Background: Having cruised a total of 20+ times, 3 with X (Infinity/Solstice/Eclipse), HAL, RCCL, Princess, Cunard, and Carnival (once was more than enough!), I must say that X has classy cruising dialed-in. GF and I are 50-ish give and take, and wanted to get away for a week of unwinding, relaxing, and to recharge the batteries. Mission accomplished thanks to X. We live in South Florida, so a short limo ride to the POM placed us at the curb at 11 am. We booked Concierge Class, so we had zero wait to check in. A quick picture for the Sea Pass card and off we went. By 11:15 am, we were handed our mimosas. Next stop was Bistro on Five. What a great way to start the cruise. We were seated by the window with a fabulous view, and enjoyed a quiet, terrific lunch of soup, panini, and crepes for desert. Oh, while waiting for our soup, I walked over to the beverage package sales area on deck 5 and purchased the Premium Alcohol Package ($54/day + 15% gratuity) This may sound expensive, but in the end was a great deal for us. The most interesting benefit of this package is the psychological feeling of being able to have any kind of beverage, whenever you wanted it. Specialty coffees, sodas, waters, beer, wine, alcohol, etc, etc. Every time we passed a bar, no matter where we were on the ship, cocktail please! After all, we were on vacation and were there to enjoy ourselves. Best thing we did! We highly recommend it. You never have to think about how much the drink you are ordering is and can try any and everything on the menu.

Stateroom: At 1 pm, they announced that the cabins were ready, so off we went, deck 10, port side, mid-ship, CC 1099 (cat c2). Our cabin was located directly between the forward and mid-ship elevators which was perfect. No noise from anywhere as we had cabins above and below. The cabin was perfect in all ways. Bathroom spacious and luxurious with plenty of storage and a fabulous shower with endless hot water and nice pressure. X provides very nice shampoo, conditioner, body wash, and lotion which was re-supplied every day. In CC, the towels were the larger over-sized variety, which were great. Other CC benefits were fresh flowers, fruit, canapes, priority embarkation, reservations, concierge desk, etc. Well worth the few extra dollars CC costs. The balcony is awesome. Had breakfast on it and was a true pleasure. Our cabin steward Desmond took extreme care of us all week and was just perfect. The bed was very comfortable and the pillows were super comfy. Plenty of storage for all of our stuff and all of our luggage fit under the bed easily.

Dining: We ate in the MDR every night and were lucky to have Mr. Froliam Santos as our waiter. He was such a sweet guy from the Dominican Republic. He couldn't do enough for us and by the 2nd day we felt as though we had known him forever. Our Assistant Dennis was equally as good. The food was great, no complaints. The menu has enough selections to satisfy anyone, in fact at times making a choice was difficult. Mr. Santos thought for us and brought us both items without even asking. I like coffee ice cream, which never seemed to be on the menu. Have no fear, Mr. Santos delivered coffee ice cream every night until i had to shut it off. Just fabulous in all regards. Having sailed on X 2x prior, we had already enjoyed the specialty restaurants and didn't bother with them this trip. They are terrific, especially Murano, but to spend an additional $80 + gratuity didn't make sense to us. Read more