SamanthaM

This was our first cruise, we took a 4 night cruise to the bahamas. Since we have nothing to compare it to I thought the ship was very nice. We had a stateroom with no windows, and I think we booked one of the cheaper cruises, which leads me to believe this is the smaller boat of the fleet. Needless to say it worked out well for us. Our room was very small but if you are in your room for more than just showering, changing, and sleeping, you are using your time on the cruise wrong anyway. The stateroom attendant always cleaned up nicely, he even organized my shoes sometimes! There were a lot of activities on board, which was somewhat overwhelming, but at least you were never bored. The only issue is that not everything you want to do is free, and most things that I found to be more fun would cost you money; i.e. the casino, playing bingo, alcoholic beverages and sodas if you don't have the soda package. We added on sodas and they gave us these great giant thermos cups to use and keep so it was well worth it. I highly recommend getting this or bringing your own cup like this because in addition to using these cups for soda we also filled them with ice water when on the islands and at the beach, so we didn't have to purchase bottled water. There are things to do on the ship that are free though, shows, games, karaoke, rock climbing, basketball, ping pong the pool of course and other stuff I'm sure. You can also add on excursions when you are docked at the different destinations (which obviously also cost money). From what I noticed, they cost more if you book them through Royal Caribbean but it feels more secure if you do it that way, and if something is cancelled you can get your money credited easily back to your account. You can purchase excursions once you are off the boat and on the islands too but I found that to be more shady and preferred paying a little extra for the security. We did a Sea Lion experience in the Bahamas, and rented floating mats at Royal Caribbean's private island, CocoCay.Lastly, the food is always free, breakfast, lunch and dinner, and even room service if you want in between those meals. We always traveled back to the boat to eat, so we never spent money on food. The food is not fantastic, but it isn't bad either. All nights but one we ate in the fancy dining room. The portions were kind of small, but you could order multiple things if you wanted to, they just don't tell you that. One of the nights we ate the buffet dinner which I liked a lot better. They had some of the same foods that were being served in the dining room and more, and of course the buffet gives you the option to eat as much or as little as you like. The only thing with the buffet is that you miss out on making friends because you can sit alone, whereas in the dining room they group you with different people at a table. We had a great experience with the people at our table, all were similar in age to us, and we all lived on the same floor. We didn't end up hanging out with these people on the cruise, but we all got al on great and talked a lot during dinner. If you are looking for or interested in making friends on the cruise but dinners in the main dining room are a great place to start. Overall we had a great first experience and I am looking forward to going on more cruises. I will likely cruise with Royal Caribbean again, but I also want to branch out and try other cruise lines.