Legend of the Seas - Rome to Venice 8/31 Review

[jrmint427]

We got back to the ship and got changed for an earlier dinner. The MDR menu for our fourth night, in Malta:

 

 

I ordered the mozzarella salad as an appetizer. It was similar to Caprese, on a bed of arugula.

 

 

By this time it had become my habit to order an appetizer and a soup. So, I also had the Vichyssoise, which was a chilled cream of potato and leek soup. I thought it was surprisingly good.

 

 

For my main dish, I ordered the Vegetable Paella. It was fine, but not my favorite of the main meals.

 

 

I was always excited to see the dessert menu. Our server, Valentino, would say, “It’s yummy yummy time!”

 

 

I ordered the Crema Catalana, which was baked vanilla cream and a biscotti biscuit. It was similar to crème brulee. I loved the top layer, but skipped the rest. I do that with crème brulee too.

 

[jrmint427]

Here was the Cruise Compass for our day in Malta:

 

 

[jrmint427]

As we left dinner and passed the Centrum elevators, crew members were passing out raffle tickets. We didn’t know what the raffle was for, but they told us to be at the Centrum shops in 5-10 minutes. As we walked into the shops, we saw a huge crowd of people and heard the announcer already beginning to call the winning number. They called the numbers slowly, one at a time, and the next thing we knew, the husband of the couple we were with had won! And it turned out they were only calling one number. How lucky!

 

It turned out that the raffle was a promotion to get people in the Centrum Shops for a short sale they were having. You could buy many cheap items on sale for the low price of $10, and if you bought five items, you got one item free.

 

The prize was to pick out three items for free. The couple was very nice and let me pick one of the three items. I ended up with cz earrings, but they do look pretty nice! It was a madhouse at the sale, though. People were pushing to get to the front of the lines to pick out scarves, watches, jewelry, etc.

 

 

 

 

One of the crew members saw me trying to get pictures of the crowds and told me that when they have this promotion in other locations, it gets even crazier than it was that night!

 

We then headed to the Schooner Bar for a drink and to listen to Tony B on the piano. As I said before, this was one of my favorite things to do each evening.

 

 

Around 10pm he took a break and the ship hosted Name That Tune – Michael Jackson trivia. Our team did just okay, but it was fun.

 

After the piano bar, we went to watch the Love and Marriage Game Show. This is a show similar to the Newlyweds game where several couples are selected and the men and women have to answer questions about each other, and then try to guess what their spouse said.

 

For the RCI version, they selected three couples. They looked for newlyweds married within the past year, a couple who had been married awhile (I think up to 15 years) and a couple who had been married a long time. Two of the couples selected were from our Cruise Critic roll call. The couple married the longest had been married 35 years! The host of the show was Rico, our cruise director. Maybe it was just me, but I thought he looked a little like Steve Carell.

 

 

 

It was a funny show, but I felt bad for the contestants at several points – especially considering the parents of one of the contestants were in the audience! The men had to say which of their wives relatives the liked the least, and which part of their wives they would make bigger and which parts they would make smaller. The tame question was, who would they take with them to a deserted island?

 

The women had to say the most interesting place they made “tacka-ticky” and what the first thing their husbands touch in the morning is. They had us laughing the whole time, but I was thankful I was not up on that stage!

 

The next day was a sea day, so we enjoyed staying up and chatting later than we normally did. We were going to lose an hour that night, and the ship was great about making announcements and leaving reminders in our state room about the time change. I was thankful that we were losing the hour on a sea day!

[cruise pup]

Since you're a vegetarian did you ask about the ingredients in the Vichyssoise? It is usually made with chicken stock/broth. That goes for most creamed vegetable soups.

[jrmint427]

Since you're a vegetarian did you ask about the ingredients in the Vichyssoise? It is usually made with chicken stock/broth. That goes for most creamed vegetable soups.

 

There were a few creamy soups on this trip, and I was told they were made with vegetable broth. There was cream as well, but I am not vegan, so this was fine for me.

[Bimmer09]

Loving your review and fantastic photographs! I have never been to the places you visited but will see some of them next September on the Ocean Princess.

 

Your food photographs are among the best I have seen. Have you mentioned which camera(s) you used?

 

Looking forward to your Venice report as that is where my cruise starts next year.

 

Thanks again.

 

Norris

in Chicago

[jrmint427]

Loving your review and fantastic photographs! I have never been to the places you visited but will see some of them next September on the Ocean Princess.

 

Your food photographs are among the best I have seen. Have you mentioned which camera(s) you used?

 

Looking forward to your Venice report as that is where my cruise starts next year.

 

Thanks again.

 

Norris

in Chicago

 

Thank you! We used two cameras on this trip, a DSLR and a point and shoot. We used the Canon T2i (DSLR) for most of our touring pictures and the Canon Powershot SX260 HS for most of the pictures on the ship.

 

Most of the food pictures were taken with the point and shoot camera. I use Picasa and Google Plus to edit the pictures.

 

Where else will you be visiting next year? Venice was our last port, hopefully it won't take me too long to get there :)

[jrmint427]

Even though we stayed up until almost 1am the night before (and we lost an hour this night, so it was really 2am), I woke up a little after 9am and could not get back to sleep. I wanted to let my husband sleep in, so around 10am I decided to go to the Windjammer on my own for breakfast. I had a feeling I would run into a friendly face or two considering how often we ran into people we knew, and I was right.

 

Shortly after I sat down with my breakfast, I saw another couple from our Cruise Critic roll call and they offered to sit with me. It was relaxing to eat breakfast slowly and enjoy the views and conversation. I picked up a banana to take back to my husband, thinking he might be awake by the time I got back.

 

 

When I got back to our room, my husband was still asleep. He got up around noon and we decided to try the main dining room for lunch. I wasn’t too hungry, but figured I could eat as much or as little as I wanted.

 

We were seated quickly with several other groups of 2 and 3. I was being so lazy this day, I forgot to take pictures of the menu or my food. They had a salad bar where you could tell the crew member at the bar what you wanted, and they threw it all in a big bowl and mixed it up right there. I was impressed by the number of options for the salad, including different types of cheeses, dressings and even some non-meat protein.

 

The salad was good, but I just ate a little and shared the rest with my husband. I ordered the gnocchi for lunch. It was very good, but very rich. We skipped dessert. We picked up a Bloody Mary in the Schooner bar (for my husband) and headed back to our room.

 

[jrmint427]

I let my lunch settle and then decided I would try to get a little exercise in. I changed into my workout clothes and thought I would try to run around the quarter mile track on the top deck. By the time I got up there, it was crowded and very windy, so I walked around a bit and went in search of the gym instead. This was the track on another morning:

 

 

I found the gym by walking through the Solarium and Spa. There were several treadmills available. They were set to km/hour instead of miles, so I tried to do some math in my head as I adjusted the speed for running and walking. It was a little weird trying to run on a treadmill while the ship rocked back and forth, and I had to catch my balance a few times. I ran/walked 3 km and called it good.

 

When I got back to the room I was planning to rinse off and get changed for the pool. It was 2:55pm. As I was getting in the shower, my husband asked, “Don’t we have somewhere to be at 3pm?” I had completely forgotten about the formal Cruise Critic Meet and Mingle hosted by the ship. They had delivered an invitation to our stateroom on Day 1 and I had tucked that away.

 

We still wanted to check out the pool after the meet and mingle, so we changed into our bathing suits and cover-ups and went down to the Anchors Aweigh Lounge, only 5-10 minutes late.

 

I could not believe how many people were in the lounge. More than twice the number of people who actually participated in our roll call. We had already met most of the people who were regulars on the roll call, and there were many faces we did not recognize. Since we had already gone to our meet and greet on the first day, we probably could have skipped this formal event.

 

There was also a huge international group who had not participated in our board. I think most were from Russia. I think what happened was this group had their own board on another forum, and one person from their group had participated in our roll call on Cruise Critic. He must have encouraged them to sign up. It was a little awkward because their group sat on one side of the room, our group sat on the other, and there was not a lot of mingling. Their group won most of the raffle prizes, including the champagne!

 

They wanted to take a group picture. They took one of each group separately, and then one together. Someone posted the international group’s picture on our roll call, but I still have not seen the full group picture. If anyone reading this has a copy, please post it!!

 

We skipped out quickly after the picture to head to the pool. It was difficult to find chairs that didn’t have towels or other items on them to save them. Considering how few people were actually in the pool, I think there were just a lot of chair hogs, off doing other things on the ship. We found a single chair after a few minutes and decided to share it. I went to get a piña colada, and we sat and watched a show called Copy Cat.

 

After a while, the people in the chairs next to us were moving to chairs back in the shade, but left all their stuff on the chairs in the sun. I asked one of the women in the group if we could use the chair right next to us (still leaving them 2 chairs in the sun). At first she said no, but came back a few minutes later to say we could take the chair. This is what the pool area looked like at 6:30am on another day... I guess if we wanted chairs we should have gotten up much earlier!

 

 

We sat out for another 15 minutes or so. I tried to get into the pool, but it was freezing cold, and it was not quite hot enough outside to make up for that, so I quickly went back to my chair. We left just a little before 5pm to get ready for dinner. It was the second formal night of our cruise.

[jrmint427]

We had dinner with our normal group. The menu:

 

 

I started with the Creamed Wild Mushrooms. I liked the pastry and the mushroom sauce but ate around the mushroom chunks. I like the flavor of mushrooms, not the texture.

 

 

I also had the chilled roasted peach soup. I enjoyed trying the different fruit soups every night. Most tasted like fruit smoothies.

 

 

I also had the house salad this evening. I normally only had two appetizers, but the sunflower seeds sounded good, and I justified that this was a healthy option.

 

 

My main course was the Soy Meatballs. I was impressed that they offered soy products. We had a different server this night, and when I ordered the Soy Meatballs, he asked me if I knew they were not real meat. I said yes, that’s the point. He did not seem to approve of my order, but I’m not sure why. This was one of my favorite main dishes of the cruise!

 

 

The meatballs were in a Mexican-inspired lentil chili with tortilla chips. Interesting, but delicious!

 

We had a beautiful sunset during this meal:

 

[jrmint427]

One of the first nights a server had told us that we had to order the Baked Alaska when they had it. I was not sure what this was, but we saw it was on the menu this night.

 

 

We continued to follow the rule of ordering what is recommended, so I ordered the Baked Alaska. It was ice cream under a baked meringue. I didn’t really like the meringue, but the ice cream underneath was great.

 

 

We also ordered the low-fat angel food cake to share. It was okay, but I just picked at it.

 

[GranysT]

Never been a big fan of the ship's Baked Alaska. I love the Grand Marnier Souffle tho. Deelish! If you've never tried it, be sure to do so on your next cruise.

[cruise pup]

They used to automatically serve everyone Baked Alaska and not even bother with a dessert menu. Since I don't like it I always had to let the waiter know after my entrée that I would want a different dessert. I think it's smarter that they now put it on the menu with other desserts and allow the passengers to select the dessert just like every other night. They used to parade around the dining room with the Alaskas flaming but I think they stopped doing that a while back so they don't have as much prepared. At one time Holland America not only did the parade of Baked Alaska but on Alaska cruises they had the Running of the Mousse and the waiters would wear antlers and the Rocky & Bullwinkle theme was played on the p.a. system.

[travellingshoes]

Loving the review. Thank you!

 

Quick question- did you have the $25 laundry bag option? Do you remember what day?

 

Debbie

 

 

Sent using the Cruise Critic forums app

[DragonOfTheSeas]

DH loves the baked Alaska. He will be so happy to hear they are serving it again. For awhile we did not see it on the menu.

[JM-1972]

Loving the review, the food pictures are great as my husband is a vegetarian.

[jrmint427]

Never been a big fan of the ship's Baked Alaska. I love the Grand Marnier Souffle tho. Deelish! If you've never tried it, be sure to do so on your next cruise.

 

I'll have to try that one next time!

 

They used to automatically serve everyone Baked Alaska and not even bother with a dessert menu. Since I don't like it I always had to let the waiter know after my entrée that I would want a different dessert. I think it's smarter that they now put it on the menu with other desserts and allow the passengers to select the dessert just like every other night. They used to parade around the dining room with the Alaskas flaming but I think they stopped doing that a while back so they don't have as much prepared. At one time Holland America not only did the parade of Baked Alaska but on Alaska cruises they had the Running of the Mousse and the waiters would wear antlers and the Rocky & Bullwinkle theme was played on the p.a. system.

 

I'm glad it's not automatic anymore, but it would have been fun to see the dessert flaming!

[jrmint427]

Loving the review. Thank you!

 

Quick question- did you have the $25 laundry bag option? Do you remember what day?

 

Debbie

 

 

Sent using the Cruise Critic forums app

 

We did have this option... I think we got a notice about it on our third day (in Malta), which was right before our sea day. I asked our room steward for a bag on our sea day and we left it out that evening. It was very convenient!

[jrmint427]

Loving the review, the food pictures are great as my husband is a vegetarian.

 

Thank you! I'm glad it's helpful, I was really curious about what I would be able to eat on the ship and was so happy to see they identified the vegetarian options on the menu.

[jrmint427]

The Cruise Compass for our day at sea:

 

 

 

After dinner we went to watch the main show in the theater, Absolutely Fab. This was my favorite show of the trip. It was a song and dance show where they worked their way through British Music, and even sang a Spice Girls medley. I loved it!

 

Our Cruise Compass advertised a poolside Michael Jackson concert at 10pm. We thought we would check that out, but it turned out to just be a Michael Jackson movie playing by the pool. We hung out by the pool for a little bit. Several people in our group, including my husband, decided to head to bed.

 

At 11pm the ship was hosting the Quest game show in the Anchors Aweigh Lounge. I had heard a lot about this game show and decided I couldn’t miss it. I went downstairs with a few other people from our roll call. Based on what I had heard about this game show, I thought I would just watch. But when the crew came around with numbers for teams, our little group decided we would take a number just in case we wanted to participate.

 

For those who are not familiar with Quest, you break up into teams of 4-6. The host of the game show announces a task, and someone from your group has to come down to the stage to demonstrate completion of that task and hold up your team number to be recorded. We did not realize in the beginning, but speed was important. Although our team completed every task, we did not win because we did not complete the tasks as fast as others.

 

The tasks started out easy, like sending a woman down in male shoes, or our whole group coming down to the stage to dance to Gangnam Style. The tasks became increasingly risqué, and without spoiling too much, clothes started coming off (mostly men's clothes). As one person on our team phrased it, it was a moving train, and once you were on, there was no jumping off. We were all driven to complete each and every task!

 

I’ll leave you with a few of the tamer pictures from the evening. The women had to put on lipstick and kiss the head of a bald man:

 

 

Then the men had to kiss the head of the same bald man… with lipstick:

 

 

The rest of the pictures may be embarrassing to those in them, so I will be nice and not post them!

 

It was a very fun night, although a little late for a port night for me. When I came back to our room, my husband was fast asleep. But this guy was up watching TV:

 

 

My husband said the towel animal was watching cartoons when he came into the room.

[windjamming]

The sail into Valletta, Malta was beautiful. It was my favorite sail-in of the trip. The city is mostly made from limestone, which gives it an ancient and unique look. I was so excited to catch the sail-in from our room as I was getting ready that morning. I wished I had gotten ready quicker to have been on the top deck for these views, already enjoying some coffee.

 

I completely agree about the sail in!! We were lucky enough to stop in Malta on our Mariner cruise, and we were completely unprepared for its uniqueness and beauty. It was later in September when we were there, so when we sailed away it was already dark. Gorgeous, too!

 

Still loving the review, jrmint427! What a neat itinerary. Looking forward to the rest!

[Bimmer09]

Thank you! We used two cameras on this trip, a DSLR and a point and shoot. We used the Canon T2i (DSLR) for most of our touring pictures and the Canon Powershot SX260 HS for most of the pictures on the ship.

 

Most of the food pictures were taken with the point and shoot camera. I use Picasa and Google Plus to edit the pictures.

 

Where else will you be visiting next year? Venice was our last port, hopefully it won't take me too long to get there :)

 

Ocean Princess itinerary is

9/20/14 Board Venice (stay overnight on ship in port)

Dubrovnik

Sea day

Valletta,Malta

Tunis (La Goulette)

Sorrento

Rome (Civittavecchia)

 

Adding one day in Venice before boarding and two days in Rome after the cruise. It will be our first time on a small ship-680 passengers, 30,000 tonnes.

 

As usual I will be taking lots of photos (Canon T3i) and HD video uploaded to youtube for a future review on the Princess boards where I live.

 

We haven't been to any of these ports before.

 

Now the waiting!

 

Norris

in Chicago

[Merion_Mom]

 

We learned that Artemis was both the goddess of fertility and of hunting. As the goddess of fertility, they speculate that the eggs on her represent testicles. One theory is that people would sacrifice bulls in hopes of fertility and would hang the testicles on her statues.

 

 

 

Your guide told you that those are eggs and represent testicles?

 

hmmmm

 

They are breasts. As the guide said, goddess of fertility. Breasts.

 

:)

[Merion_Mom]

 

 

My husband ordered the prime rib. He said it was good, better than he had expected, but not the best he ever had. See, I promised there would be pictures of meat:

 

 

I LOVE this comment!

 

Your review is amazing.

[Bobal]

Your guide told you that those are eggs and represent testicles?

 

hmmmm

 

They are breasts. As the guide said, goddess of fertility. Breasts.

 

:)

 

Google Artemis statue breasts and you'll find that many articles on this state that what the guide said is believed to be the truth.