I was on this cruise soley because it was my daughters choice of the ultimate holiday following the hard graft of GCSEs. Cruising never been an ambition for me and in truth I was there under sufferance! I read a lot of reviews before I travelled and these only made me more sure I was going to dislike the experience. I would say I am fussy, I like good service, I detest rude people and don't like crowded places!! --Yes I know a possible recipe for disaster!! I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience. I thought the staff were just fabulous --sometimes in the face of extreme rudeness from passengers, They were friendly polite and professional --our waiters in the main dining room, our cabin stewardess and the bar staff--particularly Sherene in the promenade deck bar are to be commended particularly. Our cabin was very comfortable 6558 --a balcony cabin --plenty of room for my very excessive luggage a lovely balcony and peaceful and quiet in the main. There was one occasion when a family in the next cabin were having a full scale screaming match complete with throwing things at the closed patio windows when I was concerned but a quick phone call to guest services stopped this within 10 minutes.My daughter had 6559 which was a promenade deck view inside cabin which was also good --but smaller than ours

All the things written about terrible food, tired badly decorated ship, poorly maintained were just not true, the food was excellent -- there were plenty of options if you didn't want formal dining. The wind Jammer was a buffet restaurant with amazing views and on 2 occasions a dolphin show !! I am not a fan of buffet restaurants so we didn't go in there very much, but I have to say everything was fresh, hot and lots of choice. I loved the 3 formal evenings and made the most of getting really dressed up. Royal Caribbean are out to sell as much as possible but you didn't have to buy anything!!! We took the opportunity to dine in Chops Grill and Giovannis Table and had amazing steak and a lovely evening on both occasions and were very spoiled by the waiting staff but you didn't need to do that we just liked the 'occasionness' of it --the food in the main dining area is also beautifully cooked and well presented. I could nitpick and my main complaint would be the extortionate price of the basic internet package -- I would not have bothered with this if there was an app as I believe some cruise lines have, with an intranet so families can communicate on board, my daughter was disappointed by the 1 am curfew as she has been with carnival and nothing like that existed with that cruise line although I didn't think it was a particularly bad thing!!! The other issues were the crowding of the adult only pool area though I expected that on sea days. And my one big issue which happened on embarkation was that the permission letter we had painstakingly completed as per Royal Caribbean e-mailed advice was rejected and my daughters 16 year old friend was left upset and we were all traumatised as they refused permission for us to get on board!!! We then had to spend well over an hour trying to contact the young ladies parents who were on holiday abroad so he could send a photograph of his passport to verify his signature!! It wasn't enough that it had been witnessed formally by the director of Children's' Services for our home town !! All this despite us following Royal Caribbeans advice to the latter. We only made the sailing by about 30 mins to spare and other families were still stranded on dockside at this point. This needs addressing we did as they asked but it was not enough at the port --VERY INNEFFICIENT!!! And made for a very poor start to our holiday.

I would definitely recommend the premium drinks package, I like a cocktail or 3 and port with my cheese and brandy sometimes after dinner. Having the drinks package made me very relaxed about on board spending and well worth it for us. I cant tell you anything about the shore excursions as we did our own. I really enjoyed most of the Ports we visited but again I did feel RCB over charged for shuttles etc Read more