We love cruising and enjoyed this one on the Vision, a mid-size ship with nice venues that is easy to navigate. The cruise director staff were excellent -- high energy and lots of fun. A big surprise came when ship's captain Marek Slaby entertained us at the C&A social even by singing to us. He also entertained passengers in the Centrum (along with other talented officers and crew) belting out Ride Sally Ride to the delight of all. Other Entertainment: The VOS song and dance troupe is a hard-working group of young people, but their inexperience shows. Uneven and somewhat hokey production numbers with ill-fitting costumes and dated material resulted in shows that were just tiresome. Felt a little like watching a high school or junior college production. Better entertainment came from the more seasoned pros brought on for one or two night performances. But hey. No lines. No outlandish ticket prices, so no major complaint here.

Food: Have to say that food in general across all lines is heading south and not in a good way. The Windjammer (which I privately call the Traffic Jammer) offered rather heavy hot foods and desserts that seemed to be mostly mousse. We learned later in the cruise that cookies could be had "on request," which seemed kind of cheesy to us. Food in the MDR continues to be uneven as well and the reservations system is also uneven and unreliable. It did not used to be this hard to sit down at a big table with lots of other folks and get a great meal. What oh what is going on? We did not starve, of course, but we've had better food. It used to be that you could try interesting meals that might cost too much in a landside restaurant, in the MDR but not any more. We tried Giovanni's and found the food there to be first rate, exciting, interesting. Park Café food was light and very nice, with better dessert offerings than in the Windjammer.

On board activities: We thought there was plenty to do and lots of places where you could avoid stuff like the belly flop contest if you wanted. Cabin: Really nice. We had a large ocean view room. There was plenty of closet space, a nice arm chair, a desk and chair and lots of drawers and shelves to hold all our stuff. You have to ask for ice and oddly, for shampoo and conditioner. But had to ask only once and got it every night after that along with fun towel animals. Very comfortable bed. Read more