We, husband and wife, both youngish seniors, embarked on the shiny new Ruby Princess for the last week of February after completing successive cruises of the Panama Canal eastbound on Celebrity Mercury and the eastern Caribbean aboard another new ship, RCCL's Liberty of the Seas. For this cruise, we were joined by brother/in-law and wife who met us in the terminal. I'll write reviews of the first two cruises later, but will make some comparisons as we proceed with this one.

This was our 8th cruise. The others have included the 3 lines mentioned plus Holland America (Noordam), and four main sizes of ships from small, Tahitian Princess, to gigantic, Liberty. Our past voyages have been to the south, east and west Caribbean, the eastern Mediterranean and recently the Panama Canal for the first time. We have certain preferences partly determined by our age group, but we are happy to cruise with young people. We're not fussy or overly demanding, but we have quality standards rooted in our experience in a Celebrity Galaxy cruise 11 years ago.

Cruise ship standards have changed over the years, just as cruise ship operating costs have changed. Standards have declined, prices have risen. We can't escape this reality unless luxury lines are an option and price not an object of concern. For us, the class of cruise lines I have mentioned represent the limit, so we try to be realistic in our expectations. Ruby Princess met most of them quite well. Read more