Iluvcruising2

Day 2. What a sight to wake up to.

Do note that our Deck 10 balcony was completely shaded. It suited us fine but I'd imagine some passengers may not be exactly pleased that they can't sun-tan on their private balcony.

We are still in Sydney. Ship was only sailing off at 11pm.

The question was raised during Captain's corner - why the late departure?

Apparently, there was some harbour restriction that the ship cannot sail out before 6:30pm, but this didn't explain why the ship set sail so late, at 11pm.

Capt Charles gave a straight and honest reply. He commented that the OPT at Sydney wasn't exactly the largest passenger terminal that they had used.

Also, this was the first season that Royal Caribbean Voyager class was sailing out of Sydney OPT. Therefore, they were being conservative. They wanted to make absolutely sure that they could turn around the ship and sail out.

Hopefully, as Royal gains more experience with Sydney OPT, they can sail out a couple of hours earlier. Due to the large distances to sail, we only reached Hobart at 10am on Day 3. An 8am arrival would have been much better.

Great thank you! We are in JS on deck 7 and are excited to see the balcony is a good size!

 

Looking forward to the rest of your review :)

I assume you are in the aft JS on Deck 7? If yes, don't worry, it is of a jolly good size.

Now, Royal Caribbean allows you to bring onboard 2 bottles of wine. You'll have a great time watching the ship's wake and sipping your wine in the balcony. It is an awesome, awesome feeling.

We headed straight to the La Scala theatre for the welcome show after dinner.

Do remember that on Day 1, there is only 1 show, usually at 8pm. I noticed that the theatre wasn't full.

Overall, the entertainment on the cruise ship wasn't much to shout about, given that we are relatively experienced cruisers, other than the production shows by the Royal Caribbean singers and dancers.

However, if you are first time cruiser, do try to catch as many shows as you can. Some of them are ok, some are very good, some are, oh well, a yawn.

The dessert menu from Day 1.

I can't remember what this was called but it certainly tasted good!

Hi Iluvcruising was your balcony as big as the JS you had last time on deck 7? Any more cabin photos?

 

Thanks for the great reviews!

I think the balcony was about the same size. However, the key difference is the view. Deck 10 is much higher and there is less obstruction from the super structure.

The internal cabin space on Deck 10 was definitely bigger though. I think the cabin was a bit longer and slightly wider.

This was the Top Sirloin Steak, which was actually available every night. For some reason, I just felt like having sirloin that night even though they had the Slow Roasted Prime Rib on the main menu.

The catch of the day.

The Chinese chicken salad.

Day 1 - Dinner!

We took the main seating which was 6pm. Second seating was 8:30pm.

We had just been on the Voyager in June 2012 (Singapore to Shanghai). We had never been on a 14 nighter and we were most curious to see what the MDR menu would be like.

Overall, we were not disappointed. The food was fantastic, in our opinion.

The menu was different for the 14 nights, though a couple of the more popular offerings were repeated. (e.g. Surf & Turf, certain beef dishes)

Gone were many of the Asian offerings which, in our opinion, wasn't great at all.

Muster drill was at 5:30pm.

It is not everyday that we can do a muster drill while admiring the beautiful Sydney Opera house in fine weather.

Later in the evening, there was a public announcement for all those who joined the ship after the muster drill to assemble at the Cleopatra's Needle for a briefing.

Gosh you are quick off the mark - are you back in Singapore already?

 

Looks like another great review coming up.

 

Cheers

Di & Tony

Hi Di & Tony,

Yups, we are back in Singapore. Arrived yesterday evening just after 7pm local time. Already suffering from tremendous cruise withdrawal symptoms.

So envious that the both of you are getting on your next Royal Caribbean cruise so soon!!

Just my hubby(50) and myself (48)

18 nights from sydney, around New Zealand, Hobart, Adelaide and finishing in Freemantle.

:)

Oh cool!

I assume you have cruised with other lines before?

Anyway, we are a family of four and our kids are 6 and 7. Thanks to Adventure Ocean, my wife and I can have more time to ourselves during a cruise.

For shore excursions, we usually do-it-ourselves, as you will see in the rest of the review. The ship organized shore excursions are generally good and they guarantee to wait for you to return, however the cost adds up with four.

Loving the pictures and the review. We are going on our first cruise on Voyager in Feb. Any advice for a first timer on this cruise line???

Thanks

Anne:D

Thanks! Many more pictures coming along the way.

What's your itinerary and are you cruising with your family?

Some pictures of the empty casino on embarkation day. The ship cannot open the casino until they reach international waters.

The adult-only Solarium, from Deck 12. Unfortunately, the Solarium isn't sheltered from the elements, unlike the Radiance class.

The Captain explained that the Voyager was designed for the Caribbean with sunshine all year round.

Hopefully, they will do something about this at the next dry dock.

I noticed that the hot tubs were extremely popular this entire cruise.

The view from Deck 12 was gorgeous.

One of the most famous buildings in the world.

Day 1! Yeah baby!

Key officers. Very interesting to have the same Captain (Cpt Charles) as well as the same Cruise Director (Gordon Whatman) from our June 2012 cruise!

It was quite funny. During the Captain's corner, Cpt Charles stressed at least twice that he was Norweigian, not Italian.

That's the view of Circular Quay wharves from the balcony. We will be taking a ferry from Wharf 5 to Darling Harbour on Day 14 of the cruise. It is just a short walk from the ship. Extremely convenient.

This was the balcony we had.

Our stateroom for the next 14 nights - a beautiful aft JS with an awesome balcony.

On board the ship!

By the time we reached the terminal, it was about 4:30pm.

See the following poster for the staggered boarding times.

The location of the Sydney Overseas Passenger Terminal cannot be beaten. However, the terminal is rather small and therefore boarding must have taken quite some time earlier in the day.

Given our late arrival, boarding was a breeze. At the check-in counters, we were told that the ship was sailing with 3,400+ passengers and at the time of our boarding, another 500 passengers had yet to board.

Since we just returned from the 18 day Au/NZ on Radiance, I am very interested in your report. Your pictures so far are great! What type of camera are you using? I had a new camera for the trip and was very disappointed with my pictures:(.

Lucky you, 8 hours away. Our flights were one hour, followed by 5 hours, followed by 15 hours, followed by 5 hours:eek:....thirty something when you count connection times.

I am using a Canon PowerShot S95, bought almost 2 years ago. It is a point and shoot camera, and not a DSLR. I believe the current version is the Canon Powershot S110. If you google up the camera, you will find tons of reviews. Cheers.

Australia has extremely strict quarantine laws, therefore we did not bring any food with us other than made-in-Singapore 3-in-1 Milo sachets. We dutifully declared them to the authorities and we were allowed to bring them in.

From the airport, we took a taxi straight to Circular Quay, Overseas Passenger Terminal. The ride took about 30 minutes and the fare was more than 60 AUD.

This is the ship from the taxi drop-off.

Singapore is an 8 hour flight away from Sydney.

Our journey started with a red-eye flight from Singapore to Sydney on the new budget carrier called Scoot (a wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore Airlines). (http://www.flyscoot.com/index.php/en/)

We arrived in Sydney at about 2:30pm on Dec 8th, embarkation day.

This was the plane we took. It even has a name.