Badger-Badger

We have stayed at the Sheraton Old San Juan and it was really convenient for sightseeing. However I liked the Condado Plaza more. The oceanview balcony rooms are worth the extra money and the pools, beach and grounds are gorgeous. I'd recommend both hotels depending on exactly what you are looking for. Close to Old Town or a more resort - type hotel?

I roll. I spent 16 days in Europe with only a carry on suitcase .... and had plenty of room for dinner clothing and extra space. Just did 10 days in the Caribbean and all my clothes fit on one side of the suitcase. I watched YouTube videos by flight attendants and pilots for ideas of how to best pack with only a carryon. Best travel tip I ever implemented!

Plaza Catalunya. Dumb phone.

We stayed at Hotal Ingleterra near Placards Catalunya and the top of the Ramblas. Really wonderful hotel with an excellent breakfast option. However it may be out of the price range. Barcelona is an expensive city in terms of hotel rates.

Another vote for Villefranche. I could have sat on the balcony and just stared at the scenery all day and I still wouldn't have believed I was really inside such a perfect picture.

It may have been just our sailing. Our experience did not match anything I had read about before. It really surprised us. We had to eat in the Windjammer the night we tried to just show up because they told us they were full that night!

But the cruise was great ..... what can you do? I'm just not sure if I want to try MTD again even though I prefer flexible dining.

I'm so excited to see this! Wish we'd had the chance to meet onboard, but I'm happy to get a chance to read about your trip!

We had a fabulous time on this cruise too. With just our one carryon ;)

You can choose different times.

Just a heads up ... on our Jewel cruise 2 weeks ago MTD was booked solid. If you had no reservation they had no table available, not even with a wait .... and when we went to book reservations onboard they had 2 times available: 5:45 or 8. Nothing else. And they put us at the same table every night even though we actually would have loved a different table. We were not happy with MTD and found it as rigid as traditional seating.

I think the amount of flexibility MTD gives you is very dependent on your individual sailing. Based on what I had read here I was taken aback by the reality onboard.

We are a family of 4 and usually tip $20-30.

We have done less when we felt the guide was "eh." But we have done more, such as in Europe or this past weekend in Dominica because the guide went above and beyond when he realized I was struggling due to a health condition (he sensed the problem and immediately offered the help I needed to keep up with everyone else).

You come in to a city, no beaches nearby. The beaches are really out on the islands/cays. You can arrange an excursion which will take you by boat out to one such as Starfish Island. I

We did the western Med last June. It was very warm to mildly hot .... however the water was unbelievably cold when we ventured in post - cruise while we were in Spain.

The only museum we visited was the Vatican Museum during our Rome stop. There is more than enough to see if you would rather skip art, museums and cultural demonstrations. Although it is not a hit the beach kind of vacation it does not need to be "stuffy" either. It was a truly amazing experience.

When they switched us from Tortola to St. Thomas on our upcoming cruise on the Jewel they never contacted us ... or anyone else that I know of. It just changed on our cruise planner along with a complete reorder of the ports. They made the change about 3 months from sailing.

I could not disagree more with the above post more. Our young teens absolutely loved our Med cruise last summer and it was worth the money to bring them. We spent a week in Spain and then cruised the Med on Royal, which was absolutely fantastic. The kids really loved the entertainment on the Liberty. As did we. I think my then 12 year old took more photos than me!

As someone else mention, we checked the port times to help choose our ship .... as well as a family-friendly atmosphere.

We are trying to coordinate a lot of schedules and a budget for summer of 2016 and so finally just booked with NCL to take advantage of their great promotion that was running. And it has a great itinerary in the Baltic too with good port times. I figure I can just cancel and book with Royal if they offer something better .... but I didn't want to hold off and not take advantage of the NCL offer just because Royal is lagging behind releasing itineraries.

The day pass includes lunch, which is nice. It is an easy walk, the staff is friendly and when we were there it was completely UNcrowded. I suppose that varies by day. In my opinion it would be a good choice with kids that age (mine were 8 and 10 when we went).

Oh yikes! Didn't notice that on my phone app.

When Royal did that to my cruise it was because the cruise was cancelled. It took a few days for the reps to even know. I had my TA call them and after a couple of days she rebooked us. Royal gave us a few hundred dollars in OBC and let us book at the same rate even though the new cruise was actually quite a bit more expensive.

*We were supposed to embark on our Med cruise from Marseilles but they discontinued that as an embarkation port. We rebooked from Barcelona. The price was nearly $2000 more, but they honored our original rate. Ended up working out great and actually am glad it happened. Hope you have a similar result if this is what is happening. :)

My experience was the same as Fire Eater ' s when we sailed the Sky in January.

We did have reservations for Cagneys. It was quite full.

Have a good cruise. We were pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed the little ole Sky :)

Jewel out of San Juan on March 28. We were switched to St. Thomas sometime before Christmas. We were never notified, it showed up on the itinerary when I checked one day. We had a re-shuffle of the order of our ports too.

I chose the itinerary for Dominica and Barbados, and while I would have preferred Tortola over St. Thomas I wasn't really bothered. I'll hit Tortola another time when the construction is completed. Excuse to book again :)

I simply don't check their names and that's it. No cash account. No debarkation delays. No charging privileges. They get a SeaPass that works as a key and that's it. It doesn't change check in or out in anyway. And my girls are teens. They have the soda package marked on their cards and they do just fine. They have never needed to spend money on board.

The sjhips are all modern and fun and the fun is never over the top, insanely drunk college kids style. Haha.......well, maybe the Sky on the weekend cruises;).

We were braced for a typical "booze cruise" atmosphere - especially since we were sailing at New Year's. Instead, we barely saw anyone drinking, much less drunk (and we spend most of our free day-time on the pool deck). We were really pleased with the behavior of our fellow passengers. It was a far, far classier, more laid-back crowd than on our 3 day Carnival cruise years ago (which we did enjoy just fine).

What we did notice on the Sky was the casino... it was packed! But surprisingly not smoky.

Freestyle Dining and the friendly, casual atmosphere.

We have only done a 3 day weekend cruise on an old ship with NCL - but even that was enough to completely convert us to Freestyle and we have booked our Baltic cruise with them for 2016. I was pleasantly surprised with the entertainment too.

I wasn't expecting much on a 3 day itinerary, which may be why this cruise stands out as being so good. Our expectations were far exceeded.

I think that 11 is an OK age to roam around a ship...as long as they are well behaved. We let our kids do it, but they had to let us know where they were going.

 

I did see it an the extreme though....some parents went out to dinner and sent their kids to get dinner by themselves (I know b/c their kids ate with us, since they had made friends with my kids....I couldn't imagine them eating by themselves so I asked them to join us).

Why extreme? My girls are both young teens and they ask to go eat in the buffet alone a couple times each cruise. We travel a lot (not just cruises), they appreciate the chance to do something alone after all that "family togetherness" :p

We were on Liberty last year during World Cup and all the games were shown in some venue or other. It was a lot of fun watching the games on the pool deck with a bunch of European fans ( we were sailing from Barcelona). Enoy!

14 is high schoolers. Would you really even want your 10 year old to do unstructured activities with high school kids? Just something to consider.

I am glad my girls are so close in age that they are always in the same group ... it would be hard that first day to seperate!