Dining and AO?

[ToddlerMom]

We've just booked the FOS for the first week in December and it says that My Family Time dining is unavailable. I haven't figured out if that means that it's already full or that we can't reserve it because our DD will only be 4 when we cruise. Regardless, if we do MTD, can the waitstaff speed up serving our DD like they do with My Family Time dining so that I can drop her off in AO myself before my entree arrives?

 

Would I get stuck in a long line dropping DD off at AO in the evenings?

[boulders]

You can ask your waiter to speed up your daughter's meal. I've found that we're almost done by the time AO opens at 7 pm anyway. Any line at dropoff should move quickly. It's never taken me more than a few seconds to drop off. The exception would be the first full day of the cruise, in the morning, when parents who hadn't registered the night before are registering their children.

[crusinmama06]

Do MTD and you will ALWAYS make the 7pm drop off time - we always do. By Day 2 our waiters have the kids appetizers and drinks at the table by the time we arrive. We LOVE MTD on RCI. You can ask for the same wait staff every night / same dining time.

[jmpaull]

Do MTD and you will ALWAYS make the 7pm drop off time - we always do. By Day 2 our waiters have the kids appetizers and drinks at the table by the time we arrive. We LOVE MTD on RCI. You can ask for the same wait staff every night / same dining time.

 

I might be having a blonde moment but when you say do the MTD and you always make it to the 7pm drop off time....is that with you eating too or is that just the kids eating and then you having to run them up?

We are booked on the Allure for April 2014 and i just checked our reservation it says "Traditional Dining 06:00 PM , No Waitlists " does that mean we are MTD or the Family Time Dining???

If its not FTD and we can still that do you recommend that? My girls will be 4 1/2 and 6 at time of cruise. With FTD does that mean that AO comes to the dining room to get the kids from us?

 

Thanks

[boulders]

I might be having a blonde moment but when you say do the MTD and you always make it to the 7pm drop off time....is that with you eating too or is that just the kids eating and then you having to run them up?

We are booked on the Allure for April 2014 and i just checked our reservation it says "Traditional Dining 06:00 PM , No Waitlists " does that mean we are MTD or the Family Time Dining???

If its not FTD and we can still that do you recommend that? My girls will be 4 1/2 and 6 at time of cruise. With FTD does that mean that AO comes to the dining room to get the kids from us?

 

Thanks

 

You are booked in early or main dining, not MTD. IME, AO does not come into the dining room. You have to take the kids out of the dining room to the AO counsellors at a fixed time. It was 6:40 when I did it. The problem with this is at that time, the waiters are generally serving the main course which means a) your main course comes while you are signing your child into AO outside the dining room and b) you run the risk of waiters with huge trays not expecting passengers to be up and about, turning abruptly and either hitting you with the tray or dropping the tray altogether. On my one cruise, a) happened every night and b) almost happened one night. This is why I stopped family time dining after about 4 nights. Even with a fixed dining time, all of us were done with dinner and dessert by 7:10 or earlier.

[jmpaull]

You are booked in early or main dining, not MTD. IME, AO does not come into the dining room. You have to take the kids out of the dining room to the AO counsellors at a fixed time. It was 6:40 when I did it. The problem with this is at that time, the waiters are generally serving the main course which means a) your main course comes while you are signing your child into AO outside the dining room and b) you run the risk of waiters with huge trays not expecting passengers to be up and about, turning abruptly and either hitting you with the tray or dropping the tray altogether. On my one cruise, a) happened every night and b) almost happened one night. This is why I stopped family time dining after about 4 nights. Even with a fixed dining time, all of us were done with dinner and dessert by 7:10 or earlier.

 

Can we drop off the kids anytime during the 7pm-9pm slot or does it have to be right at 7?

If its anytime then i dont mind keep the kids with us during the whole dining service. they tend to be really good about not throwing fits and waiting for us to finish our meals.

Now, do you think on the Allure that if we are booked at 6pm that we will be dont by 7ish? Or should i assume it will take like 2 hours to eat?

IF we do decide to run them up to AO do they have a dress code? Say its formal night and i dress the girls up....do we have to run back to the room to change before they can go to AO?

I know they offer to feed the kids lunch and/or dinner at AO for an extra fee. Does anyone know how much this is? Just incase we opt to do that one day?

sorry i know its a year away but im trying to figure out what will be the best for us. We plan on doing excursions in every port so im wondering if i should change it to MTD instead just to be safe and then if we need to eat late we can and just give the girls a snack if they get hungry.

[boulders]

I answered most of your questions in your other thread. Even if you are late for your assigned dining time one night, there are plenty of other places to eat other than the main dining room.

[crusinmama06]

I might be having a blonde moment but when you say do the MTD and you always make it to the 7pm drop off time....is that with you eating too or is that just the kids eating and then you having to run them up?

We are booked on the Allure for April 2014 and i just checked our reservation it says "Traditional Dining 06:00 PM , No Waitlists " does that mean we are MTD or the Family Time Dining???

If its not FTD and we can still that do you recommend that? My girls will be 4 1/2 and 6 at time of cruise. With FTD does that mean that AO comes to the dining room to get the kids from us?

 

Thanks

 

I eat with my girls. You have traditional dining - not "my time" or even "family my time".

 

So we are discussing two different things. In my time dining - the servers go at your pace.

 

We have had traditional dining as well and if we ordered right away - we have been able to make it out of the dining room at 7pm or a little after.

 

And yes, of course, you can sign your child into AO at any time during the night but my girls never wanted to miss a minute of it :)

[Cheryl H]

Can we drop off the kids anytime during the 7pm-9pm slot or does it have to be right at 7?

If its anytime then i dont mind keep the kids with us during the whole dining service. they tend to be really good about not throwing fits and waiting for us to finish our meals.

Now, do you think on the Allure that if we are booked at 6pm that we will be dont by 7ish? Or should i assume it will take like 2 hours to eat?

IF we do decide to run them up to AO do they have a dress code? Say its formal night and i dress the girls up....do we have to run back to the room to change before they can go to AO?

I know they offer to feed the kids lunch and/or dinner at AO for an extra fee. Does anyone know how much this is? Just incase we opt to do that one day?

sorry i know its a year away but im trying to figure out what will be the best for us. We plan on doing excursions in every port so im wondering if i should change it to MTD instead just to be safe and then if we need to eat late we can and just give the girls a snack if they get hungry.

 

We've never paid a charge for our son to have dinner with Adventure Ocean. It's called Adventure Dining. We used it on the Radiance and the Jewel. For those 2 ships, it was offered every night except the first night. Our son wanted to do that every night. We had to sign him up some time during the day and tell them what entree he wanted. Then we just delivered him to AO by 5:00 pm. They took the children participating to Windjammer for dinner. Then they took them back for the evening activities. Our kiddo loved it! We did leave a tip the last evening for the AO staff.

 

I think the entree choices, were nuggets, hamburger, hotdog and something else I think. Our son wanted nuggets every single night. I think they also got him some french fries and ice cream. A couple of the nights he was the only child participating. The rest of the nights there were either 1 or 2 joining in.

 

We had strict instructions from our son not to get him a minute before 10pm. He was having too much fun and hated to leave each evening. We even had a mad face photo of him the last night when we got him picked up.

 

Did you mean a dress code for AO? I wouldn't think they would want to show up in dressy clothes. The only rule I know of is that they have to have a closed toed shoe to play dodge ball I think. So we always make sure he has his tennis shoes on. He never really got dirty in AO, but I think they did make a volcano, and they used glue to make a constellation, and they played with glitter to make an experiment on how germs spread. Also they made a Saturn with a CD and styrofoam balls which I think they had to paint.

 

That's pretty much how it went for the last 2 cruises (age 6 and 7).

[crusinmama06]

We've never paid a charge for our son to have dinner with Adventure Ocean. It's called Adventure Dining. We used it on the Radiance and the Jewel. For those 2 ships, it was offered every night except the first night. Our son wanted to do that every night. We had to sign him up some time during the day and tell them what entree he wanted. Then we just delivered him to AO by 5:00 pm. They took the children participating to Windjammer for dinner. Then they took them back for the evening activities. Our kiddo loved it! We did leave a tip the last evening for the AO staff.

 

I think the entree choices, were nuggets, hamburger, hotdog and something else I think. Our son wanted nuggets every single night. I think they also got him some french fries and ice cream. A couple of the nights he was the only child participating. The rest of the nights there were either 1 or 2 joining in.

 

We had strict instructions from our son not to get him a minute before 10pm. He was having too much fun and hated to leave each evening. We even had a mad face photo of him the last night when we got him picked up.

 

Did you mean a dress code for AO? I wouldn't think they would want to show up in dressy clothes. The only rule I know of is that they have to have a closed toed shoe to play dodge ball I think. So we always make sure he has his tennis shoes on. He never really got dirty in AO, but I think they did make a volcano, and they used glue to make a constellation, and they played with glitter to make an experiment on how germs spread. Also they made a Saturn with a CD and styrofoam balls which I think they had to paint.

 

That's pretty much how it went for the last 2 cruises (age 6 and 7).

 

They do charge for lunch ;)

[Cheryl H]

They do charge for lunch ;)

 

Good to know. Thanks!! We've not actually ever taken advantage of the lunch.

[crusinmama06]

Good to know. Thanks!! We've not actually ever taken advantage of the lunch.

 

Yeah neither have I. That's one of my cruise rules - the kids eat lunch with us. :D

[jmpaull]

I eat with my girls. You have traditional dining - not "my time" or even "family my time".

 

So we are discussing two different things. In my time dining - the servers go at your pace.

 

We have had traditional dining as well and if we ordered right away - we have been able to make it out of the dining room at 7pm or a little after.

 

And yes, of course, you can sign your child into AO at any time during the night but my girls never wanted to miss a minute of it :)

 

Would you recommend i contact my travel agent and have it changed to my time or family time dining? Since we will be eating dinner with our girls every night?

[rm1247]

Cruisinmama - So your preference is My Time Dining? We've always had the traditional 6pm dining, but on our upcoming cruise in Sept (on Royal) we are on the waitlist (have been since last Fall!) and I've been kind of bummed that we'll have My Time Dining. My main worry is that my kids love connecting with our servers. How easy is it to get the same server each night? Did you still do 6pm? Any other tips? We're traveling with my parents, so there are 8 of us, including 4 kids who will want to head to AO.

[MarlboroBell]

It's been a couple of years since we did this, but the important thing is that My Time Dining and My Family Time Dining are two different, and indeed incompatible, things. You can't do both.

 

My Time Dining means you go along to a dining room at a time of your choice and eat.

 

My Family Time Dining requires 6pm Traditional Dining. The kids (theoretically) get served quickly, and by 6:40, the intention is that they're done, you drop them off with the counselors at the entrance to the dining room, and you go back and eat a relaxed kid-free rest of dinner.

 

In our case, it didn't work out very well because the kids suddenly clung to us and refused to go to AO, but that was more because of the nature of our kids than anything the AO folks did. (My son has Asperger's (mild autism) and I still remember the awesome counselor known as Ben 10 who looked after him.)

[c230k]

Would you recommend i contact my travel agent and have it changed to my time or family time dining? Since we will be eating dinner with our girls every night?

 

Go to Royal Caribbean.com

https://secure.royalcaribbean.com/mycruises/login.do?default=false&cS=MHDR

 

create a logon, add your reservation number and then you can change your dining times and any other changes you wish to make.

 

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

:cool: