My wife and I recently completed back-to-back cruises on the Tere Moana from Istanbul to Athens and then Athens to Rome. We like back-to-back cruises because Europe is too far to go for just one week, and by combining two cruises, we only need to unpack once.

I want to begin my review by thanking all those who wrote in with complaints about the initial Tere Moana trips to the Caribbean. It was obvious that the cruise line had taken the criticisms to heart and resolved many of the complaints. But the best part was the small number of passengers that booked the cruises we were assuming the low bookings were based in part by the negative reviews. The first week there were 54 passengers and the second week there were only 33! There were approximately two crew members for each passenger the second week.

We booked one of the eight balcony cabins and it was wonderful. It was very quiet, there was plenty of storage, and the balcony was much larger than on most ships. There was a table, two chairs, and a lounge on the balcony. Compare that to a room with two portholes on a Windstar ship. (We like Windstar and have sailed with them four times, but the Tere Moana is much nicer.) Only real complaint about the room was the poor lighting around the mirror in the bathroom. Read more