Background information: Husband and wife, ages 56 and 60, traveling with husband's brother and his wife, around the same age. This is our third cruise in Europe over the last three summers; Eastern Mediterranean on Princess, Scandinavia and Russia on Royal Caribbean. Spent four days in Rome at the Hotel Amalia Vaticano before embarkation. Super location and reasonable price. Used romecabs.com for both airport transfer and hotel to port transfer. We were very happy with this company!

Where do I start? With the biggest issue, which was being in Rome for four days without luggage and only having one of two bags arrive at 3:30 A.M. on embarkation day. After embarkation, which went quickly and smoothly by the way, I went to the front desk to let them know a second bag might be arriving at some point during the cruise. The people at the front desk, including Dangil and Rosie, took over. Dangil copied down our airline claim information and got a pair of dress shoes for my husband so we wouldn't miss the first formal night. The smart-casual rule for the dining room was waived and dining room staff was made aware of that. Housekeeping sent us a note saying we were eligible for complementary laundry service until the other bag came. (That helped with the whole smart-casual dress code also because my hsband could get his one pair of long pants laundered.) All the stress of dealing with the airlines and the courier service was lifted from my shoulders. Finally, 6 days into the cruise, they tracked down and delivered our second bag. Rosie told me, "Surrender is not in our vocabulary."

The front desk also helped us out when our stop in Marseille got switched to Toulon because of labor unrest at the port in Marseille. They were very generous with complimentary phone service so that we could contact the driver we had hired for Aix-en-Provence and change our pick-up location. Read more