cruizinnoon

Amazingly they are still serving at the bars on BotS

Shouldn’t be long now. On brilliance and we are in the turning basin and it looks like serenade is tying off but don’t know which terminal

+1 for Larrys Limo.  Particularly if you have an early flight.

Alternatively, we have used public transport involving an Uber to MIA Airport Tri-Rail station and then Tri-Rail (~5$) to the FLL Airport station ( which provided a free shuttle to FLL).

It does seem to be much more of an occurrence the last year or two.  I think instead of trying to rush new features and functionality, they need to take a step back and work on the resiliency of the systems they currently have in place.  I rather have old and working 90% of the time, then super pretty and down 25% of the time.  

It would also be nice if they scheduled the downtime when the majority of the world is not in normal hours. (Which, as someone who works with global teams, I get is difficult)

10 hours ago, ridge4 said:

We were able to get the UDP for our upcoming TA on Anthem for $215 pp. With 11 dinners and 8 sea day lunches, that is roughly $12 pp per meal (plus grats).  Considering Anthem has more restaurant options than the smaller ships, it was a great deal we couldn’t pass up.

Agreed, the Quantum and Oasis class ships give great value on the UDP.  With the number of restaurants, there isn't the feeling of having to eat in the same three specialty restaurants every night.  We purchased the UDP on the Wonder inaugural and found it to be great value, with lunches at Chops and Giovanni and Mason Jar some of the days, and dinners at all of those as well 150 Central Park and Hooked Seafood.  Having the $20pp at Playmakers each day also came in handy if we wanted a snack that was a bit more robust than the Sorrentos pizza.  I''m not sure I would purchase on a 3/4/5 night cruise as i likely would use whatever OBC I had to do one or two nights at either Chops/Izumi Hibachi/Giovanni's and then eat the other nights at the MDR.  

I will be cruising with a large party. When making MDR dining time selections or any other type of reservations, can one person reserve for entire group or does everyone need to make their own individual reservation? If you have to make your own, how or who do we let know that we all what to be seated together in the MDR?

Your TA can link the reservations and then Royal will attempt to get all of you at the same dining table or at adjoining tables if your party is that big.

We did this cruise last year and thought it was great. The key west stop we kinda toured around and then did Nachi in Cozumel. The crew on Brilliance was great. So far I think that is my favorite size of ship for being not to small but not too big.

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Agreed that whatever you feel is a good price is what you should pay. We are doing some cruising over the Memorial Day holiday and those price points aren't the same as if we did them in low season. Great thing about cruising is that you can adjust the price of the same vacation by choosing a different room type. To me "of the Seas" in an interior beats "on the couch" at my house any day.

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I've stayed here for work before. It is definitely good enough for a pre-post cruise hotel. It's not the Ritz, but it's not Ritz pricing either. They have a small on-site restaurant, that's not stellar, but edible. There are a few restaurants within walking distance, but for a real dining experience, I'd probably Uber/Cab to Ybor and find something authentic. (Columbia is always a good option :), and very popular with the CC crowd. )

Completely agree with the previous poster. One of larger work locations is in this area and the Bahama Breeze is decent enough food, but would definitely look to something local. Ditto on the Uber idea after-dark, we walked back to the Doubletree from The Chart House and it was definitely more of a challenge than the 8AM walk to the office across the same highway.

-Brian

Nachi Cocom??

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Been through Liberty and Everglades since they made the change and no problems with either one. We have just put the bottles in the carry-on and no issues. I think they only look to make sure it's not more than 2 bottles per person, even though 2 per stateroom in the rule.

I would probably replace American Icon or Chic. The menu items from the replaced restaurant could be incorporated into the pseudo-MDR.

FWIW, I had no problems with the Dynamic Dining on the Quantum 12/1 Cruise. I know there were a lot of people that did. A lot of these people were people who had been cruising for the last 30 years or more. I have only been cruising for the last three years, but I like both styles (MDR & DD).

I agree with the previous poster that RCI wouldn't have made the change if it wasn't a)financial beneficial to them; b) bring more customers. I was just thinking of a solution that could potentially make everybody happy.

Quantum had them at the Grande we ate there on night 9 of 11 and they still had them.

We all know that some people love the choices with the new Dynamic Dining. Also we know that some people love the MDR style of traditional cruise dining. I think what RCI could do as far as dynamic dining to find the happy medium would be to eliminate 1 DD restaurant and have that space used as a "MDR" style restaurant. At reservation time we would choose either DD or MDR style. Once the 400(x2 for two seatings) or so MDR style seats are taken, then that's it and DD is the only choice. That would allow for MDR fans and DD fans to be happy on the same boat.

DW and I were contestants on Love and Marriage on th 12/1 quantum sailing so it is still alive on that ship.

Thank you so much it looks exactly like what I'm looking for. I'm in my 60s and when we were in our 40s we adopted a special needs child she's 18 now. I took her on her first cruise last year and playa Mia ,well she didn't like the ocean she said it smelled and felt funny. Well she is definitely a foodie,lol, and with the smaller crowds I think this will be the perfect place. Thank you so much for your quick response have a wonderful cruise I know we will

 

 

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We were there last Saturday and I think this will work good for you. The food alone is almost worth the price. The servers will come by taking drink orders throughout most of the day. I laid out reading my book most of the day and had a great time.

Cruizinnoon do you have pix from formal night? Thanks for the review!

Unfortunately I don't. There were some patriotic, if not skimpy outfits, however.

-Brian

Note on our cruise that was July 4th so it was formal or patriotic which made for some interesting outfits

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The formal night was the first sea day (day 2)

Hit the Solarium Cafe hard in those first few days. I don't know if its just my experience, but the 1st half of the cruise noone was ever there. We were able to just walk right up and pick up our food usually. By Day 3 everybody was lined up for the Brie and Parma or the Beef Kummelweck sandwich (both great.)

Great review, we were on this sailing as well and I would say that you are spot on in your review. I really had a good time on this. Now to find another three day weekend to work a cruise in.

Have previously sailed on Monarch and Oasis, thought the one was a bit small, and the other the bit big. I liked the number of activities on Oasis, but found it somewhat impersonal. I liked the fact that you saw people more than once on the Monarch. Hadn't been at sea for a while booked due to a good price the July 4th weekend Vision cruise out of Port Everglades.

Ship:

The ship looked to be in good shape. Everything seemed to work and was always clean. One wouldn't guess it was one of the older ships just by glancing around. It looked like theyre had been some upgraded lighting effects and such in the centrum, the Viking Crown Lounge, and by the pool.

Food:

Windjammer - we only ate at the Windjammer on embarkation afternoon and disembarkation morning. Both times it was adequate. No honey stung chicken, which wasn't a big deal as during embarkation I was still lying to myself saying that I was going to eat sensibly on the cruise. (This lasted 4-6 hours).

MDR - The food in the MDR for the three nights that we ate there was pretty good. The escargots were great and the breads were done nicely. Most appetizers were OK as well, even the crab cake which I had extremely low expectations for. The entrees were all good, while not as great as the ones we had on Oasis. The only portion of MDR dining I really didn't think was all that great was desert. Night 1's creme brulee wasn't bad, I just don't think the bananas sat well with me. Night 2's cheese cake was perfect. Night 3's rum baba was horrible.

Chop's Grille -- This was my first experience with a specialty restaurant. There are a lot of people who dismiss specialty restaurants due to fact that there is perfectly good food in the MDR. This is true, however I think that the Chops on Vision did a great job of providing a special experience. The food was perfectly cooked and my NY Strip was cooked perfectly. The sides were all large portioned and cooked perfectly. This was better than the service and food I have received on some land-based steakhouses.

Solarium Cafe/Park Cafe

Definitely under noticed the 1st days, but by Day 4 one of the most popular eateries on the ship. The sandwiches and salads here made for great lunches. A revolving selection of cookies and deserts also helped with the unnneeded calories :) The late night pizza was hit or miss, depending on who was working on the heating up/cooking of the pizza sometimes it was almost good and other times it was bordering inedible. But it's late night pizza at sea, I'm not expecting PapaJohns.

Drink Package/Bars

We got the select package (beer/wine). If I had it to do again for a shorter cruise like this I'd have gone for the premium as the selection of liquors is a better value then the beers. That being said, I never had to wait 30 minutes as I've read to get a drink. The pool deck had mid deck stations set up with the most popular drinks, and the longest wait I had was on the second sea day I had to wait about 10 minutes, which was just due to volume. At less popular venues such as the schooner and R bars, my longest wait was roughly 2 minutes to get served.

Entertainment

Entertainment was good on this, with some exceptions. The Farewell show had technical difficulties and had to be cancelled. The cruise director, Steve, was very apologetic however. On every other ship we had sailed we tend to see a lot of the cruise director, but we didn't see a lot of Steve outside of the "Thriller" dance class he was doing. The Schooner Bar trivia and the Karaoke also were a big hit.

This was also my 1st time being on the winning Quest team.

Overall

Overall, I liked the staff and the boat. All issues we had were minor and the only thing we'd have wished for was faster service in the MDR. Not sure if the waiter was slow or new, but he was trying, just not quite getting there. I liked the size of the boat and had a really good time.

Eastern. .. But would rather have the first port in coco cay rather than nassau

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Victoria,

Interesting to hear your thoughts on Monarch. I was on Monarch in December( my first cruise), and the crew was great. I feel bad, since a lot of what you describe wasn't bad customer service, but just flat out rudeness. Hopefully your next RCI cruise will bring a better crew and another of your fabulous trip reports. I, too look forward to short cruises on Enchantment when it goes to Port Canaveral. As of this moment I've been on two cruises, Oasis and Monarch, so it would be nice to try one of the in-between sized boats.