13-Day Cruise Around the United Kingdom and Southern Europe on the MAJESTIC PRINCESS

People usually read these reviews to learn about the bad things. When you pay large amounts of money you want only good things.

We were on the Majestic Princess Fire & Ice Cruise. 26-days total. We had a Mini-suite.I want to say that the first half of the cruise was for the most part incredible.

I want to mention 4 crew members who were absolute SUPER STARS:

Our cabin steward “Neptali”

Dining room servers; Svitlana (Lana) & Ryan

Restaurant Manager named Lazaro

Thank-you all for making our cruise better.

Now it’s time for what you have been waiting for – the bad stuff:

MDR:

Limited choices in the MDR. Small portion sizes at times. In 26-days they had only one lobster night. Breakfast and lunch service was always very slow.

PRINCESS SHORE EXCURSIONS: I wouldn’t recommend them.

Poor crowd control. One day we were in a “forever” line when one of the crew came down handing out stickers. When he got to us my wife was getting the tickets he said “no tickets no stickers”, I told him that we had been waiting 20-minutes so he could wait 10-seconds. He didn’t so that allowed others behind us to get off the ship first. I complained to Guest Services. No follow-up from Princess.

Horrible Guest Services!

DO NOT book the Paris excursion. 3-hour bus ride to Paris; 1.5-hour lunch (dry chicken and rice); 20-minutes at the Eiffel Tower.

There was also a tour that had a double deck bus (actually 3-decks). It was old and dirty. The heater was going upstairs (the people were really hot); downstairs was freezing cold because the ACV was wide open trying to cool the upstairs. We were sitting down on the lowest lever. We couldn’t see out to our left and the bottom of the window was eye level on the right side where we were sitting.

We had weather issues that caused the captain to cancel our last Norway stop and Iceland stop. We went to Belfast then 6-days to NYC. We’ve been cruising for 26-years so we understand weather issues. They did give us $100 obc.

The crew member, male, had a habit of putting stickers directly on the women’s chest. Other cruise lines do not allow this; the male crew members hand the stickers to the female guests. Minor thing I know.

Last problem: On our last sea day my wife was sleeping in. I had gone down to the MDR for breakfast. I returned to our room around 1030-1100. There was our cabin steward, and 3 other crew members at our cabin door. My wife had her head stuck out talking with them. I learned that they wanted to go through our cabin to paint the balcony. There was no prior notice given to us and my wife wasn’t dressed for the day. So I slipped by them and told then to go away.

Later I went down to Guest Services to complain. Guest Services said that it was “normal” procedure. Dozens of cruises, hundreds of days at sea and never experienced customer service like this.

Since it was “normal” procedure for Princess I did something that isn’t normal procedure for me, for the first time I removed the gratuities for the 2nd half of the cruise. I have never done that before. We still tipped the 4 people that made our cruise better.

BOTTOM LINE:

We have a 25-day cruise booked with Princess later this month (different ship) and a 21-day cruise in 2027 (back on this ship). After that we are done with Princess.

They have become Carnival with table cloths.

I bought a Future Cruise Package rather reluctantly. The entire process has been unbelievably great! Everyone was helpful beyond expectation with hotel reservations, perks from the package, and I just received a refund check promptly from the cruise line for expenses not used!

The cruise was great, food could be improved a little- sorry. The pizza was delicious and always hot. Hamburger meat needs a lot of improvement. One was enough for me, and hubby refused to eat all of his. Spoke to a chef about it, but you know that probably stopped there:)

Excursions and tenders were fine with us. We unfortunately missed Edinburgh because water was too rough for tenders. That was the main reason we had booked the British Isles Cruise.

Staff and cleanliness awesome. We have booked a second cruise and looking forward to it!

We were not looking for lots of entertainment or activities. They were available if you wanted it.

The cruise had many port stops and only 2 days at sea. I felt it was very busy and would have enjoyed another day at sea. Especially in the beginning. The food was ok but not fantastic. I am celiac and the they were very accommodating. I do think the deserts are very lacking. They were almost always ice cream, mousse, or rice pudding. The English tea was terrible. The gluten free scones were like sawdust. The international cafe was so disappointing. Never a gluten free savory and always a rice pudding or mouse for the gluten free option. It would be nice to have cookies or cake. There were some chocolate chip cookies on the buffet but they were often gone. The breakfast at the buffet was great. I ate an omelet every day. Poor gluten free options for pancakes or French toast. The weather was fantastic so watching the World Cup games around the pool was super fun. The ship supplied blankets on the chilly nights. I love the burger and fries around the pool. One of my favorite things for lunch. Overall the ship was good, entertainment was ok and the ports were great.