November 2015 Princess Cruise/Palazzo Offer

[Mauretania]

Back in the fall of 2014, I received a comped cruise offer from the Palazzo in Las Vegas.
I was able to go and pick up the certificate (along with a heavy, canvas Princess Cruises logo bag which I left behind) that fall
and booked a 10-night cruise, for November 2015 on the ROYAL PRINCESS. The offer was good for any time throughout 2015.

Though the offer included an ocean view cabin, I upgraded for $250 per person to a category M6 (Premium Mini Suite) as it had
an unusual, large balcony at the front of the ship.

The itinerary included port stops in Aruba, Bonaire, Dominica, Grenada, St. Thomas and the standard beach stop at their out-island.

The ROYAL PRINCESS is one of Princess Cruises' largest ships, along with her sister REGAL PRINCESS and built in 2013.
She carries 3,560 passengers. You may compare that to Royal Caribbean's OASIS or ALLURE which carry 5400 passengers or
NCL's ESCAPE which carries 4,248 passengers. The only other "large" ship I've sailed in was the QUEEN MARY 2 which is larger
but only carries 2,620 passengers.

The ROYAL PRINCESS felt very crowded, all the time. I was glad we had a large, comfortable cabin to escape the crowds.
Princess Cruises is a pretty mainstream cruise line, meaning average rooms, food offerings etc...Plenty of choices for entertainment,
music, shows and even a "Sound of Music" film sing-a-long in the main theater.


There were a few unexpected surprises.

We rarely go to the shows but there was a fantastic tribute show to Edith Piaf. The band and singer were from Argentina
and the singer did such a great job, that I made a point to thank her, later on in the cruise.

I won a couple of hand pays in the casino!

Our cabin steward was fantastic and from Goa, India. Any steward we've had from Goa has been great (once on a P&O Cruise and once on a Carnival cruise).
They train them well.

The meals in the main dining room were okay. In other words, pretty much what we expected. They still offer first and second seatings
along with an "Anytime Dining" option which we picked. The Anytime Dining worked just fine and we also ate in the two "pay" restaurants
twice, each (one the steak house and the other Italian). The Italian was the better of the two in our opinion.

I'll continue this later, along with some photo's.