Our first Princess Cruise was on the Diamond last fall to Asia. Despite the Norovirus epidemic on board ship it was a great experience. My husband and I took an over the counter preventative measure called SACCHARO-B (http://www.globalmedikit.com/products/Travel_Health/CytoMatrix_Saccharo-B) which was suggested by the nurse who gave me the required vaccines for the trip, and we attribute not being one of the Norovirus victims to taking these. This natural remedy cannot be purchased at just any drugstore but at a Travel Pharmacy. Surprisingly there were only a few hand sanitizers, located mainly at the entrance of the Horizon Buffet and dining rooms.

The Cruise Director and his assistant on the Diamond ensured our mornings would start on the WAKE Show with zany antics, quick wit, trivia questions, winners announced from the previous day, and all the activities planned for that day. Bottles of champagne were used as prizes for challenging but fun events, like horse racing, ring tosses, trivia pursuit, egg dropping contests, putting contests, etc. We enjoyed this cruise so much so that we booked 4 more Princess cruises while still on the Diamond Princess, such as The Grand Princess which took us to Hawaii in March 2013, a one day cruise on the Golden from Vancouver to Seattle in May 2013, The Pacific Princess for the Transatlantic in December 2013, and the Golden Princess for the South American Cruise in March 2014. In order to become a Platinum member one requires 50 days of cruising on the Princess Lines to reap the benefits of 250 free internet minutes each and free laundry.

Alas, our expectation for another glorious cruise on the Grand Princess to Hawaii for 15 days in March was not to be. We arrived at the Pier in San Francisco where an investigation by the Coast Guards aboard ship was taking place delaying our boarding by 2 ½ hours and our sailing by 5 hours. This understandably was out of Princess's control. We were fortunate to be only a few of the passengers allowed to wait inside the terminal, but hundreds of others had to wait for over 2 ½ hours outside under the hot sun. I am sure that bottles of water handed out would have been appreciated. Our first indication that it was not going to be as much fun and relaxing as our previous cruise was when we turned on the Wake Show the first morning. The Cruise Director, Sammi, did not make much of an impression with us so we opted instead to turn on the news every morning. There were far less games, and if you are religious there was plenty of opportunity to attend mass, sometimes twice a day, Bible study, etc. Aside from Trivia, fun, passenger participation in competitive games were frowned upon, as the Cruise Director stated that she didn't approve of competitive events and wanted passengers to bond together and form friendships! Read more