Just Back From The Sun Princess

[gunnywife]

My husband and I agree that this was one of our nicest cruises. We had a great time. The crew was wonderful, food good and we met some great people.

 

I agree with people who say the cabins are small and the balconies seem really tiny, but we soon got used to the cabin. There was a lot of storage space for clothes and luggage fits nicely under the bed. We had a good cabin attendant - Reyno. As soon as we left the room in the morning and evening he was in there cleaning. If we forgot something and went back to the cabin it was already cleaned up. Always had a smile on his face.

All the crew were pleasant - always smiling and greeting us.

 

We had a wonderful waiter - Charlie from Thailand and his helper Dhiraj from India) at table 84. We had personal choice dining, but the first night we so enjoyed our waiters and our table companions we kept that table for the 10 day cruise.

 

The entertainment was fine. We enjoyed the comedian, Cary Long. Micky Finn and his wife gave a real good show. She can really play the banjo. Never saw anything like it. We really liked all the shows we saw. We mostly went to the comedy shows this time since my husband likes that better than the music. Personally, I like both.

 

I have copies of all the Patters so if you have questions just ask. I also kept a copy of the laundry and cleaning prices. The cleaning prices seem to be comparable to what we pay at home.

 

We tendered into St Vincent, Grenada and Princess Cays. The rest of the ports we docked. I can't really tell you much about any of the islands we visited because we didn't take any tours on this cruise. But I can tell you I wouldn't bother to go to St. Vincent, Grenada or St Lucia again. Been there, done that.

 

I liked the food on the ship. I especially like the cold soups. And though I hardly ever eat fish at home I ate a lot of fish on this trip and enjoyed it. We ate virtually all our meals in the dining room. When aboard ship I like to be waited on and I certainly was. No complaint there. With the exception of the first night people dressed "smart casual" and formal. On formal night they turned away men in short sleeved shirts with no jacket.

 

We did not have one problem on this trip. None. We enjoyed every minute.

 

I will say some people got upset about one thing. We left from one dock in Ft Lauderdale and came back to another dock which I'm told is about 5 miles from the other one. So one person (probably husband) had to shuttle to get the car and then drive back to pick up luggage and wife. We took the cruise connection bus since we live in FL and it was right there to meet us when we got off the ship.

 

If you have questions about the ship just ask and I'll help if I can. If you're considering this ship I would highly recommend it.

 

Next month we're off to Hawaii on the Island.

Lynn

[RvrCrzr]

Why the hesitation to do those ports again? Anything in particular?

This itinerary appeals to me. I sailed OCEAN PRINCESS on the CARIBBEAN MEDLEY (10).

[gunnywife]

I suppose I shouldn't have said I wouldn't visit those islands again since we didn't take any tours to see the other side of the islands. So I'm probably not being fair. But my husband and I like to get off the ship and walk around and see things on our own and I just didn't feel that comfortable while doing that. We got back to the ship pretty quickly. We're not beach people, but if we were and got to some of the other areas we might have enjoyed it.

 

It's simply a matter of taste. I would recommend the cruise highly.

Lynn

[BigTimeCruiser]

We were on this same cruise and agree with most of your comments. IMO, embarkation was a little unorganized since they were working out of a different pier. The food in the Buffet was not as good as we experienced on this ship in May of this year. The food in the dining room was very good. Looks as though they have a new chef. We did notice air conditioning issues. One day at lunch the air conditioning was totally out in the Horizon Court. Our stateroom remained warm when the ship was in port. Tendering was not too efficient. Long waits to get onshore. There were some Internet issues with the Internet Cafe being closed and locked on 3 different occasions.

[mjtrike]

My wife and I just got back from a Sun Princess cruise ourselves at the beginning of October. We were on our honeymoon. If you would like to see pictures of our trip go to our pictures site pictures.planetkryptonite.com. There is a folder labeled honeymoon.

There are pictures of the ship and Islands we stopped at. We took shore excursions at each port. There are videos on our site too but they are not setup yet so you might not be able to view them.

We loved our cruise. We had a really good time on the Sun. There were some things we liked better then others. My wife really liked the cold soups as well. I found the food overall to be OK to Good. Some of it was very good but some things were down right awful. Such is life though. If you get something you don't like just send it back. The crew on this ship is SOOOO nice you won't have a problem.

I also recommend the aft swimming pool and hot tubs. There is no music back there but there is a bar and the pools tend to be less crowded. A very positive note on the Sun Princess pools. They are fresh water and they are open all night. It is very pleasant to take a mid-night dip with friends when no one else is on the deck.

I would agree the cabins are a little small. DON'T worry though. You get used to it and by the time our cruise was over we didn't even notice it. They seemed more then big enough with all the storage space. We stayed in A321 and our room steward was Vutipong. He was awesome as almost all the room stewards are.

pictures.planetkryptonite.com

[DandyCandy]

here is a direct link to the pics of the Sun Princess and the Ports of call from our trip. Ports of call were: Curacao, Isla Margarita, Barbados, St. Thomas the Princess Cays. (don't know why he didn't just post a direct link to begin with.)

 

http://pictures.planetkryptonite.com/Honeymoon%20Cruise%20&%20Disney%20World%202005/index.html

[florida_mom]

Hi! My husband and I just returned from the 10/9 cruise. It was our first time on Princess and 5th cruise overall. We truly enjoyed this ship. I have found that the service on board really makes or break a cruise for me, and the staff was outstanding. Our room steward couldn't have been nicer and more efficient and helpful. Our dining room servers -- Ilda and Jeffery were organized, attentive, funny, and just excellent at presenting the meal.

 

I thought the entertainment was the weak spot of this cruise. The comedian on the first night (who came back on the third night, I believe) was hilarious, but the other entertainment was not good, in my opinion. A piano bar would be a welcome addition to the entertainment options, I believe.

 

The itinerary was good for us, as we enjoy getting off the ship and hiring a taxi driver to take us around. We did this in St. Vincent, Grenada, and St. Lucia. In St. Lucia we used Frank's taxi as recommended by these boards, and he did not dissapoint. (We booked his tour prior to arriving.) Martinique was the one port where we literally had not spent any time planning on what to see and do. We ended up taking the ferry to the other side of the bay in Fort-de-France and rented a small motor boat at the marina there for about $66 for 2 hours. It was great! We snorkeled, saw some caves and just had a fun time. St. Thomas was our jumping off point for St. John's -- a place we had been to twice before on vacation -- so we rented a jeep and went to our favorite places.

 

However, our favorite days were those at sea where we just relaxed by the pool or read our books on the promenade deck, enjoyed a leisurely meal with our tablemates, and had a few cocktails with folks from cruise critic. The spa was nice -- I had a swedish massage and a scalp/neck/shoulder massage. The latter was my favorite as it got rid of an intense headache I had had all day!

 

Princess Cays was fun, too, and very relaxing. We rented a sea kayak with a glass bottom to it, which allowed us to see some sea life.

 

The ship had to tender into St. Vincent and Grenada, even though they had docks for cruise ships. These islands did not have tugboats and so there was no way for the ship to dock given that the bow thrusters were out. This was an inconvenience, to be sure, but the staff did a pretty good job of tender tickets, and getting people on the tenders without long waits.

 

The ship was beautiful, the food was delicious (especially the desserts), the coffee was barely passable as coffee but we strangely became accostomed to it, and the service exceptional. We mostly ate in the dining room for our meals, but the times we did go to Horizon Court it seemed fairly good with the occasional item looking like it had sat out too long.

 

Overall, great cruise, great ship, met a lot of fun people, and would sail Princess again.