This was our 9th cruise. Most of the others were with Silversea. We chose the Azzurra because it only holds 100 passengers. We wanted to try something smaller than Silversea ships. Boy, what an experience! There were only 53 passengers and 76 crew. As you can imagine, the service was really great. The crew member wanted to provide great service wherever we were. This was our best cruise ever. We'll be back in November.

While there was only one main dining space, there was plenty of diversity on the dinner menu -- which was plated. Same goes for the breakfast and lunch menus, which were served buffet style.

The ratio of space to passenger is huge. Many times, we felt like we had the ship to ourselves. Because there are so few passenger, we became closer friends to the other passengers. And for the first time ever, we got to know Captain and the Hotel Director. We got to see them every day; and had separate dinners with each of them. Read more