Crown Princess Review

4.5 / 5.0
2,240 reviews

Cruizn the Eastern Caribbean

Review for the Eastern Caribbean Cruise on Crown Princess

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Sail Date: Nov 2008

Background and Embarkation: My wife and I cruised on the Crown Princess departing Ft. Lauderdale for the eastern Caribbean on Sunday, November 9, 2008. We stayed in a balcony cabin on Riviera deck and we are in our late thirties. This was our fourth cruise on Princess having previously been on Golden Princess and Caribbean Princess twice. We have also cruised on Carnival Destiny, Ecstasy, Fascination, and Legend. We live in Naples, Florida and drove to Port Everglades and parked in the garage right at the dock. In my judgment I would rather get to the ship a little later and avoid the crowds and since we live an hour and forty-five minutes from the port and weren't flying in this was no problem. We arrived at the garage at 1:45 PM and I was sitting in my cabin at 2:15 PM. This was by far the easiest embarkation we've had.

Ship: The Crown is very similar to the Golden and Caribbean Princess with some minor differences. Read Cruise Critic's review for ship specific details as it is quite exhaustive. I felt the layout of the Crown was more refined than the other two but overall very similar. One thing about Crown is that Princess moved their nightclub Skywalker's so it's not perched on top of the rear of the ship. I think this works better as it no longer covers the rear swimming pool blocking the sun. The Crown is a beautiful ship, tastefully decorated, and easy to navigate. Princess's ships are prettier on the whole than the Carnival boats I've been on. I would like to mention that the seas leaving Port Everglades the first night were rough; I believe they were in the ten foot range as we crossed the Gulf Stream in route to the Bahamas. We are not prone to sea sickness and we didn't have a problem this night but the boat was certainly rocking. This was something we noticed the entire cruise. The sea conditions for most of the trip looked fairly calm but this was the bounciest cruise we've ever been on and I don't know why.

Food: I feel the food in the dining rooms may be slipping a little in quality. No major complaints, but I just wasn't wowed by anything either. They also had a lot of fish on the menu and I'm not big fish eater. Crown Grill and Sabatini's however blew me away and were well worth the extra charge to dine there. At Sabatini's you order your main course and then everything else as far as appetizers is simply brought in several courses to your table. I love Italian food and this was a special treat, great service, intimate environment on top of the ship, and wonderful food. Crown Grill is very good also and much improved over the Sterling Steakhouse on Caribbean Princess. I had a wonder Ribeye and stole a lobster tail from my wife. The Lido buffet on this class of ships is not well laid out and is prone to traffic jams. Carnival wins in this category, especially Carnival Legend. The food was fine but nothing to write home about. The pizza poolside is very good in my opinion and I have lived in Italy, people from Chicago might not agree, very thin crust.

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