EMBARKATION Since this was the second half of our Back 2 Back, embarkation was a little different. We were already on the ship, so we had to meet a staff member in the lobby at 9:45am. We were escorted off of the ship, handed our customs forms to the CBP officer and then back in line to get on the ship. We had to wait a few minutes to get back on the ship due to some staff members needing to clear Customs and Immigration as well. Once the ship was cleared, we were escorted back on to the ship. No Embarkation pictures. Yeah!!!! We were give our S&S cards as we reentered the ship. The Purser's desk just carried our credit card information from the previous cruise to this one. One thing to note.... they don't take your picture for your S&S card upon re-entry, so you will get stopped the first time that you try to get off the ship in a port. After we got back on board, we went to our cabin and picked up our pool stuff. We had Lido Deck to ourselves for about 1 hour.

SHIP The ship was beautiful, clean and looked nice. There were always employees cleaning to make sure the ship looked 1st class. We found the ship easy to navigate once we realized that it was much easier to go to the 5th floor and navigate the ship from there. Due to positioning of dining rooms, you can't go end to end on the ship on 3 and 4.

PUBLIC ROOMS Dining rooms seemed to be a little dark, but very nice. It may have been because we were on the lower level of the dining room and under the overhang of the second floor. The casino was well, a casino. Found the table games to get fairly crowded some nights. We stuck to the cruise. We liked that we could access $$$ from our S&S cards in the slots, but that could be dangerous if you are a serious gambler. Lido buffet was always well stocked and a nice variety. It did get a little tough to find seating during the busy times though. We usually ate from the buffet's by the pool. Read more