Sunday, December 28, 2008

A Royal Gem



Royal Princess is a remarkable gem of a ship. At a little over 30,000 gross tons, she would be considered a small cruise ship. However, she is large enough to have scaled-down versions of many of the trademark Princess features familiar to travelers on the Princess mega-cruise ships. In addition, the ship is tastefully decorated throughout with extensive use of wood paneling and the type of furnishings that one would expect to see in an English country house.


This ship was the last of a nearly-identical series of eight ships built for Renaissance Cruises. Following Renaissance’s bankruptcy in 2002, the ships were scattered and are now favorites of travelers on several cruise lines at the upper end of the market including Azamara and Oceana. Princess has two others in its fleet (Pacific Princess and Tahitian Princess). After a refit, Royal Princess joined her Princess sisters in 2007.


Because of her size, Royal Princess can go where larger ships cannot. Accordingly, Royal Princess does longer than average cruises and includes in her itinerary some ports that are less visited. This tends to attract more mature, experienced travelers.


My profile of Royal Princess can be found at http://beyondships.com/Princess-RP-Profile.html. The in-depth photo tour and commentary starts at http://beyondships.com/Princess-RP-Tour-1.html

1 comment:

Sue Clark Koenig said...

Thank you for the great pictures of Royal Princess. Having never been on her, it really added to my anticipation of our upcoming World Cruise on her. If you would like, please follow our blog: http://luxcruisetravel.blogspot.com/