We loved getting on the ship at Bayonne, NJ instead of having to fly somewhere first to embark. So easy getting on and later disembarking. I wish now that we'd gotten a room with a balcony since the sealed porthole gave me a bit of claustrophobia and it was hard to dry our clothes since we couldn't get any fresh air in the room. But that's not the fault of the ship, just our own for choosing that kind of room. The food in the dining room was wonderful. We ate there every single evening and loved it. The salads were creative and delicious. Our waiters were fun, Balbuena and Ivo. Ivo entertained us with interesting tricks - quite a personality there, he will go far in life. We did a lot of laughing during dinner, really enjoyed ourselves. Our room attendants, Jesse and Thomas, were very nice, and did a fine job.

I loved the swimming pools, being a frequent swimmer here at home. This was the first cruise ship we were ever on that had sea water pools and deep enough to actually do laps or treading. There could be some improvement on the number of chairs around the pool and adherence to the rules about saving chairs. For instance, at a table near ours, someone "saved" two chairs and no one was there for way over an hour while others were wandering around looking for chairs. We loved the solarium room and the health food bar offerings as well as the utterly delicious hamburgers and french fries by the first pool.

Our first day on the boat, my husband was very irritated by many waiters pushing drink package upgrades on him, which we already had, while all he wanted was to order a drink and no one would take his order. All they were interested in was selling the drink package upgrade. Pushy salespeople lower the general tone of the cruise and set him off to a disappointing first day. Read more