Thoughts on Discovery Princess 9/18 to 9/25 Cruise Seattle to Vancouver - 1st Time Princess Cruiser

[san diego spartan]

Rather lengthy so read at your own risk! Just wanted to give my overall impressions on the ship and a take from a newcomer to Princess (though not a new to cruising in general).  I do have to thank the people who responded to my questions pre-cruise as I had many as was not familiar with Princess and the Medallion App, etc.  

 

First time on Discovery Princess, first time on Princess, but have taken almost 30 cruises on other cruise lines.   Traveled with my husband.  We also had another couple traveling on the same cruise.  Had always wanted to sail on Princess.  Overall, I had a good time (despite getting Covid-19) and the ship was nice, but there were a few things that I found disappointing and would not make Princess my first choice in the future.

 

I am not a fan of the Medallion App due to the time it took pre-cruise to get everything set up/entered. It was cumbersome to try to find things on the App pre cruise and would prefer to use the lap top website to just enter the info required for check in.  Also you could not book excursions pre boarding on the App – did not make sense to me.  It did work well for making dining reservations for our party pre-boarding.   It did work fine for us on the ship (even ordered food to the Vista lounge while watching some NFL football), with a small hiccup 2x when we came back on the ship from port.  We just had to log out and log back in – not a big deal.  Using the locate your shipmate was handy on one occasion.  My big problem is that I did not like the App to look at the schedule of events (prefer the paper Princess Patter that my cabin steward gave us).  It was just not user friendly and difficulty/time consuming to scroll through on the App.  Also I could never find the opening/closing times of the restaurants, shops, bars, etc on the App.  Maybe I just missed it?

 

We were booked on the September 18^th Alaska cruise from Seattle to Vancouver.  For some reason this was unfortunately not a RT out of Seattle due to the end of the season I guess.  I would have preferred RT since we had to deal with the ArrivCan app and a one way flight from Vancouver to San Diego which was more expensive and more complex as there were not a lot of choices/direct flights.  Unfortunately missed Skagway port - which I had been so looking forward to - but next time right?  The weather was not felt by the Captain to be safe to go there due to having to tender us in.  Understandable and we made the best of it in Sitka instead. 

 

Anyway,  the Discovery Princess is a nice looking ship.  As it is fairly brand new, everything seemed in good shape.  Being new to Princess I failed to do my due diligence and just booked a standard balcony cabin.  Once I realized that it did not have a small sitting area (small couch) but just one chair and a desk, I would  have upgraded to the deluxe balcony or even the mini suite (our friends had one and it was a nice size, though the jacuzzi tub seemed like a waste of space).  I tried to do so through our TA but was quoted a ridiculous price to do so and I never received (despite being eligible) the request to bid on a better cabin.  So not sure what happened there.  The cabin was FINE just a bit tighter than I’m used to.  The bed was comfortable, and I liked the pillow menu!  The cabin steward was great and kept the cabin in prefect order.  The balcony is small.  2 chairs and a small table.  We were R704 – more after on the port side, Rivera deck.  The cabin was quiet and conveniently located to the stairs/elevator and the laundry room where we actually did some self-laundry.  Nice that it was free (soap and dryer sheets too!).  I liked the large closet, though could have used a few more shelves.  Plenty of hangers for a 7 night cruise.  The bathroom is SMALL.  Hopefully you are not a large person or I have no idea how you would turn around in there.  The shower was fine, but really on a new ship I was surprised it was a shower curtain and not shower doors as I am used to on other ships. The flat screen TV was good, though it was not the fast reaction when you tried to move through the channel choices.  I liked that there was room in the closet to store our luggage instead of putting it under the bed like on other ships.  I like that the liquid hand soap and lotion were provided.  I'm not a fan of combo conditioning shampoo (oxymoron in my opinion). So brought my own conditioner to use.  I had read reviews re the terrible placement of the toilet paper, but frankly the bathroom was so small I did not find it a big deal. 

 

Positives of the cruise:

Excellent Staff with 1 exception in guest services that was quite frustrating and really left a bad taste in our mouths.

Food – overall quite good in the MDR for dinner and for lunch.  The buffet was OK – though the design is cumbersome and quite tight at times.  They had some decent choices and for the most part the food was good.  At 1 time at the Crown Grill ($29 fee) and would not waste the money again.  Disappointing meal.  International Café is very good and really like Gigi’s Pizzeria.  Did not try the Salty Dog on deck nor the slice Pizza.  Though the MDR breakfast was just so-so and while I usually prefer to eat there in the mornings, found no hurry to do so on this ship.  Also thought the room serve menu (especially for breakfast) was lacking in choices. Liked that there was a venue open 24 hours to eat if necessary (OK did not use that but it was nice to know it was there).  The desserts (which exception of the Crown Grill) were delicious!  We had no trouble pre cruise making dining reservations for the 4 of us.  And after the 1st night we were asked if we wanted the same table each night with same waitstaff, etc - we decided to say "yes" and had it the same time every night the rest of the cruise, which worked out very easily. 

 

Enrichment Programs – Excellent with the host Michael!  Really enjoyed his presentations, informative, entertaining, great photos, etc.  I attended 3 of the 4 and would highly recommend them to future cruisers.  Also enjoyed several other informative programs.  Princess did a good job in this area. 

 

Loved the large outdoor Movie Under the Stars screen – watched a bit of the NFL game Monday night and it was great.  Unfortunately for an Alaskan Cruise it is really wasted as Princess Discovery has no way to shut or cover that pool/lido area – it was pretty cool at times or the weather not congenital.  I can see for the Mexican Riveria it will work fine.

 

Gym – was nice and large and had some nice equipment/machines (though no 8 lb dumb bells).  Used it several times and was never crowded. 

Games/trivia/Zumba, etc – they had a nice mix of things to do to keep you entertained.  The Zumba classes were fun and I did attend the line dance “party” on the last day in the piazza, that was fun.  I did think that some of the trivia times were odd and interfered with the main dining room meal times, so I missed some that I would have liked to attend.

 

Pool areas.  The wake pool area is really nice and I like that pool on the back – very scenic.  I also like the option for the adult only retreat pool (though never used it as it is outside) and I think on some days was not open.  The lido pool area on Deck 16 and the Deck 17 hot tubs were super nice – but again not used by many due to it being an Alaskan cruise.  We did have a lovely warm day for Sailaway from Seattle so used the hot tubs then and it was fun.

 

Despite the Medallion App (or probably because of it) the embarkation was smooth and quick.  Disembarkation was easy, though a bit backed up at times, we were in no hurry so waited it out.

 

The not so great:

Entertainment – while one of the production shows (Rock Opera) was good, the other one which was a newer production was not that good.  I also found that while there were several choices for music (piano, orchestra, jazz, etc) that other than the violinists, the rest were just so-so.  I am used to higher quality of live music entertainment. 

Wine choices – poor, poor and really poor! Wow – I had heard it was bad, but had no idea it was  that bad.  Asked for a wine menu at dinner – brought something that basically said “red” or “white” – no kidding!  Princess needs to step up their game on this.  Even paying the different between the plus and premium package did not amount to anything but disappointing. 

Deck layout that did not allow you to walk through to the middle of the ship on decks 6 and 5.  Had to walk up and around and back down – was confusing and frankly don’t know if I ever go the “hang” of it. 

Crowded/slow elevators at mid ship – use the aft ones or the stairs for quicker get around (and work off some of the extra calories!). 

Poor layout in the buffet and hard to find drink/beverage self serve stations.  I also prefer a cruise line where the staff servers you at the buffet over letting you do it yourself.

The ship felt “tight” or narrow at a lot of places (i.e. Deck 7) when you were trying to get around.  The buffet tables were also close together which made it difficult for the disabled persons I saw. Also oddly many of the stair cases we took were tighter ones – though some areas had wider ones. 

Specialty dining choices – not that interesting to me and based on the 1 meal I had (Crown Grill) – not worth it.  I did not get a chance to try the sushi bar though the menu looked good.  The gastro pub Salty Dog did not look like any good options to me for $19.  Also I felt that the “feel” of the specialty restaurants was just “meh” – not “special” – many were just right were people were walking and not secluded enough like I’m used to on other ships.

 

What was missing.  While I did like the 3 story open piazza and a lot of the programs/entertainment seemed centered around it which was nice (though it got crowded and the seating was limited), I thought the Princess Theater was tight seating and there should have been drink holders.  But mainly I missed an indoor lounge area which had floor to ceiling windows that was up on the top or near top of the ship to sit and enjoy the scenery as we were cruising.  That is important on an Alaskan cruise to me.  It was too cold to sit up on the open deck (and I have to say I never saw blankets offered just pool towels). 

 

Overall a nice cruise.  Princess seems to have a bit more of a lively “party” feel than Celebrity and Holland American -which is fine with me.  I also liked that there was very few kids on board, but probably had to do with the timing of the cruise since most kids were back in school by then.  Due to some disappointments noted above, I’m not in any hurry to book a new Princess cruise. Have 2 more cruises coming up – one on Holland America and one on Celebrity.  Am glad we tried Princess though and I'm sure if it became an option in the future we would sail again. 

[like2cruise]

Thanks for the review...we are sailing the Discovery on the 15th.  Was the Rock Opera production show offered once or twice the evening you went?  In the current app, it is only showing at 7pm.  We may have dinner time conflicts if it is only offered once.  Thanks!

[MsSoCalCruiser]

26 minutes ago, like2cruise said:

Thanks for the review...we are sailing the Discovery on the 15th.  Was the Rock Opera production show offered once or twice the evening you went?  In the current app, it is only showing at 7pm.  We may have dinner time conflicts if it is only offered once.  Thanks!

It was shown twice each week when we were on the inaugural and the second cruise.  I’m usually not big on the shows but I loved Rock Opera.  

Edited October 4, 2022 by MsSoCalCruiser

[san diego spartan]

34 minutes ago, like2cruise said:

Thanks for the review...we are sailing the Discovery on the 15th.  Was the Rock Opera production show offered once or twice the evening you went?  In the current app, it is only showing at 7pm.  We may have dinner time conflicts if it is only offered once.  Thanks!

It was shown 1 night only - but there were 2 show times that night.  I believe it was the 2nd formal night that they had the show.  The 1st formal night they had the other show (also 2 times that evening), which I believe was called Spotlight.   We changed all of our dining in the MDR to 7:30 p.m. each night, so there was time to make the late show times. 

Edited October 4, 2022 by san diego spartan

[dianef]

What time were the shows?Was going yo make 5:40 dinner reservations in hopes to catch whatever is going on in the Vista lounge and the main showroom.Did the Vista lounge offer entertainment most of the night?

[catskier]

I sailed this cruise. I had a wonderful time, we had a premium balcony off the aft. I loved. Yes the bathroom very tight in the shower. I thought the same thing about a larger person. 
buffet was crazy, the lay out. I do not think they had the same offerings on both sides. But there was way too many offerings.

I liked the medallion. I was able to prebook dinner reservations ahead of time on the days I wanted to. 

I ordered a couple drinks on the deck on the last sea day. With the app, worked great. Beautiful day, watched whales. 
 It was odd you could not get through on deck 5&6, but we quickly got the hang of it and always got off on 7. 
 I did like Michael as well, he was kind of quirky, but grew on you. I found they did a fine job of keeping you entertained by day. 
 I never had a problem finding something I really liked to eat at the MDR. We seemed to just end up at the buffet every am.
I had no problem with the wine. We had the regular drink package, and we were able to drink Decoy every day. I find nothing wrong with decoy. I buy that at home. It’s about 19.00 a bottle at home. Elvis at Princess live did a fine job making sure we always had it. I have sailed Princess, Royal and NCL, Seabourn as well. I really enjoyed Princess. 

[san diego spartan]

On 10/3/2022 at 7:25 PM, dianef said:

What time were the shows?Was going yo make 5:40 dinner reservations in hopes to catch whatever is going on in the Vista lounge and the main showroom.Did the Vista lounge offer entertainment most of the night?

I think the show times were either 7/7:30 and 9/9:30.... sorry I don't remember specifically.  There seemed to be a show for the earlier dinners and then the late dinners.  The Vista Lounge had DJ music nightly, I really don't recall if they had other entertainment in there at night. 

[san diego spartan]

19 hours ago, catskier said:

I sailed this cruise. I had a wonderful time, we had a premium balcony off the aft. I loved. Yes the bathroom very tight in the shower. I thought the same thing about a larger person. 
buffet was crazy, the lay out. I do not think they had the same offerings on both sides. But there was way too many offerings.

I liked the medallion. I was able to prebook dinner reservations ahead of time on the days I wanted to. 

I ordered a couple drinks on the deck on the last sea day. With the app, worked great. Beautiful day, watched whales. 
 It was odd you could not get through on deck 5&6, but we quickly got the hang of it and always got off on 7. 
 I did like Michael as well, he was kind of quirky, but grew on you. I found they did a fine job of keeping you entertained by day. 
 I never had a problem finding something I really liked to eat at the MDR. We seemed to just end up at the buffet every am.
I had no problem with the wine. We had the regular drink package, and we were able to drink Decoy every day. I find nothing wrong with decoy. I buy that at home. It’s about 19.00 a bottle at home. Elvis at Princess live did a fine job making sure we always had it. I have sailed Princess, Royal and NCL, Seabourn as well. I really enjoyed Princess. 

Glad you enjoyed the cruise.  We did use the Medallion App to order snacks to the Vista Lounge when we were watching an NFL game and it worked fine for us - but our friends ordered as well and their order never came - though it showed it had been delivered.  Someone else apparently got it I guess.  I did use the App to order drinks at the pool on the 1st full sea day and it worked fine for me as well.  It seemed to work well on board for me - it was just the whole getting ready on the App pre-cruise that I truly hated and I also hated the way the time line of events showed on the App.  It was nice to open your door as you approached the cabin. 

 

Glad you had a large balcony - I saw them and they looked very nice! 

[KKB]

We were also on this cruise. Our 8th Princess cruise in 18 years. Have also sailed Celebrity, RCCL, NCL & DCL.

We find Celebrity & Princess to be similar in great food, great service.

 

Medallion app--meh. Yep, I much prefer Celebrity's app. I just take a pic of the paper daily activities to have on my phone. Easier to read plus I have hours of everything.

Plus on our July Princess cruise & this one, others drinks appeared on our bill even tho we had drink plan. Bizarre. (they were removed)

 

The room--we find bathrooms on most lines to be fairly similar in size so not sure on that one.

We prefer the larger closet/'dressing room" area to a sofa. Yes, the room area is therefore a bit smaller, but we like the privacy added by that area when each of us is getting dressed.

We find when we have a sofa we tend to toss clothes on it!

Balcony seemed similar to most regular balconies on other lines...so again not sure.

 

We thought MDR was great & buffet was ok--we too are not fans of the layout.

 

We loved the activities staff. We would hit 4:30 trivia, go to dinner & catch the next trivia after! 

 

We thought Rock Opera & Spotlight Bar shows were both terrific! So that seems to be subjective.

The violinists were excellent as was the band with the great female vocalist, imo.

 

We find lines to be more alike that different & have found things we love/don't care for on each & every ship. We would sail them all again--except not DCL. The price doesn't reflect a better product imo.

 

Guess we shall see you on Celebrity!

Edited October 6, 2022 by KKB

[KKB]

20 hours ago, catskier said:

 I did like Michael as well, he was kind of quirky, but grew on you. I found they did a fine job of keeping you entertained by day. 
 

Who is Michael? Do you mean DuVaul?

[catskier]

2 hours ago, KKB said:

Who is Michael? Do you mean DuVaul?

No, the naturalist on board. 

[KKB]

1 hour ago, catskier said:

No, the naturalist on board. 

Ah, yes. He was really good. Voice for radio!

[Momma Rene]

2 hours ago, catskier said:

No, the naturalist on board. 

I am very interested in hearing the naturalist onboard.  We will be on the Alaska Cruise on the Discovery.  We are bringing our granddaughters who will be in college for marine biology.  How often did the naturalist speak?

[MsSoCalCruiser]

20 minutes ago, Momma Rene said:

I am very interested in hearing the naturalist onboard.  We will be on the Alaska Cruise on the Discovery.  We are bringing our granddaughters who will be in college for marine biology.  How often did the naturalist speak?

Sorry to go off topic but Marine Biology…. That’s awesome!

[Jammu2]

Good read. I had many of the same criticisms of the layout of the ship as you did. We, too, never figured out how to get from one end to the other and just basically wandered. We wont be sailing on a Royal Class ship again. We do have one other Princess cruise scheduled for 2023 - Canada and NE on Caribbean Princess but otherwise Princess is not our preferred line at the moment. I should probably update my profile!

[MsSoCalCruiser]

6 minutes ago, Jammu2 said:

Good read. I had many of the same criticisms of the layout of the ship as you did. We, too, never figured out how to get from one end to the other and just basically wandered. We wont be sailing on a Royal Class ship again. We do have one other Princess cruise scheduled for 2023 - Canada and NE on Caribbean Princess but otherwise Princess is not our preferred line at the moment. I should probably update my profile!

I know it’s too late now to help you but you can take deck 7 from one end to the other and then use the stairs or elevator.

[san diego spartan]

10 hours ago, KKB said:

We were also on this cruise. Our 8th Princess cruise in 18 years. Have also sailed Celebrity, RCCL, NCL & DCL.

We find Celebrity & Princess to be similar in great food, great service.

 

Medallion app--meh. Yep, I much prefer Celebrity's app. I just take a pic of the paper daily activities to have on my phone. Easier to read plus I have hours of everything.

Plus on our July Princess cruise & this one, others drinks appeared on our bill even tho we had drink plan. Bizarre. (they were removed)

 

The room--we find bathrooms on most lines to be fairly similar in size so not sure on that one.

We prefer the larger closet/'dressing room" area to a sofa. Yes, the room area is therefore a bit smaller, but we like the privacy added by that area when each of us is getting dressed.

We find when we have a sofa we tend to toss clothes on it!

Balcony seemed similar to most regular balconies on other lines...so again not sure.

 

We thought MDR was great & buffet was ok--we too are not fans of the layout.

 

We loved the activities staff. We would hit 4:30 trivia, go to dinner & catch the next trivia after! 

 

We thought Rock Opera & Spotlight Bar shows were both terrific! So that seems to be subjective.

The violinists were excellent as was the band with the great female vocalist, imo.

 

We find lines to be more alike that different & have found things we love/don't care for on each & every ship. We would sail them all again--except not DCL. The price doesn't reflect a better product imo.

 

Guess we shall see you on Celebrity!

Lol....I think you might be right re the sofa now that I think about it...hubby would throw his clothes on it!!  

 

I do think HAL and Celebrity bathrooms are a tad bigger with the shower doors not curtains on the newer ships and the standard balconies  seemed a bit deeper to me.  But will see since I have both a HAL and Celebrity cruise booked in the next 5 months 

[san diego spartan]

10 hours ago, KKB said:

Who is Michael? Do you mean DuVaul?

DuVaul was the cruise director. Michael is the naturalist who gave the Alaskan enrichment talks

[san diego spartan]

5 hours ago, Momma Rene said:

I am very interested in hearing the naturalist onboard.  We will be on the Alaska Cruise on the Discovery.  We are bringing our granddaughters who will be in college for marine biology.  How often did the naturalist speak?

He had 4 programs.  I attended the first 3.  Excellent.   Make sure to look for it in the schedule.   Seemed to be about 11am ish.  Also he narrated the day we went into the fjord and saw the glacier.  We listened to hom on the TV in our cabin while on our balcony 

[san diego spartan]

3 hours ago, MsSoCalCruiser said:

I know it’s too late now to help you but you can take deck 7 from one end to the other and then use the stairs or elevator.

Thanks.   It seems silly but we and a lot of others had problems.  Good solution.   But why can't  we just take elevator to deck 6?  I panicked 2nd day out about being  late for spa appointment....

[MsSoCalCruiser]

47 minutes ago, san diego spartan said:

Thanks.   It seems silly but we and a lot of others had problems.  Good solution.   But why can't  we just take elevator to deck 6?  I panicked 2nd day out about being  late for spa appointment....

You’re welcome.   Some decks do not go all the way through because the Galley is in the way.  

[KKB]

9 hours ago, san diego spartan said:

Lol....I think you might be right re the sofa now that I think about it...hubby would throw his clothes on it!!  

 

I do think HAL and Celebrity bathrooms are a tad bigger with the shower doors not curtains on the newer ships and the standard balconies  seemed a bit deeper to me.  But will see since I have both a HAL and Celebrity cruise booked in the next 5 months 

Was on the Edge & Apex w/in the last year...so Sunset & Infinite Verandas leave me no perspective!

It was a bit larger than my NCL balcony in Aug.

We sail Equinox again next month so I'll have a better comparison.

[jtcoolk]

Thank you for your review.  I was curious about the Crown Grill and why it was a bad experience.  I went in May on same ship and had 2 amazing dinners there.

[Tedferg]

10 hours ago, MsSoCalCruiser said:

You’re welcome.   Some decks do not go all the way through because the Galley is in the way.  

I guess this is because Princess has three MDRs and one is aft, behind the galley, as you said. Our one no-Princess cruise was Celebrity and they had one MDR, so could probably locate the galley in a more convenient area for passengers. On Celebrity we missed the Princess central Piazza. Celebrity felt chopped up to us.

[MsSoCalCruiser]

2 hours ago, Tedferg said:

I guess this is because Princess has three MDRs and one is aft, behind the galley, as you said. Our one no-Princess cruise was Celebrity and they had one MDR, so could probably locate the galley in a more convenient area for passengers. On Celebrity we missed the Princess central Piazza. Celebrity felt chopped up to us.

I felt the same way on my last Royal Caribbean cruise. It had one large three-story dining room so it was a bit noisy at times.  I missed my medallion.