Demographics: About 90% from the UK and about 95% retired, which surprised me a little -- surely some people in the UK take their holidays in June?

Ship: The Grand Princess has some nice features that disappeared in her later siblings, for example some small mezzanine areas between the promenade deck and its extension around the Emerald deck at the bow that are protected and good places to watch the passing scenery. Also one of the pools is enclosed, making it the only one useable on this itinerary. On the other side, there is no central staircase, making it hard to reach some areas for those who want to avoid elevators. There is a serious bottleneck through the photo display area when the Vista Lounge and/or Botticelli dining rooms are in use because there's no real alternative for getting around this channel.

Princess's new "no smoking on balconies" has finally made it possible to enjoy them. But Princess doesn't really get the (non) smoking issue -- almost everyone smoking on the promenade deck were crew, including one person who spent fifteen minutes of every hour out there having a smoke. Surely it's possible to provide a crew smoking area away from passengers? Similarly, the casino and the bar where smoking is allowed are right by the lower level of the Princess Theatre and were not separated from it by any doors, so this part of the theatre was often noticeably smoky. Read more