We are an older couple in our late 50's and living in Baltimore thought it would be nice to try cruising from our home port for a change. We loved that we did not have to fly and the transition of getting on the ship was even smoother at the Baltimore Cruise Terminal than we had experienced in Manhattan or Tampa. We were on the ship and eating lunch within an hour of arriving.

The decor on the ship is not to my liking, renaissance, dark depressing colors, totally vintage decor. The formal dining room was not as elegant as other ships we had been on. We did get the early dinner seating that we requested and were seated in a booth with a very nice couple our age.

We had paid extra for the extended balcony which turned out to be the same size as regular balcony on the princess ship that we previously went on. The room was not a bad size but our first night in the cabin the toilet stopped working which was very traumatic considering I had food poisoning from either lunch on the ship or something I had eaten the day before at a local restaurant. They did come and fix it when we called. One thing we found really irritating is that whenever an announcement would come over the intercom from our cruise director announcing something special that was going on within the ship, we would hear the chime to let us know the announcement was coming on but could only hear the announcement if we opened our cabin door and listened in the corridor. This was very annoying having to run from our balcony or room each time an announcement was made. Our dinner companions said they could hear the announcement from their cabin so we spoke with the people at the service desk and they assured up that we were not supposed to hear it in our cabin because they did not want to disturb us. Seriously? We were disturbed having to run our of our cabin several times a day? All other cruise ships we have been on we could hear the announcements right in our cabin. Read more