My wife and I sailed on the Grand Princess departing Los Angeles on 10/20 for a 10 night Sea of Cortez Mexican cruise. This was our 3rd Princess sailing this year. Although there is no such thing as a bad cruise, some are better than others. If this had been our first Princess cruise, it might have well been our last. I don’t know if we were spoiled from our 16day Panama Transit on the Island, but the Grand isn’t so Grand.
I’m 56 and my wife is 52. Our primary residence is in Hawaii and we have a home in Southern California. The Grand was delayed getting into Long Beach on the 20th due to bad weather coming south from San Francisco. Our son drove us to the dock and after about an hour wait we were on board around noon. After a quick bite in the Lido, I headed out to meet with the Maître d’ to check on our dining arraignments. We had first siting and had asked for a table of 2. We were assigned a table of 6 in the Botticelli dining room. We got it changed to a table for 2 in the Michelangelo dining room.
Our cabin was E729. I couldn’t wait to see our large balcony and wasn’t disappointed. The only drawback is the chairs are very uncomfortable to lie out on. We have always gotten a Mini suite as my wife likes the bathtub and I like the extra room. First impression on the Grand, our balcony railing was buckled and looked unsafe. The wooden top rail didn’t fully meet up with the metal railing. A lot of rust everywhere. I live 2 blocks from the beach, so I know how rust creeps.
Awesome Balcony. Liked the vibration. Some noise when docking when using thrusters. Early morning noise when docking from line handlers. None of it bothered us.