Renaissance has an ad in the Sunday New York Times today (Travel Section) offering the following:

7 to 8 day Mediterranean Cruise from $999 per, free airfare from JFK

10 day Tahitian Cruise from $1,499, free airfare from LA

15 day far east cruise from $2,499, free airfare from JFK

Details about these and their other specials, including which cruises they apply for are at www.renaissancecruises.com (http://www.renaissancecruises.com) , then start clicking away at the specials on the left hand side.

The above deals expire this friday.

I've never been on a cruise before. The offer of Rome-to-Istanbul really sounds tempting. Has anyone been on this particular cruise? Or anyone with experience with Renaissance? I'd really appreciate some suggestions or comments.

Thanks.

We did Athens to Istanbul a couple of years ago and it was fantastic. The exchange rate with Turkey was something like 470,000 lira to the dollar, and we thought everything was an incredible bargain. Now it's about 1.3 million lira to the dollar, so things cost so much less. The beautiful island beaches, the ruins thousands of years old, getting places for all the mythology stuff you heard about, it's an incredible trip.

We have never been on Renaissance, but one of our travel agents highly recommends them, indeed he is putting his daughter on them for her honeymoon in October. They may be our next cruise if the deals hang around, we just haven't had time to fit them in yet.

Most all of Renaissance's ships hold just 684 passengers; Kwaj boy and I sailed on them 04/00 (10-nite Tahiti itinerary). We were very pleased with their serice level, food was very good (compared to most other mass-market lines), open-seating dining was convenient, AND THERE WAS NO SMOKING OR KIDS ALLOWED!!!! Beware, however, that Ren is changing their policy and effective 12/01 they will allow kids and "limited areas of the ship" will allow smoking. Needless to say, they will lose alot of loyal cruisers but they expect to attract another class of clientele with the new policies.