How was it? What ports did you stop at?
I've only been on one cruise before, so my experience is limited. I had a great time with 50 family members (from my wife's side) I haven't seen since 2018, so the ship was really more of a "meeting place".
Here we are leaving New Jersey going under the Verrazzano bridge. When you're on the ship, it looks like there might not be enough clearance. I had to bite my tongue so as not to make any Baltimore bridge jokes.
Our ship was Liberty of the Seas, which is older and it showed in some ways, but the staff was amazing. I agreed with some of the passengers who said the food wasn't up to par (even on the same ship on previous sailings), but still mostly OK. We ate in the main dining room every night and for half of the breakfasts, with the other half at the buffet as well as lunches. I'd rate the food as adequate, but I expect more from a cruise. Occasionally there were some dishes that were amazing - the beef tenderloin, Carne Asada, and Jerk pork chop come to mind. There was also a pizzeria that stayed open until 3am, which was better than average. It was located in a promenade on Deck 5 with a bunch of other shops, bars, and eateries. We had an inside cabin on Deck 8 with a window overlooking it all.
Bermuda was the only port, but we were there for 2 days. It was beautiful, but expensive as is to be expected of any place that has no exports whatsoever and relies solely on tourism. My young adult kids raved about the fish and chips and fish sandwiches at a restaurant by the dock called Anchor, but for USD$30 a plate, they should have been amazing. The waters were rougher than the Caribbean cruise I went on previously on a similarly sized ship, but I heard it was typically for this route and being windier than usual also contributed.
Bermuda shoreline under the moonlight:
The on-board entertainment was hit and miss. The comedian was a flop on his first show which was a family audience, and marginally better when he was allowed to let loose on the adults. The juggler was good. The ship had a small ice rink on which they did a show which was OK. They also had a theater and did a musical of "Saturday Night Fever" which was really good (it helped that I never watched the whole movie from start to finish). They also did some game shows in the theater which were hilarious to the audience and probably mortifying to the contestants. I didn't get much time to spend in the bars for the live one-man bands, but the Karaoke bar was packed on the last night and there were some pretty good performances. Somebody named Albert signed up for Journey's "Don't Sop Believing", but must have chickened out at the last minute as a no-show, so one of my nieces ran up on stage yelling "I'm Albert" and brought the house down with the entire audience singing along. At the end, everyone was chanting "Albert! Albert! Albert!".
We booked in September for July, so we didn't get the best pricing. Cost was USD$1100 each for my wife and me including gratuities. We also bought drink packages for $100 and $400, but we didn't even break even, so next time we'll probably just pay a la carte. We did 2 excursions through Royal for about $100 per person - a 6-hour island bus tour on day 1 and a boat tour with snorkeling on day 2. I liked the convenience of being able to drive to the port in 8 hours, so will be keeping an eye on last minute deals for the future. I also realized there are cruises from Quebec and Nova Scotia, which I'll also be looking into.
