We had stayed in Beijing for a few nights before the cruise and were fortunate enough to find someone on the cruise critic forum who had organised a bus to take passengers down to the port of Tianjin, which is about a 3 hour bus journey away.Thank you Suzie!
The embarkation procedure was rather chaotic and I don't know why the myriad customs and immigration forms for the various ports of call could not have been sent to passengers beforehand to reduce the chaos. Also, we had not been informed that we required two copies of our passports (we already had one) and it seems that nobody else had been told of this to judge by the queue at the photo copy machine.
On board the ship is looking its age and isn't as good as its sister ship Rhapsody of the Seas on which we travelled last year.
Good sized cabin, quiet and well attended. The only complaint was that the balcony was often covered in soot and I think it would have been better to take a side balcony stateroom.