My wife and I celebrated our 20th anniversary by sailing on the Sunshine this month. This was my fifth cruise (second on Carnival) and her seventh (fourth on Carnival). We sailed with a friend and her sons who just graduated high school this year. In short, it was another great cruise experience.

We've sailed Celebrity, Royal and Norwegian and had great experiences on all of them. While Royal will probably forever be my favorite, I just don't find enough differences between the lines to warrant paying the additional cost. In short, Carnival offers a terrific vacation at a great value.

Ports of call included Grande Turk (amazing), San Juan (nice but a major thunderstorm limited what we saw and did), St. Kitts (a lot like Belize, in my opinion) and the always beautiful St. Martin. Once you've cruised the Caribbean a few times, the ports start to feel similar (that is not intended to sound like it does) so ultimately, it's the ship that has to please you. The Sunshine did NOT disappoint. Read more