Day 1: Miami. Embarkation went very smoothly. My wife and I were getting married on the ship, so we had priority embarkation. We arrived at the pier at 10:30, and after a brief stop in the VIP lounge for picture-taking and card issuing, were shuffled to a waiting area where all the back-to-back cruisers were waiting to re-board the ship. We were on board and in our rooms to dress and prepare for the wedding ceremony by 11:30. The first impression of the stateroom was that the living area was a bit smaller than the room we had on our previous cruise (December 2006 Carnival Sensation). However, the bathroom space seemed to be about 70% larger than that of the Sensation. I will review the wedding ceremony in a separate posting on the appropriate board, but in short, it was fantastic. We married in the chapel at 1:30, had a wonderful cake and bottle of champagne with our guests, and were back in the staterooms and changed in time for the 15:30 muster drill. Although the announcements stated to carry the life vest, and *not* put it on, when we arrived at our muster station in Azura, we found the majority of people had fastened their vests already. I never cease to be amazed at the amount of people who cannot follow explicit instructions! After muster drill, we relaxed on our balcony and awaited our scheduled 16:00 departure. However, our boat had experienced a delay in getting fueled, and we left the port at 17:30, right as the sun set behind the Rickenbacker Causeway and SW Miami. A note on the balcony: I found it to be fairly spacious, with two chairs and a small (16" diameter) table, but plenty of room for a couple additional persons to stand. An interesting board recently floated the idea of taking romance to the balcony - I can assure you this would be a sketchy proposition. Noise carries very well from neighboring balconies, and it was not uncommon to see heads craning around the corner of the balconies all along the ship. My recommendation: keep it in the stateroom! After sailing away, we went to Blue Lagoon for a light dinner, since we were full of cake. I tried the Buffalo wings, after reading several positive reviews on these boards. However, I was grossly disappointed. The wings were breaded, very small, not meaty, and were not hot/spicy in the least. I can only guess that those who recommended these wings have only ever eaten wings at Hooters, because they were simply not that good. Edible, yes; incredible, no. My wife had the southern chicken tenders, which were very much like KFC's extra crispy chicken strips. A bit too much breading for my tastes, but they were much better than the wings. Service was on the slow side and not particularly courteous. After a quick nap, we went to the show, which featured "party band" 60280 ("sixty-to-eighty") as an opener. Frankly, I thought they were pretty darned awful—not for the musicianship, which was certainly very good, but rather, for their stage presence, which struck me as a cheesy lounge act. Thankfully, their set was brief, and magician Jean Pierre followed. JP was simply amazing. The act was both funny and astonishing at the same time. The audience was very willing to participate and engaged with the performance, and rightfully so. I don't typically enjoy magic shows, but I left this one highly impressed. The show was certainly suitable for all ages, although, like a Bugs Bunny cartoon, the kids would have missed some of the jokes. To beer drinkers: whatever you do, order the helmet of beers. You get 6 for the price of 5. For domestics, this will be roughly $23 USD after gratuity. It is the best deal on the boat. One thing that was not mentioned in previous posts discussing the beer helmet is that there is a $5 deposit for the helmet. This is returned to you at the end of the cruise, when you return the helmet. You can refill the helmet with any beer, import or domestic, at any bar on the ship. I found it probably saved me $50-$75 over the course of the cruise. After a great first day, we retired to our cabins. On our bed, our room steward prepared our first towel animal: two swans kissing, their necks in the shape of a heart. He had taken the boutonniere I left on the desk and placed that in the center of the heart, at the point. A very sweet touch!

Day 2: At sea. We lost an hour due to entering a different time zone. We awoke to see Cuba's mountains outside our door. We saw the sun rise and then hit the showers and readied for breakfast. The shower was nice and spacious for me, although it would likely be cramped for those much over 6 feet tall. I found the dial that controls temperature to be a very nice feature, and learned that 32 Celsius was just about perfect. We ventured to the Garden Cafe for breakfast. Fare was pretty much standard, much like a buffet at a Shoney's or similar breakfast restaurant. Plenty of variety—fruits, breads, cereals, meats, eggs, potatoes were all available in a multitude of forms. The food quality was very good, but a constant throughout the cruise was the cold potatoes. Eggs and meats always were hot and tasty, but the potatoes were consistently cold. At 9:00, the cafe was extremely crowded; we did not know that overflow space was available in Mama's Italian restaurant, although this was probably posted in the Freestyle daily and we did not notice. We went to the casino for a few minutes and won $40 on .25 slots, then went to the room for another nap. The bed, by the way, was very comfortable. There was no lump in the middle, and the comforter was warm, and the sheets were very gentle to the touch. Pillows were supportive and comfortable. There were not many morning activities, which justified our nap. We found that unless you were on board to buy something (future cruise, jewelry, spa treatments), exercise (aerobics, health seminars, etc.) or gamble (bingo, Texas hold'em, etc.) morning activity offerings were minimal. We returned to the Garden Cafe for lunch, since it was the only venue open when we chose to dine. I had a variety of offerings, but the Masala (a curry-like vegetable dish) particularly stood out as excellent. Food quality and taste was much better than breakfast. We relaxed by the pool deck and listened to Caribbean Wave, the reggae / world music band, which we repeated throughout the cruise. They are highly talented, and the music was perfect for our itinerary. We ventured again to the casino, where my wife won $276, which paid for all our souvenirs throughout the cruise. We then watched the Jean Ann Ryan Company's Band on the Run show, which was a sort of 1970s musical revue. It was not my cup of tea, and I did not particularly enjoy it, but the performance itself was well executed. Choreography was on point, and it was evident that many of the singers were classically trained. The level of talent of this group of performers cannot be questioned. It just wasn't my thing. We went to dinner at Azura, which was not a pleasant experience. We had a 10 minute wait (the only wait of our entire cruise), which was not a problem. The problem was the lethargic service and the unpleasant demeanor of the waiter. It was evident that the high volume of patrons was proving challenging and stressful to this individual. For appetizers, I ordered the oxtail, which was a soup containing cubes of mush meat. It was not enjoyable in the least. My wife had the pumpkin ginger bisque, which was well seasoned and flavorful. She had the tortellini primavera for an entrEe. The pasta was slightly overcooked, but the dish was very good. I had an excellent beef wellington. I ordered rare, and it came medium-rare, which is actually how I prefer my meat. I expected they would overcook the meat, and they met my expectation. So I was very pleased with the entrEe's preparation and taste. Since service was incredibly slow, we bypassed dessert. We went to the Fyzz lounge to watch karaoke, but all the singers were very good! I only enjoy karaoke when it's a train wreck, sort of like the first couple weeks of American Idol. We hit the casino one more time and lifted another $40 from the slots, then headed to bed (towel animal was a snake this evening, and we had excellent chocolate chip cookies for turndown) to prepare for our first port of call.

Day 3: Samana. We arose to witness sunlight bouncing off the rugged mountains of Hispaniola. Our shore excursion was scheduled for a 10:00 tender, so we had plenty of time to enjoy the morning and mountain views on our balcony. The tender process went fairly smooth and seemed well coordinated. It really was fascinating to watch it unfold from our balcony. We met in the Stardust Theater at 10:45, and were en route and on our tender by 11:10, and at Cayo Levantado by 11:30 a.m. It did seem interesting to me that folks doing independent trips to Samana were allowed to disembark before those on scheduled NCL excursions. Perhaps this is common practice, but it seemed odd to me. Anyhow, we were not disappointed at all by Cayo Levantado. The beach was very nice, and the water was clear albeit a bit chilly. The water has a greenish tint, something that I have read others complain about, but this color is not atypical of the Caribbean, and certainly beats the ruddy brown of, say, coastal regions north of Virginia. There were a great many sea urchins and coral rocks on the bottom; I would recommend water shoes for any taking this excursion and venturing into the water. This was prevalent on the side of the island we were on, but around the bend, another beach appeared to have a much sandier bottom. There were a great many vendors selling cheap trinkets but I did not find them to be overly pushy. I did not purchase anything here, but did practice my negotiation skills, and once I began speaking in Spanish, the price dropped drastically. A $20 shell necklace was quickly talked down to $8, but we ended up passing on the offer. We were the last couple on the 15:00 tender back to the ship. Tenders were scheduled for every 30 minutes from Cayo Levantado between 15:00 and 17:00, although we saw tenders running back from the island until 18:00. The beach break was quite nice, and certainly put us in the mood to relax and enjoy the ports still ahead. I would highly recommend this excursion, particularly since I heard some rather alarming reports from other passengers who ventured to Samana proper. I will not repeat them, since they are hearsay and I did not experience it for myself. But Cayo Levantado was a great choice for us. We cleaned up and ventured to Tsar's Palace for dinner, which was a polar opposite dining experience from that of the night before. Service and the meal itself were outstanding. I started with the lamb sausage, and my wife had a fruit cocktail with mascarpone. Both were to die for. I had the pork roast for an entrEe, and it was served with a potato pancake and red cabbage salad. It was awesome, and the variety of textures and flavors on the palate was quite appealing. My wife ordered the sirloin well done with fries, and she proclaimed it excellent. The desserts were amazing—a warm apple stuffed bread pudding and pineapple cream cake. Both were relatively light and the perfect cap to a great dining experience. Service was prompt and courteous, which we found to be the norm for Tsar's. We tipped well and changed for the Second City performance. The comedy was overall very funny. The improvised bits were a bit hit or miss, but the planned skits were hilarious. The ship was rocking fairly well this evening. We went by the pool and watched the waves in the pool, generated by the motion of the ship, drench the Caribbean Wave band, who gave a spirited performance despite the less than ideal conditions. We headed back to the room after a while for some balcony time, and ordered a room service pizza, which was not particularly sizable, or tasty. The pizza available at the Garden Cafe lunch buffet was far better. As with Blue Lagoon, it was edible, but not incredible. We retired for the evening. As an aside, for all the NFL fans: there were three games on Sunday, and all were broadcast on ESPN (it seems in international waters, they are the sole distributor of NFL games). The Monday night game was also broadcast on ESPN, as was the Thursday night game. You may not get to see your local / favorite team in action, but there are games, should you be interested in catching them. Read more