Its been several years since I cruised on Princess. I was very impressed with my last two Princess cruises and have been sailing with Carnival mostly and have also been on RCI and Celebrity. I always have a good time on a cruise and vow to make my own good time.
I think there is definitely a fair amount of being critical after being so spoiled on many cruises. This is by far the noisiest cruise I have ever been on. Mariachis in the wine and coffee bar. Loud activites and games in a place I would normally go to for a pre dinner cocktail. The deck had movies and concerts on the big screen, which was nice. I went and watched the U2 concert. The main lido pools were incredibly loud and noisy. I feel I am very sympathetic toward customer service individuals as I have worked with the public for 27 years, but I often received less than cordial service from a lady bartender, and servers in the dining room. When someone asked why the service was so slow, the waiter got very upset and started going on an on, how it wasn't his fault, that it was the kitchens fault. The first night we missed the show and on 2 other nights, we skipped dessert in order to see the shows. I only had a couple of dishes the whole week, that were fantastic. Mostly, the food was very mediocre. My New York steak the last night, was inedible, and tasted like Liver. Biggest disappointment was the salad dressings and soups were not good. Crown grill food was fabulous and service, impeccable, with generous portions. The Yoga teacher, and Zumba instructor did a great job. Sadly, the Yoga room was exposed to the very noisy gym, instead of being private.
There were two comedy shows, that were fabulous. Alfred and Seymour, and Carlos Oscar. They could not have been more funny and talented. Production shows were okay, not great. Would not want to see them again. Singers were fair. They had a Billy Joel tribute singer and he did a good job, but the last night, he did almost a duplicate show with just different Billy Joel songs and a few other songs in there. Should have had him in the minor lounge,for his second show, and other major entertainment in the main show room.
No rating as Hurricane Patricia, gave us another sea day.