This was our second ever cruise. We came away from our last one 6 years ago (Carnival) with mixed feelings about the cruise experience but decided to give it another go primarily due to the itinerary.We also felt Princess would be a bit more upscale. Ours was a party of four(2 couples, early 60's).The embarcation and disembarcation both went smoothly - no complaints. Our cabin was spacious enough and clean. We ate at the Coral and Island dining rooms, as well as at the steakhouse. Our food was excellent;however the service left us shaking our heads. The staff seemed to be in training mode - several times they tried to remove our plates before we had finished. Language skills were also an issue as we repeatedly asked each other "did you catch that?" The biggest frustration came when twice we laid aside 2 part bottles of wine for the next night and staff lost both of them! It took a 15 minute consultation between the waiter, his superior and the maitre'd before they generously??? decided to give us another bottle. Any restaurant would have replaced the missing wine immediately.

Cabin service was a bit spotty. Robes we had requested did not arrive until the day after sailing.Our laundry took 2 days to be returned. Our room safe malfunctioned; the steward seemed at a loss for what to do but fortunately Guest Services sent a tech up right away. Activities were less than we had anticipated and seemed geared to an older demographic (70+) - lots of health & beauty stuff. We had anticipated some educational seminars on ports of call, but that was restricted to a one page blurb in the nightly bulletin.Games available in library appeared rescued from a garage sale.We were happy with ports of call but did mostly private excursions more geared to our tastes. Won't be sailing Princess anytime soon.