As you can see with the grades I gave in most categories, performance by crew and ship were above average. Allowing for some gaffes in food preparation, and "tendering", I still stand by my ratings---but--and of course their are some "buts"--

TENDERING:

What was baffling to me was how terrifically competent the embarcation and disembarcation process was, yet when it came to the tendering process, the resulting confusion exhibited by large numbers of staff gave me the impression of a crew that was going through the process for the VERY FIRST TIME! It is not that the process took a long time,and yes it did, but that in the process, staff appeared confused, causing frustration to passengers.On this trip, our ship docked on time at 2:00PM-our group's tender landed on the dock at 4:45PM. It was a lesson on the danger of booking a tour with anyone other than Princess. Fortunately, our tour vendor in Juneau(MARV & HARVE) gave us a full refund which of course did not reverse the fact that we lost out on a port experience. I will continue to use shore based vendors but never where tenders are involved. Read more