My husband and I sailed to Canada and New England on the Oct. 5 departure of the Caribbean Princess. We are in our mid-to-late forties and this was our seventh cruise, although it was our first with Princess. We decided to try Princess because we were able to book this particular cruise at the last minute online at an excellent rate that we were quite pleased with.

Getting There

Since the cruise departed from Brooklyn, NY, and we live about 2½-3 hours away in Pennsylvania, we opted to drive to the cruise terminal. We left home a little after 8 am and expected to be among the first passengers to board the ship. Everything went smoothly until we were almost at the entrance to the Holland Tunnel and, theoretically, no more than 20 minutes from our destination. Our first clue to the impending disaster we would experience was a sign that read, "Holland Tunnel Closed. Use Alternate Route." We opted to use the Lincoln Tunnel instead. Apparently, so did everyone else who was trying to get to Brooklyn or Manhattan that morning. Over 3 hours later, after sitting in never-ending bumper-to-bumper traffic, navigating our way around a myriad of Manhattan streets that were closed for street fairs and bike races, and a few wrong turns, we approached the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal around 1:45 pm. Surprisingly, the previous week's passengers were still trying to exit the terminal area, making both the terminal's traffic patterns and the passenger drop-off area difficult to navigate, further testing our dwindling reserve of patience. Read more