My thirteen year old daughter talked me into this trip but I couldn't convince my wife and other daughter to join us because they are prone to seasickness. I researched this trip extensively here and read all reviews. Suffice it to say that everything I read is pretty accurate and left no surprises so I'll talk about our cruise in particular. The ages of passengers ran from 8 to 92 (yes, 92) and most from the US and some from UK and a few from Australia and one couple from Puerto Rico and just about everyone was an English speaker. There were a handful of teenagers, mine included, several young adults with parents, and most of the others ranged from 40-65 with some very active seniors.

We were fortunate with the weather, it was sunny every day, sometimes a bit cloudy overcast in the early morning, and a bit humid for us (I'm told it was like a typical NY day in the summer). We anticipated cooler water temps and brought our own wet suits but the El Nino kept the waters warmer than normal and used the ships 3 mm shorty suits which worked just fine. Probably in the low 70's and we never even felt the shock of cold when first jumping in and swam at the beaches without wet suits.

So, things I wasn't sure of. Well, the luggage limit thing is not really enforced, they told us we could bring more pieces on the plane to Baltra from the hotel if needed. The weight limit appears to facilitate the loading onto the ship. All the luggage which was turned in the night before is taken aboard a small boat, looks like a converted lifeboat, and the pieces are loaded into a single side door on the ship. Each piece is hand carried to the room individually from a staging area, up the stairs since there is no elevator. Heavy pieces would add to the work and make it difficult for the stewards and housekeepers who had to deliver the pieces to the rooms one by one. We had no trouble with three suitcases, one of which was 44 lbs. All stored under the beds and there was ample storage. Read more