We had debated a special trip to celebrate my half century and it came down to a choice of a guided tour to Egypt or a cruise. Everyone raves about Royal Caribbean and we wanted to go with them. My favourite was a cruise taking in Venice, Dubrovnik and Kusadasi, as we were keen to visit Ephesus. However, we could not get a deal that suited our budget and I was not impresssed by the Egypt tour that added 'taxes and charges' of €250 each! So I was surprised to get an email from RCCL in May advertising the Venice-Kusadasi cruise at a price I thought was reasonable. So, I rang my wife, I checked connecting flights, rang her again and then decided to go for it. However, in the intervening hour or 90 mins, the price had moved up significantly. I rang RCCL in England but got no satisfaction. Heartily diasppointed, I went to lunch. Thinking about it over lunch, I decided to go back onto the web and see what the other offer had been. It was a 7 day cruise from Malaga, returning via Sardinia, Rome, Corsica and Majorca. Better still, even with a balcony stateroom, it came in under €1,200 including gratuities. As this was a first cruise, we agreed it was more important to go on the cruise than what cruise it was! So, I booked the cruise and the connecting flights from Belfast to Malaga and counted down the days, courtesy of the online cruise counter! On October 2nd, after a week of birthday celebrations, I was carried calmly by Aer Lingus to Malaga for our first cruise. We had booked a transfer as there were two couples and associated check in bags etc and I had feared that a standard taxi might not cope. The transfer company supplied a minibus and for €52 we travelled in comfort to the port. The return journey was a different experience, see later. First impressions were - "Wow-that ship is huge!" Arrival at the terminal and embarkation was very smooth as we had checked in online and printed our Setsail passes. Just a minor form to fill in and hand over the credit card and we were on. We entered the ship on deck 4 just outside the Vivaldi main restaurant and saw a queue formed outside the dining room. We enquired what it was for and were told that it was for changing dining arrangements. As we were travelling with another coupe and had not been seated together, we queued for ten minutes or so and the head waiter arranged for us to sit together. Off to the windjammer which was already crowded and we managed to get some lunch while sharing a table with some very noisy passengers from some part of Scandinavia, I think. The sheer luxury of the ship was stunning, with panoramic lifts to all decks, the Royal Promenade and the pool deck with spa and sea water swimming pool. One reservation I had was the carpeting of the pool deck. This was wet and unpleasant to the touch of bare foot and people were wearing deck shoes and sandals on this deck. Unhygienic in my opinion.

We soon found our stateroom and despite a somewhat stuffy smell, once the balcony door was opened the room was fine. Huge bed (two large singles pushed together and plenty of storage and an adequate ensuite promised a very comfortable trip ahead.

We dined in the MDR(main dining room) on level 4, the Vivaldi restaurant. This was formal type dining, very good waiter service. I must say that our waiters, Chetan from India and Eugenio from Panama, were excellent although the spiel about the next day's stop, from waiter and head waiter both, was a bit tedious. The food was generally excellent and was served in a 'cuisine' style, i.e. towering high but not overly generous portions. This suited us, as I like to eat early and little before bed. We dined at 6.45pm and we four shared our table with a lovely couple from Yorkshire, Beryl and Brian. This meant we caught the early show most nights except two when we dined in the Windjammer. While the food in the Windjammer was plentiful and most nights we managed to get a table to ouurselves, it could be crowded. I did not like the melamine plates and bowls but it was quite adequate. Overall the food was excellent although my wife was disappointed that there was not more, varied seafood. Eventually, we had to cut back or skip lunch to ensure we were ungry for dinner. Read more