My wife and I sailed on Jewel from 5/6-11 with our 1 year-old daughter. Ship & cabin were terrific; not too crowded at the pool on cruising days; nice mix of people - most were a bit older than us, but that's probably to be expected given the time of year. Food was good all around. Windjammer cafe had a nice variety for breakfast & lunch, and unlike some other cruises we've been on there didn't seem to be throngs of gluttons pushing and shoving for food like they'd never eaten before. Main dining room for dinner was terrific; specific requests for kid-friendly meals were accommodated without a problem. Same was true of Portofino & Chops Grill.

The only issue we had was with babysitting. RC's website says it's available on Jewel. Well, not really. It's available IF staff feel like working extra hours, but we only learned this after requesting babysitting and not getting a response. The first morning of the cruise we requested a babysitter for 2 hours for the last day so we could go to the spa for a couples massage. The customer relations rep at the desk assured us she'd put in the request and get back to us. Never happened. Eventually, after repeated calls and getting her manager involved we got the truth: the service only exists to the extent staff responds to the babysitting request and will work a couple of extra hours. Not a big deal, but it would've been nice if they'd told us that up front. They did give us 25% off a future cruise as an apology (and a "Pets at Sea" stuffed toy for our daughter).

One other odd thing: only saw it once, but a security officer was asking kids wearing swim diapers to leave the kiddie pool. I don't get it. Why have a kiddie pool if you're not going to allow kids in it? Read more