Island Princess Cruise Reviews - Reviews

We all enjoyed our cruise immensely.   We appreciated the care Princess took to keep us safe and as germ-free as possible.  Our steward was excellent and provided everything we needed.  Our agent ("Specialist") is awesome, there for every possible question.  The food was delicious, with endless options.  Service was good, too.  The only problem we had was the cost of the wine for the selection available.  We feel they should either lower their prices (we know what those wines cost in the stores), or raise the quality of offerings.  Aside from that, we would heartily recommend and Princess! 

overall the cruise was fantastic but did have a few comments.

1.Was suppose to get a dinner at the specialty restaurant and never got it.

2.  Only 2 smoking areas for smokers and one was enclosed and smelled like a huge ashtray so really only one available.

3. The bathrooms on each deck were very hard to find and very few and small. Also no toilet seat covers available,

4. All crew members from the Cruise Director right down to the room steward wore much too much perfume.

Loved most of the tours and ports. Could have done San Juan Del Sur port and tour. Anytime dining was very inconvenient and unorganized. Was very unhappy with baggage not being found when I was disembarking! Suzanne the head of the process of customer service in Ft Lauderdale wasrude, uninformed about information given her by her under personal. I did not feel like it was handled professionally. I am extremely upset with that situation.  Never could believe this in a million years!

This trip was a special event that had been planned for a year. Transiting through the Panama Canal was the highlight of the cruise and was well worth it. The ship was sold out and had a very mature crowd aboard of mostly senior citizens. There are no more midnite buffets but there are still formal nights (3) which are nothing more than an attempt for the cruise line to earn money by selling pictures taken by their staff. On board entertainment was better than our last cruise and there was a nice variety of shows. The lecture series was something new but well received. Be sure to take copies of all paper work along because the cruise line does not recognize any document that is not theirs. Internet service is still not good and very expensive. 

**Ship's hospital should have more varied hours of service.  The cost of having vitals checked for my husband, a congestive heart failure patient, was excessive. Customer service attendant is not qualified to determine if my husband truly needed to be seen...thus I did not owe her a lengthy explanation before I was allowed to contact the clinic from her desk.

**Price of cocktails WAY TO HIGH!!

** All services other than the ones mentioned above were perfect and met/exceeded expectations.

**Hard sale for spa products after receiving services NOT APPRECIATED. We went for relaxation not purchasing products we did not need since we have all necessary products at home.

Favorite part: The cruise ship personnel were considerate, accommodating, helpful and courteous.  The anytime buffet was always clean, neat and organized. There was plenty of staff working the buffet section that we did not wait for coffee service or a clean table,  The buffet location towards the bow is very nice being able to look out windows while dining. The Chef & Head Maitre D cooking show was Great and tour of the galley (kitchen) was wonderful. 

The ports of call were a good selection Aruba. Cartegena Columbia, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Huatulco. Cabo San Lucas.  All in our party desired a longer port stay and would have paid $$ to have an extended time in port. 

Improvements: We met 3 wheelchair bound clients that had a difficult time getting around the ship and through doors as even after the recent refurbish in port ADA accommodations were NOT done.

Princess added more rooms and removed VERY desirable features, outside track around boat, International restaurant, relocated gym making it smaller and no windows, cigar lounge was small with poor ventilation and very small television screen in back corner of room, bar service in the lounge was non existent until we met with head waiter for this section, 

The entertainment was okay but not as good as other cruise lines. 

The seated dining room food options were good but did not change as frequently as other cruise lines. 

Recommend:  I would probably not recommend this boat for future cruises but would consider a newer Princess boat with a nice gym, outside track & other dining options that were not as spendy as the Island Princess. There are other restaurants that offer different food selection but this was an added cost of $45 per person

Non-balcony rooms (with window) are comfortable, adequate for a couple.

The entertainment is very good, there is always something there to prevent boredom whilst at sea.

Food is likewise very good. In the Bordeaux and Province restaurants the quality is highly recommended, in the buffet there is a constant supply with good choice.

Little things that weren't positive:

The constant source of things the cruiseline want to sell. Merchandise, tours, photos etc.etc. I guess they make their profit here.

The tours are expensive, better to find a similar tour ashore for ha;f the price.

The last day, the experience is "how quick can you get off we have new guests to cater for now". The vacation experience should last until you leave the ship.

But overall I would sail with Princess again

Our favorite part of the cruise was the Panama Canal transition.  We viewed the canal from the balcony  of the sanctuary.  Awesome experience and the Island Princess staff made everything special.

old ship in urgent need of renovation. Food is ok. entertainment was horrible. especially the outside performers. The cruise director and her staff were horrible and didn't do much. The other staff were very nice and provided good service.

We did enjoy overall from the long itinerary and interacting with the other guests.

Big Smile - 1) Cruise Staff (Armando, Greg, Emma, Neesha, and DJ Delitte).  Very friendly, always smiling, very approachable and personable.  They made all the activities fun to participate, creating great atmosphere, and made your feel comfortable.  Especially Armando, a great guy and always has time to chat with you.   Princess is lucky to have this group of staff....

2) Cabin Steward- Memino is one of the most hardworking and accommodating steward that I have ever met.   The cabin was always in excellent condition.  He also helped me secure "materials" for a game activity.  Big Thumb's up for him..I would give him a big bonus...:)

Improvements: - 1) Suggested to include variety of activities as the 15 days cruise had a lot of sea days.   :)

2) Food quality - seemed to have declined, especially with the steak/Beef dishes in the main dining room.  The cut was typically tough and difficult to get a medium rare.   Variety of choices in the Horizon Buffet needed to be more expansive. 

Yes, I would recommend this cruise to my friends.

Septimus Kwong

The cruise was enjoyable and relaxing. The ship was very clean and well maintained. Dining and entertainment could certainly use some updating. The show quality was quite poor and there were many shows where people simply walked off within a few minutes of the show starting. Dining definitely needs to be updated with the current food trends. Some meals were quite insipid and re-purposed.

PLUSES

Perfectly sized ship.

Great Dinners.

Lotus Pool area.

Happy hours.

Friendly staff, except unfriendly Security staff.

MINUSES

Repetitive Breakfast menus

Embarkation chaos

Disembarkation chaos

Way too talkative Cruise Director

No Ship's newspaper

Very reduced times in port.

Spotty entertainment.

No free access to internet news (eg NY Times etc)

Trivia on board, dining room mates, shore excursions, great stops.

The walking deck was nice. The sun bathing decks were good. Pools were too small and far removed from most sun bathing decks. The men's hot legs contest was a laugh. Many shows and activities were right in the middle of our late dinning. Entertainment was hit and miss. Loved the comedian magician and the comic. Music trivia could use a lot of work. 

First the good:

Rooms, Ship was well maintained and service overall was excellent.

Now the bad:

Food in the buffet was not up to other cruise lines. Same food everyday. Pork was the primary meat ( bad for me since I do not eat pork).  No pasta bar, Omelet bar was poor ( you ordered it and they delivered it to you later). Felt like I was in my old college dorm food line again.

Sit down dinning was excellent except that it was all but impossible to get a place except for the 7:45 sitting which was too late for me to eat ( finished at 9:00pm).

Specialty dinning was available but only for $29. additional each. No included specialty dining. 

Drinks were expensive... Could not sit down for long without someone pushing more booze down your throat everywhere. This was morning till late night.

Less than a half a day was allowed off the ship at many ports. Did not give you enough time to do much.

Library is above the smoking lounge. So guess what Princess ship designers..Smoke rises and it stinks!  Could hardly stay in the Library to read for more than a half hour.

My favorite negative is the area on the boat called "Sanctuary". The top deck was restricted to guest who want to pay $40 each for a half a day to be there. So now you have to pay to sit yourself down on part of the ship you already paid to be in. 

TV Choices: Same exact programs over and over again. How many times can you watch the same "Love Boat" episode. Other Cruise lines had DVD available for the cabins. This was an excellent solution in my opinion.

My wife and I have been on 3 other Cruise lines.  Princess is obviously the last choice in cruise lines for us in the future. I would suggest you consider the same. 

It was an extremely enjoyable trip - met some very friendly people and thoroughly enjoyed all the destinations.  The transit of the Panama Canal was truly interesting and amazing.

Went to LA the day before and stayed on the Queen Mary over night.  It was a great start for a cruise as it took us back to the beginning of cruising in luxury.  The history included famous people who sailed on her, her role during the war and more.  You get a self-guided audio tour with the booking and it is fascinating all the things the Queen Mary has been through. They were still working on parts of the ship.  Evidentially she had slipped into some disrepair, but she is now looking like an old lady with stories to tell.  Highly recommend these accommodations.

We took a cab to San Pedro to board the Island Princess and arrived within our slotted time.  Embarkation went smoothly with our cabin available for carry-on drop off. We promptly went to the Horizons on Lido Deck for lunch.  The Horizons is in the front of the ship so we were always a bit disoriented as we are used to the buffet being in the aft.  The food selection was good and tasty.  I enjoyed this part of the ship as it seemed so open even when crowded.  It did get busy for the transit, with folks saving their place at the front at 4:00 AM.

We expected the passengers to be an older crowd and we were right.  There were only about 2 dozen (or so) 50 and under.  The disadvantage to this was the scheduling for Early Dining…. It was overbooked and a real disaster when the Any Time diners tried to get into the MDR.  We skipped the MDR the 3rd night due this mess but figured out a “work-around” after that.  We were impressed that they were able to have a varied menu for 15 days.  The food was good and the presentations very appealing.  They are also very accommodating for people with special diet needs (be sure to let them know ahead of time).  We were slightly disappointed in the more casual dress on formal night than the last time we sailed on a Princess ship (2 years ago).  That said, they did enforce the dress code as posted daily in the “Princess Patter” and at the entrance to the dining room.

The balcony cabin was smaller than we anticipated and the shower was tiny (kept hitting my elbows).  We felt that a balcony was a must because we had no idea how much rail space would be available for the transit.  I would recommend deck 9 (Emerald Deck) because it is closer to the water and better for measuring the rise and fall of the ship. Sadly there was a leak in the plumbing on decks 9 & 11 and they were frequently turning off the water for hours at a time and there was a musty odor in the corridors. She is, after all, an older ship and age takes a toll on us all. 

Our room steward, Glenn, was the best we have had in many years (reminded us of the ones back in the beginning of our cruising history).  He watched the cabins to see when his passengers left to eat and promptly cleaned the cabin.  There was no need to pick when you wanted your cabin cleaned as it was morning and evening (with chocolates every night).  We asked for a sheet because the duvet was too hot for sleeping under and he had it ready that very evening.  He always asked if there was anything else we needed and seemed happy to fix whatever problem arose.  He was always smiling and remembered our names.

There were only a few smokers on this cruise (mostly the younger folks), so the casino was relatively smoke free.  They would go to Churchill’s to smoke or the one outdoor area (I think there was only one). No one seemed unhappy on either side of the issue.

If you have sailed the Island Princess in the past and expect deck 7 to go around the ship, that is no longer true. Many folks did a daily walk on this deck, but either turned around or walked through the ship for their laps.  This is more shaded than deck 15 where others went for the daily laps.  Yes, there is a gym on board, but I have no idea what it looks like.

We had a “destination specialist on board that gave presentations for each port of call and information about the area in general.  These were wonderful and very informative.  If you have a chance to hear any presentation from Humberto Neto, go and enjoy.

I would like to praise the staff that served us at each evening meal.  They were Allan, Bryan and Adrian.  They made our meals a big part of our trip.  The food was great but their service and friendly attitude made it great!

I liked the dining best.

The ship was cold, had to have a jacket at all times.

The pool was too cold - about 80-81 degrees, should be minimum of 83 degrees.

We really loved the trip. The stops were nice and interesting but the Panama Canal was great. A fantastic sight to see. Wonderful and fun. Just wish we could have gone ashore to visit more.

We were very happy with the Panama Cruise. Excellent Service and stops. :) Special mention to the head waiter Manuel Alves that provided an suberb service and was always very helpfull.