Fantastic new ship with a few caveats

We thoroughly enjoyed our cruise onboard the brand new Princess Regal. The ship is amazing, and we really liked the high-tech features, design, and attention to detail.

Pros:

1. The big shows in the theater were AMAZING! I've never seen anything with this level of quality before on a ship. The two productions at the end of the voyage set the bar for entertainment. There were high tech effects, multiple set changes, full 15 piece-orchestra, and fabulous singing.

2. Beautiful new ship - everything was shiny and new. Some people have complained about the design, but we had the opposite experience. The design made this "at capacity" trip seem like there were few onboard. We never encountered a wait at any of the public places.

3. We had the cheapest interior (no view) room, and the layout made it seem bigger than onboard other ships.

4. The service was amazing (as usual) in almost every part of the ship (note the one big area of weakness in the "cons" section.

5. High quality food served in the dining rooms. We only went to the buffet a few times as we thoroughly enjoyed the dining areas.

Cons:

1. Service in Alfredo's Pizzeria - The food was good, but the waiters here were EXTREMELY RUDE. We were really taken back by how poor the service was considering it was perfect everywhere else on the ship. They made us stand and wait several minutes for a table on both of our trips to the restaurant, despite it being almost empty. They seemed indifferent to their customers, and it didn't fit with the rest of the ship's overly-polite and ready to serve mentality.

2. Mid-ship elevators - The one design flaw that we experienced was trying to get between levels at mid-ship. These elevators seemed to stop on every floor and were incredibly slow to use. There weren't enough stairs in this area either. It was only a minor inconvenience, and you learn quickly where to go to get around.

3. Entertainment ended a day early - I'm not sure if this is common cruise practice, as this is the first time I've been on one that disembarks at a different port than where we began. However, on the last night of the cruise, there were no shows and the entertainment options were very sparse. I figured since I paid for the day, they shouldn't just assume that we didn't want to be entertained on the final night.

4. Enrichment activities - This cruise seemed to have fewer choices for entertainment. I really enjoyed attending game shows on prior cruises, and there weren't very many offered on this one. And, some of the games that they did offer were complete duds (murder mystery, smarter than cruise staff). The folks running the entertainment were great people, but they weren't comedians or actors. Watching them tell knock-knock jokes and pretending to be children in a game show was painful...

OVERALL: We had an excellent experience and the cons are all minor compared to the amazing pros of this ship. You won't be sorry if you book your next vacation onboard the Regal Princess.