We just returned from a 2 week Land/Cruise Tour, arranged by Princess Cruises, to Alaska on the Grand Princess. Although we are experienced cruisers, this was our first time travelling with Princess. I must say our disappointment began before we even left home. This review is not about Alaska or the excursions we took, which were wonderful, but about Princess Cruise Lines. Along with the land and sea package, we also booked our airfare with the expectation of security of travel arrangements. I understand that flights in and out of Alaska are limited, but Princess should be aware of what is offered their passengers from their website. We were to arrive in Fairbanks at 2:00 am the morning before our tour began. Several months before our vacation, I called Princess to specifically ask about accommodations for this day since check-in was listed as 3:00 pm and was assured by their representative that they were aware of our arrangements and accommodations would be available to us. Four days before the trip began, I received a call from another representative explaining there would be no accommodations available for the first day. After contacting customer service and having my complaint escalated through many levels, we were extended several complimentary services on board ship and I made our own arrangements for the first night.

It was not until we arrived in Fairbanks that we found out the Princess Wilderness Lodge did not open until 12:00 noon the day our Land tour began. We stayed at a hotel not owned by Princess and had to transfer to the Wilderness Lodge closer to their listed check-in time. Upon check-in, our room was extremely hot. I called the front desk and was told to open the window. We went to dinner and returned to a still hot room. After another call to the front desk, I was told the chillers were emptied over the winter and hadn't been filled yet. After some insistence, a fan was brought to our room. We spent an extremely hot and sleepless night. On our way to breakfast we passed a maintenance worker and explained our situation to him. He assured us that he would take care of it and we would have a cool room when we returned from our excursion. I wish I knew his name because he was true to his word; we came back to a nice cool room. Menu selections were pricey and very limited with little opportunity to go elsewhere. The shampoo and shower gel dispenser was empty for our entire visit. When the manager asked me at check-out how I liked my stay I explained my experience and his response was he had just arrived opening day.

Our next stop was the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge. Thankfully, this lodge seemed to know guests were to arrive and were prepared for us. There was no soap available to wash our hands, but was rectified quickly. The morning of check-out we came back from breakfast to find our room had been stripped. There was a note of apology on the bed from housekeeping explaining they thought we had checked out. This was a small scale problem compared to the inefficiency of the other lodges. There was a larger selection of menu items, and we had a very nice dinner with a beautiful view in the King Salmon restaurant. Read more