Ruby Princess Review

4.5 / 5.0
1,976 reviews

Food & entertainment has gone way downhill on Princess

Review for Alaska Cruise on Ruby Princess
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KBates1030
2-5 Cruises • Age 50s

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Additional details

Sail Date: Jul 2019
Cabin: Vista Suite with Balcony
Traveled with children

We chose Princess because we had always heard that Princess really dominates in Alaska. We could not tell that, especially since our Princess ship was usually docked the farthest from the main downtown areas of each port. And there were certainly other ships that joined us on the same route into Glacier Bay. We enjoyed our Princess excursions but would have appreciated knowing before hand that the only probability of seeing whales in late July was in Juneau. We booked helicopter to glacier and dog sledding and loved it, but never saw a whale at all on our cruise. We did our water excursion down in Ketchikan and were told that we should have booked water excursion in Juneau if we wanted to see whales this time of year.

Our very first cruise 13 years ago was on Princess and we still remember how wonderful the food was. This time, not at all. Very limited menus and dishes were odd and not well prepared. Hamburgers were average and my son did not like the pizza. Steakhouse and Share were good but not fabulous. Bartenders really had better things to do rather than acknowledge our presence or ask what we would like. Main dining staff were excellent and our cabin steward was wonderful. Comedian was not great and my son did not enjoy the teen area very much. He mostly watched movies in the room and ordered room service and they could not even get a kid's cheese quesadilla or grilled cheese sandwich correct. The quesadilla (kids) came with tons of onions and spices. The grilled cheese was two pieces of toast with un-melted cheese in the middle. He was very bored on Ruby Princess and staff even agreed that at 15, they could totally understand that. Most music was for an older generation and we are in our 50s so we did not enjoy that either. Movies Under the Stars were all things we've seen a million times or did not even recognize.

On the plus side, the bed was so comfortable I got the best sleep of my life onboard.

Cabin Review

Vista Suite with Balcony

Cabin S6

The cabin was great, although the sitting area looks wider in the pictures. Shower was very small and leaked constantly so used a lot of towels. Huge Jacuzzi tub that we never used. Would have preferred a larger shower instead. Bunk that pulled down from the ceiling over sofa was perfect for our 15 yr old son. Plenty of storage and liked that shower, toilet and sink were all separate areas. Balcony was huge and wonderful!

Port Reviews

Glacier Bay

Hardly any snow due to the warm summer they are having. Kept saying, "There is usually snow on the tops of those mountains over there." Glaciers seemed very small and not what we have heard about at all. Calving (the little we saw and heard) was impressive because of the sound.

One thing I wish I had known before scheduling the tours was that by late July, all the whales have migrated up to Juneau. In Juneau, we did a helicopter ride to the top of the glacier with dog sledding, which was awesome, except that I never saw even 1 whale on my 7 day cruise. We did our boat tour in Ketchikan and saw nothing but a couple of eagles that she threw fish out to make them come down near us. She said we should have done a whale tour in Juneau at this time. We did not even see any in Glacier Bay! Our neighbor cabin went fishing in Juneau and had a humpback swim under their boat and surface practically next to them.

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