My wife and I had heard and read very mixed reviews on Costa but this cruise which included flights and a two night stay in Venice at a very affordable price booked through Cruise Nation looked too good to turn down. Even had the ship been like a budget hotel on sea the itinerary was great so we had a chance to visit Croatia and Montenegro for the first time. Well, our expectations were significantly exceeded. Some specifics - we paid for an inside cabin, we got upgraded to a balcony. Our account was credited with two free cocktails on the first night, a nice touch. The bed was excellent. The entertainment surprisingly good. With one or two exceptions the Costa staff we engaged with were friendly, professional and service oriented. The food - especially in the buffet restaurant - was very good. There were a few niggles - the main restaurant food was often a little colder than it should have been, but Costa had decided to give the waiters small tablet computers to record orders on our cruise and there were the obvious teething troubles. Costa has a different approach to the mainly US based cruise companies we have sailed with in the past and the passengers were mainly Italian and French with some obvious language issues - it's amazing how many foreign language words you can remember when you have to (!) - but overall our experience was very good.