How are table mates assigned? Any truth to this?

[BillOh]

My sister said she thinks that the cruise line makes an effort to put like people together as table mates... seems she had other honeymooners on her honeymoon cruise, parents with kids when she took her young son on a cruise, etc. Since it will be me and my 24 year old daughter I wondered if there is some truth to it and we might be assigned a table with others in the same situation.

I cant see RCI actually sitting around making seating arrangements in this manner... but would be awesome if they did. ( even awesomer if we ended up at a table full of moms with eligible 25 year old sons... )

 

Any thoughts?

 

I've heard this discussed, and I largely agree with that statement. I've heard conflicting info on this. However, If you've ever tried to arrange seating at a wedding reception, you know people change plans after yours are set and sometimes it gets down to the last few days and you run out of logical choices for everyone. I've had good experience with this personally. Off to read your replies.

[Sam.Seattle]

Since you brought it up, the last time we did Traditional Dining on the first night we were taken to a table for 6 and one elderly couple was already there. The very first words out of their mouth was a question, "So what church do you go to?" Really? I really don't expect to discuss religion or politics with strangers while on vacation. That was it...we changed tables and started doing MTD the next cruise!

We usually dine alone, so I can't offer much to this other than a tactic a friend uses. They always book a speciality resturant the first night. They time their dinner so they can walk by the assigned MDR table to size up the their table mates. They might engage the table in some sort of conversation or just walk on by... Then if they don't like the table mates - they just request a different table. (Yes, I realize first impressions can be misleading, but it works for them).

[Sam.Seattle]

The cruise lines will put your information; age, marital status, any kids, language spoken, cabin type, cabin location, where you live, income and cruise history, and put it all into a computer. Then you name is printed out on a little strip of paper. The waiter and waitresses then pull the names out of a hat for each table they work.

No... That is how life boats are assigned.

[Diver2014]

We go on cruises to get away from it all and we are not the most sociable people you'd ever want to meet so we go to the maitre d' as soon as we get on the ship and ask for a table for two. We're main dining room, first seating and they've always been able to accommodate us. But, after being on the Radiance of the Seas last January in Australia, we found that the Windjammer Marketplace was so good that we skipped the dining room and specialties for the whole rest of the cruise. On the other hand, we've always met some amazing and friendly people on board....just not in the dining room.

[beancounterbeth]

All these posts make me nervous. This summer will be our fourth cruise and first one on Oasis. All our previous cruises we have been placed at a table with other couples of similar age as us and have gotten along great with them. In fact we have gotten along so well we usually end up spending the evening with the other couples hanging out in the bar or going to shows. This is one reason I am so happy the dynamic dining won't be on my cruise. We are a couple in our 30's and without kids. If we get placed at a table with a bunch of kids we won't be happy. We don't hate kids but we don't go on vacation to sit and listen to perfect strangers talk about their kids (that we don't know) and have their kids throw fits at dinner or such. Don't start bashing me.....I won't waste my time reading your post. It's my vacation and I didn't just put your kid down. I guess if we don't luck out this time and make great friends like previous cruises we will just ask to be moved or check out the other dining options this cruise.

[Mjoellnir]

I know Norwegians have been seated with other Norwegians.. for me that is not necessary. If we have to sit with others (we want a 2 person table as it is our honeymoon ) i would prefer to be seated with other nationalities. After all, we do see Norwegians every other day of the year! I do believe that Germans want the opposite though. Those guys prefer thei own kind while they discuss how to hog chairs the next day.

[clawmachine]

All these posts make me nervous. This summer will be our fourth cruise and first one on Oasis. All our previous cruises we have been placed at a table with other couples of similar age as us and have gotten along great with them. In fact we have gotten along so well we usually end up spending the evening with the other couples hanging out in the bar or going to shows. This is one reason I am so happy the dynamic dining won't be on my cruise. We are a couple in our 30's and without kids. If we get placed at a table with a bunch of kids we won't be happy. We don't hate kids but we don't go on vacation to sit and listen to perfect strangers talk about their kids (that we don't know) and have their kids throw fits at dinner or such. Don't start bashing me.....I won't waste my time reading your post. It's my vacation and I didn't just put your kid down. I guess if we don't luck out this time and make great friends like previous cruises we will just ask to be moved or check out the other dining options this cruise.

 

Summer on the Oasis will be a LOT of kids.

I'm not offended by your post but you really are being judgemental. I have 3 kids and still believe I am an interesting conversationalist! DH and I would be happy to sit with a couple without children and discuss things other than our kids.. As they sit quietly and eat. Hey- they can be interesting conversationalists too, if you give them the chance!

[mellibee]

On our first cruise in 2009, DH and I were seated for late dinner with a family of 4...DH, DW, and 2 college age daughters. They were from Texas and DW was a pharmacist and DH was a petroleum engineer. We live in Kansas. I am a nurse and DH is a structural engineer. I thought then that they must match people. On our cruise in 2011, there was 8 of us and we had our own table. This summer, we will have 7 so I'm guessing we will have our own table again.

[Cuizer2]

Summer on the Oasis will be a LOT of kids.

I'm not offended by your post but you really are being judgemental. I have 3 kids and still believe I am an interesting conversationalist! DH and I would be happy to sit with a couple without children and discuss things other than our kids.. As they sit quietly and eat. Hey- they can be interesting conversationalists too, if you give them the chance!

 

I enjoy talking to the kids. It is nice to be able to speak with someone who is my intellectual equal.

[Cruzin RN]

We have always enjoyed all our past table mates...but most of the time, we have very little in common. Once we were seated with 4 adults, 2 children..only one speaking english. He was VERY busy translating our conversations all evening....but it worked!!:)

[copter]

From the stories above it sounds like we have been fortunate to get matched up with other interesting couples in the past. I can't say that I've ever been disappointed with our table mates. Not always similar age or interests, but the stories shared are all memorable.

 

This next cruise we will be travelling with our 2 teenage daughters (previous cruises with them have involved a larger group of us travelling together). We've asked to be seated at a table of 8. I'm making the assumption that if we are, it would likely be with another family with kids of similar age. Not sure if it'll work or not, but it's definitely worth a try.

 

It's really all personal preference. I'm a very social person and enjoy meeting new people and hearing about their experiences. I can have a quiet dinner with my wife/family any time I want. Cruising affords us an additional option that we wouldn't normally otherwise have at home. And hey, if it doesn't work out, we can always request a change.

[marci22]

Lately, I think it's a total crap shoot. This is the reason I'm doing MTD on my next two cruises.

 

For fun though, I decided to reminisce and list what sort of table I ended up at on previous cruises. Ah, memories :p Seriously, if you don't care, don't read.

 

It was interesting reading about your experiences. I think some cruisers have had very good luck with their random dining mates, but I don't think that is typical. Our results have been mixed enough for me to request our own table in the future.

[nelblu]

My sister said she thinks that the cruise line makes an effort to put like people together as table mates... seems she had other honeymooners on her honeymoon cruise, parents with kids when she took her young son on a cruise, etc. Since it will be me and my 24 year old daughter I wondered if there is some truth to it and we might be assigned a table with others in the same situation.

I cant see RCI actually sitting around making seating arrangements in this manner... but would be awesome if they did. ( even awesomer if we ended up at a table full of moms with eligible 25 year old sons... )

 

Any thoughts?

 

From my personal experience--not true. In my 21 cruises with RCL have never been seated with anyone from our immediate area, age and other similar characteristics. As examples: Table for 8, sat with 3 couples from Alabama--a riot watching them outdo each other; table for 10, sat only with a Flemish couple who could not speak as stitch of English on a 12 nite Medit. cruise; table for 6, sat with 2 Spanish speaking couples who only showed up on the 1st and lobster nite; table for 10, sat with a Haitian family with small children and my teenage daughter that was sailing with us .

 

This has been my basic complaint to RCL that they should do a better job of matching tablemates. We have given up and for the past 5 cruises requested a table for 2. This worked very well on the Quantum DD, and it felt really special as though we eating at upscale restaurants. We met & spoke with more Paxs seated next to us than ships with traditional dining. Although the wait service was spotty at both the complementary and specialty dining, we enjoyed it overall.

[OddHack]

We also were matched with other just-married couples on our honeymoon cruise (almost 20 years ago), but have not noticed any pattern since.

 

It seems possible that they use a few obvious things to match tablemates, but not much beyond that. I'm thinking honeymoon flag, nationality/language, and the same process might try to keep group bookings together.

[Desert Cruizers]

Our worst dining experience was our 2004 Caribbean cruise, we were at a table of 6, the one couple was very nice and we dined with them in Chops one evening, but they left after the 4th night because they got tired of the husband of the other couples complaining. We stuck it out only because his wife was very nice and being our 2nd cruise, we didn't know enough to change. Interestingly we had run into the complainer earlier in the day while heading to our room, he was coming toward us complaining he had to get his luggage. Now that I think about, he might have had to visit the naughty room.:D

[telecruiser]

In all our cruises, we have only been seated with other couples, mostly not too far apart from our age. Never any singles or children or mother/daughter type groups.

[Sandy Sails]

The only one I really remember was in 2006 when my friend Sue and I were cruising together. We were put at a table for 10 - with all single ladies, middle-aged and older. I was so disappointed because I had wanted to meet some single men that cruise, but I ended up just loving these ladies. Plus we all know that cruise ships do not carry single men! Except for this specific cruise, when I met my husband ;).

Edited February 17, 2015 by Sandy Sails

[BND]

Our experience after 17 cruises is that they do try to place people together who are similar. In the cases where we've cruised with friends, we've been seated with either just them or if we ask for a bigger table which we do with one set of friends because we're all sociable, we've always had couples about our age. In general, we find RCI does a better job of doing that than Carnival. We've been seated with couples within 10 years of our age, traveling with no minor children (except in the case of grandchildren who are with their parents for dinner). Most cases, we've had all Americans, but we met our Canadian friends at our dining table and on one cruise we had a Swedish couple. Never have we been seated with children or non-english speaking people. We've also never had one single, but we did have two single ladies in Nov. We are almost always at a table for 8 which is what we request. We have also found that we are usually seated with people at our same or close status level and/or cabin type. We've only had one mediocre experience with our tablemates, but it was a 5 day cruise and we basically didn't argue with them when they tried to bait us on politics. Anyway, point is, we've found that most times we have several things in common with our tablemates and we currently keep in touch with couples from at least 4 previous cruises and have cruised with one of them twice since, the last being last week.

[Carolla5501]

On my last cruise there were several single ladies seated together. One solo diner spoke about 20 words of English. She was Japanese. We told her to bring her dictionary night 2.

 

Night 2 the waitstaff had arranged for her to be moved to a table with Japanese speakers. She looked like we had just kicked her so we drug her back, waitstaff set a place and with the help of that dictionary we had a great time

 

 

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[KansasK]

We have cruised several times with family and had our own table then.

 

On the Freedom of the Seas, we were seated with 3 other couples around our age. One couple only came twice, but the rest of us came to dinner each night and we all got along. Another time on the Freedom, we were again seated with 3 other couples and two of the couples were from Denmark. They only spoke to once another and I tried introducing ourselves to them, and they did introduce themselves. Two of them spoke English. They changed to late dining, so we had dinner with the remaining couple, and it was still a nice experience.

 

On the Carnival Miracle, my husband and I and my brother were seated with a couple and her sister. After the first night they left because we were near the swinging door to hallway to the kitchen and it was open most of time and the bright light bothered the man. We had new tablemates the next day, and the swinging door was closed unless someone passed through it. This couple wore Captain's hats all the time and at dinner. I had seen them at other times on the ship. The man was in a wheelchair and would speak to us if we asked a question, but otherwise concentrated on the food. The woman was very friendly and we enjoyed her company that week. The Captain's hats seemed odd at first, but you can't tell a book by its cover.

 

On the Carnival Freedom, we were seated with a French Canadian family, two couples and their mother. Two of them spoke English well, and the others managed. We had a good time and laughed a lot.

 

On the Independence of the Seas, we were a mixed racial table. Two members of that family were ministers at a church in Memphis, and they were traveling with one of their sisters and her daughter. We were my husband, my brother and myself and we all talked and laughed our way through the dinners. The one minister got them to make peach cobbler for our whole table for dessert one night. It was so good!

 

On the Carnival Liberty, my husband, my brother and myself were seated with a man and his wife who had been married for 55 years and a woman traveling with a dance group from Dayton, Ohio. They were all part of the dance group on board the ship. They would meet in lounges at different times to dance. We had good conversation and enjoyed our dinners with them, also.

 

On the Carnival Liberty another time, my husband and I were seated at a table for two in the middle on the main aisle to the back of the dining room. There was a row of tables for two. It was like sitting on the medium on a highway. We tried this for a second night and then asked to be moved. We were moved to a table with a man and is 12 year old daughter. The daughter was sitting on the level below us with the family of a friend she had made. The Dad could see her from our booth along the railing. He said he had played football for Detroit in the 80's and it was interesting talking to him. He was clearly in a different income bracket than we are, which was interesting, too. We enjoyed the conversation with our new tablemate.

 

I think at times they see what they think is a good blend of people and other times they just fill in with the number they need. We were mostly happy with our dining experiences with people we had not met before.