This was my first cruise and wanted a safe environment so decided to give a cruise a go. The single occupancy for some cruise liners were stupid. Anything from 50-100% of cabin cost. Thomson had the best offer on Thomson Dream. She had plenty of cabins and the rooms were not a bad size. The bathroom was spacious and clean and plenty of closet room.

There were sports activities on deck 12 every day as well as fitness classes. Quizzes to take part in. Unfortunately the crew had only managed to get to the ship a day or so before due to the ash cloud stopping flights so they were learning as they went. As I said in introduction, teething problems. However when they got the hang of it they were marvellous.

We spent a 10 1/2 shore excursion in Italy visiting Florence and Pisa. And amazing day but tiring. The second was Villefranche, Nice, Monaco and Monte Carlo which was a fantastic tour. The final was Barcelona which the excursion was good but we could of done with stopping a few more times than we did. However each port had many different excursions to keep everyone happy. Read more