Mariner of the Sea Review October 24-31

[mj]

I was on Mariner of the Seas October 24-31. Traveled with a friend, we are both in our late 30’s. This was my tenth cruise overall(5th on RCCL) and my friend’s seventh(4th on RCCL). Overall, we had a great time, and there were some imperfections, but not enough to spoil a very good time.

 

 

 

Flew in a day early and stayed near the Orlando Airport at a Sleep Inn. Decent place to stay, no complaints. When we arrived in Orlando, rented a car from Budget, a Chevy Malibu for $31. That was a pretty good deal. It seemed everyone else in Orlando was wanting to rent a car and took about 45 minutes to get checked in and going.

 

Embarkation Day

 

Arrived at the port around 11:15AM. We were going to drop off the luggage and then turn the car in. This was a slow moving process. They were only allowing so many cars at the time to drop off luggage with the porters. Since we had e-docs, we had to get the porter to fill out the luggage tags. Preferably, I like it the other way when your tags came with your documents. Dropped off the rental car and got back to the port. Very easy to check in at that point and were on the boat at 12:30. Rooms were not ready until 1PM, so we explored the boat. The Mariner is a very pretty ship and I think holds it own against the other Voyager class ships. Had a good lunch at the Windjammer, explored the ship until it was time to sail away. It was very rocky that night, so much that the RCCL dancers could not perform. But that was the only rough night of the cruise.

 

Service

 

This is my 5th RCCL cruise. The service overall was good on the Mariner. I don’t know if I’m being picky, but it seems the service on the Navigator and the Mariner has slipped slightly compared to my other three cruises on RCCL. It seems the service is good, but not as crisp as on the Sovereign, Explorer, and Voyager. The room steward on this cruise was ok, nothing special. The thing I noticed was how late the room was made up. Most of the time the room would be made up around 11AM-12PM. One morning in Ocho Rios, we were out of our room by 8 and came back around 11:45 to relax and the room was not made up. When we got in the room, the room steward knocked on our door wanting to make up the room, so we left. He would tend to forget something whether it would be ice or just minor items.

 

On the other hand, the dining room waiter was one of the best. He took the time to learn our names and ensure that the service and food was excellent. The Head Waiter was very personable as well, taking the time to chat with us. The Assistant Waiter was slow the first night, but service steadily improved over the week. All in all, a very good dining room experience. I thought the dining room was beautiful as on all the Voyager class ships. Overall, the ship was very friendly.

 

Food

 

This had been debated on the boards quite often. I thought the food was good to excellent in the dining room. The weakest night was the Italian, it was ok. I thought the food was much better in the dining room than on the Navigator, where the food at times tasted bland. We did go to Chops on Caribbean night, and we had better food at Chops last year on the Navigator than on the Mariner. Chops was good this year, not great. I had no problems getting stuffed in the dining room on this cruise and our waiter made sure we did. The Windjammer food was good. The Windjammer seemed more crowded at lunch and breakfast than other cruises I’ve been on. Only ate in the dining room for lunch once. I didn’t like the cutbacks in this area. I thought the menu was limited and only wanted to eat their once. The big plus was the crème brulee and that was very good. I may be wrong, but I don’t remember the dining room being closed on port days on RCCL before. The dining room seemed to be open only 3-4 days of the cruise. Room service was good and enjoyed having a cup of coffee on the balcony each morning.

 

Ports of Call

 

At Port Canaveral, we received a notice that we would not be going to Grand Cayman due to the hurricane. However, Thursday morning we did have to stop at Grand Cayman due to a medical emergency. We did not hear anything else about the condition of the lady, so I hope everything is ok. In Ocho Rios, we did some shopping, but really did not spend much time on the island. In Cozumel, we did some shopping in the morning and went to Paradise beach in the afternoon. This was a nice relaxing way to spend the afternoon. There was no entrance fee and there was a bar. The beach was clean and was there was no problem getting a taxi back to the pier. Total cost for a taxi was $24 + tip round trip. Labadee is always nice and is one of my favorite ports. Just had a nice relaxing day on the beach.

 

Entertainment

 

I thought the entertainment was good. The opening night comedian, whom they called the Reverend was funny. My two favorite shows were the 50’s group The Coasters and Ice under the Big Top. Quest was hilarious as well as the Love and Marriage Show. Did not attend any of the productions shows this year, so I cannot comment. The only show I thought was ok was a group called the Alan Parsons Project.

 

 

Debarkation

 

This could be an area for improvement. We had a 1:00 flight at the Orlando airport. We had red tags and unlike other cruises we were not given a list of the order of colors to be called. I checked with the pursers desk that morning and they said it would be around 9:20. We disembarked around 9:35. We went through customs and got our bags and were on the bus by 10:15. We did not leave until after 10:30. We got to the Orlando Airport at 11:30 and were checked in by 12:15. That was a little too close for comfort. This is what I could not understand. What is the use to check that you have a 1:00 flight when they seemed to give you whatever color tag they wanted. I was talking to various people waiting to get off and ones with later flights than mine were getting off earlier. It was not due to having a shore excursion. When I was at the pursers desk, I should have pressed harder to get tags for an earlier departure.

 

All in all, had a very good time on the Mariner. This was an excellent cruise and would like to try a Radiance class ship next time on RCCL.

 

I could not cover everything, so if you have any questions, I will be happy to answer them.

[mj]

There was one other thing I failed to mention in the review. It seemed RCCL is more aggressive in trying to get onboard revenue than in the past. It seemed like there were more announcements for bingo this year and drink servers were constantly asking me for drinks on deck, much more than in the past. The other thing was the free ice cream near Ben and Jerrys on deck 5 were closed the entire week. However, there was free ice cream near the Windjammer.

[bpear1600]

Your impressions of your Mariner cruise is almost identical to ours of our 1/04 Mariner cruise. Believe me, you didn't miss anything by skipping the two production shows.

 

In 25 years of cruising we haven't noticed much deterioration of service on the mass market lines, maybe because we really don't demand much. If there has been a dropoff it's in cabin maintenance. We had a Junior Suite on Deck 9, as we will on our next cruise, and the steward and his partner rarely cleaned up until mid-afternoon. The guy was kind of a smart-ass too. The other room stewards were always seen in the hallways working but our guy was invisible most of the time. This was OK but it would have been nice to have the room cleaned earlier.

 

Maybe it's us. It seems no matter where we stay, on land or sea, we are always among the first to arise and the last on the cleaning list. No biggie, however. If that's the worst thing we have to deal with in our life we'll get over it. :)

[ruttie]

Thanks for the review what cabin were you in?? do you rememebr if they had a spot to get hamburger/ hot dogs fries etc.. by the pool?? or did you have to get them at johnny rockets and pay??

[Ocean Boy]

This sounds much like our experience from April on Mariner. Our cabin was made up much later. We always stop back at our cabin before going to lunch. I was not crazy about finding it either not made up or the steward being in there cleaning when we got back. Since we are always out of the cabin by 6am the latest it certainly wasn't our fault that he couldn't get in there earlier.

 

As far as the production shows. One was ok. The other, call Front Row, was about the worse thing I have ever seen at sea or on land for that matter. Under the Big Top was very good. But I actually preferred Explorer's "planet Ice" the year before. That is mostly due to the fact that I liked the musical choices better in "Planet Ice".

 

Dining room service was ok but nothing like on Explorer. Our waiters never got to know our names and never spent much time at the table except for the last night.... tip night. Often times water glasses and iced tea glasses would not get refilled unless asked for and sometimes not even after asking for it.

 

Mariner is a great ship and we had a wonderful week but it just wasn't up to par with the week that we spent on Explorer. Crews change and service changes from sailing to sailing and ship to ship. Service can also be different for various people who are on the same sailing. This was simply our experience.

[mj]

Ruttie,

 

I was in cabin 7620 which is in a very good location and close to the stairs and the elevator. We had a balcony and the room had adequate storage space.

 

 

Concerning hamburgers and hotdogs, they had them available in the Windjammer every day along with fries. To be honest, the hot dogs in the Windjammer was just as good as Johnny Rockets, in my opinion.

[ruttie]

thanks Mj! my hubbie loves to sit by the pool and eat hamburgers all day when he is cruising (i think it is because he is always in charge of cooking out by our pool and never gets to relax and enjoy)!when he was told Jr was charging he had a fit until i told him i thought they had a grill set up near the pool you have made his day thanks!!!

[mj]

I better clarify my point a little better. There were no grills set up around the pool. The hamburgers and hotdogs were available in the lido deck cafe, which would be close by. Generally, hotdogs and hamburgers were available from 11:30 - 2:30, and sometimes were offered in the Windjammer between 3-5. Hotdogs and Hamburgers were also available on the room service menu as well, which would be around the clock.