Firstly, my cruise was free because my best friend won it from a casino (of course this was for an inside room and we had to pay taxes, gratuities and fees), but my mom wanted to come so she gave us the gift of a balcony upgrade. "Upgrade" is a term I use lightly. The balcony was tiny! I've been on the Norwegian Sky, a much older and much smaller ship and our room and balcony were significantly bigger!

Embarkation was stress free for us because we got to skip the lines as special customers due to winning the cruise from the casino. Other customers were not so lucky! The computers broke down and people had to stand in unorganized lines for hours! The Manhattan terminal is very poorly organized. I guess I was spoiled by how pristine the Miami terminal was!

I've only sailed out of Florida in the past, so I didn't realize how choppy the seas could be when sailing from New York. Luckily, I don't get seasick, but I would NOT recommend this for anyone who might have an issue with motion sickness because this ship never stopped rocking (and supposedly it has these amazing new stabilizers that are supposed to make the movement less detectable). We weren't even able to go to the private island because the sea was too choppy to lower the tenders to take us over to the island. I've seen it before, but my it was my friend's first cruise and he was really disappointed. Read more