My family of three always go away ay spring break to get away from the tourist to become a tourist. That being said we are prepared for the price increase for travel during that time. I don't know why but last year it occurred to me to try a cruise since my little one was old enough to enjoy it. We booked a *B Balcony on the Carnival Valor for a week long to western Carribean and sort of let it go until a month before the cruise.
I realized that we should look into excursions and looked both at the cruise ship offerings and that of other sites. For Cozumel, we did the jeep and snorkel excursion from a different site and paid $40 less per person and it was worth it, my only concern was that we got to the ship a little late. In Belize, because it was a tender port we booked through Carnival and did a tour of some Mayan Ruins, the bus ride is longer than advertised and the ruins were good but it threw me off that the tour guide asked for tips. What I had wished I had known was that you could get your passport stamped at the port. In Honduras's we did and Eco tour and beach trip through another site and I can tell you that the sun was relentless, I am darker skinned, work outside and used sunblock and I still got sunburned. We only shopped around in Costa Maya because it was a short day. They tell you that you get a refund from the Mexican government but they don't mention the steps ( look up the tourist tax refund).
The ship looks older but it is still nice, the staff was great on the 6th floor and were always happy. The wifi didn't work in my room and I paid for the most expensive one because while my kid was on spring break I was not and ended up going to a library to try to do homework.
Cabin was as described, it was well kept and with the only drawback being that they were pressure washing it while we were there and we couldn't open the door.
It was fast getting on the boat.
Nice shopping area.