As in the intro this was my first cruise. Since I was leaving out of Galveston I had only 2 choices. Carnivals Magic or Royal Caribbean Mariner of the Seas. A friend of mine that has actually worked on both cruise lines plus Norwegian and princess recommended RCL hands down and without reservation. Okay... Now for the cruise.

We arrived in port on Sunday and parked with 81st Dolphin Parking (galvestonparking.net) and the royal treatment began. Though it does not look like much this is the place you want to park, my friend that has left cars for months at a time highly recommended this place. They do have a fenced lot and security. Okay they got us right up to the port and even though a cruise was arriving the drive got a porter and got our bags into the line for check in. We had to wait a little while but it was not bad. We go inside and because the port is used by many cruise lines it was kind of crowded but we knew all we needed to do it get through this little time of being couped up and then we would be on vacation. We go into line and because we had researched and talked to RCl ahead of time we were checked in in no time and then we had to sit and wait for our group to be called.

Our group was called and the vacation began. I had read some other reviews about the Mariner being old... maybe but it is tried and proven. We went up to the windjammer and had lunch. The food in the buffet was nothing less than excellent. We ate breakfast every morning in the buffet and lunch a few times. We never had dinner there but after all, why. This leads me to say if you go anywhere other than the dining room every night you are making a mistake. It is included in the price. We made friends right off the bat with an awesome family of 3 that included a 17 yr old daughter. She and my son hit it off and they started making up their own kinds of food requests. What do I mean by that? Well they were kind of picky so the dining staff and our waiter (mario) brought them something they liked. I little secret, if they know what you like and it is served anywhere on the ship and they know ahead of time... it will be available at your table for dinner even though it is not on the menu. Read more