Just got off the Voyager....

[AmberMarie]

and had a great time! Even with the chilly weather the first couple of days and the high winds on the last couple of days, it was still amazing. The cruise director, Mike, was hilarious and always fun to watch and seemed very personable to the guests. I hope we get to cruise with him again in the future!

 

Now back to reality... boo!

[Cruisedeacon]

tell us all about your cruise... I leave this coming sunday.... anxious to see compasses... and/or hear about the entertainment... cruise director... etc... thanks for your time...

 

:p

[Shekim]

Which itinerary? Do you have the cruise compasses? Are you going to do a trip report? I know, I full of questions this morning, we sail in 26 days! Can't wait and we're at the point where we want ALL the information we can scour off these boards! Thanks...:D

[sas80]

Could you scan, email or snail mail the compasses?

sasproul at gmail dot com

 

It would be VERY much appreciated!!!

[wolfcathorse]

Amber, who was the captain? Did you have Capt Patrik Dahlgren?

[ranchingal]

I am begining to wonder if a gag order was issued?

[Redheada]

Would love to hear about entertainment, etc. What did you do on the cold days?

[Bigtex1622]

I am begining to wonder if a gag order was issued?

 

Either that or where told if they talk,

or shared any information,

they would be killed.

:eek:

[AmberMarie]

Well, I do plan on writing in more details later. :) No one replied last night! Cruise Compasses, I stopped saving them from each cruise as I used to do. I do have the last day's cruise compass, though. On the cold days, we explored the ship. The helipad "king of the world" spot was really neat. Most ships I have been on do not let you get that close to the front. It is verrrrrrry pitch black dark at night, though, so be careful or have someone to hang tight to! We also checked out the infamous waterfall in the men's urinal by the buffet... well, I didn't see it, but Josh did. I would DEFINITELY not miss the Quest gameshow. Unfortunately, my cruisemate is more of a "relax in the room" type of guy, so I did this by myself. I mostly watched rather than participated, but it was very amusing! Mike is a very entertaining person. :) Josh participated in the dodge ball tournament against Mike and other cruise staff. His team won, which was quite impressive because you could tell that the cruise staff had been playing for a long time. They were very... merciless. Had a couple of balls go overboard-- oops.

 

Honduras- we did a personal tour with Victor Bodden Tours. Our guide's name was Julio and he was very cool. He was a little quiet but we started asking lots of questions and he opened up a bit more. I would recommend him in the future. We saw spider monkeys, but seriously-- wear your hair in a bun and don't carry your bag inside. I was getting jumped on left and right and was beginning to freak out (all in fun) a bit. But they were dragging stuff out of my bag and would not get off me! Josh tried to gently bat them away but the would give him a little love bite to get him to stop. lol We ended our tour by stopping at a small outdoor/indoor bar that was owned by an American who had moved to Honduras after Obama was elected (we did not discuss politics with him, he brought this up on his own.. we are Democrats so we kept quiet, lol). He was very nice and even had his American wife and their adopted baby (from Honduras). So precious! They were generous with shots and we tried a few of the favorite beers of the area. Our favorite was the Port Royal Export. We ended up buying a six pack and bringing it back "home" with us.

 

Costa Maya was also nice, however we just stayed around port at those shops and restaurants (Mamasita's, I believe) and got in the water at the beach (at this point it was not too cold). Very fun "party atmosphere" in some of the areas, but we ended up in the more laid back areas.

 

Cozumel was awesome, as always, we did Nachi Cocom (my third time there). Endless drinks and enough food to last all day. Good stuff, too. Nachos are good. We snorkeled here with a guide who took us out to a couple of spots. The water was quite chilly but we got used to it pretty quickly. I have gotten a massage here in the past, but decided to pass on it this time. It rained for about five minutes, but it was still quite nice. This was by FAR the busiest I have ever seen it at Nachi, but still probably not 100 people were there. There was a large group of about 20 that were there (family thing) and they were very fun to watch and looked like they all had a great time as well. Endless Dos XX is pretty much my idea of heaven, so I was definitely blissful that day.

 

After our three port stops, the cruise went by too fast for my taste! I wish I was still on that ship. We were definitely a minority on the ship. I would guess that the average age was probably around sixty or seventy. Much different than our past experiences in cruising, even on our other RCCL ship. This, of course, did not bother us at all. Everyone was quite nice and personable. I even saw a couple that I had seen on a FIVE DAY on Carnival Ecstasy back in September of 08. I recognized them because they had participated in the Love and Marriage game show, and they had been married for like sixty years or something crazy like that.

 

Some of the random activities that I saw--

Karaoke (for adults... mostly "serious" karaoke-- I like fun and silly karaoke, as well, but these tended to be spur of the moment things that would happen in random bars so often times I missed out on that).

Scrapbook Workshop-- I did not participate but it was on there on two days, atleast.

Champagne and Wine tasting

Art Auction Seminars

Various spa seminars

Slots tournaments

 

Sorry I cannot be of more help on this one. Unfortunately while I enjoy participating and watching fun things on the compass, my cruise companion and boyfriend tends to like to "chill in the room." So many times I was just exploring the ship on my own. I did have an amazing time, but I must say that the staff is what made it so fun. This was definitely my favorite cruise director, the other entertainment staff were very friendly, the photographers were friendly... the casino staff didn't really talk at all like I have seen on past cruises, but that could have been because we were only there for a few hours.

 

Hope this helps-- we had a hump cabin 6618 and it was great. Right by the elevators but I never once heard any noise. Had to walk down only one flight to get to our dining room (late seating in the Magic Flute). Our waiter, Claudiu, was great and very accomodating.

[AmberMarie]

Amber, who was the captain? Did you have Capt Patrik Dahlgren?

 

Ah, yes, I forgot to mention the captain! Yes it was Patrik. He was quite younger than I have seen in the past and very nice and friendly. He came by our table at dinner one night and spoke to us for a few minutes. Mike Szwajkowski (cruise director) also interviewed him on the last day, I believe, and that was very interesting to watch. You can tell that he really enjoys being on the ocean, which is nice to know that he has that passion for what he does.

[texas cowgirl]

Thanks Amber for a nice write up. 6 of us (3 couples) will be on the 24th. I do hope that it is warmer than you mentioned but we'll go prepared and have a good time anyway. A few Dos XX will take care of that and we are booked on the same tour in Honduras. Glad to hear you enjoyed that. Thanks again.

[kc320]

We had Mike S in May 2008 when he was still on Adventure...and I agree he is a fantastic CD..and it must be true that the CD can make or break a cruise experience cause he is one of only 2 that I remember out of all my cruises...the other was Mark (bing-bong) from Enchantment...:D

[wolfcathorse]

Ah, yes, I forgot to mention the captain! Yes it was Patrik. He was quite younger than I have seen in the past and very nice and friendly. He came by our table at dinner one night and spoke to us for a few minutes. Mike Szwajkowski (cruise director) also interviewed him on the last day, I believe, and that was very interesting to watch. You can tell that he really enjoys being on the ocean, which is nice to know that he has that passion for what he does.

 

Ty Amber, I changed the chart to show Capt Patrik on at least 1-10, he may have started sooner so I guess I'll never know if this was his first week back from vacation or not.

[Cruisedeacon]

Well, I do plan on writing in more details later. :) No one replied last night! Cruise Compasses, I stopped saving them from each cruise as I used to do. I do have the last day's cruise compass, though. On the cold days, we explored the ship. The helipad "king of the world" spot was really neat. Most ships I have been on do not let you get that close to the front. It is verrrrrrry pitch black dark at night, though, so be careful or have someone to hang tight to! We also checked out the infamous waterfall in the men's urinal by the buffet... well, I didn't see it, but Josh did. I would DEFINITELY not miss the Quest gameshow. Unfortunately, my cruisemate is more of a "relax in the room" type of guy, so I did this by myself. I mostly watched rather than participated, but it was very amusing! Mike is a very entertaining person. :) Josh participated in the dodge ball tournament against Mike and other cruise staff. His team won, which was quite impressive because you could tell that the cruise staff had been playing for a long time. They were very... merciless. Had a couple of balls go overboard-- oops.

 

Honduras- we did a personal tour with Victor Bodden Tours. Our guide's name was Julio and he was very cool. He was a little quiet but we started asking lots of questions and he opened up a bit more. I would recommend him in the future. We saw spider monkeys, but seriously-- wear your hair in a bun and don't carry your bag inside. I was getting jumped on left and right and was beginning to freak out (all in fun) a bit. But they were dragging stuff out of my bag and would not get off me! Josh tried to gently bat them away but the would give him a little love bite to get him to stop. lol We ended our tour by stopping at a small outdoor/indoor bar that was owned by an American who had moved to Honduras after Obama was elected (we did not discuss politics with him, he brought this up on his own.. we are Democrats so we kept quiet, lol). He was very nice and even had his American wife and their adopted baby (from Honduras). So precious! They were generous with shots and we tried a few of the favorite beers of the area. Our favorite was the Port Royal Export. We ended up buying a six pack and bringing it back "home" with us.

 

Costa Maya was also nice, however we just stayed around port at those shops and restaurants (Mamasita's, I believe) and got in the water at the beach (at this point it was not too cold). Very fun "party atmosphere" in some of the areas, but we ended up in the more laid back areas.

 

Cozumel was awesome, as always, we did Nachi Cocom (my third time there). Endless drinks and enough food to last all day. Good stuff, too. Nachos are good. We snorkeled here with a guide who took us out to a couple of spots. The water was quite chilly but we got used to it pretty quickly. I have gotten a massage here in the past, but decided to pass on it this time. It rained for about five minutes, but it was still quite nice. This was by FAR the busiest I have ever seen it at Nachi, but still probably not 100 people were there. There was a large group of about 20 that were there (family thing) and they were very fun to watch and looked like they all had a great time as well. Endless Dos XX is pretty much my idea of heaven, so I was definitely blissful that day.

 

After our three port stops, the cruise went by too fast for my taste! I wish I was still on that ship. We were definitely a minority on the ship. I would guess that the average age was probably around sixty or seventy. Much different than our past experiences in cruising, even on our other RCCL ship. This, of course, did not bother us at all. Everyone was quite nice and personable. I even saw a couple that I had seen on a FIVE DAY on Carnival Ecstasy back in September of 08. I recognized them because they had participated in the Love and Marriage game show, and they had been married for like sixty years or something crazy like that.

 

Some of the random activities that I saw--

Karaoke (for adults... mostly "serious" karaoke-- I like fun and silly karaoke, as well, but these tended to be spur of the moment things that would happen in random bars so often times I missed out on that).

Scrapbook Workshop-- I did not participate but it was on there on two days, atleast.

Champagne and Wine tasting

Art Auction Seminars

Various spa seminars

Slots tournaments

 

Sorry I cannot be of more help on this one. Unfortunately while I enjoy participating and watching fun things on the compass, my cruise companion and boyfriend tends to like to "chill in the room." So many times I was just exploring the ship on my own. I did have an amazing time, but I must say that the staff is what made it so fun. This was definitely my favorite cruise director, the other entertainment staff were very friendly, the photographers were friendly... the casino staff didn't really talk at all like I have seen on past cruises, but that could have been because we were only there for a few hours.

 

Hope this helps-- we had a hump cabin 6618 and it was great. Right by the elevators but I never once heard any noise. Had to walk down only one flight to get to our dining room (late seating in the Magic Flute). Our waiter, Claudiu, was great and very accomodating.

 

We will be on the Jan 24th sailing... thanks for the information... we are in the SAME CABIN!!!!!.... glad to hear no noise from elevator... made my day by giving info to us... sorry your BF stayed in the room... we love the ship will be our third time on this one... 10th cruise with RCL and our 19th overall... did I say we love to cruise?... thanks again:)

[Cruisedeacon]

Thanks Amber for a nice write up. 6 of us (3 couples) will be on the 24th. I do hope that it is warmer than you mentioned but we'll go prepared and have a good time anyway. A few Dos XX will take care of that and we are booked on the same tour in Honduras. Glad to hear you enjoyed that. Thanks again.

 

we will be on the cruise with you guys as well ... meet and mingle?

 

have a good time if we dont see you...

[Sabiney]

We sailed on 01/03-01/10/10 and Captain Frank Martinsen was the Captain. He told us that he was leaving to go on vacation when our cruise ended on the 10th.

 

Pat

[TEXASMUNK]

Food; Dramatic improvement over last winter!!!

 

CD: Mike is outstanding!

 

Ports: 10 hours each port, perfect!

 

Portofino's: WOW! Wine matching worth every penny!

 

Derek Lewis: Overflow crowds nightly!!!!

 

Captain: Patrik, very visible, informative, friendly

 

Not a bad thing to say!!!!!

[AmberMarie]

We had Mike S in May 2008 when he was still on Adventure...and I agree he is a fantastic CD..and it must be true that the CD can make or break a cruise experience cause he is one of only 2 that I remember out of all my cruises...the other was Mark (bing-bong) from Enchantment...:D

 

Very true. I have had fun and enjoyable CDs in the past, but I feel like Mike was especially charismatic and fun with the guests that he worked with during game shows or other activities. I wish there was a way to "stalk" particular CDs... that makes me sound creepy, but it would be nice to know where a CD was going to see if it swayed any vacation plans. I have had a fun CD on Carnival, as well, that it would be nice to "follow," but I think Mike takes the cake.

[AmberMarie]

We will be on the Jan 24th sailing... thanks for the information... we are in the SAME CABIN!!!!!.... glad to hear no noise from elevator... made my day by giving info to us... sorry your BF stayed in the room... we love the ship will be our third time on this one... 10th cruise with RCL and our 19th overall... did I say we love to cruise?... thanks again:)

 

Same cabin, how cool is that? I can never find anyone on here who has had the same exact cabin. The location was very convenient. Very close to the library, too, which I thought was kind of nice. Just down three flights to get right to the photo gallery and studio B-- that was very cool! As big as this ship was, it was sooo "mid ship" of a location, that I never felt like I was walking for days to get anywhere. I had an aft cabin on the Carnival Ecstasy (tiny ship in comparison) and did a lot of walking to get to places (however I still loved the room, and the ship was quite fun, as well).

 

The toilet button sticks sometimes, be careful! lol Although once it flushes, everything goes down-- so that's good. haha TMi?

 

The left side of the balcony is a metal wall that is permanent, the right side is partitioned. That wall is translucent, but you cannot make out anything but slight movements, so I never felt too shy about going out in my unmentionables for a quick glimpse at the view. If you do stand by the railing, you can clear-as-day see your rightside neighbor, though. lol

 

Like I said before, though-- very little noise. It was a good cabin!

[AmberMarie]

Ty Amber, I changed the chart to show Capt Patrik on at least 1-10, he may have started sooner so I guess I'll never know if this was his first week back from vacation or not.

 

I believe you are right-- This was Capt Patrik's first cruise! He says that he likes Galveston because Texans are so friendly!

[Scoot29]

Food; Dramatic improvement over last winter!!!

 

CD: Mike is outstanding!

 

Ports: 10 hours each port, perfect!

 

Portofino's: WOW! Wine matching worth every penny!

 

Derek Lewis: Overflow crowds nightly!!!!

 

Captain: Patrik, very visible, informative, friendly

 

Not a bad thing to say!!!!!

 

I have to agree. I was on the Voyager January 2008 and though the food was good, it wasn't outstanding. This time around, things have improved immensely.

 

Mike was by far the best Cruise Director I have ever had. (And I've even had the infamous John Heald at Carnival before.) Major kudos to him for increasing the number of adult-related activities (such as comedy, quest, liars club, etc.)

 

Derek in the Pig was a great way to start off the night. Had us rolling all the time - shook some balls and watched friends and strangers get their "Superstar" moments.

 

I was greatly surprised how much fun Costa Maya was. First time to this port and I greatly enjoyed it. Like you said, 10 hours was just perfect.

 

So far I have my sights set on the Oasis in the late summer and a Mariner cruise in October however if Mike is on the Voyager next winter, we might consider taking this cruise again.

[AmberMarie]

I thought the food had improved since our last RCCL cruise in Sept of 06, also. It was mmm mmm good! Better than Carnival's last year, in my opinion.

[sas80]

Food; Dramatic improvement over last winter!!!

 

CD: Mike is outstanding!

 

Ports: 10 hours each port, perfect!

 

Portofino's: WOW! Wine matching worth every penny!

 

Derek Lewis: Overflow crowds nightly!!!!

 

Captain: Patrik, very visible, informative, friendly

 

Not a bad thing to say!!!!!

 

You have convinced us to sign up for the wine dinner series in portofino :)

Im on the phone with RCCL right now ;):D

[KITKAT0229]

Well, I do plan on writing in more details later. :) No one replied last night! Cruise Compasses, I stopped saving them from each cruise as I used to do. I do have the last day's cruise compass, though. On the cold days, we explored the ship. The helipad "king of the world" spot was really neat. Most ships I have been on do not let you get that close to the front. It is verrrrrrry pitch black dark at night, though, so be careful or have someone to hang tight to! We also checked out the infamous waterfall in the men's urinal by the buffet... well, I didn't see it, but Josh did. I would DEFINITELY not miss the Quest gameshow. Unfortunately, my cruisemate is more of a "relax in the room" type of guy, so I did this by myself. I mostly watched rather than participated, but it was very amusing! Mike is a very entertaining person. :) Josh participated in the dodge ball tournament against Mike and other cruise staff. His team won, which was quite impressive because you could tell that the cruise staff had been playing for a long time. They were very... merciless. Had a couple of balls go overboard-- oops.

 

Honduras- we did a personal tour with Victor Bodden Tours. Our guide's name was Julio and he was very cool. He was a little quiet but we started asking lots of questions and he opened up a bit more. I would recommend him in the future. We saw spider monkeys, but seriously-- wear your hair in a bun and don't carry your bag inside. I was getting jumped on left and right and was beginning to freak out (all in fun) a bit. But they were dragging stuff out of my bag and would not get off me! Josh tried to gently bat them away but the would give him a little love bite to get him to stop. lol We ended our tour by stopping at a small outdoor/indoor bar that was owned by an American who had moved to Honduras after Obama was elected (we did not discuss politics with him, he brought this up on his own.. we are Democrats so we kept quiet, lol). He was very nice and even had his American wife and their adopted baby (from Honduras). So precious! They were generous with shots and we tried a few of the favorite beers of the area. Our favorite was the Port Royal Export. We ended up buying a six pack and bringing it back "home" with us.

 

Costa Maya was also nice, however we just stayed around port at those shops and restaurants (Mamasita's, I believe) and got in the water at the beach (at this point it was not too cold). Very fun "party atmosphere" in some of the areas, but we ended up in the more laid back areas.

 

Cozumel was awesome, as always, we did Nachi Cocom (my third time there). Endless drinks and enough food to last all day. Good stuff, too. Nachos are good. We snorkeled here with a guide who took us out to a couple of spots. The water was quite chilly but we got used to it pretty quickly. I have gotten a massage here in the past, but decided to pass on it this time. It rained for about five minutes, but it was still quite nice. This was by FAR the busiest I have ever seen it at Nachi, but still probably not 100 people were there. There was a large group of about 20 that were there (family thing) and they were very fun to watch and looked like they all had a great time as well. Endless Dos XX is pretty much my idea of heaven, so I was definitely blissful that day.

 

After our three port stops, the cruise went by too fast for my taste! I wish I was still on that ship. We were definitely a minority on the ship. I would guess that the average age was probably around sixty or seventy. Much different than our past experiences in cruising, even on our other RCCL ship. This, of course, did not bother us at all. Everyone was quite nice and personable. I even saw a couple that I had seen on a FIVE DAY on Carnival Ecstasy back in September of 08. I recognized them because they had participated in the Love and Marriage game show, and they had been married for like sixty years or something crazy like that.

 

Some of the random activities that I saw--

Karaoke (for adults... mostly "serious" karaoke-- I like fun and silly karaoke, as well, but these tended to be spur of the moment things that would happen in random bars so often times I missed out on that).

Scrapbook Workshop-- I did not participate but it was on there on two days, atleast.

Champagne and Wine tasting

Art Auction Seminars

Various spa seminars

Slots tournaments

 

Sorry I cannot be of more help on this one. Unfortunately while I enjoy participating and watching fun things on the compass, my cruise companion and boyfriend tends to like to "chill in the room." So many times I was just exploring the ship on my own. I did have an amazing time, but I must say that the staff is what made it so fun. This was definitely my favorite cruise director, the other entertainment staff were very friendly, the photographers were friendly... the casino staff didn't really talk at all like I have seen on past cruises, but that could have been because we were only there for a few hours.

 

Hope this helps-- we had a hump cabin 6618 and it was great. Right by the elevators but I never once heard any noise. Had to walk down only one flight to get to our dining room (late seating in the Magic Flute). Our waiter, Claudiu, was great and very accomodating.

 

That's the room we have booked for our cruise in March. Sounds like you had a great time and I can't wait! We have my in-laws across on the other side in 6316. How was the room size and the balcony? Just curious. We downgraded from a D2 to save some money and because we could get hump rooms.

[AmberMarie]

I thought the room size was nice and adequate. It felt a little bit smaller than my last two rooms on the Carnival Ecstasy (although one was a handicap and neither one of them had a sitting area so of course it seemed larger). The storage was really great in the cabin. The one thing that I missed from our first RCCL cruise (atleast I think it was the RCCL cruise) was the extra drawers (which I believe were under the couch). There are not really any "large drawers", just the drawers in the vanity. But this ended up being perfectly fine for us because I had my clothes in basically all of the drawers, and Josh used the shelving in the closet. We also used the shelving for our shoes.

 

Each of us had a night stand with a drawer and "cubbie shelf." We ended up using a large plastic shopping bag to put our dirty clothes in and then just shoving them in that cubbie. We were putting the bags under the bed at first, but the room attendant used that area to stuff large decorative pillows so we stopped.

 

There is PLENTY of storage space for "shelvable" items. The vanity mirror has large, long mirror cabinets that open up on either side of the main mirror. I used this for hair products and everyday lotions. There was also storage space above the safe that we used for our wrinkle releaser, travel cups, or any other random stuff. The bathroom also has an adequate amount of storage space. The shower, itself, has little shelves for shampoos and stuff-- loved this! The bathroom provides you with shampoo plus conditioner from a pump in the shower, and then a bar of soap. I alternated between my shampoo and "their" shampoo (which was nice), but used my own body wash.

 

The balcony had two chairs and a little mini table.

 

The TV swiveled to where you could watch it from anywhere..

 

lol-- one trivial thing that annoyed the poo out of us, though-- the light switch for the bathroom is in a really inconvenient spot. It is on the left side of the door. But the doors swings open left. So if you walk into the bathroom and realize you need to turn the light on, you have to walk out, close the door, turn the light on, open the door, and go back in. It sounds really stupid and mundaine to "complain" about, but it is quite annoying when you are really racing to use the restroom!! lol No biggie for us, it was just one of those annoying things we would laugh about throughout the trip.