Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Stunning - and in a good way, too!

Cruise Report 2

I really did expect to walk onboard and feel like I'd landed in Vegas - all the official and unofficial pictures we'd seen gave me the impression that the ship would be garish and a bit tacky.

Maybe they need to take new pictures.  It wasn't at all - it was simply gorgeous - much nicer than the Diamond Princess, I thought.  The passageways on the stateroom decks seemed to be wider, there was a lot of natural wood (including some gorgeous inlay work), and the colors were warm and soothing, not garish.  It was just a really pretty ship.  On the Promenade deck, they had created a wide walkway bounded on one side by the casino and on the other by a bunch of squishy sofas in groups - a perfect place to hang out and people-watch.  And handy to the coffee bar too.

The reviews I read that said that the ship handled the crowds well were generally right - you could nearly always find someplace public that wasn't particularly crowded - although I must admit that by our third "fun day at sea" we were kind of tired of those of our fellow passengers that were not in our party.  Many of them would have carried out the "landed in Vegas" theme nicely, if the ship had in fact been decorated that way.

One odd note, though.  I was doing laundry on our second sea day - because most of my family drove, we had several day's worth accumulated by then - and heard a familiar bit of background music over the speakers - one of the movements from Mozart's Requiem.  Beautiful stuff, but a Requiem Mass just doesn't put the "fun" in "fun ship" if you ask me.

So, I'm a little confused now, because I had certainly been laboring under the impression that Princess was supposed to be more upscale than Carnival, but the ship itself really didn't bear that out at all.  Go figure...


No comments:

Cruise Clock ticker