Easter Week on Allure of the Seas ~ April 16-23, 2017

[LisaLisa87]

We returned on Sunday from the 4/16 Western sailing on Allure. It was our first time on an Oasis class ship and hopefully will not be the last! We stayed in a 1-bedroom ATS on deck 11, and both the room itself and the Sky Class perks were fantastic. I'll share my thoughts about our experience over the next few days. To get things started, here are links to our Cruise Compasses:

 

Allure Western - Day 1

Allure Western - Day 2

Allure Western - Day 3

Allure Western - Day 4

Allure Western - Day 5

Allure Western - Day 6

Allure Western - Day 7

[Mickeyboy]

Thank you, I've been waiting a good while to get current and up to date western compasses for Allure.

[dst]

We are sailing on the Allure in September; different itinerary but I am looking forward to hearing all about the ship.....

[LisaLisa87]

I'm back for my first "real" installment. I know there have been quite a few Allure reviews and trip reports, but I'm hoping that I can provide info that will be helpful to some. I've learned so much here and would love to return the favor!

 

 

 

The Planning

 

We booked this cruise back in October 2015, during a 30% off promotion. While many of RCCL's "sales" have been questionable at best, this one seemed like the real deal and we were happy with the price we paid for a JS. Over the next year, I occasionally checked RCCL's site, but I never saw a lower price. Fast forward to December 2016, and I noticed that prices for many of the full suites had been reduced. We started toying with the idea of upgrading to an ATS. Thank you to those here who encouraged us to go for it in response to my WWYD post!

 

 

 

The Day Before

 

We flew into FLL from DC the day before sailing. We had never cruised out of FLL, so I relied heavily on CC for advice regarding where to stay and eat. We ended up booking the Hyatt Place 17th St via ValueTrips and were happy with the hotel and location. The pool was unimpressive, but the proximity to Harbor Place and the port more than made up for that one flaw! We ate dinner at Duffy's (13 year old DD's choice) and enjoyed it. I would have preferred to try Gilbert's but maybe next time! We turned in early after dinner so we'd all be well rested for our first day on the ship.

 

 

 

Embarkation

 

We took an Uber from the hotel to the port at about 10:30 am.The ride was short, but it took awhile to get close to Terminal 18. Once we handed off our luggage to a porter, we found a sign that pointed toward security for suite guests and headed inside. At first I thought we must have gone through the wrong door, because there was no line at all. We breezed right through and walked right up to a check-in counter. The only slight hiccup was that there was a problem with the machine that printed Seapasses, but that only added a few minutes to the process. The next thing we knew, we were heading upstairs and boarding the ship! We've been on a handful of cruises, and this was by the far the fastest boarding process we've experienced. I think we were onboard by 11:10.

 

 

 

Here are a couple of photos I took shortly after boarding:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First Look at the Boardwalk

 

 

 

 

Our room!

 

 

 

Next up: The inside of our room + the food...

Edited April 26, 2017 by LisaLisa87

[wrcjr98]

Following along as we just booked a Western on the Allure! My first time on an Oasis Class! Excited to read more!!

[LisaLisa87]

The Room

As I've mentioned, we were in a 1-bedroom ATS on deck 11 -- room 11730 to be exact. As many here know, the 1-bedrooms were added to the ship later, and some think the layout is a bit odd. Having only sailed in a JS with RCCL, we were extremely happy with the room. The deck 11 ATS have more interior space and larger balconies than those on decks 12 and 14. Our room had a nice entry with a closet, a spacious living room, separate bedroom with a second closet, and decent sized bathroom. I've read that the bathrooms in the 1-bedroom ATS are not as large as those in a GS, but we were fine with it. We loved that DD had a separate space, and she appreciated the privacy. The balcony was amazing. I only got pictures of two of the three sides, but I'm going to attempt to embed a video in my next post that will show the entire balcony (along with the inside of the room). It was a lot of fun watching the divers practice for Oceanaria from the balcony, and we watched the show once from the balcony as well. We also caught a couple of movies there.

 

Here are some photos:

 

 

 

 

 

[LisaLisa87]

I'm hoping to embed the video of our room here. If it doesn't work, I'll try a link! The password is allure.

 

Well, that didn't turn out very well. Let's try a link (password is still allure).

 

[Lionesss]

Two cruises ago we were in ATS 14730

 

Although loved the view, the balcony on this deck was smaller.

 

After sailing CL on Allure/Oasis class we thought the "personal" touch provided by being at the end of the hallway was lacking.

Seemed we got lost in the shuffle.

 

We only encountered one draw back of the suite, and that was having to jump up over the side of the tub to get in.

 

Now mind you, glad we did it, but love the CL suites more.

 

Oh, I cannot believe how much bigger your balconies are on this deck (11)......nice. On 14 was very small. Actually very difficult to see the theatre.

 

Glad you enjoyed!!!

 

Thanks for sharing.

[LisaLisa87]

Two cruises ago we were in ATS 14730

 

Although loved the view, the balcony on this deck was smaller.

 

After sailing CL on Allure/Oasis class we thought the "personal" touch provided by being at the end of the hallway was lacking.

Seemed we got lost in the shuffle.

 

We only encountered one draw back of the suite, and that was having to jump up over the side of the tub to get in.

 

Now mind you, glad we did it, but love the CL suites more.

 

Oh, I cannot believe how much bigger your balconies are on this deck (11)......nice. On 14 was very small. Actually very difficult to see the theatre.

 

Glad you enjoyed!!!

 

Thanks for sharing.

 

We did notice how much smaller the balconies on deck 14 were. A colleague of DH's and his family stayed above us in room 12730. We didn't visit their room, but they came to our room for drinks one evening and mentioned that our balcony was noticeably larger than theirs.

 

I had read a number of posts that mentioned the long walk from the ATS to the elevators, etc. but that didn't bother us at all. I think I expected much worse, so the reality was a pleasant surprise! The biggest advantage to being at the end of the hall was that there was no foot traffic and no noise from people talking in the hallway. It was very, very quiet down there!

 

Having said all that, DH and I agreed that we'd love to try a CL one day. The proximity to the lounge and CK alone would be great, and those double height windows were amazing!

[Mountainmommalrn]

Following!

[Cruzinbabe06]

Enjoying your review so far!

 

Thanks for taking the time to post.:)

[LisaLisa87]

The Food + Beverages

 

Here’s where we ate:

 

BREAKFAST

Solarium Bistro – This venue offers a buffet for breakfast and lunch and then turns into Samba Grill for dinner. We ate breakfast here 3 times. This was a kinder, gentler version of the WJ, with healthier options like turkey bacon and chicken sausage. The selection wasn’t as large, but there were plenty of choices and the buffet area was easier to navigate. We never had a problem finding a table.

 

Wipeout Cafe – We ate here once after an unsuccessful attempt to eat breakfast at Johny Rockets. We were able to get a table at JR within a few minutes, but the harried hostess told us as we were sitting down that the wait for food would be 40+ minutes. No thank you! We headed up to Wipeout Cafe because I really wanted a made-to-order omelet. The line was short, but moved agonizingly slowly. I finally got to the end where fried eggs and omelets are ordered, placed my order, and took a number. About 20 minutes later we were all finished eating and my omelet was still MIA. I went inside and was told it would be another 5-10 minutes. By that point I was pretty much over it, so we threw in the towel and left. Not impressed.

 

CK – We finally decided to try CK for breakfast on day 5. I really, really wish we had gone sooner! It was very peaceful and the food was the best we’d had. Add to all that the proximity of the amazing espresso machine in the lounge, and it was a home run. DD is more of a buffet girl, so we compromised with her and ate at the Solarium Bistro on day 6 and CK on day 7 (and embarkation day).

 

LUNCH

WJ – We ate at WJ on embarkation day and once again later in the week. On those two occasions we made sure to go at off-peak times, but we still had difficulty finding a table. If DD had had her way we’d have gone every day, but even she came around to our way of thinking when she saw the line to get in most days.

 

Sorrento’s – Our first sea day was cloudy off and on, so we spent some time checking out the Royal Promenade. We decided to try Sorrento’s since it was so convenient. I would have liked to try the make-your-own pizza, but there was no one there to help. We ended up getting a couple of pre-made slices each. It was fine, but nothing to write home about and certainly not good enough to warrant a second visit.

 

Barefoot Beach BBQ – We spent a big chunk of our Labadee day at Barefoot Beach, where there is apparently an “upgraded” BBQ for lunch. It was good. Nothing really special, but perfectly acceptable.

 

Park Cafe – We only ate here once, but I would have been happy to go every day. I’m not big on roast beef, but I love the salad bar. DH loved the roast beef sandwich on Brilliance, but opted for an Asian noodle salad the day we went. We were there on the late side, and while there were no tables available inside, we were able to find one just outside in Central Park.

 

Nachi Cocum – We spent our day in Cozumel at Nachi Cocum. The food was good to very good. We had chips with salsa and guacamole, nachos, and wings as appetizers. DD had a quesadilla as her entree while I had grilled shrimp and DH had grilled grouper. Very tasty. There were also some Mexican dishes (enchiladas, tacos, fajitas, etc.) on the menu.

 

Solarium Bistro – We ate here for lunch one sea day because we wanted to avoid WJ and didn’t want to stray too far from the pool deck. It was good, but nothing special. My favorite part was the salad bar, which included some extras like feta cheese with red pepper flakes.

 

DINNER

Samba Grill – We had booked the FNDR promotion through the Cruise Planner and I had read enough posts here to know that our choices would be Giovanni’s and Samba Grill. We already had a reservation for Giovanni’s on day 3, so when the concierge emailed us before the cruise I asked him to make a reservation at Samba. We ended up going with the other family staying above us, and it was a fun evening. I really enjoyed the salad/starter bar and had to force myself to keep the portions small. The meats ranged from good to very good. The only one most of us didn’t care for was the sausage. The filet and bacon-wrapped chicken were my favorites, while others at the table really enjoyed the lamb. I had read that it can get steamy in the Solarium, but there was a nice breeze that night and was very comfortable. We enjoyed it, but I’m not sure I’d go back on a future cruise.

 

CK – The plan going in was to eat here 3 times for dinner since it was “free,” but we only ended up going twice (more on that in a bit). We enjoyed it both times. The menu is not very extensive, but between the nightly specials and the “classic” options that are on the menu every night, we were all able to find something that appealed to us. I thought the food and service were both great, and the setting is hard to beat.

 

Giovanni’s Table – We enjoyed Giovanni’s on Brilliance and had a good experience on Allure as well. Like many others here, I felt that the filet at Giovanni’s was better than the one at Chops. The restaurant was busy the night we were there and the service was a bit slow, but overall it was a positive experience and we’ll definitely go back.

 

Sabor – We had a fun night at Sabor. The food was mostly average (with a few standouts), but the margaritas were tasty and the atmosphere was relaxed and festive. We’ll go back!

 

Izumi Hibachi – We booked this one through the Cruise Planner as well. We’ve been to Hibachi restaurants on land many times, and while the food at this one didn’t quite measure up, our chef was super entertaining. The overall experience was a lot of fun, but I’m not sure we’d go again because of the price ($45/person for one protein or $49 for two).

 

Chops – We weren’t planning to go to Chops because of the price ($49/person), but we lucked into a “deal” they day we ate lunch at Park Cafe. A gentleman from Chops was walking around Central Park trying to get some additional bookings, and he stopped by our table. I told him that we really liked Chops on Brilliance but the price on Allure was just too high. He didn’t take the bait initially, but I pushed the issue a little, figuring I had nothing to lose. We were with DH’s colleague’s family, and we ended up getting 30% off if all 7 of us committed to going the next night. While $34 and some change isn’t cheap, it sure beats $49! We had originally planned to go to CK that night, and frankly I kind of wish we had kept our original plans. The food was good, but the service was really slow and the check ended up being pretty big by the time the two bottles of wine we drank were factored in. I’m not sure we’ll go back, unless we happen to be on a ship where the price is lower and there aren’t a lot of options (like Brilliance).

 

BEVERAGES

Before we upgraded to a full suite, I had purchased the combination Voom/Deluxe Drink Package through the Cruise Planner. When we upgraded, I decided that we could do without the package, assuming we made good use of the suite lounge (which we mostly did – it was the bottles of wine at dinner that got us into trouble). We did not get DD the refreshment package, but she did fine between the flavored waters, lemonade, and free soda in the lounge.

 

Drink card – The 10-drink punch card was offered on day 6 for $79. If it had been offered on day 5, we probably would have purchased one.

Edited April 26, 2017 by LisaLisa87

[Snooksi]

Thank you so much for scanning/posting all of the Cruise Compasses. We sail the Western Itinerary in 3wks and these have been invaluable for my planning!!

 

Enjoying your review and following along!

[shellden]

Thank you for your review and the Compasses I will admit I printed out some, cookoo planner. I love to hear everyones different experiences makes planning that much more exciting!

[LisaLisa87]

Thank you so much for scanning/posting all of the Cruise Compasses. We sail the Western Itinerary in 3wks and these have been invaluable for my planning!!

 

Enjoying your review and following along!

 

Thank you for your review and the Compasses I will admit I printed out some, cookoo planner. I love to hear everyones different experiences makes planning that much more exciting!

 

For some reason the multi-quote feature isn't working quite right for me, but I'm glad you're finding the Compasses useful!

[LisaLisa87]

Fun on the Ship

 

ACTIVITIES

Like many people who sail Oasis class ships, we had grand plans about doing everything the ship had to offer. We got off to kind of a slow start, but in the end we felt good about what we got done!

 

First up was the rock climbing wall. This is not my thing, but DH and DD had planned to do it. In the end, only DH took it on. DD climbed the wall on Brilliance, but the wall on Allure is much taller, and I think she was a bit intimidated. DH made it to the top but said it was tough, with one spot in particular being particularly tricky. I took this photo from our balcony.

 

 

Next was the FlowRider. DH surfs and had been looking forward to trying the stand up side. He finally made it over there on day 5. He did respectably for his first try, but he said it's very different from "real" surfing. In any case, he was happy to escape without a fall and decided to quit while he was ahead. I considered trying the boogie board side, but in the end I chickened out!

 

 

We had been waiting for an opportunity to ice skate, and we finally found some open ice time on day 7 (the last sea day). We showed up about 15 minutes before the session started and were able to get skates and get right on the ice.

 

 

The one activity I really wanted to try was the zip line -- mostly just to be able to say I'd done it. I finally got around to it on day 7. It was fun, but I was so intent on landing correctly that I didn't have a chance to look around! Unfortunately, I didn't realize until it was too late that I could have gotten back in line and done it again.

 

 

I'm not sure whether this is technically an activity, but DD enjoyed the carousel and rode it several times during the week. She usually avoids things that she thinks are "for little kids," so I was happy to see her letting loose a little!

 

 

Next up: The Shows

Edited April 28, 2017 by LisaLisa87

[Cel_cruise]

Enjoying your review! Interested in hearing whether your daughter met teens on board and what types of activities she did or if she hung out with you!

 

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[LisaLisa87]

Enjoying your review! Interested in hearing whether your daughter met teens on board and what types of activities she did or if she hung out with you!

 

She ended up hanging out mostly with us and the kids in the other family we knew. That worked out well, for the most part, even though those girls are 6 and 11. She didn't try the teen club as even the older of the two girls she was hanging out with would have been in a different club. Even if the three of us had been on our own, though, I doubt she'd have gone to the teen club. We've been on several Disney cruises, and while she enjoyed the kids clubs when she was younger, she started to lose interest a couple of years ago. So we spent a lot of time together, and she spent some time in our room and on our balcony reading or listening to music. I will say that we saw lots of teens in groups around the ship. They all seemed to be having a great time and were mostly well behaved!

[easyboy]

Enjoying your review review nice photos!

[lynn_sa]

Thanks for the great review so far! We'll be on the allure in a crown loft in 3 weeks so I am enjoying reading about the suite perks :)

 

Sent from my LGLS991 using Forums mobile app

[lynn_sa]

Oh, and thank you for the Cruise Compasses! It's my same itinerary and I hadn't been able to find a recent one on the "other site"!

 

Sent from my LGLS991 using Forums mobile app

[LisaLisa87]

Thank you to everyone following along! I'll pick up where I left off with Fun on the Ship...

 

THE SHOWS

I booked the shows we wanted to see via the Cruise Planner as soon as I noticed that they were available, which was in early January. (I forgot to mention this earlier, but specialty restaurants were available for booking in late October 2016.) In late February, I received a couple of emails from RCCL stating that some of the show times had been changed, and we had been rescheduled for new days/times. It was a bit of a pain moving things around, but everything turned out fine in the end. Here are the shows we saw:

 

OceanAria

Based on advice I'd read here, I booked OceanAria for the first night. I knew we'd be able to see the show from our balcony, but I wanted us to have the full experience once. We saw the 9:00 pm show and sat in the seats reserved for suite guests. We were asked to arrive 20-25 minutes beforehand any time we wanted to use that perk (more on that later). We all loved the show and found the diving to be very impressive. The fact that several of them dive off the really high platform is amazing. I don't think I could even force myself to climb up there! There was also a part of the show that involved some intricate trampoline work, and we loved that as well. Both shows on night 2 ended up being cancelled due to slightly rough seas, but they were successfully rescheduled for later in the week. All totaled, I think the show ran at least 6 times over the course of the week.

 

Mama Mia

This was one of the shows that was rescheduled, and our new time was 2:30 pm on day 2. We weren't thrilled with that time initially, but it was kind of a cloudy day so it turned out to be fine. We all enjoyed the show and felt that it was really well done, although the story line and some of the content may be borderline for kids. I think most of the racy material probably went over the heads of the younger kids, but my 13 year old DD knew exactly what was going on! We weren't really concerned about this aspect of the show, but parents should be aware that it's a PG experience. The acting and singing were very good, for the most part. We thought the actress who played Sophie did a fantastic job. Including intermission, the show came in just under 2.5 hours, and it was time well spent.

 

Blue Planet

We saw this show on day 5 at 8:30 pm. There were some really cool parts of the show, but overall we thought it was just okay. I didn't really care for the actress who played the lead role (who was also Tanya in Mama Mia). As others have reported, there wasn't much of a story, but some of the effects were very cool. If we sail Allure again, I think we'd skip this one.

 

Ice Games

We saw Ice Games on day 7 at 3:30 pm. We really enjoyed it were very impressed with what the skaters were able to do in a small rink on a moving ship! There was a special guest performer who was absolutely incredible. Along with skating, she spun and did some amazing acrobatics in a ring suspended above the ice. Definitely our favorite part of the show.

 

We would like to have seen How to Train Your Dragon on Ice, but there was only one performance and it conflicted with our dinner plans. We weren't interested in the headliner or comedy shows. Hopefully we didn't miss anything great!

 

Here is the full schedule, which was included in the Day 1 Compass:

 

 

Next up: The pool deck and the spa...

Edited April 29, 2017 by LisaLisa87

[LisaLisa87]

Thanks for the great review so far! We'll be on the allure in a crown loft in 3 weeks so I am enjoying reading about the suite perks :)

 

Sent from my LGLS991 using Forums mobile app

 

I'm going to do a whole post on the suite perks soon!

[lynn_sa]

Oh my gosh, I was just studying your Cruise Compasses and noticed that your headliner was Ronn Lucas! I am so jealous! (He is a ventriloquist and did a special on tv back in the 80's when I was a wee one...we had recorded on VHS, maybe even Beta, hah...and I must have watched it 100 times!)

[LisaLisa87]

THE POOLS

 

I took this photo the day we were docked in Jamaica, which explains why the pool deck is relatively uncrowded! This was the only day that I spent any time on the actual pool deck. When I took the photo, I was facing forward, with the beach pool on the right, the main pool to the left, and the back side of the suite sundeck further forward on deck 17. We loved that there were several pools, but our experience was that they were all crowded from late morning through early evening on sea days. Even so, we did swim several times and tended to gravitate to the beach pool as it was cooler and we liked the salt water. We were never certain whether the other pools were salt water or chlorine. I asked a life guard at the main pool one afternoon, and while he was a bit hard to understand, it sounded like he said that all the pools except the beach pool were chlorinated. Does anyone know for sure?

 

The chair hogs were out in full force, and we gave up trying to find 3 (or even 2) lounge chairs together on the pool deck pretty quickly. There were generally still chairs to be found on deck 16 in the late morning, but we figured that if we weren't going to be on deck 15, we might as well go up one more deck and hang out on the suite sundeck! The lounge chairs there were heavily padded and plentiful, the towels were free for the taking, and there was a bar that offered cold drinks and an assortment of snacks (bags of chips, cups of fruit, etc.). I'll post photos of the suite sundeck when I discuss suite perks.

 

We didn't spend any time in the Solarium on this cruise except to eat. I did take a look around, though, and noticed that there was a lot of seating, but that the pool was quite small. We sailed on Brilliance last summer and the pool in the Solarium was fantastic.

 

THE ARCADE

I would happily have gone the entire week without setting foot in the arcade. Alas, I have a 13 year old DD and a DH who is very much a kid at heart. There is a small arcade on the Boardwalk, but the "real" arcade is up on deck 15, aft. I just checked our final statement, and we spent $29.50 in the arcade. This was mostly DD and DH playing air hockey and skeeball, but I did get in on the action a bit. Most of the games cost $1.50/play. The system for scanning your Seapass is very odd and was quite frustrating for almost everyone I saw. Instead of swiping the card, you had to hold the card about 6" under the scanner and line is up just right. I never could get my card to scan.

 

There were ping pong tables in the same general area, and while we planned to play at some point, we never got around to it. The area is shielded from the wind and mostly out of the way.

 

THE SPA

I'm not a big spa person, but DH and DD went horseback riding in Jamaica, and I had to do something to pass the time! I showed up at the spa a few minutes before my 3 pm appointment time and was shown to a waiting area downstairs. I had no idea the spa was so big! I sat there for a few minutes, filling out paperwork and just relaxing, until my massage therapist came to get me. I went with a basic 50 minute Swedish massage. The therapist did a great job, but she had some seriously strong hands and things got borderline painful a couple of times! I got a little bit of a sales pitch at the end, but I told her that I can't buy any products without talking to my dermatologist first. That approach was effective. I used the Platinum C&A discount loaded on my Seapass to get 15% off the massage. The discount almost canceled out the automatic 18% gratuity. My total, including an extra $10 tip, was $119.36.

 

I had planned to go to the gym a couple of times, but that never panned out. I like to think that I worked off some calories walking around the ship and taking the stairs almost exclusively. DH didn't make it to the gym either, but he did run on the track twice. He loved that it was long and out of the way. The track on Brilliance was ridiculous as it ran right through the sundeck above the pool deck!

 

I think that mostly covers what we did on the ship. Next up, fun off the ship!