Best For: Adults seeking a relaxed getaway and families who like a sophisticated cruise ship
Not For: Guests who want a ton of onboard whiz-bang features like waterslides or rock-climbing walls
Bottom Line: Enchanted Princess is a beautiful cruise ship that offers a wide range of fun activities and a solid array of dining options
Enchanted Princess is a sophisticated cruise ship that delivers a wide range of activities both outdoors and in. It features a lovely range of public spaces that appeal to a variety of tastes -- no easy task on a ship that carries 3,660 passengers. But it does so effortlessly, with great passenger flow and an environment that is inviting and relaxing.
The heart of the ship is the Piazza, a stunning, multilevel space inspired by the piazzas of Europe. Restaurants and bars surround the central space, which is always buzzing with activity, from music to balloon drops. It's the best space onboard.
Dining on Enchanted Princess is a highlight: The array of options, including reasonable specialty dining, is strong, and the service in all restaurants -- in truth, across the ship -- was excellent. We especially appreciated that crew seemed empowered to solve problems on their own and do whatever it took to ensure guests were happy. (For example, we asked for a paper list of spa services as well as a printout of the Enchanted Princess deckplan. While these aren't typically shared -- these features are available on the app -- crew scrambled to accommodate, even printing off a new deckplan when they discovered they didn't actually carry these.)
At the forefront of the Enchanted Princess experience is the ship's Medallion. While the concept itself seems straightforward -- create fast, accessible internet while providing an uncomplicated, worry-free cruise for all guests -- the technology behind it is anything but simple.
Medallion is Princess Cruises' approach to solving all cruise problems, and its done so thanks to a wearable disk and a super powerful app, plus a ship that is wired to the nines to make sure it all works.
Because Enchanted Princess is one of the few ships in the Princess fleet to debut fully loaded with all the power of the line's Medallion -- it's technically part of the Medallion Class -- we put the technology to the test on our Caribbean sailing.
We've had the opportunity to try it before, but all components of Medallion functioned on our sailing better than we'd experienced before. We streamed live meetings with our home office and watched shows on Netflix, thanks to the strong internet, which worked everywhere. We ordered food and drinks on the app, and servers found us to deliver, even when we moved around after placing our orders. We used the Medallion disk to open our cabin doors every time, with a range of about 15 feet. And we effectively tracked our traveling companions using the app. Best of all, we rarely had to swipe that disk when we bought something; most servers simply handed us our items and thanked us (by name!).
There were a few hiccups: Medallion is designed to make embarkation frictionless, but ours saw some chaos and longer-than-expected lines (the couple behind us in one line grumbled "we've found some seams in 'seamless'”), and we still found we had to swipe that disk in some locations, especially busy bars. And there was that time we tracked our brother to the women's bathroom (turns out, he was sitting at a table on the wall behind the bathroom). But overall, we were impressed with the evolution of Princess' defining feature, which enhanced our cruise.
Meals in the main dining rooms (Amalfi, Capri and Santorini), the World Fresh Marketplace buffet (including The Pastry Shop, Slice Pizzeria), Gigi's Pizzeria, Swirls ice cream bar, the International Cafe and continental room service breakfast
All entertainment, including shows in the theater shows
Much of the Medallion functionality, including stateroom door opening, interactive games, passenger location and food delivery
Access to the fitness center, though most classes and all personal training are extra
Movies Under The Stars, with popcorn
Camp Discovery access for children, though some exceptions apply
Beverages including tap water, coffee and iced tea (specialty coffee will cost more)
Gratuities
Soda, alcoholic and upgraded beverages, bottled water
Wi-Fi
Automatic gratuities for beverage, mini-bar, spa and salon purchases
Mini-bar purchases
Meals at most specialty restaurants
Spa treatments
Most fitness classes and all personal training sessions
Access to the ship's Enclave thermal spa
Access to the ship's Sanctuary sundeck
Casino, sports book betting and gaming via Medallion
Activities such as alcohol tasting and bingo
Shore excursions
Photographs and artwork
A Wonderful Cruise
many10+ Cruises
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Age 65s
Amazing First Cruise!!
oneFirst Time Cruiser
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Age 44s
Staff on the Enchanted Princess All Deserve Raises
oneFirst Time Cruiser
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Age 25s
many10+ Cruises
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Age 76s