My husband & I booked a Mediterranean cruise along with my brother, his wife & 2 children the week of April 13, 2014 leaving from Venice. We were celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary & 60th birthday and were so looking forward to our first ever cruise. Our experience was not a good one.

Ship was beautiful & the cabins were clean & nicely furnished. However, our experience with the drink plans & meals was very disappointing. The minute you board the ship they come at you from all sides trying to push their "drink packages" before you even get to your cabin. You have to make a quick decision as to what plan you want. After paying for what you think is a deal, you realize after a day or so that the so-called "deal" isn't such a deal. You have to stand in long lineups for drinks & once you order, it takes forever to even get your drink. Everything on the ship is "extra" - ice cream, pop, water. The buffet areas are completely jammed with people pushing & clawing their way to the food that they want. I waited in line for my turn & was always pushed aside by a rude passenger who didn't want to wait his turn! It was a nightmare. We booked into the 2nd seating for the dinner meal & were not served dinner until 10 pm. Seating was supposedly at 8:30 but 8:45 was the actual time & it took at least another 1/2 hour to 3/4 hour to even get a drink of water or glass of wine. After a long day in port we were starving by 10 pm & too tired to go to any nightclub afterwards. The food was nothing like we anticipated, very bland & not much of a selection. Nothing fancy like you would expect on a supposedly 1st class cruise.

The ports that we stopped at were very nice & we enjoyed most of them. One day we chose to stay on the ship because it was raining & the ship's pool & bar area was packed. It was hard to find any chairs or tables. Read more