The trip was very good. I had a great time. The cruise was lots of fun. Its a great way to check out several places in one vacation for a pretty good price. If you're looking for a totally relaxing trip then a cruise would not be for you, but if you are looking for an exploratory type vacation with some sun and fun then you can't go wrong. The reason its not a totally relaxing vacation is due to the fact that the ship lands on an island around 8am and leaves at 6pm. In order to maximize one's time, you need to get up and get on the island as soon as you can. Lets see, we had a direct flight to Puerto Rico at 7am on Saturday morning arriving at noon (Puerto Rico time - one hour ahead of EST). From there, the cruise folks greeted us and took care of the luggage and bused us over to the cruise ship. We were able to board immediately and got familiar with our room location. The ship left port at 10pm and headed out to Aruba. We were at sea the following day and arrived at Aruba the next. While at sea, we spent the daytime lounging around the pool area. That evening we explored the ship. It was unbelievable! Its like a small city. There were 12 floors that we had access to. Of course that includes the floors with cabins. The ship had 5 decks of cabins, a casino, a theater for shows, a nightclub, a large dance hall, several lounges with spectacular views, a card room, a library, a gym and spa, a beauty salon, two pools, four hot tubs, three cafes, and thats about all I can think of right now. Upon arrival in Aruba at 8am, we went on a snorkeling tour ($25 each), then we proceeded to the beach. Snorkeling was lots of fun and the beach was beautiful. It was picture perfect and was probably the best beach of the whole trip. The ship left Aruba an hour past midnight (this is the longest time the ship stayed in port). There are lots of casinos on the island. Its a very busy island setup for tourism. Very nice. We really enjoyed the island and the beaches. We are planning a return trip to the island later this year perhaps. We arrived in Curacao the following morning at 7am. After we finally got up, we headed straight for the beach again. The beach here was our least favorite but still much nicer than anything around here of course. Aruba and Curacao are two of the three "ABC Islands". The other being Bonaire. These islands are only 15 miles off the coast of South America and are very desert-like. The air is dry and there is always a nice trade wind (great when you're sunbathing so you don't get too hot). These islands are only 12 degrees from the Equator; thus the sun was the strongest here. We left Curacao at 6pm and headed for St. Martin/St. Maarten (frech/dutch). The ship headed North and we were at sea the following day and finally arrived at St. Martin on the next day at 8am. St. Martin consists of two sides: a frech and a dutch. The port was on the dutch side. This island was the first island that we were not able to dock; instead, the ship dropped anchor and we took boats (called tenders) over to the island. Of course, we headed straight for the most popular beach on the island, Orient Bay. Its a nude beach (on the Frech side of the island). We opted for clothing as most people (tourists) do; however, there were a handful of folks that were nude. Its always the ones that shouldn't be nude though .. haha. Orient Bay is beautiful, the water was spectacular in color, the beach was pretty, the sand wonderful, the water was a bit rougher than any of the other islands but great for body surfing. Lots of water sports going on here at this island, parasailing, windsurfing, jetskis, etc. It was our second favorite beach compared to Aruba. The ship left St. Martin at 6pm. We arrived at St. Thomas (US Virgin Island) the next morning at 8am. St. Thomas has one of the top ten beaches in the world. Its called Meggans Bay. Very beautiful. We headed straight to the beach for the day. St. Thomas is also known for its duty free shopping especially jewerly. You can find lots of high quality products for good prices (which can be bargained even lower). St. Thomas also has a famous spot called the "Mountain Top" which is one of the highest points on the island. You can see everything from here including other islands. The view was beautiful. The ship departed at 6pm and headed back to Puerto Rico to conclude our trip. Both St. Martin and St. Thomas were geographically completely different from Aruba and Curacao. Rather than a desert-like environment, St. Martin and St. Thomas were much more lush. They had lots of vegetation. In addition, they had a much more exciting terrain. It was mountainous. Very hilly with lots of cliff side roads and houses built on the sides of cliffs. Very very nice. These islands are in the hurricane belt and receive much more rain than the ABC islands. Upon arrival in San Juan, we got off the ship at 10am and had 7 hours to kill so we took a trip to a rain forest. Very cool. It was located in a mountain range so there were the St. Thomas like cliff drop roads. It was very scenic. The rest of Puerto Rico did not appeal to me at all. Very poor and reminded me of Mexico. I've been omitting the details of eating on the cruise until now. Lets just say you can never go hungry on a cruise ship. The food was really good (especially since they cook for 2500 people). Anytime throughout the day you could order room service. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were served in the formal dining room or the large cafe (buffet style). We always ate breakfast and lunch in the cafe. At dinner, we would sit at our assigned table and eat with 6 other couples. It was very nice. The waiters were top notch, the food was excellent, and there was always a 7 course meal. You had a menu to choose from each day and you were able to order as many dishes as you wanted. If you wanted more shrimp cocktail, you just order more. All the food is included in your bill. Unbelievable. The only thing that you do have to pay for on the ship is the bar bill but we don't drink much so it was non-existent. I forgot to mention that I won a $1000 dollars on a slot machine. That was exciting. We took lots of pictures and I'll post them on my web page as soon as I get them developed. We had lots of fun. Feel free to contact me with any questions and/or comments at pete-web@kazmier.com.