I returned just under one week ago from our holiday cruise aboard the Island Princess. This was a 15 night cruise to/from the Hawaiian Islands from Los Angeles with five days at sea, five days in the Hawaiian Islands, 4 days at sea, a four hour stop in Ensenada, Mexico, and then back into Los Angeles. I've previously cruised on Royal Caribbean (4 times) and Carnival (5 times). This was my first Princess cruise and to be honest, I didn't see many differences between this line and the others. My husband, Kevin, daughter, Jessie (15 years old) and I flew from Fairbanks on December 18th and arrived at LAX at 3:45 p.m. My older sons and one son's girlfriend (all in their 20s) happened to be in town and they met us at the airport. It took over half an hour before the baggage arrived at the Alaska Airlines baggage claim area. We stayed at the Four Points Sheraton LAX for two nights. I would recommend this hotel to anyone staying in the LAX area. The rooms were clean and nice and they offered a 24 hour shuttle to and from the airport. The rooms were $75 through the Sheraton web site. My only disappointment was that the hotel pool was closed for maintenance, though I never saw anyone working on it. The pool at the Marriott was available to us, though, and the Sheraton even offered free shuttle service, which all the kids utilized.

On the 19th we rented a mini-van from Enterprise. There was a "hotline" phone at the concierge desk and they were there in 5 minutes to take us to their facility. We all piled in and went to my sister-in-law's house and then we followed SIL, BIL and two nieces to Venice Beach. The sky was absolutely blue and clear... The nicest day I've EVER seen in LA! We had dinner at SIL's house that evening and went back to the Sheraton for the night.

On December 20th we woke up and it was finally CRUISE DAY!!!! I get goofy over my cruises and was very anxious to pack up our belongings and get to the pier! We took all the kids to a late breakfast and gave the older kids + girlfriend their Christmas gifts. I'd heard that the pier at San Pedro was usually an absolute zoo, so was a little leery about what we would encounter when we got there. My sons are on the road with their band, so they had room enough for them, their equipment plus the three of us and all of our luggage in their van. It was a very tight squeeze, but we made it! When we got to the pier at 1 p.m. there was quite a line of passengers snaking out and around the building, but almost zero traffic! We kissed the boys and girlfriend goodbye, the porter took our luggage and Kevin, Jessie and I got in line. We filled out a questionnaire asking us if we'd been sick recently (which none of us had). The line moved quickly and we were in our cabin in about 40 minutes. Hooray! We brought one bottle of rum and one bottle of vodka packed in our luggage. No problems getting them on board. We also had a twelve pack of Diet Coke, a twelve pack of Sierra Mist, a case of beer and three bottles of champagne which were in our carry-ons and with that, also no problem. Read more