THE 3 WORST CRUISE LINES According to the Internet
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2024
- Let's take a look at the worst three cruise lines according to reviews across the internet, from Which, Cruise Critic, Trustpilot, and more! One cruise line had 64% of its reviews marked as 1 star! You will be shocked to hear what cruise line was voted worst of them all!
We highly recommend you check out the reviews before booking any cruise vacation! It's so important to book the right cruise line and cruise ship for you!
The full Which report for cruise ship rankings is here: www.which.co.u...
------------
⭐ Show your support and get exclusive access to videos, a live zoom chat, postcards, your name on our videos, and more! Become a Patreon: / benanddavid
🛒 Visit our Amazon shop for cruise must-haves (Affiliate link): www.amazon.com...
🚢 Book CHEAPER Shore Excursions with Viator (Affiliate link): www.viator.com...
📧 Join our FREE email newsletter: bit.ly/3XuZdsy
📸 Follow us on Instagram!: / cruisewith
📖 Find us on Facebook: / cruisewith
✉️ Contact us: ahoy@cruisewith.co.uk
Surprised with the Princess Cruise reviews. Our experiences with Princess have been great! Excellent and attentive customer service, very good food, variety of entertainment, clean ship, and well planned excursions. We will gladly continue with Princess. The Medallion experience worked flawlessly.
Agree!
The problem is, Princess Cruises has to start putting its guests first. They need to hire someone who knows what their customers want and give them precisely that. Princess has one of the most loyal client base, and all they have been doing lately is slowly depleting it. Princess, we know you see this; stop messing around!
Yep. The problem is, like Disney (not the line but in general) it depends on who is in charge and if they listen and adapt OR if they go fine we'll just charge everyone who DOES show up more
I’m thinking the Diamond Princess debacle might have something to do with it
Don't forget the Ruby Princess and its 28 deaths from COVID-19. Yes, I have Government References.
its going from bad to worse
Totally agree!
A lot of these complaints can be chocked up to making the ships hold as many customers as possible yet not providing enough chairs, space etc. for the amount of people on board.
I was recently on the Regal Princess. One day was not only a sea day but it was also very very rainy... so everyone was inside and wanted to have a good time. There was not a seat to be found. Not even in the less desirable public areas. People were even sitting in the theater and in some restaurants which weren't being utilized at the time. But, it was so crowded that the only choice was to walk, stand, or go back to my interior cabin (that I usually only utilize that for sleeping at night) and watch TV.
They had activities, music to enjoy and things to be done... but no place to sit.
Yes agree with you, we did Majestic last year here in Aussie and was so disappointed re seating, activities etc. But the food was so good and def 5 star for us.
This is my concern. They are increasing the size of ships by adding more passenger cabins. But they are not increasing the public spaces. If you double the number of passengers and you need more pools and more lounge chairs.
I was booked on MSC in a balcony midship cabin for transatlantic. I booked 18 months in advance and had a great low price. 6 months before the cruise, I went to online to book excursions and my booking had disappeared. My travel agent looked into it and told me that MSC sold my cabin for a much higher price to someone else and just canceled my booking. NEVER AGAIN.
😊😊😊😊
😊
😱😡 that’s just wrong!
That really sucks. Imagine that your one booking was THAT important to MSC....shows to go ya, can't trust anyone. Glad you canceled but sorry you didn't away.
I believe that is illegal. Even if they are international, if they operate in the USA they have to follow USA law.
We been cruceing with MSC Divina, Meraviglia (my favorite) and Seaside and we are in love with the shows and such elegant boats yes maybe a little understaffed but overall experience was excellent we have no complaints and next Nov we doing MSC Magnifica so we'll let you know how is it and last but not least their story behind their Marine Reserve Ocean Cay what an honor be a part of it, look how they fix that dump site and brought back to life by MSC fixing Coral reefs and bringing 70,000 trees and now even birds not seen before are coming back 😊 I haven't heard from any other cruise line doing such a respectable effort to bring life back to that part of the Bahamas
I’ve taken over twenty cruises and would never sail on Princess again . Rude dining room staff and a cabin steward we had to ask be changed after several arguments about room issues. We were in a group of 16 and we all had issues. Never again!
What ship were you on? I sailed the Sky Princess this year and everything was really good. I am guessing the issues are not with the cruise line but rather with specific ships.
Sounds like you got a particularly bad ship. I have cruised over 20 times and 5 times were on princess cruises. All 5 of the cruises were outstanding.
Will never take Princess Cruise again. Had a scheduled massage - I am a little plump but wanted s message. The attendant spent most of our time messaging my head! My hair was so oily I left fuming mad! I never answered their calls to my cabin and left a bad review on their site! 😮
Never Princess Cruises!
Bad, Bad, Bad experience
6@@Calendyr
Much of the deck space on some of the big ships is taken up by the addition of a floating funfair and haven type areas leaving insufficient space for sunbeds around the pool. I personally prefer the smaller ships that offer a different less hectic experience.
I just did my first cruise with Holland America for our Alaska cruise. Very happy with everything! Staff was all so pleasant, did not encounter any rude staff, not a single rude one. Isn’t it amazing? They all served with a smile. Most of their staff are from all over the globe, Indonesians, Indians, Filipinos, Europeans.. very diverse and interesting. Food was very good. Entertainment was sufficient to keep us busy. I enjoy the smaller ship without all the fancy gimmicks. I have absolutely no complaints and now planning my next cruise with Holland America.
I’ll be on my 8th HAL cruise in a week. I am never disappointed
I did my first cruise with HAL too in May and loved it. Yet when I was waiting to get off at Ketchikan I was chatting with a couple who had nothing but complaints and would certainly have given one of these one star reviews.
@@hobnobkitkat wow!! I’ve done two Alaska cruises. they must be crazy!!
We really need to try Holland America!
Never had a bad cruise with Holland.
I have also found that there is a big difference between different ships in the same cruise line. Absolutely love you honesty and thank you for helping by sharing this info.
Recently cruised two different princess ships one week apart. Regal was larger and newer. Island was smaller and older.
The better(not judging the destinations) was Island. I'm not sure if the crew to passenger ratio was more in line, or if being an older ship they felt that they had to do a better job just to stay relevant.... but they were excellent (and in a couple ratings areas, the best I've experienced in a while).
I have found the same , one ship was Freezing cold very cold and it was very
hot summer, other ship I enjoyed it , was a P&O cruise ship.
After 20 cruises on Princess I am shocked by this as well. Is there room for improvement, yes. But service has been excellent, food wonderful and the ships, although some of them older, very nice, clean and welcoming. I am so sorry everyone hasn't had the same experience we have had! Our loyalty remains unshaken at this point!!!
We had our cabin toilet overflow which made the cabin unusable for almost two days.
I complained and they offered a specialty dinner which I refused because we couldn’t even shower! So they offered a 30 percent discount on a future cruise, which they never confirmed and when I wrote to corporate to ask about it they never responded even after I spoke with a representative on the phone and he promised to get it fixed.
There’s lots of good lines that really want our business so Princess can go pound sand!
I can’t believe that anyone would pay thousands of dollars to go on a cruise where you get on a very big ship with thousands of people people that expect to be treated as they’re the only person on board. What could possibly go wrong ??!!!
Yep
I loved my last cruise. It was the perfect holiday.
The health dept failed Costa. They were one of the earlier ships with Covid.
Princess has really raised their prices overall. The princess plus and premiere pkgs are high priced for what you get. They have taken services and restaurants that were free and charge for them now. The way around it is to buy an upgraded plus or premier pkg. Then it's given to you but with limits. Their goodwill and service to loyal customers means nothing now. Princess management is way out of touch and ruining their facilities and services for profit. Many people have left them, not to return.
We sail with Princess in 6 weeks but we booked in March 2022 and paid in full then. They have sat on our money all that time. Our choice I know. Book early we thought and show some loyalty. Now they decide to change all their packages. When we booked we had no choice, it was one option. You’d think that they would honour existing bookings but no. Pay another £498. No chance. If room service and using the app was part of our booking back then we feel it should still be now. The things they have added is different, we didn’t pay for the juice bar etc but the things included should bloody well still be.
Bait and switch. Lesson learned. Never again.
Does it help to book with a Travel Agent in future who can go in & defend your rights to original agreement? Curious
@@mymai5859 we did book through a TA and they didn’t want to know. Apparently it’s in the T&Cs and nothing we could do about it
We saw all the negative reviews of MSC cruises, but decided to see for ourselves on a 7 day Med cruise on the Seaview from Barcelona in May and my wife and 4 adult children, loved the ship, the crew, the service, the itinerary and especially the entertainment and overall buzz around the ship.
They enjoyed the food, but accepted that it wasn’t to a high standard, just good.
They did say the food was always hot enough and they gave the crew members high praise for their service and friendliness towards everyone.
So glad you had a great cruise, it's always great to see how the reviews are not always right!
The problem?. It’s Italian. Most americans wont never understand the product.
Never been to Italy but want to go. What is the product?
@@JanetOrt Basic but solid and decent. Big ship, some nicely decorated. A bit too packet like most cheap cruise lines but with some lovely things as spa, shops, and specially restaurants. They mostly cater to southern Mediterraneans so it’s always fiesta and a bit noisy. Cabins are comfortable and service it’s standard. For what you normally pay it’s always worth it.
@@FranciscoCamino Thank you for explaining that to me. I’m not like most Americans. I don’t expect the world when on vacation. I consider meeting the locals as part of the thrill of vacationing in other countries.
On disembarkasion, MSC detained my sister and I for almost 3 hours. They accused us of stealing the life jackets from the room. The accusation was so funny , I started laughing when I heard it was the reason they detained us. My sister and I travel very light . We each have one small suitcase. If they have a brain, they would have seen that there's no way a life jacket can fit in our suitcases. They didn't even apologize sfter finding out we didn't have their precious life jackets!!
That is crazy! I would have simply opened my luggage and told them: "Show me the life jacket I stole".
@@Calendyr Yes we would have done that immediately if we had known what they were looking for or what we supposedly did wrong but nobody was telling us anything at the time. Only found out at the end. Horrible ! It's a good thing we didn't have to fly out that day or we could have been late for our flight having been detained that long! And we didn't even get an apology from them!
By any chance Were the security Indian or Philippines crew members?
@@ymgreen4113 I think if I remember correctly, Indian. Definitely not Filipino.
I stopped cruising Princess a year ago. RCL and Celebrity both offer a much superior product in the same price category.
We have to say we were so impressed by Celebrity compared to Princess!
RCCL is a better experience by far.
Wouldn't go Rc if you paid me, it was dangerous and they cover up stuff that goes wrong on their part. Never again Very bad experience.Take care & watch your back
Agree with no RCCL.
Our first experience with cruise ships was with Costa Classica in 2003. This experience got us addicted to cruising. Theme dinner every night it was a culinary experience. But when we took the Costa Concordia (3 years prior to the disaster) it was terrible, tables at the buffet weren’t cleaned, customer had to remove dishes themselves, employees were very unhappy. The only issue we had with Princess was getting out at every port, average 1.5 hours and wasn’t tender, why only god knows. Our worst experience lately was with NCL Encore (21 days) public space is for 2000 people and we were 4000. For example one pool can hold 30 persons. And so on.
A group of 16 of us went on MSC Meraviglia in June and we all loved it! Sure, it was busy, but we never had to wait more than a couple minutes for a drink. There were 5,000 people on board, but I wouldn't have thought so if I hadn't heard the number. All of the staff were wonderful and the ship was gorgeous! We loved the food!
I've been wanting to get on an MSC ship and I think I just might!
Whatever the American or Canadian cruisers may say, from my experience, overall, Costa is value for money!
@@lilkantsobnack7050I’m a solo traveler and had 10 days between two 35 day cruises
Booked the Costa Diadema for 7 days, grand total $750. Good wasn’t all that good
I was the only American on board and was greeted by my own interpreter waiting for me as I boarded, nice touch
Bottom line, you get what you pay for, the solo rate a plus
I can personally confirm some of the critique of MSC. On a 2019 Northern Europe cruise out of Kiel... Definitely the staff is overworked, but to their credit, they tried not to show it. The Mereviglia was a very nice ship and food in the dining room and specialty restaurants was nothing to complain about. Entertainment in the theater was weaker than any other cruise I've been on. Overall, it was a decent value
Been on Princess and we have not had any problems. The food was good!
What a shocker for Princess. We have booked for October 2024 doing the Canada and New England cruise on Enchanted Princess. Let's hope they sort things out ASAP including having a rethink on the casual dining charges etc.
Which date are you sailing? I just booked for Oct 5. I feel like all the cruise lines are moving towards charging extra for everything. The cheap base price though seems great for that cruise though! As long as the food is good, I’m in.
Did that cruise on HAL a couple of months ago. Really enjoyed it.
Sailing 19th October from New York.
I’m sure it will be ❤
We went on a Mediterranean cruise via MSC Meraviglia and it was a very enjoyable one. Nothing like these complaints at all. The ship was new and clean, and the staff was pleasant. I have been wanting to go on an ocean cruise soon and I am thinking of using MSC again.
The Princess app that is described as “useless” now costs money to ship and activate on board. Sudden cuts and shifty business practices seem to mark the Princess brand these days.
Boooooooo, Princess!🤬 not worth the money!
We can't believe they are charging to use the app! crazy times!
I absolutely do not know what you're talking about. We're cruising on.
The sun princess in just one month. It is a medallion class ship. The medallion app is free and the medallion and lanyard are also free. There is no charge for this internet related product that tracks your spending chip wide. The only thing you have to pay for is internet if you want it , which is the same as all of the other lines.
We took a Princess Transatlantic cruise this summer on Island Princess. We were super satisfied with service everywhere, food at the dining room and in general experience. Our Medallion app worked well, with minor glitches at times (not opening the cabin door). Princess used to be better somewhat, we remember the good old days. But we still hope they will go to the previous level if service and entertainment, once they’ve recovered from the pandemic-related difficulties. We are definitely going back to them!
Thanks for the critique about these cruise liners! We are seasonal cruisers n totally agree the comments keep up with the 😇good work😊
I've sailed on 65 cruises in 34 years, on at least 10 cruise lines, both current & previous!
I've found the European based cruise companies simply hate to give anything away for free!
When they first started serving the american market, they refused to understand that Americans
expect things to be 'included' & not extra! Until they accept this concept, Americans will be unhappy!
The differences are cultural in many aspects. Americans might expect everything to be included but are perfectly happy to separately have a charge for Gratuity which is mandated and not seeing the port fees in the first screen of selection. Europeans expect, and this is even legally required, to have an all in price for anything that is mandated, so port fees are included and Gratuity MUST be included or mentioned on every page for clarity. Europeans then find it reasonable to pay for anything that they have a choice to take it or not. The same is also true for going to a restaurant. In Europe staff gets paid and a tip is not required but an option for beyond normal service, while in America a tip is expected, lousy or great service, as staff are underpaid and rely on the tips for a living.
My first cruise in 2009 was on the MSC Poesia, the ship was beautiful, everything was immaculate. The entertainment was not memorable but I don't remember it being bad, they had a european style disco club (looked like the movie EuroTrip) which was lots of fun. My families biggest problem was the food, they had a buffet that had ridiculous hours, only set dinning times in the MDR which was quite late and I do not remember any specialty restaurants . If you left the ship for the day you would miss the lunch but dinner wouldn't be served for hours and there was many hours which food literally was not available! We cruised NCL 1 year later and the difference was striking, multiple specialty restaurants, MDR which you could just show up and eat, trademarked entertainment (Blue Man Group) and the Blue Lagoon with unlimited chicken wings and Pie.
This is a cultural thing. It is a European line cruising out of Germany. Most Europeans don't eat until much later in the evening. Since most of their passengers are European, they run the ship European style, which they are entitled to do. If it doesn't suit someone's style, then perhaps they aren't the cruise line for them, just as American cruise lines aren't always everybody else's cup of tea.
I sailed with princess in May for an 8-night sailing and by day 5 we could barely find anyone who wasn’t ready to get off the ship already. It was a disappointment at every step, but we thought it was a one off but have been seeing more and more negative reviews that were similar to our experience.
It's such a shame, we have some fantastic cruises with Princess, we are really sad to see them go downhill.
Agree! We just got off and the best minutes were the first 30 and the last one! In between we had a poor experience. We have been on at least 7 other cruises. We paid for upgrades (2 special restaurants dinners each) we could not get reservations and when we stood waited for an hour to try standby but still could not get in. The upholstery was very worn out carpet worn through holes in it. The ship could not keep speed and caused us to be miss the port of call and it was very hot inside. It was so hot the cheese wilted on the buffet and the ice in drinks melted before made back to your table. The service was slow. It was not fun at all. The guest service crew was rude to us and others around us. Drinks watered down and the lights were constantly going out. The plumbing was horrible and there was a lot of staterooms had problems backing up😢. The stateroom was fine but lacked any real feeling of being on a vacation. This was by far the worst vacation ever! Waste of time and money.
Which Princess ship were you on in May? We were on the Ruby Princess in May, and enjoyed ourselves overall, other than the so- so food in the buffet place. The food in the dining room and the International Cafe were much better. The cruise director and his staff were awesome!
@@hopeemond2840 we were on the majestic. I’m really glad your experience was better than ours. ❤️
@@hopeemond2840 I was on the Ruby last March and the buffet layout sort of sucks but the food was OK. The mdr was good though. Did not do specialty dining.
I booked our second MSC cruise today. The first was on Magnifica and was superb.
Great to hear!
We had a trip with MSC last month. It's OK, not that bad. The room is good and clean, daily maintainese is good. I locked myself out of my home, as soon as I called, they sent people come to help very soon. I liked every night show on the cruise, I think it's the best of the cruise. Food is not great but not bad. I think buffet needs more selections. Anyway, I will go with them if time and price are right.
Had my first and last cruise on the Enchanted Princess August 2022. It took 3 hours to get on board during which time I had given up the will to live. Had uploaded all info online before boarding but still had to have my photo take 3 times at the terminal. Ship didn't have enough venues for the amount of passengers on board, those they did have were so crowded we couldn't get anywhere near. The food was beyond pig swill and we played a daily game "guess the desserts today" we got it right every time, chocolate brownies and cookies that we witnessed being slapped on the plate by a crew member who really did not want to be there. Never again.
We went to Enchanted Princess last Christmas was awful, the MDR food was horrible, the casino is on deck 6 smoke flowed into the theater. We just didn’t get good food,the buffet had themes and if you didn’t like Indian foods well you were stuck. Will never sail Enchanted Princess again, we will sail Princess the Regal is very nice.
When the video started I said to myself, who is this new adorable, young man talking about cruising? ♥♥
...btw, if you want a really bad cruise experience, try Celestyal or Margaritaville at Sea.
I just was on the Enchanted Princess, Aug 2023 and I was dissatisfied. Our mini suite had a bad mildew/mold odor and we let guest services know immediately. It was never resolved, as soon as the bleach odor evaporated the mold smell was back. Also the app was horrible, did not work at all or was slow. Drink service was slow, at least half an hour or more and there were times our ordered drinks did not arrive at all. I personally think they were trying to limit drinks on the package. When we went down to guest services on final day and asked why they had not offered us another room because of the mold smell they said there was no record of us ever complaining about it. We were at guest services daily complaining about the smell. They said they couldn't do anything for us about compensation on the ship and I should contact the cruiseline after I was home. The staff overall was not the friendliest with very few exceptions, our room steward was exceptional. This was my 4th cruise, the first one with Princess and I don't think we will sail with them again.
I feel people with a negative opinion are more likely to write a review so the data can be skewed somewhat. Some people are also serial complainers. On every cruise, we’ve always encountered some negative points but never feel the need to write a scathing review. We mainly sail with Princess and did feel standards had slipped on our cruises last year. This June, on Sky Princess, we felt the experience was much improved and felt akin to pre-Covid cruises. Unfortunately all cruise lines are trying to recover pandemic loses hence the worse service and increased nickel and diming. I also feel many expect cruise standards from 20 years ago at the same price as they paid back then too.
I tend to agree with you. Even on Amazon, I've purchased products rated low & griped about, but I wasn't disappointed at all. Some people do want everything for a super low price. Unfortunately, the world doesn't work that way. Lol.
I have enjoyed MSC but they definitely need more staff for the amount of passengers, it's so hard to get seats or drinks anywhere.
Service across the service industries (not just cruise ships) have gone down due to staffing shortages.
I am a solo female cruiser; older but not elderly (not a "looker" any more 😂). It took me forever to get a drink while standing AT the bar. I mean... at one point the bar staff was chatting and cleaning rather than mixing, serving or looking who else needed help.
Sorry but I cannot agree totally, last June we cruised again with Viking after having 2020 and 2021 cancelled due to Covid. Everything was as good as ever and no obvioys staffing shortages - you get what you pay for.
We booked Princess for a long European cruise because the itinerary looked good and the deposit was very low. But then we heard some not so good reviews and within a week, they made that new change (last week) to their packages and previously complementary items. I lost faith and booked Viking instead, even though it’s a lot more money, this is an important trip to us and we want to get it right.
Sounds like a wise choice.
Cruis
Cruised with Viking both River and Ocean, and June 2022 was our first after Covid, an Ocean cruise postponed from 2020 it was as good as ever. Love the ship's and everything else they offer.
I've been on two cruises with Costa. Both were pre-covid, so more recent cruisers may have had a different experience. I thoroughly enjoyed our cruises. Mind you, I'm half Italian, so the cultural bit might come into it. I got good service from the staff because I spoke to them mostly in Italian.
I went on Costa before covid and it was great service. So help full with everything.
Ben, glad you reposted this. You guys stay safe and healthy.... Cheers J
This video was reposted?
By the look of these two staff---run for your lives!
Oh boy, im doing an 18 day repositioning cruise on MCS, out of Barcelona to Miami. Thanks for the heads up
What is a repositioning cruise?
I've been a Princess cruiser for 30 years but I was a bit disappointed in my last cruise last year. The internet didn't work at all but they refused to refund anyone who had paid, and when I got off, discovered that there is NO customer service phone number or email to complain to. That alone is a reason to change cruise lines. And now they're going to charge for the food in the pizzeria? That was one of the few things I liked on the ship, so I'm going to Celebrity or Royal Caribbean the next time.
After 13 cruises on Princess, we are done with them, their customer service is atrocious. Some of their older ships are not well maintained and they don’t answer their dining line when your put in quarantine. They don’t stand behind their product and when things go wrong they walk away rather than resolve the issue. They went from our favourite cruise line to our least favourite. My opinion is that Celebrity offers a similar experience but with much better customer service. Princess has become an overpriced budget cruise line.
Princess definitely has awful Guest Services. I dont know what went wrong.
Took you 13 cruises to come to that decision? Holy cow!
Done 15 Disney and 8 RCCL. We decided to give MSC a try for the first time in June 2023. The Seascape was beautiful and we had no complaints even though the food was hit or miss. We had a great vacation.
I'm just curious what we could do to get you to book with Carnival Cruise on your next excursion ! We would love to serve you and show you the Carnival difference! Thank you in advance for your interest! 🎉❤
I've been on MSC in the Yacht Club and as a regular passenger. I didn't know I was on the same line. If you're not in the Yacht Club, stay away. I never saw dirt though. Usually they are always cleaning.
More space for us! On Costa, MSC and Princess! Thanks for the vid.
I'm a wheelchair user and Norwegian swore up and down that the handicap balcony was accessible. They outright lied. I'm going on a cruise with Princess next year and the TH-cam videos show that it's 100% accessible.
Just came off a princess cruise…. Never again. I’ve been sailing MSC and although they are a budget line, they didn’t nickel and dime me as much as Princess. If I didn’t want a drink at dinner, the Princess staff barely acknowledged my existence. We had a mini suite and the attendant only managed to have my room cleaned while I was gone once (despite having a literal tracker on us, being gone for 3 hours, dinner reservations, and the service room sign on). The food was mediocre at best. The desserts were grainy. Not to mention they totally screwed up my best friend’s wedding… a whole other bag of issues. For $5k just in base cruise price, they can shove it. And this was to Alaska.
That’s nuts for the cleanliness on the princess ship and unacceptable. I have sailed MSC a couple times and I swear they are ninjas I can leave for an hour and come back and completely clean and restocked I was super impressed with the room stewards on all my MSC cruises
Have done one cruise on Costa. We got a free upgrade from an interior cabin to a balcony cabin. Never had that happen before or since. Thanks Costa. I've done 3 or 4 Princes cruises and enjoyed them all. However, I will admit that I'm a pretty easy guy to please.
I took my first cruise (11 days to Alaska, Inside passage) with Crown Princess. REALLY loved it. Food was always good and varied, fruits and salads were fresh. I found that the service was almost too attentive. Felt quite spoiled. I had an inside cabin and even though I can't say it was luxurious, it was very comfortable. Thinking of going to Hawaii (16 days Ruby Princess) just because I enjoyed the experience so much. At Sea days were great because besides enjoying the ship, I enjoy the ocean.
Don't like being conned by bait and switch low life at Princess. We learn our lessons well. We have dumped Princess for future cruises and choosing Holland America, amongst others.
I think Covid really turned the world upside down in every aspect of life. I went on the Princess Caribbean Early Dec 2023. The crowd was senior on this cruise. However, I went with my elderly mother and she loved it! Absolutely loved it. The food was very good. The service was excellent, very happy people working there. The ship was incredibly clean. The room was slightly dated by ridiculously comfortable. I never slept better! Incredible pillows, bed on the softer side, sheets heavenly. I dream of a bed like that! Shower pressure perfect, amazing shower experience. Lots to do. Some theatre shows were very good, others not so much, but that really depends on taste. We had perfect weather, which helps majorly, if the weather was bad the experience would have been probably much worse. Excursions were good, my were low key for my mom’s sake. beaches were beautiful, water perfect temperature. I had a great time. Place was actually really lively for the senior group that it was. Passengers on the cruise were happy and friendly. For me the crowd was too old, but everything else was perfect. I also came with no expectations and open mind.
We cruised on the Virtuosa earlier this year. It is certainly a beautiful ship but the noise in the public areas was so loud in the evenings and in the restaurant we could not bear to stay there. Our accessible cabin had a pair of camp beds which slid across the floor every time we sat on them. Not a lot of use for a disabled person.
We are very experienced cruise passengers. We chose to cruise on Costa as we were already in Rome and love the route that they were taking. After just one day, I was ready to leave the ship and never go back. We did stay for the whole cruise as unpleasant as it was. By the way, we were on the Costa Concordia three weeks before it sank. There was no safety drill on our cruise until the fourth day. The food was terrible. The crew was very unfriendly and unhelpful. We saw the captain numerous times in different bars, always with two blondes, and he was obviously intoxicated. I hesitate to give it a 1 out of 10 but that’s as low as I can go.
WOW! That sounds absolutely horrible!
Ben, thank you so much for the information! You and David always do a fantastic job. I feel terrible that you must apologize and defend yourselves. I appreciate your information and your opinions. ❤
Thank you so much!
A lot of the problem is full ships. When any ship is full, there are problems. I have been on dozens of cruises ranging from 50% full to absolutely full, and the full ships just can’t handle the volume.
I am shocked because I cruised on the Sky Princess and Regal Princess and the food was great, the entertainment was good and the cabins were comfortable.I agree with the comments about their app and the medallion.
I know msc has mixed reviews. I have been on 20 cruises and of the 20, 2 were msc. We had an amazing time and decided to book another msc for Nov.
Ahoy ! SOOOO happy that I "stumbled upon" your new (this) channel, after being a subsciber for years on your main channel ! Of course I immediately subscibed here ! Thank you.... and Cheers !!
Just voted for you guys on the World of Cruising Wave Awards!!! 🤞🤞🤞
Oh thankyou didn't even know we were nominated!
Princess Cruises complaints are all spot on. My family has cruised on Princess for years and they warned me to curb my expectations. I did enjoy my cabin but all the other aspects were sad. Crowed but that is probably an industry-wide issue. Yet, I would still sail on Princess - just not for a cruise longer than 5 days.
We've been introduced to the whole cruising thing through Costa last year and although we have some complains, overall I would say it was a great experience. Maybe we just didn't have perspective yet having never cruised before. We'll see, this year we'll try P&O, we already booked a Norwegian Fjords cruise for early September.
When it comes to complaints, I would mention three things:
1. Buffet staff locking the coffee machines for most of the day. So if I needed a coffee past 10 AM I had to go and buy one.
2. Buffet on Costa Pacifica right near the pool area so there was a strong smell of chlorine in the entire area all the time. Unfortunately that's one of the smells I don't tolerate.
3. Photographers in your face all the time. I understand that they have a job to do, but for God's sake, at least while I'm having my dinner in the main restaurant, leave me alone, don't jump on me and my family, force us into some stupid, arranged pose to take a picture. In my country there's a saying: even dogs want to be left alone while they're eating.
Speaking of the future, based on videos like yours and similar, there re three lines I'll steer clear of: MSC since huge crowds and long waits are not my idea of a vacation. The second one is - shocker - Royal Caribbean. Somehow the perspective of thousands of screaming, running, unsupervised kids doesn't sound well to me. Besides, I've seen pics of their newest megaship and it looks futuristic, extravagant and horrible. Like someone gathered all the furniture and decor from at least 500 kindergartens and just as many toy shops and stuck all of that in a humongous shopping mall. Everyone has different tastes, but to me, that's beyond what I can tolerate: everything is brilliant, eye watering Barbie pink, fluorescent green and bright blue. The very definition of kitsch.
The third one is Disney. It's just not my thing.
We took. Princess cruise to Alaska in May 2022. Second sailing after cruises resumed. The medallion app was bad. It was faster to walk to the bar and order than to use the app. 50% of the drinks we ordered on the app said delivered but never made it to us. With that said, the staff were amazing. We tended to use the same bars day after day and most of the time they had our drinks ready before we ordered. They remembered us and what we liked based on time of day. Our room steward was very nice and always made us feel special. The food was good. We are at Afredo Italian. We did one specialty dinner at the crown grill which princess comped us for our anniversary. The entertainment was ok but nothing to write home about but that is not why we booked. We booked to see Alaska and it was spectacular!! The rangers came aboard and did talks about the glaciers. We enjoyed every port we were in. Victoria was our shortest stay at 6 hours. Skagway was a 12 hour stop. Juneau was around 10 hours. We had plenty of time at each port and that is why we chose Princess. We also did 4 days on land before the cruise. Honestly is was the best vacation we ever took.
Huh. I took that 12 night cruise in September 2022 (last cruise of the season) and my medallion worked perfectly and every food and drink item I ordered arrived to me, whether I was in my cabin or not. I ate in either the dining room or the buffet. Saw humpback whales, orcas, otter, porpoises, eagles, and bears snagging salmon out of the water. We left Vancouver 12 hours late and lost Icy Point, but we had more time in Juneau, loved all the stops and I saw glaciers. I will admit I may have been lucky that I was on the Grand Princess, and we had around 1,750 people on board, out of a possible 2,250. Even dipped briefly into Capitol City Comic-con in Victoria - where we had around 15 hours. It was overall perfect for me.
Honestly, nothing would get me on a Costa Cruise! Thank you for the video!
I’ve done three MSC cruises and really enjoyed them all. I’ll agree the entertainment is less than stellar but our service and food was much better than our cruises on Royal Caribbean where long lines and cafeteria food lives. I will say Royal specialty dining and entertainment are top notch. MSC has always treated us very well and we continue to book with them.
Somebody go in expecting something that frankly they haven’t paid for
I was about to book a Princess cruise when two different passengers reported that the ship cabins were unbearable warm and the corridors were hot and humid. I have since booked a 7-day cruise on the Disney Fantasy-expensive, but mostly 5-star reviews, and this very channel of Ben and Dave showed plenty of wonderful food in all the dining rooms on that ship.
We went on Costa Diadema. We have been on 23 cruises. The itinerary was great. The time on the cruiseship wasn't. Our cabin was nice. Our complaint was the food in the dining room. I know, when in Rome ..., but if it weren't for the spaghetti that you could order every night, we would have had a hard time eating. It was like they let the chefs just cook whatever creation they came up with in their head. One time I ordered the salmon (which was good), but laying across it was a shrimp that still had the antennae and eyes. So unappetizing. If I was able to post a photo on youtube comments, I would. You would be shocked at the food presentation. The other weird thing about Costa in Europe, is that people embark and disembark at every port. So everynight at 5, you had to hear the embarkation speech piped directly into your cabin in seven languages. It drove us crazy! Also ... again, we were on European turf, but all games and shows introduction, etc. were in Italian. All of our other European cruises have been on Norwegian and Royal Caribbean, and I guess we just expected English and regular food.
We have loved our MSC cruises and can't wait for our upcoming Norway cruise on the new Euribia ❤
I thought Margaritaville might be in the mix?
My good friend just returned from a cruise with MSC sailing from Brooklyn, NY. She seemed relatively pleased with her experience but then that this was her first cruise and had nothing to compare it with. I have been on the Royal Caribbean and have nothing but good memories. Thanks for your objective review.
Shocked by Princess they are our favourite Cruise line by far only negative is the medallion which does not work great.
We loved the Princess Medallion. We could always see where family members were and when we met new people we wanted to meet around the ship, the Medallion app worked perfectly. I also loved that you could order food on Princess anywhere and it was brought to you. Maybe some of the people complaining about Princess were younger people, because Princess really does cater more to the senior set because those are their principal cliental.
Sinking a cruise ship would be a dealbreaker for me. I won’t sail on Costa.
That was my first thought. I’m surprised others didn’t mention it.
It's the fault of the captain, not the cruise line for your info.
That's because people do not take their time to leave good reviews when they are due, but very fast to go online to vent when something went wrong. I always fill the survey at the end of the cruise. Im a RCCL fan, have cruised with them 42 times and 10 timesvwith others, including NCL, Carnival and Celebrity. While is VERY TRUE that cruising is not what it used to be, in many ways, we still enjoy it, we have 10 cruises booked till October of 24. We love cruising.
We were on the Sky P transatlantic in November 2022. We gave this 5 Stars. Food was good to excellent and staff went beyond expectations. Never had to wait for a server to ask us if we needed a drink. 2200 passengers on board so lower than the 3500 capacity.
Going on the Emerald November 2023. Will see about the changes. We do agree that the app is the weakest link.
As a travel agent, I try to steer my clients away from MSC. I've gotten lots of complaints about them and they have the worst call center. The one that took the cake, I booked a family of 5 in two adjoining rooms, two adults and 3 kids. The room numbers were assigned. Suddenly MSC moves one of them to completely different on a different deck. When I called them, they said it was because both rooms could accommodate 3 people and since one room only had two, they moved them. They did not seem to care that they broke up a family with small children. Fortunately, I was able to get our BDM involved who got them another set of adjoining rooms. If they don't want a party of two in a room that hold three, they shouldn't allow the booking in the first place.
The lack of crew is smoke and mirrors. Yes, at the start after COVID it was an issue but there has been PLENTY of time to train new staff.
Have been on 19 Princess cruises. Loved them all.
We just boarded the celebrity silhouette and the room was dirty. It was re cleaned but I am very disappointed with first impressions of the room, especially with the amount paid. However , first impressions of the food here is excellent and the staff are great( completely dedicated) despite issues ..They are obviously worked like slaves.
Thank you once again for your honest commentary. I enjoy reading / watching several different Cruise bloggers as each has a different perspective. I have definitely noticed that in the past 10 years my rating has gone from about a 4.1 to 3.5, and in the past 6 months to a 3.0. What would it take to make me give up mainstream cruising? Probably ask or any lower than 3.0. I will give it a go in 2024 with few expectations.
My wife and I are Diamond Members on MSC and love MSC except the Customer Service. Both Pre-Cruise and During Cruise. Their Customer Service is utter trash. This is not enough to keep us from Booking Yacht Club on the World America for the Inaugural Cruise though! 🙂
Oh no, we're going on our first Costa cruise in October, fingers crossed it isn't as bad as the reviews say! We tried MSC for the first time this year too, and it was just too busy for us, the ship was lovely though.
One of the major problems is, they are building the ships to big. When you have 7k and 8k of people on a ship of course you are not going to have enough seating area around the pools. Same issue with the food dinning and getting drinks. We always stay away from those hugh ships. You pay a good bit more to sail on them and they are over crowded. Plus a lot of the ports can't handle these ships. We like to take smaller to medium size ships. We can get into the ports we want to get into, and the ratio of staff to cruisers is much better. I think the staff are happier due to not being over burden with so many guest.
Some of these I expected. One was a complete surprise.
Princess is my favourite.
A friend of mine was currently on Costa firenze. Catastrophic!
We love Princess cruises which are especially suited to older cruisers. We have never experienced a bad Princess cruise ship. Younger cruisers will probably like Royal Caribbean more because they have more fun activities. We especially like the older Princess ships because of the entertainment venues. Until you have done at least 20 cruises it is difficult to comparatively rate ships. Some people who expect 5 star service and Michelin star food in dining and buffets are going to be disappointed.
Try Disney ships. Wonderful
Thanks Guys, will not be travelling with Costa ever, will stick with Norwegian, we have been spoilt with them so don't want to change, will go Princess cruised with them once, it was ok, P&O no way. We will try Celebrity in the future, going to Greece on NCL next year again. We were going to book with MSC but changed our mind now going on a land trip to Europe, can't wait, no cruise this time.
My parents went on the Sapphire Princess, and were treated abominably. The service was very bad, the cleanliness questionable.My father ended up getting sick while on board and went to the medical centre and pay big time before they would treat him, and then they turffed my parents off at the next port. Princess customer service absolutely sucks!!!! I wouldn't sail Princess if you paid me. I know some will disagree with me, but this is what happened to my elderly parents.
How terrible!😱
We were on Costa Mediterranea in 2009 and the food was the best I had on a cruise.
I'd really like for you to go on a Costa Cruise at some point and take one for the team, just to see how it is first-hand.
My daughter and I had a delightful cruise on the Ruby Princess. The one negative was food an and drink delivery. Over 30 minutes for drinks on the pool deck? An hour and forty-five minutes waiting on room service before giving up and going up on deck? We called and canceled the order but we’re still charged. Other than that it was a really good experience. Loved the cover band that did a different show 3 nights.
I went on a Costa Cruise in 1998. I had one of the best times of my life!!
Excellent video content. Thank you.
tip of the day.. if you go on these bigger mega ships with 3k+ pax they equal more problems.. Princess is in the same mini group under Carnival Corp as is Holland America and Seaborne.. we just did our 110th cruise on Holland America.. we stay with them exclusively.. sailed with them since 1997 and try to do longer cruises or multiple back to back cruises.. in the past we always did the smaller ships like the Maasdam and Veendam at 1260 pax now they are gone and sold off after Covid.. with only 2 'small' older ships left - the Zaandam and the Volendam at 1450 pax.. their largest ships hold 2600 pax and that's big enuff for us.. we're not looking for rock climbing walls or surf pools.. we got to like the Vista class size ships like the Oosterdam that hold 1950 pax ... we stay with a winner for us at least- it's the great staff and crew ..and that's what brings us back to HAL
Although I have tried other lines, HAL remains my favorite one. The experience onboard HAL is always amazing. Their service is second to none, even compare to more expensive lines like Viking or Cunard.😄
Are any of the cruise lines getting better? We have been cruising for 30 years and while the newer ships have amazing features, the food and service have been on a steady decline, but to be fair so have the prices. Lately we mainly cruise RCL, but since the pandemic the quality of food and service have dropped dramatically. We now find land based holidays more fun. Since the passengers you are cruising with can influence your experience almost as much as the cruise line, you should make a partner video "The 3 Worst Departure Cruise Ports" My vote would be Puerto Rico, Miami and Seattle.
It would be helpful to know which ports are the most troublesome..especially for solo travelers and/or disabled
We’re experienced cruisers. Had one cruise on Costs. NEVER again!
‘Costa’ not Costs. Sorry.
I've read the results of the survey on Which? web site and I think we should be all carefull about making any conclusion. The sample size of people giving their opinion varies wildly from one company to the other (ranging from 30ish person to more than 300). For example, Costa Cruise only received answers from 39 persons compared to the 176 for Princess Cruises (over the 1 727 total persons surveyed).
Enjoy your videos, my wife and I try to go on a cruse once a year. Thanks for the heads up. We are in our 70's
Going on Coral Princess early December for a mini cruise. Coral Princess is currently the second oldest ship in the fleet. I will give you a very honest review. Just keep in mind my only other cruise was on Sitmars Fairstar as a 14 year old in the early 80s 😂 I have done a huge amount of cruise line ship research but I do not have much experience.
I think Princess’s problem is customers don’t really know what to expect. Are they a mass market family cruise line or are they more of a luxury couple’s cruise line? A lot of their marketing would make you think the latter. Carnival markets itself as the fun ship. You know what you are going to get. Price wise, Princess isn’t much, if any, more expensive than Carnival, so you really shouldn’t expect all that higher level of luxury. Add to that their aging fleet and I can see why a lot of customers are disappointed.
Damn those annoying Costumers, all they talk about is fit and line, what did the Customers think?? just kidding
Princess are sunk, basically. They have no place in the current Carnival Corp. hierarchy. In trying to attract customers from Carnival Cruises, and other cruise lines in that category, they have alienated their existing loyal customers. Not a good, or smart, move.
MSC Seashore- exceeded expectations! It was great, kids (7-9) loved it!
Came off Sky 3 weeks ago, the app worked seamlessly, staff were very attentive Brandon in princess live and Balsa in crown grill bar ensured we never had empty glasses… honestly the staff were exceptionally friendly and attentive, although I will agree, with comments on the food… I got very bored as I won’t eat at the buffet and there’s only so much burgers pizza and stale sandwiches one could take. We also tried to avoid the popular entertainment, to get away from the excessive crowds. Personally too I found the ship dark and gloomy, I’m mean the blinds being down day and night really annoyed me, but I guess they were just hiding some of the life rafts… I said at the end of the cruise it I could take princess staff, and technology (app) with P&O’s ship Iona and food choices that would be my perfect ship.
Although the things I mentioned won’t deter me from going on sky again, they were just small annoyances really.