We were invited to accompany some relatives on this ship, as they had never been to the ports or countries that the ship visited. The things that we remember most about the cruise ship, are all bad, except for the ports of call, where we did privately arranged tours, which were exceptional.

Embarkation was terrific - put us in a really good mood to face the rest of the trip. We were among the first onboard, & our luggage arrived promptly. The decor of the ship hit us hard in the face - very dark & dingy & way overdone with accessories - too cluttered. We liked our balcony cabin, our steward was very attentive. All went well for the first couple of days, then we struck trouble at the dining room. We had "Anytime Dining", & on this particular evening, we waited for an hour to be seated. We were given a Buzzer, & told to stand nearby, which we did. There seemed to be other people entering the dining room without being given a buzzer, so after a while, my husband approached the attendant on duty, to remind her that we were still waiting - by this time there were other people who had also been given buzzers & were standing near us. Eventually, after an hour of waiting, we were called to enter the dining room, but there were still people after us who were left waiting. We did receive an apology the next day, & a plate of sweets (to stop us from making a complaint, we think).

The disembarkation in the tender port of Bora Bora was a shambles, as a tender boat ran aground on the reef. This meant that the boat in trouble had to be hauled back onboard & replaced, all the while keeping passengers waiting to get ashore. More trouble happened in another port, with a tender boat refusing to start (not a good scenario if we were in real trouble). Upon arrival in Kahului, Maui, we were held up badly by the U.S. Coast Guard, & when we finally disembarked, there was no sign of a shuttle bus, but we had to walk quite a considerable distance to a local bus stop. Once there, the ticket officer ran out of tickets, as, she told us, the cruise line had failed to inform the bus company that the ship would be in port that day. She also said that the local bus company would have provided a shuttle service from the ship into the town, had they known of the ship's arrival. Disembarkation on our arrival in Honolulu was also a shambles, but we don't know if that was the fault of the ship's disorganisation or the U.S. Coast Guard officers. Read more