We love the Royal Princess Cruise ship. We had sailed on it on a 21 day Mediterranean Cruise in 2016. Enjoy the layout of the ship, which includes the Princess Live. We were eager to try out the new Medallion Class and were were celebrating our 35th. Wedding Anniversary. One of the reasons we chose this cruise is because it finished in Vancouver. We live in nearby Point Roberts , Washington State. We were Happy to celebrate our Anniversary in San Diego, California on Cinco De Mayo. Lots of celebrations going on in Old Town, San Diego. This was the first time that the Royal Princess has been on the West Coast! Matt O’Brien was our awesome cruise director. We selected an interior cabin this time. It was super cozy. Comfortable, and clean. We had plenty of room for our clothes. We preordered waters and beers for our room. Totally convenient! Love the new Medallion Class! Ease of embarking and disembarking! Fast! Great way to order drinks! Delivered directly to you. You use your Medallion for all purchases, everywhere on board. Including the laundry room, and the slot machines! Can’t say enough! It was awesome! Entertainment was good. The comedian, AJ Jamal, was a standout! He was the entertainment for two nights! He was awesome! The food was good. The pizza was available in two locations Alfredo’s Pizzeria , where they make individual pizzas to order. They also have other Italian food available. There is NO upcharge. The pizza is outstanding. Pizza can also be found up by the pool. You can get it by the slice. Delicious pizza! We went to the movies under the stars. Popcorn is available during the movies. Omelettes are made to order for breakfast at the buffet. Freshly sliced smoked salmon and bagels daily. Steak and all kinds of eggs, cereals, pastry. Something for everyone to eat at the breakfast buffet. There were two formal nights. The second formal night had mini lobster tails and risotto. I previously lived in Maine, so I am a tad picky with my lobster. This lobster tail was extremely tiny. We ate in the Steakhouse and it was delicious, as always. It never disappoints! My husband had the rib eye steak and I had the lamb chops. Cooked to perfection. Had salad. My husband had the baked potato with toppings and I had grilled fresh asparagus and the creamed spinach. Delicious. We also had dessert. There is a $29.00 upcharge each to eat at the Crowngrill Steakhouse. I highly recommend this for an extra special evening. Pub lunch! What can I say? We look forward to pub lunch on Princess Cruises. There is NO upcharge. Always a lineup! Usually held in the Wheelhouse Pub or the Crowngrill Steakhouse. They have fish and chips with mushy peas, steak and kidney pie, bangers and mash, English Plowman’s lunch. They also have British Beers available for purchase. It is just the right amount for lunch. We thoroughly enjoy the Pub Lunch! Read Less

We wanted to see the West Coast on a cruise, and we have sailed many times with Princess so decided to go with the Royal Princess. We have had 20 cruises sailing on Norwegian, Carnival, MSC, Celebrity, Holland and Princess. This was our third time on the Royal Princess and we were disappointed in the quality and food choices in the dining room and the buffet. We only went to the dining room twice and found the food choices limiting and not up to the usual standards. They were offering a hamburger now instead of steak in the dining room. The buffet also lacked quality food. It seemed like they were serving up left over food and putting them into strange and unappealing dishes. The food did not look fresh. Also Princess is saying that using the hand sanitizers does not kill germs like washing with soap and water, and I agree, but the sinks they have before entering the buffet do not work well. There was often no soap and the water is not a strong flow. When you enter the buffet they had the hand sanitizers, but they were often empty. Therefore, many people not using either. There were good food options like the pay restaurants. We did eat at the Crown Grill and it was very good. We also liked Alfredos and the International Cafe. All excellent choices for food. All the staff, as usual, were excellent. The ports of our west coast cruise were excellent. The entertainment was very good on this cruise. The only problem, and that is a big one for us was the food. We have two more cruises booked: one with MSC and the other Holland America. We have had good experiences on both these cruise lines in the last few years. Read Less

We did the Coastal sailing from San Pedro to Vancouver. The ports we visited were San Diego, San Francisco (over night) and Seattle. We were fortunate to have sunny skies and calm seas for the entire cruise. Embarkation with our medallions was very quick and efficient, check in took minutes. We got to the port around 10:30 and we were eating in Alfredo’s around 11:30. The ship itself is very nice. We ate in the dining room 3 evenings and once for breakfast. All meals we ate in the dining room were not good at all. On the last night I ordered the Pork Belly which was recommended by the Waiter and it was so tough and dry I couldn’t cut it with my knife. The dining room food in quality and taste has really gone downhill from when we sailed with Princess 1.5 years ago. We ate at both The Crown Grill and Sabatini’s. We both ordered the Rib Eye steak in the Crown Grill. The steak tasted very good but a rib eye shouldn’t be 1/4 inch thick. There is less choices for the vegetables to chose from as well. Sabatini’s my husband had the Veal Shank which he thoroughly enjoyed and I had the NY Strip Steak which was okay. We signed up for the WineMakers dinner which cost $40.00 each and was well worth the money. The food and wine pairing was absolutely amazing. Apparently it is only offered on the Royal and the Regal and maybe one other ship, so if you get a chance I highly recommend it. We also did the Royal Tea there was a charge of $10.00 for it. It was nice although we have had better on other cruise lines with no added charge. It was nice to do it but we wouldn’t need to do it again. There were a few entertainers on board that were very enjoyable. It was nice to enjoy a glass of wine at Vines and listen to some music. The wine prices were very expensive averaged 11-15 dollars for a glass. It was cheaper to buy drinks on land than on the ship. We brought wine onboard with us for dinner and are glad we did. One of the cheapest bottles of wine cost around $45.00 with gratuities. Our cabin was D509 which was a mid ship Deluxe balcony. The cabin was fine, we had a two seater couch and a desk with a chair. The bed was very comfortable. The bathroom was very small. I could only imagine if you have long legs that you would need to open the bathroom door if you were using the toilet. The balcony was very small, there is no way you would be able to have a balcony dinner on it! When we arrived we found the coffee table in the closet, the reason being if you brought it out it would be more of a pain to keep trying to get around it so in the closet it stayed. Our cruise director was Matt O and he was always around and about, very good. Every morning he did the Zumba class in the Atrium and him and all the guests were thoroughly enjoying themselves. Overal the cruise was good but the food In the dining room and Buffet were not up to par. Alfredo’s for pizza was good, you can add items to a pizza and make it your own. We found the service in any venue to be very good, everyone on board tries their hardest to make the guests happy. Read Less

I had been on two princess cruises in the past both excelent, so when i saw this repositioning cruise pop up with its final destination right in my home city I decided it was a must. The ship itself was beautiful, the restaurants and service within those restaurants were wonderful, but the service at the bars and by the pools were pathetic. My bf purchased the alcohol package and i purchased the unalcoholic drink package, and trying to get drinks was like pulling teeth. you would order from a server after spending about 15 mins trying to wave one down and wait about 30mins before you got the drink or just left, even when you went to the bar you would wait 5-10mins, not because someone was infront of you but because the bartenders would first ignore you, then move in slow motion to make your drink. The activities on board were pretty pathetic aswell.. but this may be because the average age on the ship seemed to be in the 70s (we were not expecting this). There was knitting and painting and when there was volleyball planned the nets didn't even get set up because so few people showed up. The comedian AJ was great and was the highlight of our week. The other entertainment was good. Read Less

We chose this cruise to celebrate 50 years of friendship of our husbands, dating back to their Navy days in Italy. We chose this week because we figured it was not a "Spring Break" week, and the few children on board were well-behaved. The Royal Princess met all of our expectations. It has attractive and elegant public areas. It took a day or two to figure out how to get around the ship because of the central piazza area - there are some decks where you have to go up or down in order to get from the forward to the aft part of the ship. There were about 3500 passengers on the ship, but most of the time it didn't feel crowded. From the moment we arrived at LAX to the moment we left, we were greeted and taken care of by Princess employees. Our transfers to and from the ship and the embarkation/disembarkation process were very smooth and efficient with plenty of friendly personnel to direct passengers. Our cabin, aft-facing E-733, was smallish, but perfectly adequate, and was well-maintained by Emmanuel, our cabin steward. There was plenty of room for clothing and toiletries. If hair care is important to you, bring your own products, since there is only "shampoo-conditioner" provided. We had some trouble with the toilet not flushing occasionally, and there was some minor soot on the balcony. However, the cabin was nice and quiet, and we enjoyed the aft view. There were lots of loungers all over the ship, so it was never a problem to find a place to relax. We chose Anytime Dining and enjoyed our meals in both of the MDRs and the Crown Grill and Alfredo's. We never had to wait for a table in the MDRs. The buffet was extensive - massive, really - with many choices. We were pleased to see so many staff members keeping the buffet clean and refreshed, and there were many servers in the buffet dining area clearing tables and serving beverages. As far as entertainment goes, Matt O is an enthusiastic and energetic CD, and his staff members were all very fun and friendly. We played a lot of trivia games and they had a nice variety of topics. As often happens, there were either many enjoyable activities that happened at the same time, or occasionally there were no events that appealed to us. However, that was a good reason to do some reading or lounge by the pool or walk a few laps on the track. The production shows were good, if not outstanding. We particularly enjoyed the presentation by Paul Burrell, Princess Diana's assistant. Service from every employee (stewards, bartenders, wait staff, cleaning staff, front desk) was polite and friendly. We took shore excursions in each port, and I expect I'll be able to report on those below. In brief, we really enjoyed our half-day sailing experience in Cabo, but thought the Mazatlan City Highlights was just OK, and we couldn't really recommend the Best of Puerto Vallarta tour. The tour guides on both excursions were fine, but the PV tour included a long drive over rough roads, and we got back to the ship more than 2 hours later than we expected. We absolutely would take another Princess Cruise - this was our third cruise with Princess. We really enjoyed it! Read Less

This cruise was provided by Harrah's casino. This is my 1st time to board the Royal Princess. I did my pre-boarding process on line. On the day of my departure, i still have to stay in long lines. I observed some passengers were attended first who are not on the line. The ushers/usherettes did not provide any explanation why other passengers were provided special treatment as i see that they are not handicapped or need special assistance. Upon boarding, i went to my cabin and was surprised to see a very spacious room. My sister and i stayed in room A 516 on deck 12. Our room is so clean and have lots of space for my personal items. The bed is comfortable and have a high definition TV. Jovito, our cabin crew, greeted us with a big smile and asked if we need anything. He fixed our bed 2x a day and always leave chocolates for us to enjoy before bedtime. He always make sure that we have everything we need before he retire at night. Our dining experience is also excellent. Ian Virgenes is an amazing guy. He always make sure that we are happy and satisfied with the food and his service. He is an asset to your company. We always look forward to see him during breakfast on deck 16 and dinner at Concerto dining Room. I also want to acknowledge Karen, Freddie and so many others who made our dine in experience on deck 16 a memorable one. The food is excellent! Read Less

We booked this cruise to experience of the remodel Royal Princess. We have sailed this itinerary several times, so main purpose was to enjoy the cruise. This was a Medallion ship and the embarkation was the smoothest I'm had. Just walk up to the scanner, show your passport and on you go. Also, embarkation started very early which gave us more time on the ship. The entertainment was overall one of the best I've seen. Food selection and quality was good but not exceptional, had a disappointing experience at Sabatini's. Service was great all around. The casino was disappointing. They try to put too many slot machines in a small space, leading to trouble getting in and out of the area. There was an actual cigar lounge on the ship. It was a little small and got crowded sometimes, but a comfortable place when you can get a seat. Overall the cruise experience was good. Read Less

We have taken a Princess Cruise to the Mexican Riviera six times. Have very much enjoyed The Crown Princess and The Ruby Princess but, Wow, The Royal Princess with the Medallion technology is fantastic! Having the Medallion streamlines so much and quickens the lines, waiting periods, and simplifies getting into your cabin, ordering meals and drinks, making purchases, pretty much every activity on board, and that means casino gaming is even easier, if you are so inclined. A noticeable improvement is consideration for those traveling with wheelchairs and walkers. The entire ship is navigable and that includes The Sanctuary. Previous trips have made The Sanctuary inaccessible because there was no elevator that went up there and even worse, no bathroom. Finally, that has all changed with elevator service and a pretty large accessible restroom. My favorite part of this trip was the fantastic Cruise Director and his team. I always think I have the best C.D. but Matt O’ Brien is in a class by himself. Funny, clever, inventive and his enthusiasm was inspirational to jump in and join whatever was going on. His team of Assistant Crew Directors has excellent hosts with many fun games and shows. We will do this trip again! Read Less

Wanted to cruise the Mexican Riviera with our best friends. Thought Princess was supposed to be a good line. Nothing special about it. The food was not very good , even the food in the pay extra restaurants. The room was very small and lacked any color or attractivenes and it was classified as a Deluxe Balcony Stateroom. We wont be sailing with Princess again. There are too many better choices... Royal Caribbian, NCL, Disney, Oceana, Holland America. The best thing about this cruise was how great our room steward was. As far as the itinerary, Puerto Vallarta was the best, lots to see and do. Though Cabo is a nice place to spend a few days (have done that in the past) I dont think it was worth the hastle of going ashore. The other thing that was a surprise is that the "Stuff" they served as ice cream was NOT... it was watery and tasteless. And lastly, finding seating at the buffets was always a challenge. Needlless to say we have no plans to sail with Princess again. Read Less

This cruise went from Los Angeles to three ports in Mexico and back again to LA. We have taken about 25 cruises with Princess and many with other cruise lines. We have also done this itinerary many times with different cruise lines from San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles. EMBARKATION Immediately after picking up our two bags at the baggage claim area, we found the Princess representatives nearby and were told to leave our two large bags with them and follow a representative to the bus. We walked with her and were handed off to a couple of other guides during a walk of about a mile to reach the bus. Fortunately we are in fairly good health and the walk did not bother us. Some of the other passengers were having problems. Luckily it was not raining or we would have been soaking wet by the time we reached the bus. The ride to the ship took about 45 minutes. When we reached the check in area, we were escorted to the elite line and the check in process went smoothly. There we received our Medallions, which replaced the cards usually used for room keys and charging items purchased on the ship. The Medallions have other uses, but we did not explore those. CABIN We were onboard by noon and the cabins were not yet ready, so we had lunch at the lido restaurant on Deck 16. About 1 PM they announced that the cabins were ready and we went down to unpack our carry-on bags. We had room C309 on deck 10. I had a small bath with three shelves on one side of the mirror for storage of personal items. There was a stall shower and toilet. The bath was more compact than on other ships and moving around was difficult. Outside the bath were a dressing area and a large closet between it and the sleeping area. There was also a very small closet with shelves and a safe between the bath and the larger clothes closet. The sleeping area had a queen bed, a dressing table with several drawers and two night stands. Each one had two drawers and a storage shelf. There was a reading lamp on each. Across from the desk was another cabinet with a small frig. Outside was a tiny balcony with a table and two chairs. There was a large, flat screened TV hanging on the wall opposite the bed. The cabin seemed clean and comfortable. Only the floor showed stains on the carpet. Our cabin stewardess greeted us soon after we arrived at the cabin. FOOD We ate most of our meals in the main dining room, but also had some in the lido restaurant. The food in the main restaurant was fair to good. I had prime rib the second night and it was tough and somewhat tasteless. The fish dinners were usually good. There was a noticeable lack of vegetables included with most of the dinners. A typical fish dinner would have the fish placed on top of risotto or succotash with no vegetables. One night I had one slice of potato and a few julienned carrots. For those wanting more vegetables, I would suggest a salad before the main course. The service in the main restaurant was somewhat slow the first two nights, but improved as the week progressed. The waiters were always pleasant and efficient. The food in the lido restaurant was usually tasteless, which is normal. The quality is also not a good as in the main restaurant. There was a good selection and several types of themes were followed. We noticed Mexican several times and one night they had Bavarian food. This ship has a serving area that we have not seen before. There were several lanes running across the ship from side to side with serving areas on each side. Even though the ship had over three thousand passengers on board, there was never any problem getting to the food items. One lane had only desert items. These were very tasty and well prepared and presented. The first day we had hamburgers with fries at the grill near the pool and they were very good. I also had a slice of pizza one afternoon and it was fair. We have had poor luck at the specialty restaurants in the past so avoided them on this trip. The gelato at a cafe on a lower deck was good and the price was right. Two large scoops for $2.10 and they were enough for the two of us to share. ENTERTAINMENT We don’t care for the productions shows put on by Princess, so we usually avoid them. We did see one on this trip and it was just so-so. There was a good comedian who did two shows, one in the Princess Theatre and one in the Vista Lounge. A singer, Lou Gazzara, did two shows and he was quite good. He apparently was on the Idol TV show 17 years ago and now lives and works in Las Vegas. A married couple did a comedy/magic show one night. Unfortunately, they were not funny and the magic was boring. They used people from the audience several times and the tricks were drawn out far too long. Overall, the shows were better than on other Princess cruises we have taken in recent years. One afternoon, we watched a movie in our cabin. There was a large selection of movies and TV shows available on demand. This is a new feature we have not seen on other Princess ships. OUTER DECKS We primarily took this cruse to see the ship. This was the largest Princess ship we have ever been on. At 142,229 tons it was impressive. The interior décor was very well done. We often stay onboard when the ship is in port and use the pools when there are far fewer people around than on sea days. We look forward to swimming in the enclosed pools, because we both are easily sun burned. However we were surprised to learn that this ship did not have one. There is one pool in the center deck and one forward near the Sanctuary area. Neither is covered. VIBRATION The ship has serious vibration problems in certain areas. Mostly it is on lower decks and from the center of the ship to the rear. My wife was in a store on a lower deck and noticed that some watches in a display case were vibrating severely. While she stood near them a glass door on a nearby display case shattered and glass fell all over the floor near her. Thankfully she was not injured, but the glass could have caused serious problems. We went down to the area several hours later and the broken glass was still all over the floor of the shop. We also noticed the vibration while in the dining room on deck 5. Our cabin was towards the bow on deck 10 and the vibration was not as serious up there. We only noticed this problem on one other ship about 25 years ago. DISEMBARKATION On the last morning of the cruise, we went to the Vista lounge, which is the area where Elite passengers wait to leave the ship. The Captain’s Club representative was there to assist in the disembarkation process and did a very efficient job of announcing the departure time for the various groups. We left the ship a little ahead of schedule and were escorted to the bus. Unfortunately, it was another walk of about one half mile to get to the bus. Once onboard everything went fine and we were checked in at Southwest Airlines and off to our waiting area within minutes. The flight back to Sacramento was quite bumpy and the attendants were therefore unable to serve any refreshments. SUMMARY It was an enjoyable cruise with quiet seas all the way down and back. We were surprised that the weather in Mexico was actually cooler than we were having at home in northern California. We expected it to be hot, but most of the time it was overcast and cool to warm. On the two days returning from our last stop in Puerto Vallarta, it was very windy and too cold to enjoy any time on deck. We had one unfortunate experience while on board. We returned to our cabin one morning and found the floor to be soaking wet near the bathroom. I was afraid a pipe had broken so my wife sought the cabin stewardess and was told she had knocked over a bucket of water onto the carpet near the bathroom. She said she had tried to soak up the water with towels, but it apparently did not work. She made no effort to take other measures to clean up the mess. We immediately called the head of housekeeping and asked to have a wet vacuum brought in to remove the water from the carpet. We then left to spend the afternoon at the pool. When we returned, nothing had been done and the floor was still wet. My wife got on the phone to housekeeping and we also went to the front desk to ask for a cabin change. We were told that no cabins were available, but a supervisor was called to the front desk and he made arrangements to have a dryer brought to our room. Unfortunately, we had to stay in the room for several hours while the dryer was going, because we had to leave the door to the balcony open and did not want to leave the cabin while it was open. We had to cancel dinner reservations given to us as a perk by Princess at the Italian restaurant and were unable to get a decent time on another night. We were very surprised that the problem was not attended to without our intervention. We suggest that anyone having a similar problem should immediately get in touch with someone at a higher level. Don’t leave it up to your cabin attendant to clean up the mess or it might not get done. Read Less