Royal Princess Cruise Reviews - Reviews

This was our first cruise and we had an amazing time! The ship was beautiful and filled with so many fun things to do! The food was outstanding. We chose this cruise because of the Ports of Call - they were everywhere we had wanted to go for so long! We had envisioned sitting on our balcony but only had a very short time one day to do that. The trip was jam packed with excursions to all of the wonderful, interesting places we have wanted to go. So unfortunately, we didn't get to spend much time aboard the ship. Our travel agent, Sharon, with United Mileage Cruises was absolutely fantastic! She offered so many helpful suggestions and her recommendation on hotels and excursions was outstanding. She was patient with me during the booking process and so responsive and informative. The whole trip overall was wonderful. The staff aboard the ship were all friendly, helpful, funny and engaging. We loved the cruise and hope to go on another one sometime in the future! We loved the Royal Princess!

We were on a 3-week cruise leaving from Barcelona, however the ship also made two stops in Rome and Athens to embark and disembark passengers.  We were relatively pleased with the Royal Princess ship, mini-suite, service, and food.  The entertainment was fairly repetitious from one week to the next which I expect was because of the changeover of weekly passengers.  But the performers were good. In addition, the Princess excursions were satisfactory except that the large number of passengers from the ship made the ports and shops overly crowded.  The unfortunate downside to the cruise was that Princess made more than 7 changes to our original 17+ ports of call and replaced them with destinations that were not equivalent to ports in our original itinerary.  Aside from ports in Tunis/Carthage and Turkey, I believe most changes were for the convenience of Princess cruises.  Scheduled stops in Sicily, Naples, and Malta were cancelled with little or no reason.  Added to the 3-week cruise changes were stops in Kotor and Corfu twice each, plus Elba and Gibraltar. None of which was on the original itinerary or worth stopping at twice.  My oral and written concern to Princess Customer Service was dismissed with their stating that the Passage Contract gives them to right to make any change.  No compensation was offered or interest in customer retention considered.   Buyer beware, I would not recommend anyone make long-range plans with Princess Cruises.  Due to Princess Cruise Lines apparent indifference and lack of customer commitment we are unlikely to use them on future cruises.

Went on this cruise with my mom for her birthday present.  Cruise was amazing and relaxing.  Great food selection.  My only complaint is the entertainment on board is not as good compared to the Sapphire Princess cruise i went on a year ago in the Mexican Riviera.  

Royal Princess is a newer ship which was nice. There was many different options for food. The service was fantastic and it was kept very clean. 

Unfortunately after recently sailing on a Princess cruise some of the shows we replayed. Princess no longer has the tv channel of the map of the ocean, temperature and wave size. On my past cruises the tv was set up like cable. This time it was more like an android box. It would have been kind of Princess to alert their passengers when booking the cruise that they would need to pay for a shuttle at some of the ports as this was mandatory on a couple of ports. 

The cruise was really impressive.   Royal Princess lives ups to its name, reputation and services.  The services from start to finish was superb. The shore excursions were planned with nice comfortable buses  and knowledgeable tour guides.  It was well organized and made sure that no one was left behind.  Some of the areas could be improved such as the market area in Bandol.  We did not particularly care for that door.  It was like going to a local swap meet by the the beach.  But overall the other excursions were great. 

I wanted to start by saying that from the technology and safety perspective, this cruise was absolutely impeccable.  The ship itself was fantastic, very well laid out and easy to get oriented in.  Next best was the staff - they are really trying hard to make passengers happy, and many of them go extra mile.

Now on to things that were less than spectacular.  

1.  Food - while food was generally of good quality and variety, the breakfast was always the same, and by the end of the cruise it got to the point I no longer even wanted to eat my breakfast.

2.  Entertainment - could definitely use some improvement.  Most of the entertainment was boring and designed for older adults.  The ship needs to think about offering more entertainment for teenagers and young adults, too.  

3.  Ports - Princess definitely screwed up on the time the ship was docked in most ports.  In the most interesting cities where people would really like to spend more time exploring the culture, the ship left too early, usually around 6pm.  The worst departure times were in Rome and Florence - the ship could have arranged for a much longer stay as the round-trip drive between Civitavecchia and Rome, and Livorno and Florence, respectively, is 2.5 hours each.  Apparently, Princess wanted to save money by not paying ports for a longer stay.

4.  Shore excursions - some very good, others were bland, rushed and overpriced. Some very clear misrepresentations and apparently contracts were signed with less than reputable local tour companies.  A mixed bag.  Not what Princess used to be years ago.

5.  Booking practices - Princess markets 14 day cruise (that's what we bought) but apparently sells it also in 7-day increments.  So the ship is like a huge revolving door with large groups of people getting on and off the ship with suitcases.  The quality of the 7-day increment passengers is much lower than those who bought 14-day increments (think of Carnival Cruises people).

6.  Upselling - while we expected some degree of upselling, this cruises exceeded our expectations in a not so good way.  Just to give you an example, a set of about 70 black and white photographs made in the ship's studio was initially selling for $8000.  When pressed, the photographer agreed to discount the significantly reduced set to about $2000.  The whole proposition was ridiculous because a professional photographer would have charged me much, much less for the same, if not better quality of work.

Overall, the impression was that Princess is only after squeezing as much profit as they can in any way possible while clearly sacrificing the vacation quality and experience of many passengers, especially seasoned cruisers.  I am not sure if I will now want to sail with Princess again.

Ports of call ofcourse, I like exploring on my own, less time restraints, a whole lot cheaper. 

Liked the staff's service although most of them looked tired. Who would not be!

A bummer that Turkey was cancelled, the replacement destination are no match from any point.

Felt like I was visiting Geece from different angles, but why!

Unsure why Rhodes got cancelled.

The ship itself was very nice. Room was nice, but with a tiny balcony that we found difficult to use much. Everything was very clean, staff was friendly. The entertainment was, well, boring for the most part.

The food was great, room was spacious & perfectly clean. Throughout the cruise the shows in theater were below average except for the one single night musical with dancers that was very good.There's no indoor pool neither a proper pool for swimming laps.. The Sauna & Steam should be for free just like in Celebrity cruises. No welcome drink neither nicely wrapped refreshing towels upon return to ship, Celebrity offers that . 

While the Royal Princess is a beautiful ship with an exceptional crew, the food could benefit from some attention.  The presentation of the dishes was much better than the taste. In the Allegro Dining room o 2 separate occasions, human hair was found in an entree and a salad served at our table. The Crown Grill was so-so and probably the best meal on the ship.  Out of 5 guest, 2 had steaks that were served over cooked.  This was my 3rd time on the Royal and am actually sailing again in Feb. 2017, only hoping the food quality will improve but am not holding my breath as this is been our main complaint when sailing with Princess. 

Wordt service and quality. Could not wait to get off ship and never return. Felt like a jail sentence. Total rip off. They stole $200 from me for internet service thay did not work. They cheat everyone. I heard many talking. Sat internet when you sail next to shore is just not right. Food was sub par. Not enjoyabke eatong the same every night. Service horrible. Go to 2 different bars and order the same and you will get 2 totally different drinks. Staff is rude and hold a long face. Felt like floating hospice

lived the places we visited. The information on the places does not justify what you end up seeing. The cruise overall was very good. The entertainment could have been better. Food was excellent and the service was great.

The ship was pretty. The staff friendly and helpful. The food was very good to excellent. We were ready to turn around a start again when it was over.

My favorite part of the cruise was sailing into Kotor, Montenegro.  There could be an improvement on the waiting area in Kotor.  It was extremely hot on the day we visited and there was no type of shade.  Some type of tent or awning would have helped.  I would recommend this cruise to others. 

I thought yours was an upscale cruise line but your many  cheesy promo routines like repeatedly sending  ship's personnel around to my table bothering me as I ate dinner hawking wine tasting crab shack etc just brought down my estimate of Princess Lines in my eyes. Whose stupid idea was that? Your marketing dept? fire them, they're low class.

The mattress I slept on was just slightly wider than a crib .It made it almost impossible to roll over without fear of falling out of the tiny little baby bed. Norwegian Line offers luxury bedding.  You need to take a look at theirs. The only thing that saves you is your shipboard personnel.  They were outstanding. Richard the cabin attendant did a fantastic job from the moment we boarded.  Candelaria in passenger services knocked herself out for us and deserves special recognition. Dr Roberto in Medical was excellent although Diane who is suppose to be greeting passengers is unfriendly and cranky.

Not only do they try and work you for every extra dollar they can get but almost every port had an extra charge just to get out of the port and anywhere you could actually walk around.  The excursions were so overpriced!  The food was horrible and every restaurant you had included access to served the exact same thing that night.  No variety unless you paid for the premium meals.  My experience on Carnival was much better.  The staff all looked angry to be there and the service was horrible.  It took begging and waiving down someone to actually get served a drink.  There were so many things wrong with this cruise I just don't even want to waste my time writing it out.  I feel like I already wasted 14 days with the wrong ship!

Each day was a funfilled and exciing cruise.  We enjoyed the beautiful places we visited, awesome experience, great food and entertainment and wonderful camaraderie among fellow cruise passengers and ship crews.  We will definitely do it again at Royal |Princess.

- nice ship

- in general very pleasant staff (we did have a couple that were not as pleasant)

- good food

- some entertainment was good, but some was just ok and repeated the second week of our cruise.

- menu for dining room was somewhat limited.  Good food, but limited choices

- staff at the gangway (most) was not pleasant, no acknowledgement or smiles

Great cruise from Rome to Barcelona.  Interesting ports and the ship was very nice.  Although it is fairly large, the ship never seemed crowed and lines were never an issue.  Food and service was great.

The ports of call was the reason I chose this cruise.  Princess cruises did not  provide a very memorable time on board.  There were very few activities on board, there was no excitement created, food in the main dining rooms were very average, housekeeping did not do folded animals with towels, on stage talent was average.  I have been on many cruises including many on other Princess ships but the Royal Princess was probably the worst as far as activities and food quality.  We did choose to dine a couple nights in the Sabatini restaurant where food quality was excellent.