Great ship! This was my first cruise to Alaska and my first trip with Princess and I had a wonderful time. The ship was gorgeous, my cabin was quite comfortable, the crew was very attentive and the food was (for the most part) pretty good. I was consistently impressed with every meal we had in the dining room, though less impressed with the more casual free locations. The buffet was hit or miss. I liked breakfast there, though it was pretty basic, but lunch and dinner were blah with the exception of lunch on our Glacier Bay day. That day they had whole roasted salmon at the carving stations, and it was one of the best things I had all cruise long. Trident Grill and the Pizza and Ice Cream stations on the Lido deck served passable food (though the ice cream was bland and too icy), but nothing to go out of your way for. Room service was pretty good though. I ordered the lasagna for lunch on our last day and was so impressed with it that I was sad that I had waited to try it.

We also tried the Salty Dog and the Crown Grill. The Salty Dog was just okay and not worth the cover charge. The portions were small and the food was overly salty. I also was not a fan of the Bourbon Chocolate dessert I had. I love a bit of bourbon in my desserts (it's lovely in vanilla ice cream or in caramel), but this was way too boozy for my taste. I quite enjoyed the filet I had at the Crown Grill, though my mother's rib eye was not the best cut of meat. She said it was very fatty (even more than you'd expect for a rib eye) and with a lot of gristle.

I was not a big fan of the enrichment on the ship. All the classes were pretty basic and were more focused on selling than teaching. I did love the naturalist they employed on the ship though. He gave a few great talks in the Princess theater and did wonderful commentary during the more scenic parts of the cruise that you could hear on deck or in your stateroom through the TV. Read more