Crystal Cruises Mediterranean review

Crystal Cruise Line is said, even by its rivals, to be oceans ahead. Graham Turner puts its reputation to the test on a 12-day Mediterranean cruise.

A year or so ago, I was chatting with one of the senior captains of a six-star American cruise line that had better remain nameless. To my astonishment, he suddenly said: "In the cruise business, you know, we always say there's Crystal and then there's the rest". The rest clearly included his own highly respected company.

With this endorsement from one of Crystal's fiercest competitors ringing in my ears, I joined its ship, the 68,000-ton Serenity, in Civitavecchia, just north of Rome, for a 12-day tootle around the Mediterranean. Would the Serenity, I wondered, justify such an extraordinary act of obeisance?