Our family of 5 went on the mediterranean cruise with Costa, an Italian Cruise Line. We live in Italy and are in the process of learning Italian. We have lived in Europe and the UK for the last 14 years and always learned the language of the country. We realized this was an Italian Cruise Line and were assured that we would be accommodated in English just as the other non-Italian passengers (Deutsch, Spanish, Asian etc.). This was our first time taking a cruise. Our primary language is English, but we can get by in other languages. We had 2 cabins, one with a balcony (BP) and one without a balcony/or window (IC). The room without was obviously on the 'darker' and smaller side since it also had no window. We will not book one of those again as it is what it is and we simply didn't like it. The room with the balcony was nice, spacious and without complaint. The ship was beautiful and MOST of the crew was courteous, but not all; specifically some of the excursion desk attendants and the bar attendants taking orders in the food areas and theater. We witnessed several incidents of servers, taking bar orders, be rude in their actions and even yell at the passengers who were trying to place an order. In two instances, it was uncalled for and in the other, while it could've been justified, it was still highly unprofessional behavior and terribly unacceptable. Above all, we feel that when you treat others with respect, they will be respectful in return. However, It is well known that you will have those who do their jobs well and those who will still need redirection, encouragement and customer-service training.

Moving on, we had fun participating in activities and loved the shows--the one put on by the crew was excellent!! The breakfast and lunch buffets were good but after five days, it all begin to taste the same. We quite enjoyed dinner--loved tasting dishes from the areas we were visiting! :D

So, as I've said, there were things we enjoyed, but unfortunately, the things that we did not appreciate (listed below) highly outweighed the things we liked and as a result, we do not plan to cruise with Costa again. Read more