I think any holiday is what you put into it. We have been on IOS about five times and therefore love the ship. We cruised this time for our Silver Wedding Anniversary and we had a lovely time. We had the drinks package, it was free as part of the deal when we booked 18 months before but talking to other people it does work out as value for money, so long as you have more than five drinks a day, which can be done quite easily without being an alcoholic!

We enjoyed the various areas of the ship and enjoyed the shows; The Quest and Darren Day were a particular highlight and were highly entertaining. Yes, Royal Caribbean have made changes in menu choices and portion sizes in the MDR, however the Windjammer was as varied as on our previous cruises and our anniversary meal in Chops was very nice. All the staff we encountered were very hard working and professional. Our cabin attendant attended to our every need and was always about, morning and evening and our cabin was kept tidy and clean. He made two towel swans for our anniversary and gave us a card and the swans stayed for whole of the cruise until we docked at Southampton! Our embarkation and disembarkation was quick and easy, we were on the ship within fifteen minutes of parking our car and disembarking was possibly quicker than that. We enjoyed all the ports we visited but always got off and walked, Valencia being the only one we had to use the shuttle bus for.

Overall we thoroughly enjoyed our cruise, met some lovely people, ate and drank possibly too much and the only negative would be the two days at sea at the end of the cruise, we usually have one day. We had lovely warm, sunny weather for the time of year and look forward to a return cruise soon.