cdncruisor

i have booked golden princess for the end of may next year. 7 days.

after reading many blogs i have come to the conclusion that celebrity food is better than princess food. i am talking about the dining room menus and referring to presentation and taste. we dont eat seafood so eventhough princess is better on seafood this doens't effect us.

the reason we chose princess is because they go to glacier bay national park and celebrity goes to tracy arm fjord.

what would you do?

food is important to us (quality not quantity) but glacier bay national park is also important to us.

i know we won't go hungry, but thats not the point , we want delicious food presented very nicely.

your comments are appreciated.

thanks

cdncruisor

i forgot to say, we don't mind going to the steakhouse specialty restaurant once on the trip, but we don't want to have to pay extra every day to get a delicious meal.

cdncruisor

we are going from seattle return. how rough is it? i dont think you can go from vancouver return and still see glacier bay national park.
2 of us aren't the greatest cruisers re seasickness but we take pills to help. i hope the ocean isn't too rough.
i know it is difficult to plan everything bec. the same cruise can be so different re weather, chef, etc. but we still want to make the best choice.
if someone could answer my questions that would be great. so far i am the only one on this thread. lol.

BudgetQueen

You can't have it all. I don't find the food on any, major cruiseline- "superb" any longer, including Celebrity. ALL have cut back and frankly, you need to consider this, since you are setting yourself up for disappointment, with food your priority. Look at Regent or similar rather than the "major" lines.

You have also chosen the roughest sailing potential route of Alaska cruises. It sounds like you have done some homework and seeking "reassurance" answers, that are going to say- "we had smooth sailing??" Sorry, the averages are very stacked against you. I have seen sick passengers every time I have gone round trip Seattle.

HAL does have round trip Vancouver itineraries which do have Glacier Bay. They offer superior itineraries anyway in my opinion. Food is just as good on HAL as Celebrity, again, my opinion.

Finally Glacier Bay is a highlight with a glacier priority, Tracy Arm, is definately "lacking" on the glacier scale, and a fair number of transits do NOT get within view of the Sawyers- which I also think you already know.

Only you can decide, ANY trip will be a compromise.

Eschew

All I can say is I was disappointed at the "new" menu debuted by the Celebrity in August this year. The food was not as good as they used to. The service was slow, esepcailly in the dining room for breakfast. The same few items on the buffet daily. Only half a lobster tail for lobster night. The food in general has been bland. The food highlight was the special brunch on the glacier scenic crusiing day.

If you have booked on Princess and is looking for reassurance, I prefer the food on Princess. Both are good but not exceptional. The premiun dining are better than the main dining room. Cost a bit extra but maybe worth it.

Unless you have motion sickness problem, a little bit of "wave" is not going to make a lot of difference. You are not talking about an Atlantic crossing in gale force wind in the old sailing ships days.

I have been on cruises that see 20 to 30 feet swells. Hardly notice it until I was near the bow of the ship when the ship pitched and hit the wave on the way down with the thump. A roller coaster a whole lot more violent.

ParrotMom

Friends just came back from the Celebrity Infinity and although there were items missing from the menu they loved..many of the new ones made up for it..Also, they said the specialty restaurant was the best they had ever been on.. Checkout review of the Infinity on cruisemates.com Admittedly we cruised Princess in April.. except for the dining room the food was lacking...Whereas we love Celebrity.. a bit more upscale. I've gotten slammed for this..but our Pacific Princess was like the Çarnival for seniors.compared to our three Celebrity cruises..

Eschew

We were on a Celebrity ship in late August and the staff told us that they just debut the new menu and we are the first to try it. There were a number of items that is less than acceptable. Could be the chef on the ship that didn't prepared it right. Compare to previous experience with Celebrity, it just wasn't as good, and I thought the product quality was lower. example: cheapaer fsh, lower cut of meat etc. The selection on the buffet was also very limited.
With that said, the food is still better than some mass mrket cruise line.
Re comments on Carnival, I still don't like them but the food quality has really improved in the last couple of years. They were voted best food for mass amrket lines whcih was a surprise.

ParrotMom

ESCHEW.it is possible your right..that it was the "chef"..Personally, two or three people can be using the same recipe and have different results.Going t/a we have found the meat, and Im not a big meat eater to be outstanding, fish I'm more particular about because we are from New England..and Caribbean lobster just doesn't do it for us.