My husband and I are 55 and 54 respectively, with a 21 year old son and a 20 year old daughter. This was a college winter break vacation for the kids, and we travelled with our neighbors and close friends, whose children are 7, 12 and 15. It was their first cruise.

We departed from Port Canaveral, where our embarkation was a finely oiled machine. No problems...we packed small bags with pool stuff, books, etc. to tide us over until our luggage arrived. We went straight to the Lido Deck to get pool chairs, and to avoid the mad rush to the buffet. We did not purchase any spa packages, but we did get the soda packages. We wandered the ship, ate lunch, went to the muster drill (these used to be fun and silly, but now they are just boring!) and made sure we were on deck as we pulled away from port. I am not going to write a minute by minute description of your cruise, but here are the important points:

-Service: Excellent! We had an efficient room steward named Achmad who recognized us in the hallway, knew our names, and tried to meet our needs, which were few. He emptied the minibar so we could keep our water bottles in it, but it never got really cold, so he brought in a large bucket, and always filled it with ice and some of our water. Read more