My partner and I are looking to do "a cruise" soon (specific I know). We generally like the idea of seeing so many nice new places and eating nice food and drinking nice drinks aplenty. I'd generally say we do like a relatively peaceful experience (lots of activities but also space to have some quite time). Our budget would stretch to the likes of Celebrity, HAL, etc however for our first cruise we'd like to not spend quite as much. We'd also like to go Nov/Feb time (we've got a lot of other stuff booked) this year in Canaries / Med which rules out a lot of the typical premium lines. We've looked at Norwegian Sun and Marella Explorer who both offer competitive prices on an all inclusive experience.
The real question is - do these ships feel busy when full. Are there bars etc on busy sea evening which would feel like a quiet intimate cocktail bar on land. Having never been on a cruise its hard to tell how busy ships really feel given that all the Youtube tours are clearly taken at the crack of dawn when everyone is still asleep.
Im really sorry for the long winded post, but i thought it was best to set the scene. Please feel free to tut or tell me off. You're help is appreciated!