This was our 6th cruise since coming back to cruising in the late 90's, and first on Azamara, having cruised with Celebrity (big ships) and Star (small ships) in the past, and I must say that by any measure this is the best cruise we have experienced, which is saying a lot as all the others have been truly marvellous experiences!

Starting with the ship, Journey at 30,000T while classed as a "small" ship, and while not having the vast, and often unusable, cavernous space that the big ships have, still has very spacious public areas, and most of the functionality of big ships, but with only 700 passengers at no stage was there ever a perception of a crowd.

Also I never saw anyone waiting in a queue for longer than a minute or two for anything, at the likes of Customer Relations and Shore Excursion Desks, or the buffet and main dining areas, and the shore excursions were a breeze running smoothly and mostly on time. Read more