Thomson Celebration: Gems Of The Aegean: This was our first cruise with some very good points and the not so good. The transfer from Dalaman was very smooth and organised and took around 80 minutes to reach Marmaris. After boarding the ship and a quick walk around, our bags were ready and outside our cabin.

Cabin: Deck 3 outside cabin but with the size of the porthole I think an inside cabin would have been just as good. It was of a reasonable size with a double bed and a small bedside cabinet either side with plenty of space for all our stuff in the wardrobes and drawers. The main cabin area was dated but very clean with at least 3 visits a day from out cabin man, Andik, who kept it spotless for us. The bathroom was small but no smaller than I expected. Again clean but with the all in one moulded style sink, mirror etc it was very airline. The toilet was of a vacuum type (airline again) and I'm afraid wasn't the nicest of experience with multiple flushes required. The shower was as hot as you can take it with a very strong jet but did look like a pipe sticking out of the wall. The tiling was dated with some poor repairs made in places and a shower curtain that had a habit of sucking up to you if you got within 6 inches of it, which was annoying.

Again the public areas were clean but dated and very tired in some areas with the adult pool being an example. The ship is due a refit so should polish up fine. The adult pool area also suffered from occasional wafts of diesel fuel and diesel exhaust fumes and this for me was the worst complaint I had. There is a constant throb from what I presume is the ships engines, but no worse than cross channel ferries I've been on and it didn't bother me really. Read more