Usually Earl and I book a mini-suite with a balcony when we cruise. It’s the equivalent of a very tiny New York apartment, but it has some amenities a regular cabin does not. For this cruise, however, we decided to save the money and take a regular cabin with a balcony. It wasn’t a bad decision.
The Ruby Princess is a relatively new ship, and I believe the designers have used the space on it in noticeably better ways. Of course, you wouldn’t know this if you’d never sailed on Princess before, but we have. Our current cabin is larger than the first one we had before we got hooked on mini-suites. There’s room to cross in front of each other on the way to the balcony, and the balcony itself is considerably larger. It accommodates four chairs and a table, whereas the old-style had room for only two chairs and a table. Additionally, even though we know our king size bed is really two twins put together, there is no bump or seam in the middle. Whoever mastered this is a genius.
Other areas of the ship seem better utilized too. The specialty restaurants, those that are hoity-toity-ed up at night are now used for specialty activities during the day. The steak house is a place for board games and cards. The English Pub offers traditional pub food, complimentary, at lunch. The tour desk is better located and its staff has increased.
The Ruby was commissioned in 2008. It has a maximum passenger capacity of 3150 with a maximum crew capacity of 1200. I understand this is its twenty-something voyage, so the kinks are probably all worked out. (We once went on a ship that had only been sailing a couple months; it was quite a different story.) So, all in all, we’re looking forward to a most enjoyable voyage.
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