The SHIP Overall the ship is new, clean and bright. Its neither subdued nor gaudy. The layout is different with restaurants all over the place and the main lobby is not that big nor central.

Embarkation/Disembarkation Top marks. Maybe we were late, but there was no queue to get on. When our color (which we picked - about middle of the timings) was called we went to the exit and walked off, found our bags, and walked out - WOW! Why can't this happen all the time with other cruiselines. The only problem was that we did sit in the bus waiting for it to depart to the airport for a while.

Cabin We always go for a balcony cabin. Well it was new and clean. Top marks for the shower/toilet, which was the best laid out of any similar cabins we have been in. The floor was mosaic tiles and the shower had a sliding door so no water cascaded onto the main area - the toilet had a sliding door too. We thought the size of cabin was a bit tight, but there was room for everything. The balcony was average size and the chairs were quite comfortable. Freestyle Dining Or is this aka "how to charge more for eating". The Great Outdoors/Garden Cafe (the always open buffet) seemed small and has an odd layout, but we always found a window seat at breakfast and lunch and the food was very good with good variety. However, if you don't drink coffee or iced tea then the drinks stations are lackluster - its water. On other cruiselines you get juices, punch etc as well - we are still waiting for a response to our request for something to be suggested as an alternative, which we wrote to them on during day2. There are 2 "main" dining areas - The Magenta did not look appealing so we did not use it but instead we went to the Grand Pacific for dinners. This is a bit dimly lit, but the food was quite good and the choice was decent. We were sat with 2 Germans on the first night, but after that they whistled us along to a 2 seater (nearly always by a window) every other night. We did feel a little rushed with the courses and it was difficult to strike up any relationship with the waiters as we had different ones every night (this - and not seeing the same passengers each night - is one of the features of freestyle - like it or not. another feature is the confusion over dress attire in the evenings) We did have a couple of lunches in the small Blue Lagoon, but the menu is fixed and limited - but the food was good. There are 7 paying choices for dinner eating elsewhere. We did not do any of them for 3 reasons. First the steak place and Teppanyaki were pricey (we think - at $20 and $25pp) The Teppanyaki was always full though. We tried some samplers in the Italian and thought the food was poor. Of the other choices ($10 to $20pp) we thought the menus were uninspiring and presumably others felt the same as they were poorly attended. Having all these eating areas has reduced the amount of space available for other things on the ship. Our conclusion is that we prefer not to have Freestyle Dining. Tours We went on a couple of tours which were well organized, but we thought they were a bit pricey. We did not cruise for the ports on this occasion as we have been to some of them before. Read more