This is our second cruise. The first cruise we took was last year on the Star Princess during the same general timeframe. Our cabin on that cruise was an interior stateroom. The port of departure last year was Ft. Lauderdale.

We left this year from Port Canaveral and the embarkation process was virtually painless. We were not impressed with the lack of security at Port Canaveral, since the process we had to go through at Ft. Lauderdale last year was significantly more involved. Kind of scary if you think about it.

Our desire to go on a cruise is not related to the island ports and excursions available as much as it is related to the comfort of the room, being on the ocean, and getting away from the daily grind of jobs, telephones, housework, and all the other stress that folks deal with. We also are very frugal and we analyze very carefully what appears to be a good bang for the buck. The extent of our excursions have been limited to taking taxi rides to town and/or taxi rides to tour the island. Based on the videotapes shown on cabin TVs of the excursions, it doesn't appear that we have really missed much and our wallets are a lot happier as a result. We also believe that the ship-organized excursions are overpriced and somehow, someway, the cruise line is getting a large percentage of the prices paid by passengers. Case in point: we had the option of booking an excursion in Belize to tour the city ($45/person). We got off the boat and found a taxi that took us on the exact same tour for $20 less per person than what we would have paid to Carnival. We would prefer that our money actually go directly to the people living on the island (vs. going through Carnival as a middleman), since the majority of their economy is based on tourism. Read more