AS our Boeing 737 banks low over the lagoon, the fragile beauty of Venice lies spread out below us like an enormous Canaletto canvas. However, a floating city of a different kind awaits us, more Las Vegas than La Serenissima.

The 3,114-passenger Voyager of the Seas towers over the port where medieval galleys once lay, its 15 decks packed with the best in US entertainment from gambling in the casino to ice-dance spectaculars.

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My only experience of cruising was 30 years ago when a Bay of Biscay gale and an outbreak of Moroccan tummy confined most of my fellow passengers to the sick bay.
Today hygiene is a priority and antibacterial handwash is everywhere but the biggest difference is one of scale.

As we glide down the Giudecca Canal and past the Doge's Palace our eyes are on a level with the tourists atop St Mark's Campanile.

The feeling is sensational and the panorama unique.

Manoeuvring this 137,000-ton ship, as long as three football pitches, is a challenge, admits Captain Frank Martinsen from Norway.

"The ships get bigger and bigger but the ports remain the same," he tells us. "In a place like Venice where the water is so shallow you really need to shoehorn them in."
I booked the trip with Royal Caribbean as a birthday treat for my first-time cruising wife Charmaine.

1in adults New York favourite with 13% for The Voyager does not fail to impress. It's vast central atrium is like a city street with shops, cafes, bars, pubs and even a car: a red Morgan that used to belong to Royal Caribbean chairman Richard Fain.

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Our cabin is like a smart hotel room. Gone are the portholes and bunks; instead there's a comfortable king-sized bed, a balcony with two chairs and a table, well-organised storage and an en-suite shower room.

The dining room looks more like an opera house with its three-tiered seating and, though food is plentiful, this is not a traditional cruise for the over-80s and overweight. The average age is 42 and many excursions are aimed at younger people such as river rafting, cycling, sea kayaking and snorkelling.

The emphasis is on informality, with jackets and ties recommended at dinner on only two nights. With healthy options available from the Vitality menu we hardly put on any weight. Children are also made welcome. Family rooms have fold-out beds so three generations can holiday together. "Granny's sleeping in a cupboard," three-year-old Toby from Yorkshire told us gleefully.

Youngsters have their own section of the ship where activities are laid on and over-17s are banned.

Our first port of call is Koper in Slovenia, a country the size of Wales but with less than 30 miles of coastline. St George is the patron saint of nearby Piran, a picturesque town on a rocky peninsula. His statue, complete with dragon, adorns the 400-year-old baroque church where caper berries grow along the walls.

By the marina we sample the local "black" wine Refošk (really a dark red) and watch scuba divers explore the clear waters.

5 named as their port voting Venice Ravenna, like Venice, is slowly sinking into the mud of Italy's coastal plain and the churches get smaller as the water table rises and higher floors have to be laid.

Mostly drab brick on the outside, they conceal colourful masterpieces of early Christian art; 5th-century wall mosaics made of tiny pieces of glass in thousands of different shades.

Dubrovnik in Croatia is the prettiest of all the Adriatic ports. White-walled houses with their red-tiled roofs contrast with the steep, bare mountains that form a natural border with Bosnia just a few miles inland. To walk around the town's massive medieval walls costs about £10 but it is worth it for the views.

To escape the crowds we take a bus to Cavtat where President Tito used to holiday when Croatia was part of communist Yugoslavia. Plutocrats' yachts now ride at anchor in the two beautiful bays separated by a narrow peninsula where we stroll in the shade of the maritime pines.

After all this exploring, a day at sea makes a welcome change. The ship rides the waves imperiously and stabilisers are deployed only when the ice skaters are in action lest a triple Lutz turn into a double fracture.

Rows of bronzed bodies turn the pool deck into a seal colony until a sudden shower sends them scurrying for cover, towels over their heads and hands flapping like a flock of startled guillemots. Rain over, we head to the sports deck, where an international football match is in progress, and try our hand at mini-golf while teenagers scale the climbing wall with embarrassing ease.

Back in Venice we spend the day getting lost among the alleyways of peeling multi-coloured houses with their wooden shutters and geranium-filled window boxes.

Many are empty. Young Venetians prefer the convenience of the mainland and the population of the crumbling old city has fallen by two-thirds in the past 25 years.

A last romantic dinner ashore, looking out across the water to the fairytale church of Santa Maria della Salute, and our seven-night cruise ends as splendidly as it began.

It won't be another 30 years, I hope, before our next cruise and this time we'll be bringing our grandchildren along to enjoy the fun.

THE KNOWLEDGE

Royal Caribbean Cruises (0844 493 2061/www.royalcaribbean.co.uk) offers a seven-night Adriatic Sea Coastal cruise on Voyager of the Seas from £869pp (two sharing) full board. Price includes return flights from Gatwick to Venice and transfers. Departs October 15, 2011.