A bit disappointed

Firstly I’ll say this was our second cruise.Our first was on The Dawn Princess July 2016 which was possibly the best holiday I’ve ever had.So it took 2 years of working overtime and saving hard to cruise with Princess again.I lived for it !

Boy what a difference.

I cannot say we didn’t enjoy our cruise,we did but there was a lot of little things that added up to disappointment.

Embarkation was smooth and easy.Our inside cabin was as expected and fine.We boarded at 12.30.

We had 2 suitcases and a holdall bag with soft drinks with us,we had both suitcases delivered to the cabin but the bag was missing. Our Steward tried to locate the bag to no avail. At 9pm ish we telephoned the service desk and were asked to come down to get the bag. When we got down they asked us to sit in the atrium area and wait for security, so the guy comes with the bag and asked us to open it,now I understand all about the naughty room which is fair enough but there was other passengers enjoying drinks etc. all around us .. looking.There was nothing in our bag that shouldn’t have been.

It was one of the most embarrassing situations I’ve ever been in and brought me to tears.

We did complain afterwards but they just didn’t seem to care.

So that rant over.

Other things we noticed ..

sitting at The riviera bar area the tables were rarely cleaned and always messy.Although the staff were friendly and attentive in other ways we cleaned our own tables.On tropical night there was no decorations on deck,no atmosphere.The food in Horizon court was very repetitive and dull.

We hardly ever saw the cruise director, on the Dawn the CD mingled with passengers a lot more.A few days into the cruise they ran out of our favourite beer, not reordering because of dry dock coming up I think.

We had an excursion booked with Princess to visit the Petronas towers,we received a letter to the cabin saying that because it was a public holiday in KL the itinerary was changed to KL tower.We felt this excursion was not to the same value but we weren’t offered any part refund.

We had 4 ports in a row, we got off and on with ease.We had a lot of rain and couldn’t enjoy the pool,nobody’s fault,and then 1 sea day before disembarking in Singapore.On that sea day the weather brightened up and preparations for dry dock started all around us, it was like they were taking the ship apart while we tried to eat,tried to enjoy our last day,tried to come back new !

They even emptied half the water from the pool.I am trying to have faith this may have been a one off disappointing cruise because of dry dock. We are booked to visit NZ on the Golden next year,I can only hope it’s a major improvement or that will be our last with Princess.