Diamond Princess - Hawaii Cruise - March 2-17, 2008

The Port of Los Angeles is actually in nearby San Pedro. Long Beach is the nearest airport, but most people fly into LAX because there are more flight options. All Princess transfers assume that passengers will use LAX, but we made our own air transportation arrangements and chose to fly into Long Beach one day in advance. We stayed at the Hilton and used taxis for local transportation.

We arrived shortly after noon and boarding the ship went very smoothly. I had been online and filled out all of the necessary paperwork in advance including our shore excursions. Some of the popular shore excursions were already full before the ship even left port. Our stateroom was ready immediately and our luggage was in our room after a few hours. We met our cabin steward and he provided great service during the entire cruise. My only complaint is that my online requests were ignored (robes and fresh fruit in the room). Our cabin steward delivered robes on the first day after I asked him. Read more