Ridiculously long 4/19/14 Reflection review

[kroberst]

The overview:

 

 

Loved the cruise, it was a great get-away after a long winter. InterContinental Miami was a beautiful hotel and very convenient to the port (in terms of a relatively cheap taxi fare). Reasonable food was within walking distance at the Bayside Market. DH thought there could have been a few more things to do during the sea days (more items like the i-classes), I was content to develop "kindle thumb" sitting by the pool. The ports were “ok” but we didn’t select this for the ports (we had been to all 3 before - San Juan, St. Thomas, St. Maarten). We were both pleasantly surprised with the variety in the buffet and other than some items not being hot, were generally pleased with the food. While we had different opinions of Tuscan Grill and Lawn Club Grill, I’m pretty sure we will try them again. We both really liked Qsine and will definitely eat there again. The Alcoves were a bust, we will not rent one again. A couple of times during the week the ship’s performers had some theme nights where they did song/dance routines in the main atrium. The first night was some weird futuristic type where they stalked the elevators/stairs ahead of the performance (we missed the actual performance that night – we just noticed people in costumes while we were leaving the main dining room). The second one we noticed was zombie-related (I think – the costumes were a little old-west but the face makeup looked zombie-esque), we watched the performance but since we’re not really show people –were underwhelmed. They advertised some liquid performance in the solarium one night but we didn’t go. They did have an issue early on the cruise with some of the music played in public venues – specifically whoever was in charge of music did not play the “edited” versions but rather the explicit versions. When I was in the gym, the music overhead included f-bombs while around the pool some of the songs included derogatory terms usually bleeped on the radio. I wasn’t necessarily offended (I have original explicit songs on my own mp3) but more surprised to hear it broadcast. Others found this offensive and this issue was brought up to the hotel director during the meet and greet. I didn’t notice this after that point. We were satisfied enough to book 2 more while on board.

 

 

 

 

I'll post the gory details below but feel free to stop reading here unless you have insomnia.

[kroberst]

We were way ahead for this trip. Spent the prior weekend packing and making lists of what we wanted or needed both prior to flying and then again after we landed. The night before, I put together my backpack of goodies and DH enjoyed guys night with his buddies. Then off to bed. Tomorrow was scheduled as a relaxing day of flying. Instead of my usual habit to book the earliest flight possible, I booked one that left in the middle of the day and would get us to Miami by dinner. We also took advantage of a bus shuttle service to get us from our home to the airport so we needed to factor in an extra 2 hour block ahead of when we wanted to check in for the flight. Even with that, we still did not need to be out of bed at the crack of dawn. Well, we didn’t need to but apparently my “ohmygodI’mgoingonacruise” inner demon needed to. After waking up promptly at 5 with no interest in going back to sleep, I started to putt around the house. Unfortunately for poor DH, part of my Thursday evening activities included setting up timers on lamps through the house (including one in the bedroom). As I walked down the hall after feeding Miss Liberty the Labradork, I saw that the bedroom lamp was on and DH was faced away squeezing his eyes tight. (oops) Eventually he gave up once he smelled the coffee brewing.

We killed some time with one last load of laundry, making sure the house was picked up, unplugging various appliances and giving Libby lots of treats (guilt offerings). We still had quite a bit of time before we needed to grab the shuttle (10 am) so we took off for breakfast. FINALLY… after an interminable breakfast and waiting for the shuttle, we boarded for our adventure! The cruise was just the first part, after that was a week in Key West with wonderful friends who invited us to stay with them. While on the bus (MI Flyer service with room to spread out, free wi-fi enroute and water), DH was looking at his boarding pass and noticed the surprise. While I was checking in for our flight the prior day, there were first class seat upgrades for a great price so I took advantage but didn’t tell him. It has been 20+ years since we flew first class and it was as relaxing as I remember. Hopefully that option will be available for the return flight! We checked in at the airport and the flight was on time for 3pm departure.

We arrived in Miami on time and grabbed a taxi to IC Miami. Taxi cost was $29 plus tip. Many other shuttle service options if you’re looking that may be cheaper depending on the # of people you have and the amount of luggage you need to accommodate. We just had 2 checked bags and 2 carry-ons. I had used LMTClub for the reservation at a great rate. The bellboy (he looked about 12 years old, definitely too young to be a bell’man’) took our luggage, gave us a tag and said he would bring our luggage up after we were checked in. At check-in, Rafael the trainee (no last name or initial on the badge – just “trainee”) gave us a nice room on the 22nd floor. He also gave us a restaurant to try in PR for mofongo, he’s from PR and his mom still lives there. I asked him where she would go for dinner and he said “Raices” so we’ll give it a try. He also confirmed our post-cruise 1 night stay. No more than 5 minutes after we entered the room, the young man arrived with our luggage. He offered to get us ice and was back with that in moments.

We walked to Bayside for dinner and tried “The Knife” – it was just ok and I doubt we would go again. Think of Fires of Brazil but less focused on presentation and the variety of food. You walk to where they are grilling the meat and vegies instead of having roving meat on a stick. No seafood options other than grilled fish (which was tasty – drenched in butter, garlic and herbs). Certain wine and a baby glass or 2 of beer (Miller Lite draft) are included – extra bar drinks are your usual touristy drinks served in a big fancy glass so they can charge you for the great breakable souvenir that will never survive the trip home. We headed back to the hotel and crashed (after all, we got up really really early).

[kroberst]

I woke up sometime in the middle of the night to lightning and thunder. Oh no, would we have a wet sailaway party? I fell back to sleep and woke up again around 6ish (that darn inner demon). The weather finally cleared around 9-ish and we walked to CVS for last minute items. The check-in desk was mobbed when we left for the drug store, it appears lots of post-cruise travelers had already arrived. The CVS store is just 1 block away from the hotel. We had a quick breakfast courtesy of the hotel’s Starbucks which we took back to our room for relaxing. Well, hubby relaxed and I paced until 10:45 after tagging our luggage with the cruise tags. I tried to do the electronic check-out but it was not working for some reason. Because of the size of the hotel and all the transitions happening on a Saturday morning, it took a couple of tries to get an elevator and then the ride down was anything but non-stop. This didn’t bother us, we were expecting this but some people were getting really cranky about it. So people remember – YOU’RE ON VACATION! Just take a breath, you’re not going to be stranded in the hotel. Some lady yelled at DH “you are kidding - this is the 5th one!” when the elevator doors opened on her floor and we were already stuffed (like he was personally responsible for it). When we reached the bottom, DH took the bags to the front while I stood in line for check-out. We left a thank-you note for Rafael (I hope/wonder if it actually was passed to him), re-confirmed our post-cruise stay and walked out to grab a taxi.

At check-out, there were several shuttle bus vendors (probably would hold 16-20 people) pushing hard to get people on their bus – they had trailers that they pulled behind for all the luggage. I wasn’t interested in that and we were able to get right into a cab and on the way to the port. The cab fare was $8 plus tip. The guys at the port directed all the traffic into loading zones and we jumped out. DH took care of the cab driver while I took care of the port guy. He then directed us to the check in area. We waited no more than 2-3 minutes at the various stops which included the port security screening area, the Celebrity check in area, and then again to board the ship. I forgot to check my watch exactly but my guess is we left the hotel around 11:15 and were onboard by 11:45 with our welcome aboard fizzy drink (I’ll just stay out of the champagne vs. sparkling wine discrimination, I don’t drink either so quite frankly don’t care about the distinction).

We took our carry-ons directly to Bistro on 5 where we were meeting some folks from our roll call for lunch. We had a good turn-out, about 20 of us and spent time there until cabins were cleared (sometime around 1 pm? Perhaps my cohorts can be more accurate). DH enjoyed the cowboy crepe (wow – this is awesome, it tastes like a cheese-steak!) and I had the Mediterranean crepe, mmmm. Dessert crepes included the Nutella/banana/pistachio for me and dulce de leche for DH (really, I mean it, it was for him – I just wanted a taste, and then another, oh what the heck – just one more). We also broke in our beverage packages – classic for me as part of 123Go and upgraded premium for DH. Cheers!

We then found our way to the cabin. Our cabin was 6215, a 1A (first extra big balcony counting from the hump cabins toward the front of the ship). The balcony is huge with plenty of room for part of it to be shaded as well as sunny. As you look down, there is white bin of some sort underneath but no obstruction as you sit and look out the glass. And as they say in real estate, location location location! The location of this cabin was perfect for us. We would get off the stairs/elevators, walk past the Ipad area, and we were “home”. We were right above both Café al Bacio for me and 5th floor smoking area for DH. Our cabin steward was Krishna. He was great, he promptly introduced himself and gave us a brief intro to the cabin. Krishna was always around to help you into the cabin when your hands were full and always knowing when you were in the cabin in the mornings/evenings so he didn’t knock. My friends surprised me with some sail away yummies (chocolates and a tiramisu later in the week) so he brought those to us as well. In fact, the cake was so big – we cut a quarter out of it and left the rest for Krishna asking him to share it with his friends.

They called the muster drill and we reported to the main dining room (much nicer than my Equinox muster where our staging area was standing in a really hot lounge – different cabins, different muster stations) to sit and view the videos. Once that was done, we went back to the cabin (our luggage had already arrived!) so we just pulled it into the cabin and went up to the Sunset Bar for our roll call sailaway party. After an hour or so, we went back to the cabin to unpack and decide what to do for dinner. We had select dining so we went to the main dining room around 7:30. The wait for us (since we were not interested in making reservations) was about 10 minutes. The hostess was running 2 lines – one for those with reservations and another for those without. Our waiter was Francisco (Buddy the Elf is right, that’s fun to say). We sat with 4 others and had a nice evening. I had ravioli and DH had the pork chop. The sommelier was present (2 at our table were having wine) but the bar wait staff seemed a bit short-handed. As we were finishing dessert, I hit the wall. As soon as we were done, we went back to the cabin and I was probably sleeping within 10 minutes. The bed was really comfy and we each had nice substantial pillows (thick not flat which I prefer since I sleep on my back and side).

[kroberst]

This was a seaday and the first formal night. We woke up and saw that it was overcast. As I got through the shower, DH showed up with a lovely coconut latte from al Bacio (guess all was forgiven about the bedroom lamp) and we sat on the balcony for a bit. Today we had reserved an alcove. The seas were fairly rough (I didn’t think they were bad but the captain described them as rough in his morning address) and there was a lot of wind by the alcoves. We approached Chris who was the gentleman in charge of the area and he apologized for the conditions and said he wouldn’t be able to put the canopies up due to the wind. Then, he offered us the option to cancel the reservation with a full refund due to the inclement weather or reschedule on another day with availability. We rescheduled to our St. Thomas stop and we would get the difference in rental ($50) refunded to our credit card. This does bring up a good point about these alcoves if you are of the mind to be interested in renting them. While a sea day does give you an area when the ship is full – since you are under way you are more at risk for a windy experience that might cause you to not be able to use the canopy. On the other hand, the port day makes you less inclined to get off the ship since you’ve paid for the area (or maybe that’s just me being cheap). Also on the port day, even if you don’t want to get off the ship – the rest of the areas where you might want to relax will likely be available anyway since most everyone else would be on shore. Pros and cons to each.

After the alcove plan was busted, we had a quick breakfast in the buffet then DH went to an i-pad class while I took the galley tour. The buffet had a good selection but I will say that not all the hot items were hot. I think a couple of factors play into this since true food-borne outbreaks (not talking noro) appear to be very rare on ships so my presumption is that food is held at the proper temps for the appropriate times. It may be that the hot items (scrambled eggs, roasted potatoes) cool if you pick them up first and wander around the area checking out other items as I did without really thinking about it. The air conditioning is cranking in the buffet so once the food is away from the heat sources, it just cools due to the room temperature. Lesson for later in the week was to select made to order items and get them after the room temperature stuff.

We met around lunch time to discuss the rest of our dining. We were intentionally avoiding formal nights so hoped for specialty dining on those nights specifically. We were only interested in trying Qsine, Tuscan Grill and maybe Lawn Club so we did not take advantage of any dining packages. We called for our reservations and were able to get into Qsine that night at 6:30 and then Tuscan Grill the second formal night. We went to the buffet for a very light lunch based on all I had read about Qsine. Some more relaxing in the afternoon while DH went to a watch seminar. We went to Ensemble Lounge for pre-dinner drinks and then showed up for our reservation. Evica (pronounced Eveesa) was our culinary tour guide and was just wonderful. We noticed they did size the portions a bit based on table size. We made it through 5 or 6 plates before we called uncle (because I needed to keep some room for the chocolate tombstone). We tried disco shrimp, lava crab, lobster escargot, spring rolls, painter’s filet, and the ceviche. We enjoyed everything and had such a friendly experience, we decided we wanted to try this again later in the week. DH tried a couple of the Qsine drinks (included in his premium package). The only one he didn’t care for was the corpse one (that had absinthe) because he doesn’t care for licorice. Then with full tummies, we went back to the cabin for nighty-night. When we got back, we found a little guy waiting for us (DH said it was a crab, I called it a sting ray) along with the giant surprise tiramisu. Krishna saw the pain on my face (or perhaps it could best be described as anticipatory indigestion) so he quickly offered to put the cake on ice for us until we wanted it.

[kroberst]

We woke up to partly sunny skies. I got up really early (I know, you’re thinking – “wow, you’re kidding!”) and scooted down to Café for our coffees. But I was so early, they weren’t even open yet! So, I went to Guest Relations to get a few Attention to Detail cards, the buffet to get a glass of juice and sat around reading my kindle until a more socially acceptable hour. At 7:10, I went back to Café for my coconut latte and chocolate croissants and more kindle action. Closer to 8, I got a coffee for DH (I took both our sign and sail cards when I left the cabin) and took them back to the cabin. Then we were thinking what to have for breakfast when I had an ingenious idea – tiramisu! It has all the necessary breakfast components, coffee, cream, eggs (in the lady fingers – hey it’s protein). Krishna stopped by the room, we asked for the cake and he was back lickety split. We cut the afore-mentioned quarter off, ate half of it and fit the remainder in the room fridge. Then we left the rest of the cake for Krishna with a note letting him know we wanted to share it with him and went to our connections party. The Hotel Director and several of his staff joined us and did a Q&A. I gave him the cards I had filled out for Krishna and Evica. DH attended another i-class and then we met up at 12:30 for the Captain’s Club party. That was really nice – the Captain did attend along with quite a few of his officers. Since this was just my second Celebrity cruise, it was my first one and they had complimentary drinks and hors’ deouvers. Meryl Diaz, the new Captain’s Club hostess was introduced and circulated the room (it was held in the Sky Lounge). After that, we docked in PR. We had no excursions planned and weren’t even sure we wanted to get off the ship. We finally did around dinner time, walked up to the old town area and walked right back. We didn't find Raices for mofongo - maybe next time. Then we tried the buffet for dinner. They had a really nice selection and it was tasty. We spent the evening sitting on the lawn by the Sunset bar watching the lights disappear in the distance. We were able to stay up until 11 this night! (Woo hoo, what party animals).

[kroberst]

Our replacement alcove rental was today. It was hot but there was a pretty good breeze. We wondered about going off the ship (on one hand, I wanted to take advantage of the alcove but the other hand – DH gets restless). Ultimately we decided not to since we had another week coming up for playing in the water. Chris got us started and we told us that we could call them if we wanted anything from the area (they would get us lunch from the Porch ($5 fee still applies), drinks from the sunset bar and ice buckets of water). There are phones in each cabana to contact them if/when you want something. He also told us if we wanted to get anything else, we were more than welcome to do that and bring items back ourselves (i.e. from the buffet or the mast grill). It was a bit less than relaxing at first due to a 16-ish month old who was really impressed with his ability to vocalize (I suppose shrieking is better than crying). However, he settled down after about 20 minutes once he had toddled over to check us out and we never heard another peep after that. I honestly don’t remember if the family was staying in a cabana or had just stopped by to let him burn some energy off on the lawn. I don’t recall seeing them the rest of the day. After a while, Chris’ colleague Oscar brought fruit and cheese plates to us. Then we ordered a few sandwiches from the Porch and shared a salad. DH had the steak and cheese Panini which was kind of lacking in meat. He reassembled the sandwich into one-half to get a meatier version. I had the caprese which was good (standard). The sandwiches came with potato chips that were surprisingly crunchy despite the humidity. The Caesar salad was good, not overly dressed. Comparing the Porch to Bistro – I’d give it to Bistro. While I enjoy crunchy Panini sandwiches, the Mediterranean crepe was a bit more flavorful overall and the western/cowboy crepe had much more substantial filling. We hung out in the alcoves until dinner time when the sun got to a point that it was streaming straight in and it became too hot and uncomfortable (after all, we came from MI and had snow the week of the cruise – we weren’t used to high 80s/90s with high humidity). We told Chris we were done for the day although you could use the alcove until 9pm. There is a 15% tip automatically added to the rental fee so the total rental was for 113.85. We did not tip extra on the rental slip (there was a line to do so) but gave Chris a cash tip as we left (which hopefully he shared with Oscar). The alcoves do take up quite a bit of space on that area of the lawn which causes foot traffic to be funneled between them. Therefore, they were replacing some pieces of the lawn in these areas while chains were up to let the others “rest”. The impression the chains gave was that the lawn was off-limits. The other lawn areas (around the sides of the Sunset Bar) did not have this issue. We had dinner in the main dining room again (closer to 6ish) and requested a table for 2. We only had to wait a minute or 2 this time.

[kroberst]

Since we didn’t have any tours scheduled, we took our time getting off the ship. Because we dawdled, there was really no line to wait in to get off the ship. We wandered around the shopping area that is immediately adjacent to where the ship docks and then took the water taxi to the main shopping area of Phillipsburg ($7 per person round trip). The beach areas looked nice with lots of umbrellas and chairs. Some appeared to be for rent but since we didn’t want to do that, we didn’t look into it. Philipsburg was disappointing, it’s been 20 years but the main shopping district was very congested and filled with aggressive sales people. We browsed for about an hour before we just headed back. Once we got back to the port area, we stopped to have a drink, DH bought something in one of the shops and then we got back on board. We didn’t go over to the French side (Marigot) and I think next year we will try that. We had reservations at Lawn Club Grill this evening. It was fun, DH loved it because he was able to get a better/thicker steak than in the main dining room (the strip steaks were sliced thin in the main). We also had scallops, shrimp, lamb and I had a filet. I made the flatbread with the chef’s assistance and DH grilled the steaks. We both thought the temperature in the venue was a bit uncomfortable, on the warm side (not entirely surprising) even though they had the “windows” rolled down. It appears they have heaters in the ceiling if the weather is cool but didn’t seem to run much air conditioning. Of course, we tried the chocolate chip cookie (always good) and also the warm apple cobbler. The ice cream tasted great since we were both so warm. If it were me, I probably wouldn’t spend $45 per person but DH likes grilled meats so when we return to a ship with it – we’ll probably do it again. They did give us advance warning about the lunch option which would have been better (same menu but cost only $25 per person) as we were checking out. They held this only on Thursday which was a sea day and advertised it only in Thursday’s daily (that I noticed) so keep your eyes open if this is something you want to catch. Since we already had a reservation for Tuscan Grill that evening, we did not do this.

[kroberst]

We started the day with coffee and café al bacio treats on the balcony. We may have had breakfast delivered to the room (we did that one day, I just don’t remember which day). We ordered basic breakfast, some pastries, scrambled eggs, sausage links and juice. The eggs were wet but hot. If you are like me and prefer your scrambled eggs dry – you might want to select another preparation method. Krishna brought us our breakfast and left quickly so although I had some $$ out for a tip, I didn’t bother to chase him down since I knew I’d cover him later in the week. DH did another i-class and I just sat around deck 14 and read. I didn’t have too much difficulty finding a deck chair under the awning. DH bubbled in the Solarium hot tub for a bit. This was the 2nd formal day for those wanting to participate. We did not and had reservations for Tuscan Grill this evening. I was really excited because this was the one restaurant I wanted to try even while on the Equinox. DH had the veal and loved it. He proclaimed it the best item he ate all week. I had the seafood stew (like a cioppino). We also asked for small orders of the lobster pasta and the risotto. I must admit I was disappointed in the meal. Once we got past the olive/cheese antipasto, it just didn’t seem that flavorful. I salted all the dishes (something I hardly ever do) but they were just so-so to me. Based on this experience, I probably wouldn’t go back but DH had the opposite opinion about the veal chop. We ended up booking 2 cruises while on board (solstice class) so it’s likely we’ll try it again since it will probably be a dining option. The view however was perfect. Looking out over the wake of the ship – absolutely GORGEOUS. After dinner, DH wandered around the watch event they were holding and I watched some of the happenings in the foyer. When we were done, we went to Molecular Bar to try some of the drinks there. I didn’t have the premium package and was prepared to just pay for the 1 drink I would probably get. Barbara offered the option to upgrade to the premium at that point even though we only had 2 more nights. So, I said “sure” in case we went back the following sea day. I then had another drink. We didn’t end up going back so monetarily it was a wash – no big deal. Other than these 2 drinks, everything else I had was covered by the classic package including some of the non-alcoholic fancy coffee drinks (affogatos – espresso over gelato and the espresso/cream/sugar over ice concoction). I mostly drank gin and tonics, pina colada, dacquiri’s, tom Collins, gin version of tequila sunrise – those kinds of things. This was before all the drink package issues being discussed currently so your experience may differ.

[kroberst]

Another day of lounging and reading on deck. Started out with our usual coffees and then breakfast in the buffet. I usually start each day checking the onboard account while DH gets ready. When I logged in this morning, I noticed a charge for an alcove rental for that day. After breakfast and making sure that DH had not changed his mind about doing alcoves again and set up a reservation when I wasn’t looking, DH went to the navigation seminar and I went to Guest Relations to ask about the charge. The rep printed out my account, we discussed the earlier alcove charges which were ok and then just the most recent one. He called up to the lawn club and said that David would take care of this for me. Because I’m (just a tad) on the retentive side and it didn’t sound like the rep really understand that I was only questioning the charge for today not all the alcove charges based on the one side of the conversation that I could hear – I thanked him and went up to the lawn club myself. Chris was there and I explained to him that I had no problems with the charges earlier in the week due to the cancellation and rescheduling but it was just the charge that showed up that morning. He left to confer with someone and came back saying it was all taken care of but no one could figure out what happened. Later that afternoon, the charge was showing as reversed on the screen. We went to Qsine again that night so we could try some of the other items on the menu. The only thing we repeated was the painter’s filet and the tombstone dessert. It was just as much fun as the first time and we’ll need to make a 3rd visit to finish off our menu items of interest! That evening, we headed back to the cabin to pack up and put our luggage in the hall by the requested 11:00 pm deadline.

[kroberst]

Back in Miami, we had identified the latest available debarkation time since we were just headed back to the InterContinental. Breakfast was available in the main dining room and the buffet until 8/8:30 am respectively. We were requested to vacate our rooms by 8 am so we packed up our carry-ons and went to the buffet. We didn’t have a problem finding a table so we grabbed some breakfast and hung out a while. Our waiting area was the show lounge with a time of 9:30 or 10am. After breakfast we lounged a while outside the buffet area checking emails and phones. At our assigned time we went to the lounge, there was a bit of a delay but they were showing the “Hot in Cleveland” tv show on the screens. Our group was called and we entered the port to get our bags and then get in line for customs. Our wait was about 20 minutes or so. It wasn’t too bad. Once through that, we walked outside right to a cab and back to InterContinental Hotel. We walked back over to the Bayside Market for late lunch/early dinner and ate at Tradewinds Bar and Grill. Delicious food and great view.

[kroberst]

Thus ended our first week's vacation. We checked out of InterContinental Miami again (the electronic check out on the tv didn't work again). This may be due to the fact the room is pre-paid using LMT. We took a cab over to the Car Rental Center at the airport and picked up a car for the 2nd half of our vacation - a week in Key West with friends (I won't bore you all with those details)!

 

If you stuck through til the end, you deserve a medal! As I mentioned before, I'm happy to answer any questions about MY experience. I have pictures but will need to post those later.

 

Happy cruising!

K

[kroberst]

We had sufficient room for clothes. Instead of the boxes that others have tried for the overhead bins, we used one of those collapsible hanging shelf things for the closet and that worked out well. Our suitcases fit under the bed for dirty clothes. We had a coupon for a laundry discount (due to captain's club) rather than the bag deal I experienced on the 10 day but didn't use it. We did use the free gelato coupons. It was very handy to bring along travel mugs for our morning coffees and other beverages. Despite the signs to NOT fill personal glasses from the buffet beverage dispensers, people did do that. It's quite easy just to fill one of their glasses and then dump it into your own mug. Sunday was Easter and there were chocolate bunnies available in the buffet but I didn't see the Easter Bunny if s/he was there - I thought there were quite a few families on board (only 7 days, over a holiday where kids may have been on break) but don't know the true numbers. Just a few instances where kids were running around. The chocolate truffles and tiramisu that you can obtain as extra goodies pre-cruise are quite good. I'll be tempted to get the chocolates for myself next time (they came in a small bowl which fit in the refrigerator). I think this is really it now. No more musings :cool:

[NCRooster]

Kathleen I enjoyed your review. Sounds like you had a nice relaxing cruise. Thanks!

 

Ken Roosa

[wallie5446]

Nice recap of your week, thank you. We were on Reflection last yr and will be on the Equinox this Nov. Were there any things you felt were a lot different between the two ships?

Edited May 17, 2014 by wallie5446

[kroberst]

My preference would be Equinox. I enjoyed the glass show (even though it is going away) but I also felt the lawn area was more inviting on E. We really liked Qsine though which is Reflectiion only. For me, the entire lawn space is what pushes it to the top.

 

Sent from my Droid using Forums mobile app

[cynbar]

Thanks for your review, we board Reflection on the 23rd and are getting really excited. I do have a couple of questions though. How was the bar service? I've seen reports that it has been slow due to so many free beverage packages. And was the music loud many places, especially in the atrium??? Miami DJs onboard?

[Lois R]

Thanks for the review and sharing your experience with us:)

I am sailing her in November and looking forward to it very much:D

 

Sounds like you both had a very good week:D

[drarill]

Great review!! Thanks for sharing your cruise with us!:)

[wallie5446]

My preference would be Equinox. I enjoyed the glass show (even though it is going away) but I also felt the lawn area was more inviting on E. We really liked Qsine though which is Reflectiion only. For me, the entire lawn space is what pushes it to the top.

 

Sent from my Droid using Forums mobile app

 

Thanks again!

[Justprettynpink]

Thank you for your review

[DebbieMacG]

Thanks for the review :)

[kroberst]

Thanks for your review, we board Reflection on the 23rd and are getting really excited. I do have a couple of questions though. How was the bar service? I've seen reports that it has been slow due to so many free beverage packages. And was the music loud many places, especially in the atrium??? Miami DJs onboard?

 

Neither one of us thought the service was noticeably slow. While at the pool area, they wouldn't interrupt you if you were reading to ask if you wanted a drink but if you made eye contact, they stopped by to offer to get you something. DH noted that the bars stocked different brands of alcohol so once when he tried to get some Woodford bourbon, whatever bar we were at didn't have it but sent someone to get it from somewhere else (which obviously slowed things up but someone was getting it for him instead of saying it wasn't available - how can you complain about that?)

 

Aside from the music issues I mentioned earlier (oops- someone loaded the explicit versions), the only instance of too loud was sitting one evening at the Sunset Bar (it was probably around 9pm ish). I don't remember how it came up (changed tracks or changed from live performer to tracks) but suddenly the music was really loud. We had been sitting there for 30 minutes or so and we just left. At times we noticed it was kind of loud in the atrium when walking around but it generally seemed to be performance specific.

 

One thing we noticed occasionally sitting in Cafe al Bacio and at the pool (at the stage end), is that it seemed 2 different sources of music were playing which just turned into a background jumble. We couldn't really focus on one source over another. Bear in mind DH has 25+ years of sitting under a siren and I've also had some occupational and (ahem) self-inflicted ear abuse so maybe our hearing is just less sharp than it used to be. The volume wasn't loud, it was just we could not discriminate what was playing.

 

I think they did advertise Miami DJs but I honestly couldn't tell you how they were different. It wasn't like they played continuously at the pool (which I actually would not have minded). I will double check the Daily's tomorrow (they're at work) and let you know.

 

You should have a great cruise! Enjoy:)

[hcat]

nice review.. we look forward to sailing on Reflection next fall. thanks for the tips about the Alcoves..it is windy up on that deck and even when we dine at Lawn Club grill we try to pick a night when we leave port a bit later..

 

if you can recall, what were the names of the shows with zombies and wierd characters? we'll try to avoid that...sounds like a flashback to when they re-did the upper M class lounges in beds and rags (anyone else remember that?)and the cirque like beasts roamed the nightclub trying to interact with guests.. it was very creepy and did not last very long ...

Edited May 18, 2014 by hcat

[mikeysed]

With the Classic 123 GO promo... can you get any beverage at Al bacio? or do you need the premium package?

[thebutlerdidit]

Thanks for this terrific review. I read it aloud to my husband as he was doing the driving. I loved your comment about Buddy the Elf. Francisco is fun to say!