Our friends were doing this cruise, and I love lighthouses, so we joined them. The Anthem is a beautiful, very clean ship. Our cabin was nice sized(#8578) with a balcony. There was an unbelievable amount of storage space—my husband and I unpacked everything and still had empty drawers,etc. We ate breakfast and lunch in the Windjammer and the food was excellent. We had dinner most nights in the regular dining room called Chic.One server was new to the ship and it took him almost the whole cruise to get things right but he tried really hard.

The most disappointing aspect of the cruise were two ship sanctioned excursions. The first was the Old Town Trolley Tour of Boston. Our friends, my husband,& I were the last 4 to get on the trolley. Our friends found 2 seats together, but there was only 1 and 1/4 seats left for my husband and I and they were not even close together. An extremely obese man was taking up 2 seats and his significant other was taking up 1and 3/4 seats. I said something to the Royal Caribbean rep who was checking us in that there were no seats together. The trolley driver got impatient and rudely said, “ well, I hate to break up a marriage but a seat is a seat, so sit down!” We wouldn’t have minded if this was just a short ride, but this was an hour and 45 minute excursion. My husband had 1/4 of a seat, could not get any air or see past this huge woman, so his tour of Boston was ruined. I was jammed between strangers on the last seat of the bus. I’m not sure how this could have been remedied but I’m sure those two only paid for 2 seats but took up 3 and 3/4 seats. Maybe a notation if you require more than 1 seat, you should pay for 2! The Best of Portland and Kennebunkport was excellent! The Top 10 best of Halifax was not so good. The trip to Peggy’s Cove was long but the lighthouse and little village were really nice. It would have been much nicer if we would have had time to eat lunch there. Instead, we drove back to Halifax and were dropped off to find lunch in what did not seem like a great part of town! We only had a short time, so we ended up at a McDonalds. It was filthy! Seemed to be full of some homeless men. Inside was too dirty to sit so we sat outside. The man sitting next to me was extremely dirty and after about 5 min. I started getting bug bites all down the side next to him! I think it was flea bites. I threw my food away and left. We met at some park, and walked through it to meet the bus. The park was pretty but a waste of time! I did enjoy the trip to the cemetery where the Titanic victims were buried. Obviously, we should have picked the excursion that just went to Peggy’s Cove and Titanic cemetery. After that excursion, we decided to cancel the Top 10 St John & Bay of Fundy. We took the Pink Bus hop on hop off instead and that was good. The Manhattan Highlights and drop off at Newark Airport worked well. It might have worked better to give us our stickers the night before and tell us where to meet the buses after we got our luggage instead of trying to gather all those people in a bar, have us walk up the stairs, disembark together, find our luggage, and go through customs as a large group. That was insane! People pushing and shoving, etc.. The WeWill Rock You show on board ship was excellent. Spectra’s Cabaret was loud and weird. The Gift was difficult to understand because the first speaker was difficult to hear and understand. I’m not sure these shows were ideal for the age of most guests on the ship. The comedian was excellent, the hynotist just so so. If I were doing this cruise again, I would probably go a little later in Sept. to take advantage of the fall foliage. And I would choose my excursions more carefully!