Enchanted Princess: Preview voyage or maiden voyage?

[mokiemokiemokie]

We're considering hopping aboard the Enchanted Princess for either her "preview voyage" (9 days, June 19, 2020) or her "maiden" voyage (10 days July 1, 2020).

 

My DH and I have done two Princess cruises in the past, both on the Emerald, with zero issues.  

 

If we do this cruise we will have our 9 year old twins in tow.  In the past few years we have been on two Disney cruises and while they loved the DCL kids club they're open to the idea to try something new.

 

Does anyone have any comparison between DCL kids club and Princess?  I know Princess has recently re-imagined their kids club so I'm looking for recent experiences.

 

I'm also looking for anyone's input on being on the first sailing of a ship.  How did it go?  Should we risk it and sail first or let them sail once and then go on the second sailing?

 

Any input is appreciated.  Thanks in advance!

[memoak]

I am always leery of maiden voyages - many times they are like "shakedown" cruises with problems being fixed as you sail  I would let them fix everything before I sail - so the cruise after the maiden is probably be much safer

[dides]

1 hour ago, mokiemokiemokie said:

I'm also looking for anyone's input on being on the first sailing of a ship.  How did it go?  Should we risk it and sail first or let them sail once and then go on the second sailing?

 

We went on the preview cruise of Majestic Princess followed by the maiden cruise in 2017. The only issues we encountered on the preview were:

- not all the ingredients were available for new bar menus and new restaurant menus - they just hadn't got there in time. So they had a more limited restaurant menu for the preview and a full menu for the maiden.

- there were a lot of Travel Agents and VIPs on the preview so it meant it was hard to book or get into the speciality dining venues for the first few days as corporate had got there first

- the launderettes were not fitted out - and, in fact, were still not available on the maiden cruise!

- they didn't offer the pub lunch on either cruise but they were shorter cruises than the first two for Enchanted Princess

Otherwise, we had an amazing time!

 

Sandra

Edited March 7, 2019 by dides

[goofy559]

We sailed on the maiden of the Royal - minimal issues. We had no issues getting into specialty dining and didn't  experience any disappointments - there was nothing we wanted to experience that we couldn't.  The only glitch we encountered was with our cabin - we had booked a cabin for 4 for the maiden.  My daughter and I ended up on the 2 day preview as well - good thing!   When we got to our cabin on that cruise, it actually only slept 2.  That gave them 3 days to figure out where my mom and her sister were sleeping....This was only an issue as it was the first ship of that class. We laugh about it now and the girls actually ended up in a mini-suite, so they were very happy.

 

 The kids clubs on Princess are great - my daughter actually preferred them to Disney.