Hawaii on the Star Princess

I was very pleased with my cruise this past two weeks, on the Star Princess cruise to Hawaii.
My favourite things about this cruise were definitely the delicious food, the game shows on board, the amazing movie choices they offered, and most of all the service we received.
My husband and I chose "Traditional Dining", where we would eat dinner at the same time each night and have the same servers each time. We were in the Amalfi dining room at 7:30 each night. Our servers names were Chris and Misael, and to be quite honest, they were one of the biggest highlights of this entire cruise. It was so nice at the end of each day to go down to dinner and see them, they would always ask us about our day and recommend activities in the next port. They were very attentive and always had great suggestions for dinners we might like, based on what we ordered before. It was like having dinner with friends, we're going to miss them!
On that note, we also lucked out and had an amazing stateroom steward on our floor (Baja deck Starboard Side) his name was Roy. Roy was so friendly and always wished us good morning and goodnight and asked about our day which really made us feel at home on the ship. He did a great job keeping our room looking beautiful and that made it feel so fresh and relaxed whenever we were in our room.
The negative things I experienced were few, but I did have some. Firstly, the coffee in the buffet dining rooms was completely unpalatable. This was no fault of the staff, as they would brew it fresh and strong as possible, it is the fault of whoever is stocking that coffee. This was a regular topic of conversation amongst so many groups we mingled with, that I was honestly surprised, it became a running joke. It felt very very much that they were purposefully offering the worst coffee available in order to push sales of specialty coffee in the cafe, which left me feeling really distrustful and cheap to be honest. This may seem trivial, but when you are on a ship at sea for 5 days at a time, much of that time is spent unwinding and socializing and coffee plays a huge part in that. We eventually did splurge for some drip coffee at the cafe but it was just as bad which really surprised us. The staff were very lovely though and eventually I thought to ask if they offered Americano's (they weren't listed anywhere on the cafe menu) and the barista said she did and made us the first decent cup of coffee on that cruise, a day before we arrived home. 
Similar to a soda fountain at a movie theater, the self serve coffee would have bursts of hot water come streaming into your cup, between bursts of the awful coffee, making it further watered down than it already was. It tasted worse than instant and as you can see by the length of my rant, was truly a big factor in the enjoyment of this cruise. So awful.
We also were not impressed that they allow smoking in so many indoor venues. We come from Canada (most of the ship did as well) and that is illegal in our country for very obvious reasons. I would not have allowed smoking in the sky walker nightclub at all, that was disgusting and distasteful and we were intending to go up there for drinks but left when we smelled the smoke. I instead would have designated one of the smaller pubs to have a smoking lounge. I also think it's disgusting that the back of the ship has a smoking allowed dining section right near the other diners and the back pool, particularly because it is situated RIGHT BELOW the children's and teens day areas! It's literally right under them. Poor planning.
I would still recommend this cruise to others, we had a very nice time over all and really enjoyed the food, service, and activities. :)