June 19th Sovereign Review (very long!)

[dicar123]

My husband and I were on the June 19th sailing of the Sovereign (4 day). This was our first cruise and we booked our air, transfers and hotel through Royal Caribbean. We had a good time on our cruise, but not a great time. We booked this trip a year in advance and every time we mentioned that we were going on a cruise, we were assured that we would have a FABULOUS time! I just don’t think any experience could have measured up to my expectations. That certainly isn’t anyone’s fault and once I stopped wondering what was wrong with me that I wasn’t having a FABULOUS time, I enjoyed myself quite a bit more!

 

First, our air travel was fine (with one large exception which I will post about separately). We did have a connection on each side of the trip. The time between landing and the connection was about an hour each time. We didn’t miss any connections, but we did have to hustle a bit to get from one gate to another.

 

We stayed at the Doubletree Hotel in Orlando, right by Universal. Reviews of this hotel were quite bad. The hotel has been undergoing renovations and is fine. The only problem we found with the hotel was that there were very few options for food until 4 or 5 o’clock. We walked to the TGI Friday’s across the street (the club sandwich was outstanding). The hotel IS right next to the Universal entrance but that does not translate into being within walking distance to the City Walk, or the park itself. We easily got a cab by asking at the front desk, and just as easily got a ride back to the hotel at the cab stand in front of City Walk. The fare was $5 each way.

 

There are “packages” you can purchase at City Walk entitling you to a meal and a movie or a meal and entrance to the various bars. The meal choices are limited (mostly sandwiches, hamburgers, pasta) but you can see the choices in advance. Also, at the information booth, you can see full menus from all the restaurants. The cover charge was $7 each at each place we visited, so if you want to visit several places, the package would probably be worth it.

 

The transfers were all fine and easy to deal with. The morning of embarkation, we did visit several hotels to pick people up. I didn’t anticipate that, but we got to the pier plenty early enough, so it wasn’t a problem at all.

 

At the pier, the person who comes aboard the bus to explain stuff did tell us that we had to be sure to see the purser to make arrangements to disembark. I told my husband I had never heard of any such thing, but he insisted that we check it out. Bottom line, you DO NOT have to make your own arrangements to leave the ship.

 

Embarkation was easy as pie and very quick. We were walking down a hallway and were suddenly aboard the ship, it was almost surprising!

 

If you want to buy a coke pass, DO NOT stand in the huge line on deck 4. Go up to deck 11 and buy it there. We never had a problem getting a drink. Usually, the sight of our coke cups were enough and we didn’t have to show our cards. Next time, I would give serious thought to bringing drinks on board to keep in the room fridge. It never failed but that I wanted a drink soon after we arrived in our stateroom and I had put my jammies on.

 

Our room was JS 1566 and our stateroom attendant was John. He always seemed to be in the hallway next to our room, and graciously opened the door whenever he saw us. He did a fine job taking care of us. The room was plenty big enough for the two of us and we probably could have had three people, but four would be pushing it, I think. We enjoyed our balcony quite a bit. We appreciated our room much more after our tablemates explained that they had to climb over each other to get out of their beds!

 

The food was ok (dining room for dinner and windjammer for breakfast and lunch). We likened it to wedding reception food…perfectly edible, but nothing to get excited over. The pizza was fairly good, we thought. The first night was the Bon Voyage menu (the one with the Videlia Onion tart, which we liked). The second night is formal night (Captain’s Gala menu), the third night was Venetian Feast (we missed that night) and the last was Feast of Nations. All these menus are available online. I must confess that we thought the coffee was hideously bad and our tablemates agreed. The midnight buffet was at the Nassau sailaway. The food was good and plentiful if a little wet (it began raining during the conga). We did not go to the chocolate buffet; the line was much too long and I was annoyed at the many people carrying out 3 and 4 plates apiece.

 

The entertainment was quite enjoyable. We liked the Dueling Pianos, Rosario Strings (in the Centrum) were quite good. Of course, Love and Marriage and the evening shows were very good and Quest was hysterical. The Juggler is a must see! He had given a volunteer who helped him on stage some candy bars as a thank you. As a joke, he asked for the candy bars back. The man started THROWING the candy bars at the juggler and actually hit him. I couldn’t believe it! I did take part in the “So you say you can’t cook/cake decorating thing. The chef really was very nice while he embarrassed me, but it was all in good fun.

 

Bingo was rather silly and not worth the money, IMO. There are only 5 games and they are very short. As a person who likes bingo, I didn’t think it much fun. Had I won, I might have liked it better! Twice during our cruise, in the day time, there were young girl dancing groups performing in the theater. They certainly weren’t polished performers, but the shows were enjoyable all the same and some of the girls were as young as 5 or 6 years old.

 

Coco Cay was a nice, relaxing day. My husband enjoyed snorkeling very much. The food was good and organized VERY well. My husband had wanted to parasail, but when he read that the height was 400 feet, he thought that was a bit too high. After watching the parasailers, he wishes he had done it. It looks like the length of the line may be 400 feet, but you aren’t going straight up in the air, so you wouldn’t be quite as high. We did wait almost an hour for a tender, I don’t know if that is common or not.

 

We booked a room at Comfort Suites so that we could enjoy all the Atlantis amenities in Nassau. The place is very big and we enjoyed it. My husband went down the waterslide that goes through the shark tank (seriously, this is the big reason why we chose to cruise). He says that you are going much too fast to see anything in the shark tank. Fortunately, there is another waterslide which will also take you through the shark tank and it is very tame. I was so glad that I was able to do this, because I certainly was not going down the other slide! We did not do the formal tour of the aquarium, but managed to see quite a lot on our own. We bought drinks at one of the outdoor stands and refills are free. We did use our room at the Comfort Suites. It was a nice size, with all the amenities that most hotels have in the states. We walked across the street to Anthony’s Grill for dinner. My husband had found a dining guide and inside was a coupon for a free rum punch with the purchase of two entrees. The rum punch was HUGE and quite potent! Both of us had seafood (a combination of grouper, salmon, scallops and shrimp for me and a combination of conch fritters, some other kind of conch and coconut shrimp for DH). The food was excellent! DH had conch fritters at Atlantis, but they were not nearly as good as the ones at Anthony’s. We ordered an appetizer, 2 drinks, and 2 entrees and it cost us just over $70.

 

We walked back to the Atlantis to catch a cab. Because it was just the two of us, the driver said it would be $10 (fares between Atlantis and the pier are supposed to be $4 each). We didn’t argue because we did need to get back to the boat. The driver seemed quite offended at the $2 tip we gave him and made a nasty comment to my husband. Two of our tablemates had some trouble finding a cab willing to take only two of them back to the pier.

 

All in all, we had a good time. It was certainly a worthwhile experience. We do plan to take our children on a cruise in a few years (we have a teenaged son who will not fly, so cruising gives us the opportunity to take him places he otherwise would not see). But we probably won’t become regular cruisers. If you have any questions, ask away!

[The Socialite]

Where online are the menus available?

[lv2cruisgrl]

I suggest you do a voyager class ship and take the kids, they will love it.

[phopte]

I did take part in the “So you say you can’t cook/cake decorating thing. The chef really was very nice while he embarrassed me, but it was all in good fun.

 

 

My wife and daughter went to the cake decorating. As I remember what they said, one of the cakes "lost" some of it's decorations when the chef spun it around but they did say that everyone was having a good time.;)

 

Did you go to the art auction?

 

I agree with the go on a Voyager or Freedom class ship with the kids. They will have more to do than you will believe!

[Ali-in-Texas]

Before my first cruise on the Rhapsody, I kept reading about the horrible coffee on the ships. So I didn't expect decent coffee, but it was quite the opposite on the Rhapsody. Their coffee was really good in the dining room and the Windjammer.

 

I guess it depends on who makes it.

[dicar123]

phopte- that was my cake! LOL!

 

As to the coffee, on day 2 there was a man carrying a cup and he said the coffee was so good that he had had to come down and get a second cup! We did only drink it at dinner the first night and from room service the next morning, so perhaps the coffee wasn't quite fresh.

 

To be honest, the cruise was exactly as I expected it to be, I just didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped. We do plan to take the children on a larger ship with a longer itinerary. Perhaps with my expectations being more reasonable, we will find that we really love to cruise.

[kc320]

dicar, It IS easy to get caught up in all the pre-cruise planning & excitement on here & develope overly high expectations. It sounds like you did a good job of scaling back & relaxing once you were onboard.

I will be on the Sov. again in 124 days & can't wait!:D

[dicar123]

Southern Diva

Go here http://cruiseclues.com/menus.htm

 

The menus will NOT be listed under the Sovereign link, but if you click around on other RCI ships, you will find the menus listed with the names I've given (Captain's Gala, Feast of Nations, etc.)

[dicar123]

kc this high expectations thing seems to be a problem of mine. You should have seen my sad little face when my children were completely unimpressed with Disney World. LOL!

 

I'm sure you will have a wonderful time! Being out at sea, with no land in sight, is really an amazing thing. I couldn't get enough of looking out at water as far as the eye could see!