I've been on Carnival, NCL, RCL and Holland so far. We'd like to do a Disney once the girls are older (currently a 2 year old and a 17 day old- so we have a few years).

Carnival is the lowest price point. I went with some friends during spring break in law school. It is a party atmosphere, and does tend to attract the "rowdy NASCAR fans" types. I also found it annoying because they were constantly trying to sell extra stuff all of the time, including making a ton of announcements over the loudspeaker. The food was decent, but this was about 7 or 8 years ago and I think the quality has decreased since.

I went on NCL with my husband when we were engaged. I was not a fan of the freestyle dining. The flexibility was fine, but I prefer to sit at the same table every night and get to know our waitstaff. I thought it was classier than Carnival. I am ehhh on NCL. The food was pretty good.

We did a Royal Caribbean cruise to Alaska. This was my favorite. The food and service were excellent. Ships were in better shape and just overall better experience. If we don't do Disney we will do Royal Caribbean again.

We took a Holland cruise with my parents and our older daughter when she was 1. Holland caters to a much older clientele. There were only 12 kids on board the entire ship. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing, but that indicates the average age. My parents, who at the time were in their late 50's, were some of the younger people on the ship. We did not see many people in their 20-30-40's. The food was okay. I thought it was pretty bland. The service in the dining rooms was excellent. My parents had some big issues with their room (flooding, having to move rooms to a different floor when the point was to be a cabin near us). All of the staff treated our daughter like gold.

Cruising is something that people either like or don't - there's not too many people that are middling. Have fun!

I had about 1/4" strip near the strap of my bathing suit that burned because I clearly missed that spot with the sunscreen. I don't generally burn easily in Michigan sun but I know Southern/Caribbean sun will burn me so I made sure I used at least an 8 SPF to avoid any ouchies.

We wondered about ages on Holland America, but we found the crowd on our Norwegian Fjords Princess cruise to be waaaayyy older...I believe I am now acquainted with every possible mobility assistance device. But, I swim laps and I had the pools all to myself no matter which one I went in! :) When we were disembarking, a young guy in front of us quietly said, "Bye, old people!" I think it can depend on your destination and port city, not just the line.

There were a lot of 3 generation families on our Alaska Holland America trip, so there was actually quite a mix of ages. Most people seemed to be pretty active, no matter what the age, and most of the excursions are more active/nature-oriented. We went on a whale-watching excursion in Juneau that was absolutely one of the highlights of my life...we saw the bubble-net feeding pod, which I've since seen twice the PBS Nature show; we watched them feeding for about a half hour and they kept getting closer and closer, and then they came up RIGHT NEXT TO THE BOAT...that's when the Coast Guard told our Captain he had to get out of there NOW! Sciencewoman loved that trip!!!

Both of these trips were on my "bucket list", and I do have to say that I thought Alaska was prettier than most of Norway. The inland passage through British Columbia is very pretty, with all the trees.

Husband and I went on an 11-night Southern Caribbean NCL cruise over this past Christmas. We chose that cruise for a couple reasons:

- Ports of call (Dominican Republic; Tortola, BVI; St. Maarten/St. Martin; Antigua; Dominica; Barbados; St. Kitts, W.I.)
- NCL's Freestyle Cruising

This cruise was a great way for us to see several parts of the Caribbean, plus we had a few At Sea days to just relax on the ship. It was the first cruise for both of us, and though we wouldn't be the type to go on many cruises, for places like the Caribbean (where it is expensive to fly in/out of, hotels can be pricey, and I'd likely get bored on one island for a whole week) it made a lot of sense for us.

We really liked the Freestyle Cruising. We both work hard at stressful jobs, and the last thing I wanted to stress about on vacation was packing a formal gown for every night in addition to all of the other clothes I knew I would need. As it was I had two suitcases. NCL still has one formal night (optional), and we found that many people dressed up to go to dinner, anyway. Maybe not as many people in tuxes and evening gowns as on other lines, but we saw many suits and cocktail dresses. We liked the flexibility of being able to go to dinner anytime we wanted, in whichever restaurant we wanted (main dining room or one of the specialty restaurants - I recommend the French restaurant...we ate there twice). The food in the main dining rooms were fine, even really good on a couple of occasions. For some people, the food on the cruise is the thing they care most about; for us, it wasn't a big deal. We have great restaurants at home, and I'm not expecting anyplace that makes 2,500-5,000 meals a night to be amazing. We were able to have some meals just the two of us (which was nice and romantic), and we had some meals with others we met on the ship and during excursions.

I will tell you our observations of cruise passengers while we were in ports with various cruise lines: We could always tell which people in port were with Carnival...they just stuck out a little more, a little louder and rowdier, and maybe a little rude; the NCL and Celebrity passengers blended in together; the Costa passengers were very rude when we ran into them; and the P&O european cruisers dressed and acted a little more sophisticated than the rest.

That's an interesting review PeppyGPhiB. Costa is also a Carnival Company line, but is down-line from Carnival. So your review is cheaper cruise = ruder travelers. NCL is about the same category as Carnival, but their ships are becoming more and more specialized and spa-focused, so over time they may be earning a higher place on the food chain.

I am also of the opinion that it doesn't matter which ports you visit in the Caribbean. Except for a few, after you've seen a couple, you've seen them all. Dominica stands out as a special port (not visited very frequently). I would definitely pick a cruise based on the cruise amenities that are important to you (fancy, cheap, big cabins, awesome spa, days at sea, etc.) and less about the ports. The one exception is the shopping at St. Thomas (you can buy the same stuff anywhere, but I love the sheer amount of stores there) and the snorkeling in St. John, which you can do on a port call at St. Thomas. It's just a very short ferry ride over.

But we haven't even been talking about the rest of the world, and ocean cruising alternatives! You can do some really cool cruises (circumnavigate Australia, China/Korea/Vietnam/Japan, circumnavigate the British Isles). I definitely want to do a China cruise with an extension to Xian and the Great Wall and a Norwegian Fjords cruise. Oh, and I'd like to do a cruise to Hawaii. It's obviously very cruise intensive (I think it's 5 or 6 days at sea before the first stop), but still something I want to do.

The other thing the parents who have been cruising a few times a year said is "The bigger the boat, the worse the food" and that makes sense I guess.

All due respect, I totally disagree. You're right that Dominica is special - it was our favorite stop, and very different from any of the other ports in that it's a rainforest island and not beach-oriented. But we were definitely able to see differences between the other islands, though some we wouldn't necessarily visit again. Our second favorite was St. Kitts - loved the laid back feel of the island, you can still feel some of the history, and it's so beautiful. Third fav was St. Maarten/St. Martin...fascinating in part due to two countries splitting the island, and two distinct personalities as a result. The rest of the ports blended together for us, with the exception of Dominican Republic (Samana) because of its extreme poverty. We decided to do our own thing there, but we should have probably done an excursion...only time on the trip we felt unsafe.

As for the on-ship amenities, our ship (Norwegian Dawn) was pretty much completely gutted last year, so everything looked pretty nice and new when we were on board. The staterooms were nice, and the bed was at least softer than most beds in European hotels. We thought the on-board entertainment was good (fantastic musicians throughout the ship, and Second City is a very talented improv company). And I had the best massage of my life in the spa.

This past week was my first time on a cruise. Royal Caribbean -Voyager of the Seas. It was so much fun. I know that cruises aren't for everyone, but I'll never be able to see how. It's like a floating city. There was even a library on the boat. I didn't get motion sickness or anything. I mean, I didn't feel the boat move, at all. I heard some people say they could feel it occasionally, but I couldn't feel it. Honestly, there is so much to do on the boat, that I could do that alone without the excursions, and tours of the islands. :p Oh, and I went rock climbing on the boat, too. I was also still able to get my daily running done on the track that's on deck. It was quite an experience, and I'd love to go again. :)

I did a Carnival (honeymoon) cruise earlier this month, which was also my first cruising experience. It was a great experience, primarily because you could do/not do what you wanted.

Only drawback was the food. I'd been told by in-laws (frequent cruisers) and others that the food, the food, the food was all of that ....well, it wasn't. While it was plentiful, and there was a 24 hour buffet, and they mixed up the offerings a lot, I found myself defaulting to the cheeseburger/hamburger area far too much for my taste.

also the frigging elevators had minds of their own, and seldom seemed want to go to our floor when we wanted to.

If I have to pose for one more picture..actually, that wasn't bad at all and we bought probably more than that we should have, but, hey, it was a cruise.

fun times.

Your food complaints would be diminished (not eliminated) by going on a higher dollar cruise. Especially where food is concerned, you get what you pay for. In the old days, the food on all cruise lines was remarkable, so the people telling you that are likely either cruising a little more deluxe than you, or are going on 5-10 years or older experience.

If you think of an all-inclusive vacation in Mexico or the Caribbean, which you may be more familiar with, you can have a perfectly good week with merely edible institutional food. Or you can stay at a place that costs twice as much, get to eat in sit down restaurants every night, never have problems getting drink orders poolside, etc. Both kinds of vacations are great in their place; the problem arises if you think you're getting the latter but you in fact are getting the former. But in all-inclusive land vacations, the opposite issue often occurs - people are expecting crappy food, buffet lines, etc., so they're expectations are low.