I have always cruised with Carnival Cruise Line. This year my family made the plans and I joined them on Freedom of the Seas Royal Caribbean Cruise out of Fort Lauderdale. At the start I noticed the difference while trying to reach someone for questions about shore excursions, they had very long hold times and were not very helpful. We ended up booking direct with various companies at our ports.

A few things I think they did great on were the check-in process was great with no waiting or lines and the muster drill went quickly and seemed to be very efficient. Our server at dinner Turkessa Kerr was terrific. She went above and way beyond and exceeded our expectations. My sister has severe shell fish allergies and Romeo took great care to ensure the food was prepared without contamination and used paper plates at every meal.

Where they fell short was service (employees at the bars were rude), food (quality and selection), chairs and seating around the pool (people would go up to the pool around 8 am and save several chairs with their towels and bags), Family Feud Game Show was awful (people actually booed and got up and walked out), beer selection was lacking (it varied between floors and location), they actually ran out of the beer we drank in the dining room and we had to bring our own each night! Check out was slow and unorganized.