First let me say that I am a very open minded traveler and that it would take a lot for me to be critical of any vacation experience. My wife and 13 year old daughter chose this cruise line on the advise of my daughters Autism advocate. We traveled with a group of parents with autistic children on this cruise. The price of this cruise was appealing, as children travel free. The ship was beautiful, very clean and well maintained. The crew were, for the most part, friendly and accommodating with a couple of exceptions, one exception being a frightening encounter that I'll chronicle later. This was a assigned seating type dinner accommodation and our assigned waiter was excellent. Our table mates were great. The dinner fare was, at best, inconsistent and the Italian dishes were uninspired (my wife is Italian and was taught to cook by her Grandmother). One seating had four different meals with the same brown sauce ladled over each. My wife had Chicken Parmesan with this mystery brown sauce that left her perplexed. A duck meal that I had convinced other table mates to try (for their first duck experience),was rubbery and should have included a hack saw to remove from the bone. No one ate it. Breakfast meals that were taken in the dining room revealed a deep communication rift with the staff that left multiple members of our party frustrated to the point of resignation. The fare in the cafeteria was typical cruise fare. There was a vast selection of breakfast and lunch fair available. Late night fare was essentially non existent, unless you love cold pizza. Forget any late late night fare (after midnight). You might catch someone circulating with trays of mystery hors-dourvres. My wife and I grabbed some deep fried roll looking things that contained tasteless uncooked potato mush centers. I'm admittedly a Chocoholic. Withdrawal was painful, as there is none available unless you buy their $35 and up selections from the ship store. Bring a stash if you don't want to suffer the same fate.

The crew in the Kid Watch program were great but they are only available from 9am till 11am and again from 3pm till 5pm. My wife and I were unable to schedule any alone excursions (we love scuba) because of the gaps in child care. The Kid Watch has no provision to contact parents in case of emergency (unless you stay in your room). Other cruise lines provide beepers (American restaurant style)for this purpose. Please note that our daughter is Aspergers high functioning autistic but is emotionally labile. The Kid Watch program is also available late night but these children are not typically up that late.

Some excursions were fun, others ill described. The Catamaran snorkel trip in St Marteen to a "deserted" beach was terrible for snorkeling. If a hotel and condo lined strip of beach with hundreds of for rent chairs and hundreds of people in them is your idea of deserted then enjoy. The trip back to the ship with prodigious rum punch drinks were the highlight of the "snorkeling" excursion. If you decide to visit the seven sisters falls on Grenada be aware that this is a mile trek down a steep muddy boulder strewn death defying trail. We are in good health and are adventuresome by nature but we turned back about a quarter way down and then paid a young boy to wash the gobs of red mud from our shoes and clothing. Read more