This was a 1st cruise for my Mom and I and we couldn't have had a better experience.

We stayed 3 days in Rome at Peace of Rome and thought that may be the highlight of our whole trip but little did we know what was waiting for us! We booked a private car through Rome Cabs to the port with 2 other couples we "met" on the roll call boards and had a seamless 1hr drive to Civitavecchia. The boarding process was smooth and took less than 20 minutes. The ship itself was wonderful with amazing artwork and tons of fun areas to explore. My personal favorite was the Library. The crew is super friendly and very eager to help in anyway they can. With over 70 nationalities on board it was wonderful to chat with everyone and hear about their homes and families. Meeting so many interesting other cruisers and crew was a definite highlight of the trip.

We boarded around lunch time and enjoyed the wonderful food at Bistro on 5 while waiting for our staterooms to become available. We enjoyed it so much we went once more near the end of the cruise. Frankly, all the food was amazing. We had select dining and never had a problem with seating and will definitely choose it again in the future. We found that 6:15 was too early and 8:45 too late. We generally went to the dining room around 7-7:30 and found that was perfect. Our first dinner was an experience as we sat at a sharing table but did not realize that the meal was 4 courses and only selected 3 so had to sit through a course that everyone else had but us. The courses are great sizes though so 4 never made me feel overly full. Unlike Qsine which was so amazing, I almost had to be rolled out. In fact, after Qsine, I didn't eat until a late lunch the next day....so plan accordingly. Read more