A great trip. My wife says it is the best vacation she has ever had. We found the onboard entertainment to be good, the food mostly excellent and the staff to be wonderful. The trip we were on was a repositioning cruise and so we had a lot of days at sea. We enjoyed each and every one of them.
Embarkation
5 out of 5
We were dropped off at the Manhattan Cruise Terminal and found the boarding process to be very easy and well organized. We were slotted to arrive between noon and 12:30. We arrived about 10 minutes early and by 12:45 we were onboard having lunch.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
4 out of 5
We found the main dining rooms to be good but a bit slow. A 3 course meal that takes more than 30 minutes between courses is difficult to understand. The food was mostly good but a lot of time spent waiting. The buffets were good and very easy to find tasty foods. Mostly had breakfasts there and some lunches with a dinner or 2. The other specialty restaurants were just that, special. We had wonderful dinners at La Cucina and Cagney's Steakhouse. Both the service and the food were exceptional. The meal we had at Tappanyaki was not quite up to the other 2 we tried. The rooms felt crowded and very noisy. The food was good, just not exceptional.
Onboard Activities
5 out of 5
We did very little of the onboard activities but watched quite a few. We did go down each of the water slides once and they were fine. We enjoyed watching some of the other guests using the rock wall.
Entertainment
4 out of 5
Burn the Floor was great. High energy, great dancing, great singing. The hypnotist was a good show. The flamenco dance duo was quite good and The Epic Beatles we good. We enjoyed them all.
Children's Programs
We had no children with us.
Service and Staff
5 out of 5
All of the staff we dealt with were both pleasant and efficient, taking care of our needs and resolving what ever issue we presented them with in an acceptable manner. We had a couple issues with our stateroom. On the second day we found our phone to be not working. We stopped at the guest services desk after breakfast and headed back to our room. Within and hour a tech stopped by, rewired the phone cord and had us back in service. The 5 day we found the sink drain to be leaking. Called and within 2 hours a tech showed up, worked on it for about half an hour and again, the issue was resolved. I can only wish my car dealer was nearly as good at getting to the issue and resolving it when I have a problem.
Ship Quality
4 out of 5
Most everything was clean and tidy. The layout of the ship was good and the decor was attractive.
Cabin / Stateroom
4 out of 5
For the 2 of us the cabin was very comfy. I was not totally enthused by the curved bed and found I had to sleep on a bit of a diagonal to fit but once I figure it out it was okay. I did not care for the layout of the shower and the toilet but my wife and I worked it out. With the layout there is little privacy while using the facilities but I would give my wife a bit of space by going onto the balcony and that mostly resolved the issue. The balcony was a good size for the 2 of us. The only problem with it was the railing. It's varnish was peeling on the seaward side. The railing on the entire starboard stern section of the ship needed to be refinished and the work was in progress as we cruised. It in no way interfered with us and I suspect it is being done to our railing this week or at least in the next few weeks.
We got off the ship in Bermuda and walked about a few of the shops but really spent very little time ashore. We have visited there a couple times before and found it to be a great port to tour but felt like a walk and then relaxing on the ship.
We did an excursion to the hot springs and the gardens. It was a fun day of learning about both the hot springs and the gardens and the people and history of both Ponta Delgada and the Azones in general.
We went to town and did a hop on hop off tour on our own. Spent quite a bit of time looking around. Found it to be a nice place to visit and will probably return and spend more time there.
This was the least interesting port we visited. We found it to be not a place that felt welcoming but that may just be because we looked in the wrong places. We did not do a tour here.
This was one of our favorite ports. We took the shuttle to town and walked around. The town is devoted to tourism and tourists. We found the people to be welcoming and friendly, the buildings to be lovely and the streets clean and tree lined. A great place to visit.
We took the shuttle to town and were dropped off a few blocks from the cathedral. We went to it and it was lovely. It's building started in 1230 and was completed in 1601. We did pay to enter and look around. It is a marvel of design and construction.
We spent 4 days here after the cruise. We looked about the city, took a tour of Montserrat and a tour of a winery with a wine tasting. We did a lot of walking about the downtown area and found it to be friendly and easy to find tasty food and nice people. We had a lovely time there.
The process for getting off the ship was okay. The big issue was with the handling of the luggage and that was just that it was very slow to appear on the carousels. In addition they spread our group across 2 carousels making it difficult to watch for our bags since we had to watch both belts. Other than that it was alright. We got an taxi fairly quickly in the taxi queue and got to our hotel in Barcelona within 3 hours of starting the disembarkation process.
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