I always enjoy reading cruise reviews before and after we sail and this time has been no exception. It is interesting, especially, to see how our experience differs from others who travelled the same week as we did. We arrived in FLL two days ahead of sailing to avoid possible bad weather in Canada. This year we stayed at The Westin on the beach, using Aeroplan points and it is a lovely hotel. At 11:00 a.m. on Sunday we took a taxi to the port and arrived there at 11:20. There was already a lineup but they didn't start letting people go through security until 12:00. Thankfully we spent most of that time outside and there was a nice breeze. Check-in didn't take long and we were able to go directly to our stateroom. We were sitting down eating lunch at the Horizon Court at 12:40.

It is a beautiful ship, and unlike a previous writer, we never felt claustrophobic at all. We had a balcony room on the Lido Deck and while that is on Deck 15 we never had rough seas (maximum 5 feet) so the motion of the ship was mostly very little. The cabin did seem somewhat small to me but I think that has to do with the way the room is laid out. By the way, if you use shower gel, bring your own. It is apparently only provided to suites. They do provide shampoo, conditioner, lotion and good sized bars of soap. There were also abour 40 coat hangers and loads of space to hang clothes. There is a safe in a cupboard right beside the bathroom with plenty of room to put other things, plus there is space to put things in two night stands and a cupboard under the desk. If you don't have enough space, you've brought too much stuff.

Unfortunately we had noisy neighbours to the forward side of us. They spent a lot of time on their balcony and they had their balcony divider opened so they could visit with family in the room next to them. They talked loud and it made it quite difficult to enjoy reading a book on our balcony. They were travelling with others as well and sometimes there were 5 or 6 people out there. We heard the people on the other side of us too but they were not loud and were not constantly talking like these other people were. That was one of the downers of our trip. We book a balcony so we can get away from the noisy pool area when we want quiet. Read more