Our trip was the RT NY/NY, up past Newport, RI, to sydney, NS, Quebec, Halifax, Bar Harbor, and back again. The embarkation process was relatively smooth, onboard accommodations upper mid-range in quality.
Positives: food, food and more food, excellently prepared, beautifully presented. Waiter service in the main dining room, Britannia, was painfully slow, especially at breakfast time (40 minutes between turn in or older and delivery), but OK at other times. Obviously a British ship, they act as though they have never heard of iced tea. Requires a lengthy process to get it, and forget about refills. The Lido (Kings Court) buffets were excellent, abundant, easy.
Negatives: the evening entertainment was designed, apparently, for 20-30 year olds, while 90% of the passengers were well past 65. Extremely loud band, rock and roll stuff. The dancers were excellent, the comedian mediocre, the guitar player very good. The MC, who is the Cruise Director, was peppy and entertaining, but seemed to take delight in picking out some unfortunate older person on the front row to embarrass. Both he and the comedian seemed to enjoy penis jokes. Does this tell us something? Why is this fun?