EMBARKATION: Nobody does this better than Princess. After collecting our baggage, we were escorted onto the waiting bus, driven to the pier and went to check in. We literally walked through the terminal and on to the ship in less than 5 minutes, including the always-hideous embarkation photos. I recommend completing the cruise personalizer on the Princess web site. Set up your onboard account and there is no paperwork onboard. FIRST IMPRESSION Grand Princess is one of the biggest of the "mega" ships. (We knew this when we booked, but having sailed on her, I'd say too big). The design throughout the ship is aesthetically very pleasing. Functionally however, the design is quite poor. Traffic flow is often a problem between meals and shows. Getting around is often frustrating, due to the cut up design of the ship, i.e. you can only pass through some areas on one side on the ship, and elevators don't go to all decks. The elevators system itself is also poorly designed and slow.

CABIN: We had an inside cabin on an upper deck as we spend little time in our cabin, and are not willing to pay a premium for outside. As it happened, ours was the very farthest forward and walking the companionway to the aft elevator to and from dinner was like once around the promenade on a "normal" size ship. First impression of the cabin is that it's smaller than usual. Bathroom is OK, not big. Storage is adequate. Now for the complaint: Filth! Several drawers were heavily stained, the Plexiglas covering on the artwork looked like it had never seen glass cleaner, and the carpeting was not well vacuumed. The clincher was discovering a previous passenger's underwear on one of the shelves! The steward blamed his "assistant." At least two things were broken - I did ask the steward to take care of this and he did, but I got tired of asking for general cleaning and you should not have to. I think Princess is wrong to just automatically post service tips to your account, and it seems to encourage stewards to just marginally do their job. This was definitely the worst cabin service of 9 cruises. (The comment card was omitted from our debarkation papers. I asked our steward for another one and never received it. A request at the Purser's desk got me the wrong form).

PORTS: Princess Cays: Well laid out. A good time - improved since our last visit. Grand Cayman: The stay here is cut too short. One of our favorite destinations, we were very disappointed to see it's been ruined by the massive influx of people from too many ships. There were six the day we visited, and dumping 12,000(?) tourists into Georgetown at one time is not viable. Costa Maya: Beautiful! We had trouble docking due to wind conditions, but finally made it about 2 hours late. (Other ships couldn't get in that day and skipped the port). I guess this is a relatively new port for cruise ships and it's very well thought out, including free shows right in the shopping hub. Cozumel: Pretty good - again very crowded. We had a good time despite weather that turned cool and rainy in the afternoon. Security was outstanding getting on and off the ship at each port. We were impressed with how well this is handled. Read more