This was my first cruise (my partner's third), sailing March 31st 2007. I'm a Primary School teacher, so have to travel during the easter holidays.
Living in Yorkshire, England meant we departed for our cruise during the afternoon of Friday 30th March 2007. We flew British Airways from Manchester to Gatwick and stayed overnight at the Sofitel Hotel at the north terminal. We departed the following morning with Thomsonfly from Gatwick South for an 8 hour flight. It certainly didn't seem long, but I was rather stiff when we headed for immigration, which was not a good experience. We were one of the last to be 'processed' and it took over an hour to be finger printed and photographed.
Check-in at the port was swift and our luggage arrived some hours later (having retrieved it from outside another cabin). If I hadn't gone looking for it, we would not have found it. Strange, as both tags clearly showed E104!