Navigator of the Seas *LIVE* 11/23/2018 - 12/2/2018

[FionaMG]

Tonight's MDR menu.

We both had the mushroom puff pastry for starters. This has been consistently good on all of our previous cruises but was a bit of a let down this evening. The pastry wasn't as flaky as it should have been and I actually thought it tasted a little stale.

For mains Fernando had the red snapper, which he said was quite nice, and I had the NY strip steak. I had to send it back as I had ordered medium rare and it came out so rare it was almost mooing in the plate. As our waiter was busy serving one of his other tables I called the head waiter over to get it changed. I thought it was about time he did something to earn his tip, since so far (and remember we are on day 7) he has done nothing more than acknowledge our presence with a "good evening" from a distance. He hasn't taken the trouble to stop by our table even once to ask if everything is ok but he spends several minutes every evening in animated conversation with the table next to ours.

Anyway when the new steak came out it was fine.

One of our tablemates had been undecided between the snapper and the pork chop so the waiter brought both. We all tried a bit of the pork chop and unanimously agreed that it was the tastiest of all.

For dessert I had the royal chocolate cake, which was very yummy, and Fernando had the banana split off the kids' menu. Sorry, no dessert pics again.  

 

[FionaMG]

We did one of the cruise line's excursions in Bonaire: Bonaire highlights and beach fun, which was an island tour with a couple of hours of beach time at Coco Beach at the end. It was a nice enough tour. We saw the salt ponds and the slave huts and then drove up to the highest point on the island, called Seru Largo, which means Big Hill. There is a monument of some sort there. I'm sure the guide, who was excellent, must have explained what it was but I was distracted and didn't hear.

Coco Beach is quite small and rocky so you really need water shoes to be able to go into the water. Alternatively there is a floating dock with a ladder but the water there is already quite deep so if you're not confident in the water it could be a bit scary.

There were lots of colourful fish at the end of the floating dock.

Our tablemates took the water taxi over to Klein Bonaire independently saving half the cost of the cruise line's excursion and having the freedom to go and come back at times that suited them. They said the snorkeling there was really good.

Pics coming up in the next post as I have to switch over to my phone to post them.

[FionaMG]

Salt ponds

Slave huts

Monument at Seru Largo

The floating dock at Coco Beach

Colourful fish

 

 

 

[JamesEM]

Sorry reading about you getting the crud, how does this quarantine thing work, does the ship deactivate your key card, post a guard, or work on the honor system?     

[CarnivalBreezer]

On ‎11‎/‎21‎/‎2018 at 10:36 AM, Johnamac123 said:

Following. Board her December 6 for a 9 day to the ABC's!!

 

Dec 7, silly!!  :)

[NateUpNorth]

1 minute ago, CarnivalBreezer said:

 

Dec 7, silly!!  :)

 

Johnamac offered to get on the ship a day early to make sure there were drinks poured and ready for us as we boarded........ 

[CarnivalBreezer]

On ‎11‎/‎23‎/‎2018 at 7:42 PM, sayvan said:

Dec 6 or 7?

 

Dec 7th. :)

 

[CarnivalBreezer]

On ‎11‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 11:30 AM, Rogueperson said:

Meet and Mingle concluded.

 

 

 

 

I know 2 years ago, I won a bottle of champagn at the meet and mingle.  But now, I don’t even remember seeing it as a prize any more.  

 

Not that it matters to me.  I don’t drink much.  

 

Much more to come

 

Do they serve any food and beverages at the M & M ??

[Rogueperson]

6 hours ago, JamesEM said:

Sorry reading about you getting the crud, how does this quarantine thing work, does the ship deactivate your key card, post a guard, or work on the honor system?     

It works mostly on honor, but your card is flagged.  I would not make it off the ship if I tried and if i tried to purchase, they would see and reject me.  Card is not deactivated.  Also, they will call throughout the day checking up on me.  I suspect if I had not answered or they caught me outside the room, they would have enacted stricter protocols.

[Rogueperson]

19 minutes ago, CarnivalBreezer said:

 

Do they serve any food and beverages at the M & M ??

In previous ones they did, this one was kind of lame.

[CarnivalBreezer]

18 minutes ago, Rogueperson said:

In previous ones they did, this one was kind of lame.

 

Thankfully, I started a White Elephant gift exchange for our Dec 7th cruise so that should liven things up!!! :)

 

[Rogueperson]

What everyone (including me) was looking forward to.  Chef’s Table.  the two things I was looking forward to Most on this cruise was this And the helmet dive.

 

This is the menu

 

 

I should also note that I got fairly drunk here. I drank more here than the entire cruise put together.  

 

 

 

 

This was the first time I’ve evet had a dessert martini.  I didn’t finish it.  I was pretty gone by the end of dinner.

 

Impressions.

 

Food and wine pairing has never failed to impress me.  This IS the best meal you can have on a cruise.  However, I have read other experiences to warn me that venue on Voyager class (and may Freedom class too?) was not able to accomodate this, so they make due somehow.  This is unfortunately true.  Chef’s table was held here.

 

 

If this looks familiar, it should.  Its the landing between deck 4 and deck 5 of the Sapphire Dining room.  We were pretty much out in the open.  This seriously detracted from the dining experience because it was difficult to hear the presentation of the pairing and course.  The sommelier will give a wine presentation first.  Then the executive chef comes out with his dish and gives a presentation of how he prepared each course.  They both were practically screaming to be heard over the normal background noise of the MDR.  Second slight failing.  We had a smaller table of 8.  They seem to have brought just enough wine for 1 glass per course.  I don’t think it mattered for our table, but previous Chef’s table gave refills of each course wines.  There didn’t seen to be extra here.

 

Would i do it again, heck yeah.  But I would prefer to do it ob another ship if i could.  Its too bad because I’m liking the Voyager class.

 

[Rogueperson]

Day 8s cruise compass

 

[Rogueperson]

I made a discovery today. Despite having strong connection to the wifi, your speed actually varies from deck to deck.  I couldn’t even get the speedtest to initiate in the Diamond Lounge on deck 14, but was fine on deck 5.  I had full signal strength on both.

 

When i was having problems on day 2, I was in the diamond lounge too.  Sucks becauses its a great place to chill.

[Johnamac123]

5 hours ago, NateUpNorth said:

 

Johnamac offered to get on the ship a day early to make sure there were drinks poured and ready for us as we boarded........ 

Your wish is my command, Master (folds arms and nods head). 

[The Fun Researcher]

5 hours ago, Rogueperson said:

Would i do it again, heck yeah.  But I would prefer to do it ob another ship if i could.  Its too bad because I’m liking the Voyager class.

 

 

Thanks for your review OP!

 

Glad to hear the love for Voyager class.  Freedom class, and the nearly identical (in our opinion) Voyager class are our favorites so far.

Dan

[FionaMG]

Fun facts from the Captain's Q&A session this morning, which was well attended. I tried to get some specific details about that stabiliser incident a couple of cruises back, but he dodged the question and I didn't think I should push it.

The forthcoming dry dock is going to last for 50 days and there are going to be between 2,000 and 3,000 contractors on board to do all the work.

In response to a question about the litter boxes, the Captain said there are two real dogs on board. One of them was just beside us with its owners; it's a yorkie and it's wearing a service dog vest. I have seen it a couple of times; the guy always carries it under his arm. I haven't seen the other one.

[FionaMG]

We are just finishing up a late lunch in the WJ. Tip if you do not like mass confusion: come later. We arrived just under an hour ago, so 45 minutes before closing. There was still plenty of food (and on the whole the WJ food has been pretty decent), lots of free tables and a lot less people. 

Now here's something that really bothers me and I fully acknowledge that I should not be judgemental of others, and perhaps I am being unfair, but the two women at the table next to ours fetched a huge pile of desserts and only took a couple of bites before walking away and leaving it all to go in the bin. It just seems to be such a waste. 

[CarnivalBreezer]

15 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

We are just finishing up a late lunch in the WJ. Tip if you do not like mass confusion: come later. We arrived just under an hour ago, so 45 minutes before closing. There was still plenty of food (and on the whole the WJ food has been pretty decent), lots of free tables and a lot less people. 

Now here's something that really bothers me and I fully acknowledge that I should not be judgemental of others, and perhaps I am being unfair, but the two women at the table next to ours fetched a huge pile of desserts and only took a couple of bites before walking away and leaving it all to go in the bin. It just seems to be such a waste. 

 

This is one thing that really infuriates me. Just because there is a buffet, doesn't mean you should splurge on food and then not eat it. I was raised to only take food that I was able to eat and then if I wanted more, I would go for more. This is totally ridiculous!! Maybe the desserts weren't good??

 

[bobmacliberty]

There used to be a Mongolian barbecue restaurant near me.  It was all you could eat...you pick what you want from a buffet bar and they cook it for you on a large wok like table.  The catch was that you were charged, by the ounce, for any food that you did not eat.  Love that idea but they went out of business, so maybe others did not like it as much as I did.

[FionaMG]

Tonight was the second formal night, aka "lobster night". The MDR menu was a lot better than the last couple of nights. The chefs came out and were introduced to everyone. At the end of the meal our waiter told us about the customer satisfaction questionnaires and explained how they work and how important they are to the staff but there was absolutely no pleading for top scores.

[FionaMG]

So, the food...

I recommended the vidalia onion tart to our tablemates and I am glad to report that it did not disappoint. Fernando had the shrimp cocktail and was pleased to note that the shrimp were not overcooked. 

For mains we both had the lobster and our waiter brought out two for each of us, which is good because they were quite small. They were nice though. 

One of our tablemates ordered the prime rib, so I asked him if I could take a pic of it. He said it was really good (he ordered it medium rare).

For dessert I had the chocolate molten cake and Fernando had the baked Alaska, both of which were good, although one of our tablemates said she didn't care much for the baked alaska because it had the three types of ice cream in it.

[Rogueperson]

For us, we were at Chops.  Since I was not released until 9:40 on Day 6, my 8:30 reservation was nixed and this was my only option left.  It was actually more difficult to fit in my 3 specialty dinner deal in than i had expected.

 

 

 Wife wanted seafood so we got the additional charge seafood tower.  IT WAS HUGE AND ITS AN APPETIZER?!?!?!

 

 

I also got the lobster bisque and tuna tartare.  I did not take a photo of the tartare because i was still in shock at the size of the appetizer.

 

 

I got another filet and the wife got the lamb.  Both were delicious.

 

 

By dessert we were stuffed.  I managed a couple bites of the Key Lime Meringue Pie.  It was disappointing unfortunately.  I may have had it before and forgot.

 

 

After dinner was the 80s party.  This was actually a lot of fun.  I think the promenade is a terrible place for this kind of party, But they pulled it off.  I feel the Centrum on Grandeur made a much better venue.

 

So, this was a good day.

Edited December 1, 2018 by Rogueperson

[Rogueperson]

I discovered a major flaw on Navigator.  There is no 24 hour drink station!  At one point there was one available in the windjammer, but its closed now at 2:12am.  Bars are closed too.  The Cafe Promenade has food 24 hours, but no drink station.  At this hour, you can get Hot coffee, or water.

 

This is where Grandeur beats Navigator.  I’m fairly certain Anthem had a 24 hour drink station too.

[FionaMG]

The 80s party was great. I can't remember there being one on any of our previous cruises, only the 70s one, but maybe I just missed it.

In the WJ now for breakfast and one of the waiters is putting on a show. He's been singing and playing guitar and is now dancing with a tray and glass on his head.