We chose this cruise because of the ports and we also wanted to experience a larger ship than we have previously cruised on with R.C. This was our eighth cruise and our fifth cruise with R.C., and I have to say that while all the others were outstanding, this one was somewhat of a disappointment. We had 12 people in our group, which included 2 children, a few senior adults, and a few younger folks too. Some of us have cruised many times and others were fairly new to cruising.

On a positive note, the ship was beautiful, clean, and exceptionally easy to navigate around. Embarkation was quick and efficient and we were on the ship within minutes of arriving at the San Juan port. The food was very good in the main dining room and we were attentively taken care of by Willford each evening. The food in the Windjammer was plentiful, prepared nicely, and always tasty. Our cabin was kept immaculate and well stocked by Bruce and we really appreciated his helpfulness throughout the cruise. On the first day, I asked Bruce to have ice in my room every evening and he actually brought it twice per day without fail. The ports were nice and we especially enjoyed Aruba and Curacao. The entertainment on the ship was excellent and we really enjoyed the evening shows and the ice skating show.

Unfortunately, many little things added up to my overall disappointment with this cruise. Airport arrival transfer was disorganized and sloppy. Not a good impression on some of the members of our traveling group new to R.C. A huge disappointment was in the shore excursions (we have always enjoyed the shore excursions in the past and spend a lot of time in advance choosing which ones to go on). Our St. Thomas excursion was cancelled before we left home (no reason provided by R.C.) but we were able to book another excursion to St. John that we did on our own. But the second cancelled excursion occurred at St. Kitts when our group was literally getting ready to walk out the door to go on the excursion. We received a call in our room saying that there was a mechanical problem with the catamaran we had booked. So we went up to the desk to find out what options might be available because we all wanted to see St. Kitts. The person at the desk had nothing to offer us and didn’t seem to care too much that this had occurred. We ended up going out on the pier where we discovered a representative for our cancelled excursion. The representative said for $3 each we could be transported by van to a “beautiful beach” where we could rent chairs and umbrellas and enjoy the beach. She said there were restaurants on the beach, and also water crafts that we could enjoy. So 10 of us opted to do this and there were 10 miserable people for the duration of this excursion. The “beautiful beach” was rocky and unappealing and the black sand was not only extremely hot, it was also like cement once it got on a person’s feet. The restaurants were not very appealing but hunger drove us to place an order. After waiting 40 minutes for our food and asking nicely about it, we were insulted by the extremely rude fellow who was trying to serve everyone all by himself. He was so rude that we walked out without waiting any longer. Oh, and the beach chairs and umbrellas were broken down and very uncomfortable. The water crafts were expensive and not in the area where we were taken anyway. We were all so happy when the van driver came back for us! So while we were all looking forward to seeing St. Kitts, we ended up having a very miserable day there. Read more