8 day cruise chosen vs. a week at an all-inclusive resort - 3 days at sea with very little variety of activities during the day, excessive extra costs (gratuity added and/or expected even after pre-paid gratuities and activities or restaurants that require additional cost while on-board), security would do nothing about unsupervised children running through the ship (at all hours of day and late night) or being excessively loud and rude during movie night, etc. and the rest of the crew absolutely terrified to say anything to improperly behaved children for fear of getting in trouble themselves. Paper-thin walls in adjoining cabin where the couple (unknown to us) would fight, cuss, and have relations at 2:00 am that could rival any pornographic film (and again the inability of the crew/guest services to say anything to them about being quiet unless we called security every time during an incident thus exposing us to their direct hatred). The "serenity" lounge for adults only was not monitored and the signs that say "seats can only be saved for 45 minutes at which time unattended items will be removed" not being enforced by crew (again for fear of retribution from supervisors).

Poor food choices on occasion in the dining room led us to choose to eat at the buffet only to find that the buffet was serving the exact same food, the supplemental restaurants such as the Blue Iguana and Guy's Burgers being only open for breakfast and lunch was very inconvenient, and as first-time cruisers we were actually made to feel like the lowest of the low because the "VIP"s or previous cruisers are catered to. As a marketing tactic, this seems a bit backwards. The hot tubs and pools were disgusting, especially at the last day at sea. When they were clean, they were often unusable due to lack of space because of ill behaved and unsupervised children taking up all space. "Unsupervised children" in this context is the average age group of 11-16. Parents of this age group treated the ship like a floating baby sitter and would allow their children to whatever whenever (including getting out of the pool and going into the cafe soaking wet thus causing the floor to be wet and many people (including family members) to FALL!!!!

Members of crew seemed very unhappy about the behavior of this age group and the fact that they couldn't do anything about it. Children (clearly underage) sitting at the bar, the drinks being priced differently based on time of day and location of ship, etc. Example: Coke (12 oz in a can) from room - $1.95, same Coke at 3rd deck lounge at 2:30 pm was $1.95, same Coke at same lounge at 5:45 pm was $2.34 (with 15% gratuity added), same coke at 10th deck (Liddo) back bar at 10:45 pm was $3.24 (with 15% gratuity added). WHY???? Read more