My husband and I booked this as a last minute post-Christmas relaxation gift to ourselves. We live on Long Island so we love sailing out of New York. Our departure day was cold and gloomy but just as we pulled away the sun came out and cast the most gorgeous golden glow over Manhattan. We had originally booked an ocean view on deck 8 but the upsell fairy contacted me just the day before sailing and we upgraded to a deck ten balcony for not much more money. We love the Gem and have sailed on it several times in the past but not since its most recent refurbishing. It looked great and was beautifully decorated for the holidays. I especially love the new lighting installation in the atrium.

We had both the drink and dining packages plus, because we are platinum, we also receive two additional specialty dinners. The food was great no matter where we ate. We have always enjoyed the Orchid Garden and had our NYE dinner there. Moderno has been moved since the addition of O'Sheehan's on deck eight and it is smaller with a scaled back salad bar but who ever went hungry when sailing? Yes, you often have a different server but we look at that as an opportunity to meet and speak with more crew members and we did find Chris from St. Vincent (I think) in several different venues.

Our cabin was great and our steward, Deepak, was terrific. He always spoke to us by name every time we met him. Read more