Introduction-This was our second cruise, our second cruise on Princess and our second cruise to Alaska.
Our first cruise last May was wonderful but far from perfect. We booked it almost on a whim knowing little about cruising and not much more about Alaska. We missed so much (two ports and the glacier), a bad start made most of the passengers a little surly at best and an over tired crew did little in the beginning to improve things. On the way home, we started planning our next cruise and this is where this report really begins.
We discovered cruisecritic.com and soon discovered cruise reports from our cruise. Many were totally negative. A few were Pollyanna sweet. Both sides missed the totality of the cruise. We started reading the cruise reports regularly, especially those to Alaska. We also read the Princess forum and the Alaska forum with care. We analyzed every detail of cruising and every reference to Alaska's ports of call.