I just got back from a seven day southern Caribbean cruise on Royal Caribbean's Adventure of the Seas. The good news is that the shore excursions and the beaches were incredible!

The bad news comes in two types, both dealing with the boat.
First, do not belive the adds, there is not enought to do on the boat and I do not have A.D.D. and can usually find enough to do on my own. This is one of the largest passenger liners ever built but when filled to capacity, 3400 passengers and crew, there is not much elbow room.

[I am not a racist amd love everyone equally, but...]
Second, as a policy, the cuise line sells all of the regular fares it can and then holds a lottery for the remaining spaces with the local populace of Puerto Rico. The lottery winners are then charged not the full fare of up to $2,500, but only $200 per passenger! Due to the season or possibly the Norwalk-type virus on the other boats, the full fares passengers were only about 1/3 of the total passengers. Can you believe the number of hair-bags that I got to spend my vacation with? It was like taking 2000 people from a poorer neighborhood from San Juan and turning them loose on a $1.5 Billion boat and letting them run wild! There were loud arguments at 2:00 in the morning outside our stateroom in Spanish, and the formal nights were a joke with everyone acting like they were extras in a JLo video! My favorite was the 17 year old Guardia officer wearing his dress whites with no shirt on underneath and a hat 3 sizes too big that was held up by his ears. It was 7 days of bedlam, 24 hours a day! The intention of these bargain hunters seemed to eat all of the free food they could, let their screaming kids run rampant all over the ship, buy all of the cheap duty free booze and cigarettes that they could get back through Customs, and to visit friends and family spread throughtout the southern Caribbean sea!
[/I am not a racist and I love everyone equally, but....]

On the good side, the beaches at St. Thomas and St. Johns were some of the best I have ever heard of and the couple of hours spent there were worth the crap, kinda.

Damn. I think I'd rather catch the Norwalk virus and cut the cruise short than endure 7 days of that.

Complain to the cruise company IMMEDIATELY.  Usually they'll offer you free tickets for a future cruise.  Choose one that leaves from  Miami next time!

Your course of action should be to call up and complain about your first cruise you've ever taken and how it was horrible and how there was no control over the people running amuck on the ship.  Complain by using the cruise ship's own literature of "A Pleasant Get Away For You and Your Wife" or whatever else you were sold with.

Check their website and see what they say and promise.  Use it as ammo against them.  As a last course of action, stop payment on your credit card and use your credit card's grievance procedure to put pressure on the company.  

Usually the cruise lines will offer something, but if not, KEEP COMPLAINING.  You'll get your way, trust me.  We had a similar experience and the cruise line extended an offer for a discounted future cruise.  Just make sure that they don't make it contingent upon booking it THROUGH THE CRUISE COMPANY!  That diminishes the value of the discount significantly.

Good luck!

Reality check!!!

Royal Caribbean its the name. What do you expect, Germans?

Call them and tell them you're not feeling well. If they don't help, then say you're going to the media. Last thing they need is more sick cruises.

Carnival & RCL are the pits.

I've had the best cruises on Norwegian and Princess. They are more expensive and the crowd tends to be older (a consideration of you are young and looking for some hot, fresh poon), but at least you don't have to worry about la especial de barrio Caribe'.