Cruiser677

The advantage of this cruise was the amount of ports.  Only one day at sea.  Plus, if you arrive early enough, you can get on the ship, leave your stuff in your room and go explore San Juan.  The ship is one of the older ones in the Carnival fleet, but you're not on the ship that much with so many islands to see.  We've been to St Thomas so we took an excursion to St John's.  It was nice not being with the crowds. In St Maarteen I recommend going over to the taxi terminal and booking a group tour there.  Everything is pre-priced and they know they have to have you back at certain times.  You'll save a lot of money over the cruise ship tours.  When leaving from San Juan expect a lot of Spanish speaking passengers.  Most of the announcements are bi-lingual.  Another thing to consider, because the islands are fairly close together the ship travels more slow than other destinations thus making for a very smooth sailing. 

This cruise was planned to celebrate my twin Sisters' 60th birthday.  I have cruised before but they had not.  Leaving from Charleston was very easy.  Everyone was so friendly.  We were on the ship by 12:30, had lunch, and were in our room by 1:30.  The entertainment was much better than other ships.  The Motown show was great.  The food was good, but one thing stuck out - on formal night a lobster tail was an extra $20.00.  In the past this was a menu item for formal night.  The ship was clean, although older and smaller than many of the other ships.  We met some great people at our dinner table and we had a great time.  Set dining time gave us the opportunity to know the other guests and the wait staff.  Just be careful with Island taxi drivers and their laid back attitude of getting back to the ship on time.  You may want to head back a bit early.