As a cruiser who took his first cruise when I was 11, I have always thought of it as a great way to see the world while having your hotel follow you. The level of service and attention was always amazing, however in recent trips you can clearly see a decline over the past 20 years.

My wife and I always do the new years eve cruise, as residents of Manhattan it can be quite expensive to go out at night on NYE, and we would rather pay for a real vacation than a night out on the town. For this particular trip, we decided to go a bit nuts, booking a back to back, first on the Reflection, then we got off and the next day literally got onto the Eclipse. The ship itself is quite nice, albeit the Reflection has more options with the Lawn Club Grill and Porch restaurants. Other than a few structural changes, it really is similar to the other ships.

My issue with this cruise is two fold. The first, the service. The bartenders and waiters on the ship are worked too hard, and you can tell they resent you for the disparity of wealth it takes to afford a cruise vacation. While there are some on the ship that love to be in hospitality, the reality is - most people on the ship do it because they have to, not because they want to. The bartenders on this cruise were very complacent, complaining certain drinks took too long to make or they claimed to not have ingredients for certain special cocktails. I even had one bartender curse at us because we got pink drinks which made my wife happy. When I filed a report with the ship I was told the Staff Captain would address the issue, he literally did nothing. No call, no follow up, nothing. I have a photo of the incident (I always carry my camera around). If I could post it here, I would. Read more