We liked the itinerary and number of countries visited. We had wanted a totally different cruise that included Riga, and a port in Poland with Costa, but just before booking, Costa changed their itinerary and dropped a port we had wanted. While the Regal cruise did not go to Riga, it did sail to Oslo, which is not always included. Any cruise had to include 2 port days in St. Petersburg, which this did. The one drawback to this itinerary was docking in Stockholm at Nynashamm, nearly an hour away. As we are fairly independent in port, we didn't have much choice but to take one of the ships excursions. As we began the booking process, we were able to get some on board credits and a good price on balconies, which it was nice to have. The food in main dining room was excellent as was the service. The women in our group also enjoyed the Afternoon High Tea. Our cabin was located near one of the self service laundromats, no issue with noise, but it was handy for checking on and nabbing the empty washer or dryer.

I am not a frequent cruiser and did not take this cruise for a rich on board experience. We are budget travelers for the most part and the first 3 days seemed very heavy handed on up selling darn near everything, and they were not always forthcoming about additional cost without very direct questions. I thought their prices for Internet were high, but we found port opportunities to catch up. We didn't buy drink packages as you would have to consume a minimum of 6 a day to break even. Ala carte wine and drink prices were essentially what we would pay at home in a restaurant, so that is what we did. I thought the highly touted on board messaging app to be useless for communicating with others. Maybe we weren't doing it right, but there was no way we could find to have it alert you that you had a text from someone on board! Who stares at their phone all the time?

We attended 2 ship shows which were well done, but even more I enjoyed 2 folk dancing shows in port in Norway and Russia. Also there was a very good lecture on Nesting dolls and lacquer boxes, educating us about the things to look for in an authentic item. They offered a class for painting your own nesting dolls which included the dolls for about $30. My sister and niece enjoyed this as well as a movie on the top deck. Dinners were very enjoyable and we loved our servers and the excellent food. Read more