ajtaylor29

We've been twice and loved it both times! imo, there are many things to do so i'll look forward to going again. We were told that they limit the # of ships that can be there on any given day, i'm pretty sure it's 2....? So, to me it hasn't felt crowded either visit which is a good thing. The first time we went to the Beach Club, very nice and relaxing with minimal crowds. Last month, we rented a beach cabana (there were 4 of us) and had a great day on the beach. Both of those cruises were out of Florida, i haven't seen any Galveston cruises going to coco cay yet...? But i wouldn't mind if they do! I feel the same about Labadee. We've been there twice and will look forward to another visit!

We were there last year, and just stopped by the restaurant as we walked in and made our lunch reservation, super easy! I will say - we ate a little later because the earliest times were already booked. If i had known, i might have made an effort to get there earlier but we were in no hurry and it worked out fine!

You're too funny. 🙂 Go Chiefs!!!!! (yes, i'm a sore loser).

We were on Symphony in December and had the UDP. We made reservations once we boarded, and even tho several time slots were full we were able to fill in the whole week easily. And, several times were able to walk up and get an earlier time because there were empty tables....So, you'll be fine!

Thanks for the review! We haven't sailed NCL so i have no comparison there. But we just sailed on Odyssey 2 weeks ago and were lucky enough to Royal Up our Grand Suite to a Grand Loft Suite which was one of only 5 (i think) Star class suites on this ship. Even tho we paid more, it included everything - UDP, drink deluxe drink package, daily gratuities (of course, we tipped more). I have to admit, i was more excited about that 2-story suite on the Aft than i was about the Genie. We're pretty easy going and didn't think we'd really utilize the Genie that much, but boy were we wrong! Our genie was absolutely amazing!!! As the op described, having everything taken care of - whatever it was - made our cruise so much more relaxing. No waiting in lines for anything. He accommodated last minute changes to our dinner times. We always had drinks and snacks waiting for us when we returned to the room. He brought starbucks coffee and breakfast every morning. He escorted us off the ship in each port. One night we had an NFL playoff game (Cowboys - it was the GOOD game, not the total collapse we had the next weekend!!) and he reserved us a prime table at Playmakers to watch the game! I was so spoiled all week. It really was a great experience, now i'm not sure how i'll travel without it?!?

I think it's hard to make comparisons, each ship is different and a lot of it is personal preferences. We've sailed on both lines, and many different ships, and still haven't had a bad cruise on any ship!!! We have loved the smaller RC ships we've been on so i think you'll like it! I personally think the food is better on RC, but we've also had some good meals on Carnival. We find the staff to be wonderful on all of our cruises. All of the casinos take your money (that's their job, just budget your spending there and have fun!) We try to avoid the buffets on all ships....the food is never going to be great, so set your expectations accordingly if going to a buffet (just like land-based buffets). The MDR and the specialty restaurants serve much better food, imo. Enjoy your cruise!

We've been to Coco Cay twice now. First time we booked the beach club (just hubby and I), got there early and snagged 2 good chairs close to the water. We had a great day! The food was awesome - just be prepared for a sit-down meal as it's a full-service restaurant. fyi, you need to reserve your time for lunch so stop by as you come in to make a reservation. We were there again last month with friends so we decided to get a beach cabana in another area instead of doing the beach club, which i think for 4 people was a good choice. We loved having the cabana, waiters brought us drinks and food all day (food wasn't as good, just burgers, etc. but it was fine for us), and it worked out a little cheaper to rent the cabana than for 4 of us to do the beach club. I would also check how many ships are there. For us, we were the only ship, but if there are 2 ships it would definitely be crowded all over Coco Cay and in that case i would definitely do the beach club because they limit how many people can go in. Have fun!

Odyssey OTS leaving this Saturday! First time on this ship, and thanks to Royal up - first time in the Grand Loft Suite!

We've eaten at Izumi several times on different ships. I love sushi, my husband does not. We both always leave full and satisfied! IMO, the food is always very good. So i have rolls and he has chicken teriyaki or other cooked options, and we're both happy. I'm always surprised when i hear people say they couldn't find anything to eat (whatever the venue is they're describing, even the MDR)....there are ALWAYS enough choices that you can find something you like if you keep an open mind. I also think if someone wants to dislike a dining venue they will.

We'll leave the lights on for you. 🙂

Will be on Odyssey in 2 weeks so i'm enjoying this thread! Thanks all!

Wow.

It IS awesome, isn't it?? 💗

That's a great plan! I have a feeling that we're now going to verify (several times, and check it twice!) that the passports are safely in our possession before we pull away! Your husband sounds like my husband....although now every time he loses something and i start to ***** at him, he's going to say "yes, but remember that time....." and that'll shut me up!!!

And that's always been me too....until this cruise!!! It's almost inconceivable that i didn't have one single thought about it until we pulled into the terminal! Usually, I'm checking and rechecking the pocket where I've zipped up the passports (in their special passport carry case, which also zips up).....😲

i don't know what WHTI means.....? But, i told her we had those and she said nope. Has to be a birth certificate.

i know, right?? They did say it has to be a copy of the "real" birth certificate (ie with seal) not some sort of reproduction that was unofficial.....

So, after 17 cruises over the last 10 years, including trips to Europe, i consider myself to be the most organized, streamlined packer in my family. I'm the one who gathers all the "important" documentation, while my husband frets over how many bathing suits he needs and does he really want to take a sport coat or just go casual?! I am always packed and waiting at the door while he finishes all his last minute checks (and of course i make fun of him for being so obsessive). Our last cruise (December 3rd on Symphony out of Miami): same process as always. We flew to Miami the night before, stayed in a local Hyatt, then got up and called Uber to take us to the port. On the way, we had him stop for our usual supply run (wine and a few other misc essentials). Then, cruise port here we come!!! At this point, i am excited as usual to be boarding a ship, and have not a care in the world. We pull up and as i'm stepping out of the car and looking around at all the excited people about to start their vacation, a thought suddenly hits me: I DIDN'T PACK OUR PASSPORTS. I don't even know what to think, i'm just sort of shocked.....I tell my husband. he says "what does that mean???" I'm not sure. I know we have photos of passports in our phones. Surely we'll be able to work this out. Lets not panic. I've read nightmare stories before of people being denied boarding because they don't have proper paperwork, but we have photos. This will all be ok. The porters take our luggage and we hurry inside. We're in a suite, so we go thru the suite entry (no lines) upstairs and the person greets us ready to check us in. I explain that i forgot our passports....she immediately takes us to a "special" desk (read: problem passengers) where the very nice employee explains to us that photos of passports are not acceptable. Only the originals will suffice. But, if you have a copy (why can THIS be a copy??) of your birth certificate, you're fine. Well, we don't have copies of our birth certificates. We have copies of our passports. We have our global entry cards. We have our vaccination cards. We have all sorts of proof that we're American citizens and we've sailed with RC about 10 times already. You guys KNOW who we are! Come on!!! In a very calm but firm manner she reiterates to me that without either our original passports OR a copy of a birth certificate we will not be able to board. I remain calm (panicking will do me no good at this point). We call our neighbor friend and have her go to our house to look for our birth certificates. Of course, since i'm the organizer, i know exactly where they are in the file cabinet. All she has to do is take a photo and send it to me and off we'll go. So, she starts looking thru the files, and finds my husbands bc. Yea, there's one! She sends a photo of it, we show the RC employee, she approves it. Easy, one down. Now, she keeps going but can't find mine. I keep directing her to another folder, then another folder, then a lockbox, then a 3-ring binder - all the possible places that i know could contain my bc, but nothing. It is not there. At some point during this search, my husband suggests that we call my mother to see if maybe she has a copy of it. My 95 year old mother who lives in a retirement community and has purged most of her lifetime of "stuff" into a small apartment. I scoff at him, there's no way she'll have it. But, he calls her anyway. And of course, he confuses her with his panicky voice, and she's not sure WHY we need it but she promises to look around. They hang up and i have little faith that she will be any help at all. (spoiler alert - you can ALWAYS count on your mother). 🙂 We've now been sitting in this special (read: problem) area for almost 2 hours. I have sent my neighbor home. I am coming to grips with the fact that i am NOT going on a cruise today. I'm trying to convince my husband that he should board with our friends (our new to cruising friends that we brought on this cruise with us and THEY of course have their passports), and that I'll fly home, get our passports, then fly to St. Maarten in 3 days and join them there. They all say no way, we're not going without you. We'll just all go to Key West for a few days instead. I'm fighting back tears. And then my phone rings. It's my mother. She says "I found it". She has a family photo album with all 3 of her "children's" bc's (we're all in our 60's....) She takes a photo, sends it to me, i show the employee, they accept it, here's your boarding pass and off you go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am in shock, it's almost unbelievable but we're getting on the ship! I can't describe the feeling i had walking up that gangway and onto the Symphony. It's always a great feeling but this time - well, this time it was truly awesome!!! From there on, we had a GREAT cruise! Everything was perfect. The food, the drinks (lots of those), the ports, the entertainment. The moral of this story is....well, i promise that i will NEVER forget passports again! I also will be ordering passport cards so we always have those in our wallets. And, never doubt your mother. She still is sort of confused about what exactly happened, but she understands that SHE SAVED THE DAY!

Thanks! I'm glad to hear that the casino didn't take all your money!! We spend a lot of time in there so i'm hoping it's gentle with me too!

i board January 14th so i'll be no help! I suggest if you search you can find youtube videos of the cabins which might help you with the plug situation. Also, for instructions on streaming on the tv. I haven't tried that (not enough time spent in the cabin!) but i know it was available on the Symphony. I'm sure you have to have the WIFI package....

thanks for the feedback! We're not big fans of the MDR OR the buffet, so we try to avoid them both whenever we can! We'll eat in CK and the specialty restaurants for most meals. I've seen good reviews for The Book so i'm reserving that. We're honestly so easy to please so i'm sure we'll have a great time, like on all of our other cruises! I'm just curious about the ship since we've never done this class before. We love Symphony, but also loved our cruise on the Vision last year!

Our first time on Odyssey in 3 weeks. I haven't read that much about the ship so i'm curious what people think about the ship in general. We have a grand suite so we'll have access to Coastal Kitchen (which we loved on Symphony). Hows the food in CK?

We just got off Symphony on Saturday, thought i'd throw my 2 cents in here because we had a great cruise! Even tho the ship was almost full, we really didn't have trouble with crowds, everybody spreads out and there are so many different places to go! Lots of bars, lots of restaurants, lots of activities going on all the time i thought. We were a group of 4, and were able to book the 4 main shows about 3 weeks before our cruise, which was great (although, due to windy weather all week several shows were cancelled and moved around. we did see the ice show (1776 i think?), Hiro (great show!) and a sing-along version of Hairspray. We decided to buy the unlimited dining package for the week, which was well worth the money imo ($240 a person or something like that?) We ate at all the specialty restaurants, some more than once, plus Playmakers (great burgers!) and Solarium for breakfast most days. Did not step foot in the Windjammer OR the MDR (by design, i just don't like those options). I'm sorry the original poster had some bad experiences (ok, if someone puked on me i would never get over that?!?! How awful) but we really had very few minor complaints. The staff as usual was friendly and attentive (although i will say a few times we noticed areas where they seemed a little short on help so things were slower than normal). I love Symphony, our 2nd time sailing on her. Next up is Odyssey, then Allure. Yea for cruising!!!

We were on Symphony last NYE and enjoyed Coastal Kitchen for the majority of our meals all week. I don't think we ever went to the MDR, and maybe once to Windjammer for a quick breakfast. We did try several specialty restaurants as well. I thought CK food was really good! Will be on Symphony again in 3 weeks in a GS, but travelling with others who are not in a suite, so looks like we won't be using CK much.

Just got my OBC for our July 31st Pride cruise. I applied about 3 weeks ago. FYI, we had a casino offer but paid to upgrade to a wrap-around balcony. Maybe because we paid for the upgrade that's why ours was approved when others are being denied.