My wife wanted to go on a Christmas cruise, and include her daughter and our 2 grandkids ages 12 & 15. It cost in excess of $10,000 as there are no discounts on Christmas cruises, and we had 2 varanda cabins, side by side. We drove there by car, and the parking fee was $105 for 7 days.

Royal Caribbean has the boarding and disembarkment process down to a science. Especially the latter, as we arrived back at Port Everglades at 6AM, and we were on the road back home by 8:30.

All of the ship's crew were very pleasant and did their jobs well. However, it was the makeup of the passenger list that surprised me most. I would estimate that 60% of the passengers did not speak English as their primary language. They were pleasant enough, but you could not converse with them in the hot tub etc. Some spoke some english, but most broken English. Read more