Great experience overall!
Royal Princess Cruise Review to Coastal - West Coast
Contributor Level:
Deck Hand
Cruises: 1 cruise (first)
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 16
5 Night West Coast Getaway With San Diego (San Francisco Roundtrip)
Sail date: April 11, 2023
Ship: Royal Princess
Cabin type: Inside
Cabin number: M125
Traveled as: Singles/Friends
Reviewed: 1 year ago
Review summary
This was my first ever cruise, and I have to say I LOVED it! I didn't pack enough Dramamine, but the ship had some available in the shop, so I didn't have to deal with seasickness. I spent more money than I had planned to, but I have to admit it was well worth it! I had a blast at the shows and trivia events, loved exploring San Diego and checking out a couple tours in Ensenada. I just wish we had a little more time in Ensenada before having to set sail!Embarkation
This was my first ever cruise, so things were, for the most part, very easy and streamlined! Lines moved pretty quickly, I loved having the option to either carry my own luggage on board OR have the cruiseline deliver it to my room later in the day. I was a little confused by a few things, though. As hard as I looked in email and online via the Princess website, I couldn't find a specific time of when we could arrive on the ship. It would have been great just to have that be explicitly said at some point. My only other complaint would be after getting through security to get the medallion, it was confusing. On the Princess app, it said I was green lane (faster). The woman directing people to different lines said that didn't matter, and we had to go to the blue lane because we didn't have our medallions yet.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
Food in the Symphony dining room was fantastic! I had dinner there every night! The buffet was also delicious, with LOTS of options - we opted to use it mostly for breakfast and desserts. There were a couple issues with regards to drinks the first 24 hours of the cruise, however. The day of departure, I went to one of the bars next to the pool. Both bartenders were busy, so I waited patiently. A couple next to me, who already had their drinks, started asking one of the bartenders a lot of questions, preventing the bartender from addressing other waiting customers (me). When the couple left, probably 5-10 minutes after getting their drinks, a larger group showed up for refills. The second bartender completely ignored me and went straight to this group for their refills, while I never even got to order my first drink. At that point, I gave up, and we went to the buffet for dinner. A waitress came by asking about drinks. They were very busy, so it was maybe ten minutes before she brought my friend's soda, but I had ordered a cocktail. She never came back with it. After thirty minutes, we never even saw her again, so we asked a second server if they could check on my drink. That took about ten minutes more to get my drink. After checking my account balance the next morning, I saw that I had been double charged, but only received the second drink. After all of that, I had no issues with drinks or food in any way. Everything was delicious, prompt, and served with smiles!
Onboard Activities
I loved the variety of things available! I had intended to go to the fitness center, but ended up not doing it at all. That said, however, I was excited to see that there were classes available, in addition to simply going and using the equipment. I enjoyed a hot tub at one point, and that was great, however some kids were not being supervised by their guardians and jumped in my tub unannounced and started splashing each other (and ultimately me and the other adults who were there). I did enjoy going to the casino, but might I suggest a tiny adjustment to the machines to at least give us some hope while we're playing? I never go to a casino expecting to win big, but betting the bare minimum and losing $100 in 15 minutes on a single machine is pretty alarming, and adds up pretty quickly!
Entertainment
I absolutely LOVED the entertainment! I attended several trivia shows at Princess Live! (Alistair was awesome!) as well as the Jenga game. Arrrrrrrrrmando was fantastic and hilarious throughout the entire cruise! I enjoyed the comedian (I think his name was Carlos Oscar?) quite a bit, and while I didn't sit down explicitly for the musicians, I always enjoyed the atmosphere of having live music wherever I went. My absolute FAVORITE show was Hollywood Hiccups. BRAVO to Ruth in putting it together, and the entire team that participated!
Service and Staff
Could not be any better! Everyone was friendly, always said hello with a smile, my room was ALWAYS clean and the bed made repeatedly throughout the day. I swear, I would leave for ten minutes and come back to a spotless room! Waiters were fantastic (with the exception of the first night's drink hiccups, previously mentioned). I especially thought that one waiter was very attentive, friendly, and sociable. I think his name was Andrei, definitely from Ukraine (tall, blonde). If I could rate the service higher than 5 stars, I absolutely would!
Ship Quality
I never had any concerns about cleanliness, and the overall layout of the ship was wonderful! After the first day or two I got a good feel for where things were and how to navigate around the ship.
Cabin / Stateroom
This was my first cruise, so the room was smaller than I expected, but it was still a good size. I loved having access to a tv with entertainment and cruise information directly on it, and was glad there were two outlets available instead of just one as I had been hearing about leading up to the cruise! The room was always spotless - Cedric was absolutely ON TOP OF IT in making sure we never had to worry about a thing with the room!
Ship tip
Pack layers so you can enjoy both indoors and outdoors (it gets cold on the outside decks at sea), and go in to it expecting to spend money. It's WAY too easy to charge your room for everything, but not regrettable one bit as long as you keep track of your account balance throughout!
Thumbs up
0
Ports of call
This was awesome, but I wish we had just one or two more hours ashore. I had booked two back to back tours, with barely enough time between them (not the fault of the cruise line by any means), and as soon as the second tour was done, it was 4:17, and we had to be back on the ship by 4:30. Having just one more hour would have given me a little time to do a little bit of direct exploring nearby.
Disembarkation
It was quick and easy, EXCEPT for getting on an elevator. We were on the 15th floor/deck, and had chosen to do the express checkout where we handle our own luggage. It was five or six elevators before we found one with space for us. I don't know how this issue could be further alleviated, but that was very frustrating.