Princess for our whole group (3 couples) and we would all use them again next time.