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Booked Restaurants?


fudge
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I'm curious why you think this is a bad idea if it guarantees that every guest will get at least one opportunity to dine in the specialty restaurant.

 

Our experience with Restaurant 2 was that it frequently got booked out by passengers who made several reservations so that others could not try it. I found that if you wanted to dine the first couple of nights, it was easy to get into but later it the cruise it often became difficult to obtain a reservation.

 

With Seabourn very aggressively marketing the Thomas Keller partnership (unlike R2), it stands to reason the same could easily happen without some means to manage it. This allows passengers to know in advance that they'll have at least one reservation protected without having to be disappointed if they wait until later in the sailing and find out it is all booked up. We like that that they are at least opening a bit earlier (6 pm vs. 7 pm) so that they can manage two seatings a night but even then, it will be a stretch on a 7 night cruise to accommodate all if everyone wants to have a go.

 

Unlike the space on the Encore class ships, the Odyssey class remodel didn't improve upon the overall space allocated for tables - and in fact, it looked to us like it might have accommodated slightly fewer guests than the R2.

 

I realize some dislike the Keller partnership and offerings, but others love them. We'd have dined there several nights on our last sailing if given the opportunity. But we also appreciated and respected that other guests needed to have their chance to book - and we were happy to check back for cancellations instead.

 

This also takes some burden off the folks in Seabourn Square who are already very busy on embarkation day by helping to ensure that the restaurant stays full.

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The fact that you have to book ahead seems to be yet another erosion of the original SB mantra. Booking ahead has generally been the requirement of the behemoths of the seas et al.

Booking ahead was Thomas Keller's condition. In order to provide the kind of food and experience he wants he needed to limit the amount of diners per night. Completely understandable to me and more than worth the effort unlike most other luxury cruise line where you have to reserve every restaurant every night i.e. the Silver Muse,

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  • 3 weeks later...

If TK is to be a truly luxury dining experience they will turn down the rock music. It is played loudly while you eat and try to have a conversation. It is definitely not music for dining. The food is good although the portions were large and wasteful. They do try to up sell special cocktails and wines.

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I started this thread, overall the pre on line booking turned out to be a nightmare. Seabourn square could not find the on line booking, they said it was there "somewhere" but could not locate it?

 

We then tried to make another reservation, "no problem was the answer, 6.15 pm on a shared table! I dont think so I said.

 

Mrs Fudge put her boxing gloves on and we finally had a decent booking at 7.15 pm. After 8 days on board we received a call from Seabourn square, we found your booking, unfortunately that day has passed!

 

As a gesture they booked us two evenings but then cancelled one, again not a happy bunny. Eventually we did eat there twice and it was indeed very nice. We were then offered a third night but we are not selfish greedy people we politely turned it down to give other guests a chance to eat there.

 

Finally, the manager of the grill admitted the on line booking system should be scrapped, it causes too many problems.

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Covepointcruiser, When we ate in the TK Grill on the Encore, the music was terribly loud. I asked our waiter if the music volume could be lowered--and it was. Sometimes simple requests are granted!! The waiter also told us that Thomas Keller himself chose the music and wanted it played a high volume. Our waiter added that he agreed with us that the music was too loud.

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R2 no longer exists. They transformed the space R2 used to occupy on the Odyssey, Quest and Sojourn into the TK Grill.

 

And on our recent 35 day cruise we dined in the Grill on numerous occasions and the music was never loud.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Forums

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Can’t recall if I asked before, but was it difficult to get seating at the sushi bar venue?

Covepointcruiser, When we ate in the TK Grill on the Encore, the music was terribly loud. I asked our waiter if the music volume could be lowered--and it was. Sometimes simple requests are granted!! The waiter also told us that Thomas Keller himself chose the music and wanted it played a high volume. Our waiter added that he agreed with us that the music was too loud.
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Can’t recall if I asked before, but was it difficult to get seating at the sushi bar venue?

 

The night we went we got a table for 6 but soon after it was full and people were being turned away. This was about 7pm.

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