My wife an I had sailed on a 7 day Alaska cruise on the Dawn Princess back in '99 and decided to repeat the experience plus add a 6 day land package. We didn't start looking until May and went with Princess again based solely on price per day.

DINING

I don’t understand why all cruise lines seem opposed to traditional dining. We were told no tables were available but when we arrived at 5:15 nightly we had no trouble being seated with strangers. Traditional makes the seating process quicker since you can avoid the maitre d and escort process by going direct to your table and you never got to know your evening waiters. That said, we enjoyed the many people we dined with over the next 7 days. Most surprising, but nice, were the number of passengers from Australia & New Zealand. Read more