I booked this cruise almost a year out as I always wanted to see the America's Cup and this cruise was in Bermuda during the finals. Plus, it did not require us to fly as we live less than 2 hours away, and it was over a long weekend. Many, many years ago I had done a 4 night cruise out of Florida and had enjoyed it, so I did not envision that this being only 4 would be an issue. I was wrong.

I knew the Anthem was built to sail out of cold weather ports, but it was still a disappointing ship. We like open spaces and promenades, like on the Oasis and Westerdam. The Anthem is very enclosed . If you score a window seat at one of the restaurants, you look out on the lifeboats. I also missed the atriums as on other ships on which I had been. On the Anthem the shopping area is small and congested and the stores are not very good. There are 2 higher end jewelry stores, both pretty empty during out cruise. ( As a side note we went into Bulgari as I am familiar with the line, but even if I wanted to purchase something I would not as the manager was very rude and condescending.)

That brings me to another issue. Overall, the staff on the ship was courteous, but there were significant exceptions. The host in Jamie's Italian was also rude and condescending, rivaling the manager in Bulgari. And, 2 bartenders in 270 insulted my daughter. We had never experienced anything like that on other cruises on RCCL or Holland America. The ship also seemed very shortstaffed. We did appreciate the servers in Schooners Bar- Dailan, Larrex, and Chris, who went out of their way to provide exceptional service. Read more