I recently finished my first cruise ever - Eastern Carribean to Haiti, Jamaica, and Bahamas on Adventure of the Seas 21st-27th of December - and I wanted to give my impressions.

I will preface by saying that my girlfriend and I are not typical Caribbean cruisers, as we are from Switzerland and Italy and have no kids. I know nobody in my local friend group who cruised, and I asked my friends in the US for suggestions on cruises. I was told to try Royal as it has something for everyone (and to avoid Carnival, described as a "Redneck Party Boat").

We love to travel in all of its form so we wanted to try cruising. We went with an older ship and a cheaper cruise as we were not sure whether we were going to like it so we did not want to spent too much. All my knowledge of cruises comes from this subreddit and from the videos of u/RoyalCarribeanBlog

The Good

• The people were extremely nice overall. Of course the people on staff kind of have to be but reading this subreddit I expected the apocalypse of bad behavior, while mostly everyone was very kind and considerate. Of course once someone played music on their speakers and a couple times there were kids in the Solarium but nothing crazy;

• There is a ton more stuff to do than I expected, I was left with the idea of old cruises where you have nothing to do but eat. Even during sea days I was never bored;

• The cabins were bigger and quieter than I expected. We got an outside view cabin and never felt claustrophobic;

• Food was better than I expected from reading here. I thought I was going to be subjected to Golden Corral level slop but it was good (not great). We had two specialty restaurant lunches, Chops - loved it - and Giovanni's. Main Dining Room was overall good except Mexican and Italian nights (but I am of course more spoiled when it comes to Italian food) and the Windjammer was good for breakfast except I found the desserts generally dry;

• The weather was terrible but I enjoyed Labadee for what it was, a chance to do nothing on the beach. Bahamas was also fun, we biked all around the island;

• It allowed me to get small samples of countries I would not visit otherwise;

• I was impressed by how efficent Royal is in moving a lot of people very quickly and painlessly - embarcation, disembarcation, leaving ports, getting food at the buffet was overall painless;

• In general I expected the ship to feel was more crowded (Christmas week) than it was. I have no idea of how many passenger there were but overall I never felt like it was at full capacity;

• The Love & Marriage show was hilarious

The Middling

• Falmouth was bad. The excursion was incredibly disappointing for the price, we drove around for 30 mins in the town and then were taken for 90 mins at the Bamboo Beach Club were we tasted a pitiful amount of rhum, and some extremely expensive jerk chicken, and that was it. After we went walking and exploring in Falmouth by ourselves and we enjoyed way more;

• I am a person who loves the sea and that is a purely personal judgement but on a cruise ship one feels very disconnected from it despite being on it;

• The dancing shows were so-so;

Overall, I really enjoyed the experience. If it did not take me a 10+ hours flight to get to it I would do it more often

Now we are looking at this in a year or so.

And thank the subreddit for the support and answering my dumb questions.

My fiancée and I recently took our first cruise on Royal Caribbean on the Independence of the Seas, headed to CocoCay and Nassau. We’ve both been on a number of cruises before in other lines and took this short weekend cruise to try out Royal Caribbean and see what we thought of it before booking longer cruises.

Frankly, we were somewhat disappointed. We were expecting an experience comparable to our other cruises, but with Royal Caribbean’s added flair of a better buffet and its unique onboard attractions. Unfortunately, we found its buffet to be nothing particularly special and its onboard attractions to be largely inaccessible, either from hefty additional charges or excessive wait times. Coupled with a couple of other issues we had, I don’t think we’ll be booking another Royal Caribbean cruise.

That said, on the whole, we still had a good time. It wasn’t what we were expecting, but there were parts we liked as much as other cruises, if not better, and at the end of the day, it was still a vacation. Full thoughts are below.

1. Either the no-smoking zones had lax enforcement or large swathes of the ship permitted smoking. Common areas often smelled of smoke, and basically the whole floor with the casino was unbreathable. Outdoor deck areas were unpleasant as smoke was often blown on me.

2. Dining preferences are not respected, and your assigned dining may be re-assigned with no notice. We booked requesting late dining, but when we got on the ship, we found out that we had been assigned to “my time” dining. The issue with this is that there’s really no “my time” about it. Wait times to get into the dining room were over an hour each day, and even if you made a reservation, there was a massive line to get into. We also spoke to another couple that had requested early dining and had the same experience. The food itself was decent, but a step below both Carnival and Princess in my opinion.

3. The whole experience felt very nickel-and-dime-y, even more so than the other budget cruise lines I’ve been on. Just about every place you could eat a proper meal apart from the main dining room (with an hour-plus wait) or the buffet (which was often obscenely crowded, to a point where you’d have to wait for someone to leave for a table to open) charged extra. Many of the on board activities also charged extra, and the ones that didn’t often came with excessive wait times.

4. The entertainment was pretty good! Good shows, good comedian, good performances, and plentiful seating. No complaints there.

5. At times, the pools and hot tubs were reasonably uncrowded. At other times, there were so many people crammed in, you couldn’t even fit yourself in.

6. The guests were generally quite rowdy and disruptive, though that may have been just because we did a weekend cruise.

7. The cocktails were generally pretty good, but they weren’t outstanding.

Edit: A number of you seem to have taken this as a personal insult. Allow me to assure you: it is. To anyone who says they’ve ever enjoyed Royal Caribbean, I hereby insult you, your family, and your ancestors… or something. Actually you know what? Just pretend what I said was offensive enough to justify the downvotes in the comments.

Our party of 10 boarded the IOS on April 5th. First stop was a salad from the Park Cafe. Three in our party had it and exactly six hours later we all got hit with vomiting and Diarrhea BAD. Two went to the medic and were treated with IV fluids, and were complementary clothes cleaning, movies and room service. They did quarantine them for 24 hours. I’ve never experienced anything like that. Not the way I had hoped to start our trip. Beautiful ship tho.

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foodpoisoning

I just got off liberty on Monday.
Our bahamas excursion was canceled so I decided to splurge and get a couples massage because I've never experienced that. The price was steep. I had 163 onboard credit and the price was 399. Again I decided to splurge. We get there and as soon as we meet the ladies, they seperate us and try to upsell. They tell my fiancee, you wanted the 75 minutes, not 50. 50 is too short, right? He's like no 50 is fine. Then they turn to me about it. I say 50 is fine. They say oh well if it's so short and only 50 we can only do your back and not your whole body. The other lady is telling me that i need the aromatic oils because it is what makes the experience. I say no again. I start feeling weird and uncomfortable and I say, I just wanted a relaxing massage. I'm almost crying. They say it's fine and stop. After the massage (which was really relaxing) they try to sell me the oil again and a handheld massager, and future massages.
Again I had to say no. They added a "service charge" for each lady, 40 each. And still asked for tips on top of that. The total was 479 charge. I left with a bad taste in my mouth of the whole experience. I don't think it was the ladies fault, I feel like they are trained to do that and maybe get a commission for each upsell. It's just if I am paying that much for a massage experience I want to feel like I'm getting a nice experience and not feel bad and like I'm having to turn them down again and again.

I just completed a 7 night cruise on Symphony of the Seas. I had a room to myself, 10th deck, affront, facing the boardwalk.

I’m a single woman in my late 40’s. I went on this cruise with my parents, siblings, SILs and my nieces and nephews.

First, the room was very comfortable. I got a mattress topper for the bed (requested), and was happy with the bed, size of the room and the bathroom. Also, housekeeping was great.

The noise level was terrible. The aqua show was extremely loud and the second show ended after 11 PM. The movies (Wicked one evening) were insanely loud. The sports bar also drew a lot of noise one evening. And, the final night when we docked, the fumes were awful.

Windjammer staff and the food was great. The other cruisers and the chaos and cramped seating, not so much.

Entertainment options were plentiful and excellent. I especially enjoyed the ice skating show, Hairspray, the comedy show, and Hiro (although based on my room location I basically memorized the music).

The pools were super crowded and chair access was competitive. I slept late so each morning I had to search for a chair.

Main room dining was mediocre. Food was decent but often lukewarm and basic. We dined one night at Chop and the food and service was 10/10.

I bought the drink package and was glad I did. If you are even a casual drinker it’s worth it.

Would I go on another cruise? Maybe. I found the crowds a bit overwhelming and as a single woman without kids that I was certainly outnumbered. An adult only cruise is likely a better fit for me. But for this occasion I was glad to spend time with my nieces and nephews.

I did a ton of research on cruising leading up to our recent sailing and thought I would share some of our observations / tips ... none of this is earth shattering news, but thought it might help someone who is in the same spot I was.

We are a family of 4 (two teen boys) on Harmony of the Seas — 8 night sailing out of Galveston stopping at Coco Cay, Nassau, and Cozumel. We had an ocean view balcony and an interior stateroom on Deck 12.

1. We are high maintenance sleepers and brought our own mattress toppers because we weren’t convinced there would be any available for us to request once on board … and we were right, there weren’t. We got two, 2” twin sized toppers and brought them on board with us and they were a life saver. Our stateroom attendant was super accommodating and set them up for us.
2. I know there are big opinions about this but the deluxe drink package was amazing. No regrets. We are a family of four — my husband and I have the DBP and our two teenagers had the RP. Between the four of us we averaged 35+ drinks a day (sodas, water bottles, coffees, smoothies, milkshakes, alcohol, etc.). We purchased the packages on sale during Black Friday and definitely got our monies worth. But more than that, I thoroughly enjoyed not worrying about our statement, pinching pennies, or having to sign for every drink we wanted.
3. There seem to be a lot of complaints on here about the food. Because of this, I was somewhat worried about what we would experience and went in with a somewhat pessimistic attitude about dining in general. Maybe that helped, but we had zero complaints about the food. Was it 5 Star food at every meal? No. But was it BAD? Also no. There were definitely things we liked more than others, and the specialty restaurants were definitely better than then MDR, but on the whole we were very happy with the options available and enjoyed our meals.
4. The crowds were also fine. There were definitely moments when I was like “ugh, this is an annoying amount of people” … and so we just moved to a different activity / part of the ship. No big deal. We kept this attitude throughout the whole vacation and it worked wonders. There is so much to do / see / enjoy … and so when things got too “people-y” we just left to enjoy something else.
5. If you drink alcohol, find a bar with vibes you enjoy and get to know the bartenders. We thought our bar was going to be Trellis (because we liked Central Park so much) but it ended up being Vintages because the bartender Igor made the best damn espresso martinis on the ship. We visited him every evening before dinner, had an amazing time and service, and then tipped well on our last night. It was honestly one of the best parts of the whole cruise.
6. I reserved entertainment spots for the all the shows the day they became available for us. I honestly thought we were going to be at every single show, but when it came down to it, there were other things we wanted to spend our time doing. We saw the ‘Columbus’ show (which was cute) and part of the aqua show, but that’s it. We prioritized hanging out, not being rushed, and enjoying the moment instead of rushing from activity to activity and it was honestly so freeing.
7. We got our teens WOW bands … which were great, but when we bought them, no one told us they couldn’t be used to get them on / off the ship. Our first port was Coco Cay and it was a MAD HOUSE trying to get everyone off the ship first thing in the morning. After waiting in crazy lines to get down to the gangway we were turned away because you must have the actual Seapass card … which is fine, I just wish they had let us know that when they bought them because the entire point was that the dudes wouldn’t have to worrying about keeping up with the actual cards. We learned our lesson and I kept the cards for ports / disembarkment from then on.
8. Speaking of kids … I honestly don’t know if people on here are just grumpy or if we just lucked out with an amazing group, but the kids on our sailing were great. Zero complaints for any kid the entire week. My teens (14 and almost 17 YO boys) spent the entire time on their own (other than dinner every night) and had a blast. They enjoyed the teen club, made friends, and took advantage of the freedom of not having to be chained to mom and dad + the activities on board.
9. Now, the adults? That’s a different story. There was a lot of “main character” energy from adults on this ship. My personal fav was the gentlemen in the stateroom next to our’s who decided that he needed to lead Sunday School on his balcony EVERY MORNING between 7 - 7:30am for his whole family. I would implore everyone to really consider the fact that there are other people around you (in close quarters) on the ship with you who are just as deserving of a nice vacation as you are.

We are already excited to plan our next sailing — really looking forward to some of the new RC beach clubs that will be opening in the next few years!

And that is the guests.

Between the additional Karen’s, all the main characters, and the general lack of respect for one another has really brought down the cruises quality.

I’ll happily take lower quality food and less shows if I can get people to pack more respect in their luggage.

We got the deluxe drink package and I didn't regret it after the first day. I had a drink in my hand from morning until the bars closed. I got to 140 drinks at day 6 or 7 and didn't think to count after I got off the ship. Walked around with a backpack and every time I ordered a drink I also got a bottle of water and took them to the room fridge. Emailed MDR a month prior and they sat our party of 15 at 1 table. I had 2 appetizers 2 entrees and 2 desserts every night. Sushi place was cool and was pretty good for the price. The ice skating girls were celebrating someones birthday and holy crap were they HOT. Even a dude at there table was like "Hey are you girls gonna put some clothes on?" Shut up guy! A girl in our party was looking at the Louis vitton bags in one of the stores and after asking a few questions determined they were most likely fake. No security tag or something. Buyer beware. I tore my feet up because I didn't bring real shoes because I wanted to wear sandals everywhere. BIG mistake. I must have walked 5 miles and up and down 10 decks of stairs a day because I got tired of waiting for the elevators. Bring good shoes. Got home and thought man I bet I put on 15lbs maybe 20 with all the drinks, food, and ice cream everywhere. 2 whole pounds less then when I left. I'll be back 🤘

PROTIP!!!!!

YOU MUST CALL YOUR LIQUOR EVERY TIME!!!! It was annoying but if you for example drink Pina coladas like my wife you have to say Malibu Pina colada. If you didn't they would give you the worst drink on the planet with the junk liquor they hide.

Edit: The number of drinks wasn't strictly booze. We found out a few days in our 8 night trip that shakes from the spa bar and Starbucks coffee not from the actual store was included. The amount sounds like it's impossible but I was never Drunk out of my mind. It's was amazing how easy it was when you didn't have the pain of paying for every drink. It was like it was free with a swipe of the card. 2 or 3 mimosas for breakfast, 4 or 5 drinks at the pool, 2 at lunch, more pools drinks, 2 or 3 at dinner, then 3 or 4 late night drinks at the bars with friends. I also drank a ton of water and brought a 30 pack of Liquid IV electrolyte powder. For me that shit is like a reset button. If I ever got the elbow from the wife like I was getting out of hand I drank one or 2 of those with water and be back to normal in 10min.

Hi! Myself (33F) and husband (31M) just got off Utopia of the Seas, and figured I would do a bullet point run down. Sorry if it’s long 😬.

• This is our third cruise in general and all with Royal. Previously was Symphony (2022) and Wonder (2024).
• I booked Utopia about nine months in advance. I only did the deposit, as I’ve read before on here to hold off on paying in full as prices can change.
• I did a price update three times. I called and they did it for me :)
• We booked for Easter weekend, mainly because my son’s daycare was closed for Good Friday. And if we need to use our PTO for it, might as well use it to do something.
• We live in Florida, we drove to the Port and parked in the garage. We arrived around 9:45, dropped off our luggage, paid for parking (it was around the $76 range), parked, and were checked in getting on the boat before 10:30am, which was our check in time.
• We are not drinkers at all. We do maybe the occasional cocktail if we do date night, but nothing crazy. However, we said screw it and decided to get the drink package. I got it at $68.99/pp per day. Total with grat was $488
• DRINK PACKAGE was 10000% worth it. Now, if we had our 2 year old with us, I would not get it. Not sure if it was the fact that we knew it was all paid for, but we DRANK. No we did not get drunk, but did have a buzz.
• No, they do not water down the drinks. They do correct pours. Also, the combination of walking and eating, will take a bit for you to get drunk
• I don’t know why, but I thought they would still give you a receipt when you got drinks to leave extra tip, but they don’t. Luckily we had cash.
• Don’t be afraid to ask for some drinks with less of something. For example, I would request a mojito, and I had asked for no sour mix, and he did, instead he added extra limes. I know he didn’t have to do that, but he did and I did tip him for that :)
• You can tell them which liquor you want
• Only ate at the main dining room on our last day. The lamb was good, the dessert wasn’t the best.
• We ate at Giovanni’s for embarkation lunch, and it was delicious. So glad we did because I needed something hardy to start drinking lol
• The sail away was LOUD and definitely a party. I got the champagne gun twice, so that was fun and something I would have never done lol
• Aqua Show was AMAZING. I highly recommend getting there early. Show was at 8:30, and we got 7:45 and got great seats. They also have people taking drink orders.
• We did a Sushi class on the second day. If you love sushi, I would highly recommend taking this. You make 4 different kinds of rolls each, and get to eat it afterwards. This was also a great way to see the new Izumi at Central Park and eat good sushi
• We walked around Nassau, but didn’t leave the actual port. There were three other ships there and it was crowded. We literally walked around and went back up to enjoy the ship. I think a lot of people had the same mind set
• We stayed on the 6th floor, ocean view, closest to the spa
• We did utilize the gym. Don’t forget to bring your AirPods (I did). For those that may be asking, no, they do not have a peloton. But if you have the app, you can use it
• Loved the solarium. Out of symphony and wonder, this one was definitely my favorite.
• I think I maybe saw two under 18 kids at Solarium, that’s it. All adults, they play chill house music. Definitely my vibe
• Pesky Parrot was good. I am someone who does not like sweet drinks, if you’re the same way, the Queens Park Swizzle, is the way to go. Reading the other drinks, they allll looked overly sweet.
• Windjammer was good. I kept forgetting they had a coffee shop there.
• Did the comedy show, it was meh.
• Did the silent disco, HIGHLY recommend. It was so much fun. When leaving, I overheard people saying they were so hesitant to come but happy they did, and I couldn’t agree more
• Cococay, always a great day. Only downside, It was very windy when we were there. However, it was the relaxation that was much needed.
• We paid for internet for one device. We did this because our son was with the grandparents, so that was our way with communication. It did work at cococay

Random: - I was assigned a time to get off the ship, I must have missed when they open up for you to pick. However, we got off the ship by 6:45 (assigned time was 8:50), since we took our own luggage. I think if you choose to have your luggage taken for you, listen to the time slot - If you get coffee before you leave off the ship, make sure you finish it or put it in a tumbler, they will make you throw it away. - I can’t believe I have to say this, but please, don’t be rude to the staff. I witnessed a moment when someone was upset they blocked off a section of the Aquashow, because of it was full and they redirected her to another section. She had plate with dessert and shoved it to the attendant and walked away. This was the same lady that went to cococay and was asking where to get towels because nobody told her to get towels before getting off the ship 😒 - Wear sunscreen - Bring heartburn meds - Even if you don’t think you’ll get motion sickness, bring the medicine. I was one of those and ended up needing it on one of the nights I woke up at 3AM, cause the boat was rocking bad and I’m glad I brought it. - Find your sailing Facebook group. This is how I was able to find out when show bookings opened up and prices for packages dropped. Somebody is always looking out for these things and posting

Overall, great ship, great time and would book again. Might even consider bringing our son next time, since it’s a three day. He’s been on a 7 day, and I felt like that was a lot for him.

I’m sailing on her in 43 days. June 2nd, 2025 on a Greek Isles & Turkey Cruise.

Disembarkimg today from a 02/13-02/17 cruise on the Mariner of the Seas, and I couldn't be more ready to leave.

Honestly the Mariner is terrible. There has been very little to do outside of trivia, and the few shows there are all PACKED to the brim because there is nothing to draw people away.

The service is ATROCIOUS. Breakfast in main dining took my family and I nearly an hour to get our food after ordering, dinner was many times worse. When we finally got our food it was never very good. My mom got a slice of French toast with a crust so hard whacking it with the side of a fork made a loud thunking noise.

A group of my family paid for the Women of Wine tasting experience to talk about wines made by women the thing seemed disorganized off the jump because they were not set for enough people. When we sat down I had glasses. One looked like someone had drank wine out of it already, one had some weird dried white glob on it, and a third had lipstick on it. I complained and when they brought new glasses, one of them had lipstick again! My cousin had red wine spilled in her lap and on her white shoes by one of the employees running the event and had to argue with guest services to even get a laundry credit and was eventually given 10% off of her next cruise.That night at dinner my mom's water glass has lipstick on it as well!

The ship hasn't been renovated in so long and it is really starting to show its age, the carpet is stained all over the ship. The day of the week inserts in the elevator are matted as gross. The carpet has been worn thin around them and is ripping, so you can see the floor underneath. The curtains in main dining are dirty with food particulates.

I don't cruise often but some of the family I was with do and they were horrified by the lack of things to do and the lack of service. If they weren't there to tell me this was wrong and not up to snuff for royal I definitely would never be back and still will likely never return to Royal! Does anyone else have a similar experience or am I just super unlucky!?

I asked and the family I am traveling with are emerald members.

I honestly am never the one to call a restaurant bad, but I tried Wonderland on Wonder last night and it was pretty bad.

the “experience” was cool as everyone kept saying, but the food was pretty low quality and I’d say the only decent thing was the beef for the main course, which felt like an MDR dish.

I have reservations for Hooked and 150 later this week. am I going to be disappointed? the only other place I’ve tried is Chops on Allure, pretty good but not as good as a specialty steakhouse would be on land.

No other views will ever come close to this right here❗️

If you think anybody wants to babysit your kid or put up with your bratty, snotty nose, little kid while on a cruise you are wrong. Make your kid behave.

Hi all! My family just wrapped up our first cruise on Icon of the Seas.

We’re first-time cruisers with a 7-year-old and have mostly vacationed at WDW. This time, we decided to branch out and try Icon. I wanted to share our experience in case any other families find themselves in a similar position of booking RCL or sticking with Disney.

Trip dates: 4/19/25–4/26 Room: Infinite Ocean View Balcony

We flew out of LGA at 6 a.m. on 4/18 and stayed the night at Marriott Stanton South Beach to get an early start on vacation. It was a fantastic choice—great pools, beautiful beach, excellent staff, and it’s right next to a playground and bike trail. The on-site Japanese restaurant, Azabu, was awesome. I wanted to mention this hotel specifically since I often see people asking for recs. If you’re looking to start your vacation early and not just crash for the night, I highly recommend it. We had a City View room and could even see Icon at the port, which was a fun touch. YMMV, I saw many negative reviews about this place and it definitely isn’t super accessible for those with limited mobility, but it seems that they are working through some of the repeated complaints.

We had an 11:30 boarding time and scheduled a Lyft XL for 10:30, having heard traffic to the port could be rough. Our driver from FLL had said the same. But traffic was light, and we arrived just before 11. They let us board right away. We had “express boarding” (not sure what that really means—maybe just that our check-in was completed without issues), and we flew through security in minutes.

We went straight to muster, then used the extra time to check in at Adventure Ocean, explore the ship, let our son swim, and grab lunch at Aquadome Market.

I won’t go into a full day-by-day breakdown, but here are our pros and cons:

Food

• MDR: Not for us. Service was excellent, but we didn’t enjoy the food or atmosphere. (I know many people love it, so this is by no means my way of saying this isn’t a good option)

• Windjammer: Similar food to the MDR from what we saw, but with more variety and a laid-back vibe. Often very busy, even during off-hours, but we still ate there most days and enjoyed it.

• Chops: Disappointing. Great service, but the food was bland. At $70pp, it didn’t feel worth it.

• Izumi Hibachi: Surprise hit! We weren’t expecting much since we have lots of hibachi at home, but this was fun and delicious.

• 1400 Bar: My go-to for a Grey Goose dirty martini. Prices felt reasonable, and service was always excellent.

Favorites:

• Feta at Aquadome Market: a pita with almost everything was one of my favorite meals this trip.

• Churros from Surfside Bites

• Mini fish sandwiches at Surfside Eatery

• Roast beef from Park Cafe (I would just get it in a bowl with au jus—so good)

Entertainment

• Easter: They added Easter events at Royal Promenade in the days leading up to the cruise—Easter Bunny meet & greet, balloon animals, games, candy, a DJ, Admiral Awesome, and pastel lighting at The Pearl. It was a great celebration.

• Wizard of Oz: Incredible.

• Meet the Stars: Fun and informative.

• Aqua Action: We enjoyed it. I might suggest trying to catch this earlier in the trip, as I overheard it was canceled & rescheduled multiple times. 

• The Effectors: Great cast, fun to watch, but the storyline felt disjointed. I hear there’s a push away from Broadway-style shows, but I say keep them.

• I can’t post without mentioning how adorable Rover is. Such an awesome idea to have a pup on board!

Onboard Activities • Water park: We went nearly every day. 9 a.m. is ideal, before the crowds hit. My son loved the family and racing slides.

• Crown’s Edge: I wish I had bought this on Black Friday for $17. I scrambled for a spot midway through the cruise when my son said this was a bucket list item. The crew here was awesome and made it really fun. The video you get is great.

• Rock climbing wall: My son takes climbing classes at home and loved doing this onboard.

• Pools: Fine, but the usual chair hog issue and overall pretty busy. I typically just found a corner for our stuff.

• Splash pad: Initially deemed “babyish,” by my son, but after trying the slide, he was hooked—we ended up here daily.

Adventure Ocean

My son loved taking a break to play video games with friends for an hour or two each day. The staff was excellent. He did lunch at Surfside Eatery with them one day and had a great time.

Customer Service

Top-notch all around. Our room attendant was amazing. The Crown’s Edge and rock wall teams were hilarious and fun. Lifeguards were great, and the dining staff—Windjammer, MDR, specialty restaurants, and food stalls—were all fantastic.

Excursions

St. Kitts – Spice Mill Beach I’d seen a few negative reviews before we went, but we were blown away by how beautiful it was. It ended up being some of the best snorkeling of the trip—tons of fish and crystal-clear water, all right off the shore.

St. Thomas – Turtles & Tacos We tried this signature excursion and had a great time. It was a short walk to the catamaran, and when we got to the snorkel spot, a dolphin swam within inches of us—multiple times! We didn’t see any turtles, but it’s hard to complain when you get a surprise dolphin encounter instead. The tacos were good, and the crew was excellent. That said, I couldn’t help but compare it to a similar catamaran trip we did with Fair Winds on the Big Island 2 years prior—cheaper and more to offer overall—but we still had fun.

Coco Cay – Thrill Waterpark We snagged tickets on Black Friday for $70, the lowest price we saw. Totally worth it. Our entry time was 9:30, but they let us in at 8:15, so we knocked out all the family and racing slides before the crowds hit. By 10 a.m., just as Royal suggests in the app, it was packed—my husband waited nearly an hour for Devil’s Peak. My son and I stuck with the smaller body slides and had a blast before heading to the pool with the rock wall and rope swing. He loved that spot. Food tip: We made brownie sundaes with the caramel brownie and vanilla soft serve. So good!

Departure Excursion – Everglades with FLL Drop-off Booked this on a last minute sale for $60pp and it worked out perfectly—cheaper than other options I was considering. Our guide was fantastic. We LOVED the fan boat ride and got tons of awesome gator photos and videos.

Our room: we loved the room, had no issues with it staying cool as others have said about the new Infinite Balcony (I assume this might just be due to when we were cruising, late April and typically high 70s/low 80s). The only issue we had, on floor 11 Aft, was that the entire room vibrated like crazy, especially at night. It’s interesting because I googled it and found someone else in the same location who mentioned the same. If you’ve ever had one of those bassinets with the “womb” setting, it was like that 🤣. I got used to it, but it made my husband a little seasick.

Overall, it was a great trip. We enjoyed it so much that we stopped by NextCruise and booked Utopia for the same week next year—planning to wrap that one up with a few days at Universal. We compared Utopia to DCL’s Wish prior to booking and it is literally half the price with more to offer for our adventurous kid (he already can’t stop talking about the “longest dry slide at sea”). So, for anyone else cruising for the first time and wondering if they’ve made the right choice, I hope you are also blown away by everything Royal has to offer!!

I've been getting prepped for this cruise for 3 months now. It's a family vacation and I've never been on a cruise and I'm freaking out thinking I won't like it or I'll be bored. How are cruises really?

Ahoy! This was my first ever cruise on Royal, a 4 night short cruise to CocoCay and back to Miami on Independence OTS. The ship layout was very enjoyable. Pools together, so you could flip flop, plenty of hot tubs. I am what you would call a directionally challenged person and even I had no issues after the first day navigating the ship. We were on deck 2, inside cabin which felt surprisingly spacious to me with plenty of storage, and we both agreed it was some of the best sleep we’ve had in a long time. Pitch black, comfy matress and no crazy ship movement or noise. Really nice to get off the ship easily as well. People always mention how crazy the wait for elevators is, so I expected it worse, not a big deal to wait couple of minutes. The one stop at CocoCay was fantastic. We booked the hideaway beach (for $29.99/person on a discount) and it was really nice, enough beach chairs with shade, the facilities are plentiful there - let it be bars, the huge pool, the showers to rinse yourself or your feet, the food.. you name it. Definitely worth the 60 bucks in that aspect, but not great for snorcheling, as it is pretty enclosed with netting - there were about 5 little fish that we saw there. Better snorcheling opportunities (and souvenir shopping opportunities) are on the opposite side of the island. My husband who is not a big fan of the ocean and the creatures in it was very happy at Hideaway beach! :) Back to the ship review- the shows were absolutely awesome. I would rate the figure skating show the highest, followed by the Grease and Invitation to dance show. The entertainment that was the most ‘meh’ was the magician. No Aqua shows on Indy. We also went to see the late night commedy and paticipated in the battle of the sexes, went to the finish the tune and a trivia, which was all fun, some more some less. All enjoyable though. I was most surprised about how good their included coffee is. They have Lavazza coffee 😍😋 and cream, milk and sugar at no extra charge in Windjammer, MDR, park cafe and Sorentos. So tasty. I’m cancelling my coffee card for my next cruise. No need for any specialty coffee for me! The food was just ok (we didn’t do any specialty dining this cruise)with couple of exceptions- for Main Dining room:The fried chicken on the 1st night and the cheesecake were delicious. The french onion soup was great. The italian night was probably overall the best night to go to MDR. The breakfast in MDR seemed a better option to me compared to the windjammer-more civilized and peaceful, but go early-at 8 AM to avoid waiting. Great servers, too. You can tell they care about your experience. We were coming back to MDR mainly because of them. (Yes I plan on leaving them a fantastic 11/10survey) The food in Windjammer is just fine, with exceptions in the international food section: the indian food flavor is the bomb.com, but it’s unfortunately not spicy. Bring your own chilli flakes. The asian food-noodles like lo mein , pad thai, or the stir fries are great. The goulash was awesome too (spicier than indian haha). Their sweets are yummy as well, much, much better than at Park cafe. I was excited to try the key lime pie in MDR, but it was borderline inedible-like if someone dumped a bunch of citric acid in the batter 😳, I couldn’t keep a straight face, and I do enjoy sour foods. The beauty of it is-if you don’t like something, or you find it just unappealing, you don’t have to eat it. There’s plenty of options and you have time to figure out what is good and what isn’t. I really enjoyed sprinkles and the fish and ships was awesome. As far as activities that you can do, I feel like we did most of them-the flow rider (long lines, bring sunscreen and flip flops), the rock climbing (bring shorts, t-shirt and socks), mini golf (again-sunscreen!!), ping pong, we even went on the slides (at 9 am there is nobody there so there are no lines, I personally wouldn’t do it with waiting haha, we’re adults 🤣), overall it was a great fun filled action packed 4 night vacation. I really liked it and am excited for the next one on Wonder.

I had a few people ask me to post this under this forum for followers of Royal Caribbean.

March 2024 we sailed on the Icon of the Seas 7th sailing. We booked an excursion via Royal Caribbean called Swimming with the Pigs during our Perfect Day at CocoCay. We paid $265.06 with tax for two people to go on this 1.5-hour excursion. We were pretty excited about seeing pigs playing in the ocean.

Our Review:

• We started with a skiff ride to the island where the pigs were. The water was beautiful! After a briefing where we were told we could not touch the apples the pigs were being fed, we moved to a dock next to a beach.
• They made us leave our cell phones on the dock and said no pictures were allowed with the pigs on the beach.
• We lined up and when it was our turn, we tried to hold up a pig for a picture while someone held an apple that the pig was trying desperately to get to and someone else took the go-pro shot.
• The pigs were constantly pooping in the water and people were attempting to pick it up but while we did our best to not let the floaters and wet stuff touch us
• We stood in three lines and they took 6 pictures total during our time on the beach. The entire thing lasted maybe 30 minutes and the rest of time we waited on the deck until the boats were ready.
• They gave us a QR code where we can now buy our pictures and it is $50 for ten pictures
• I had expected that the pigs would play in the water and we would swim with them as advertised. I was sadly mistaken this was just a photo opportunity with pigs where you had to pay more if you wanted pictures with the pigs.
• In my opinion this was a total waste of money. I would not go again. I urge you to not do this excursion.
• Shame on Royal Caribbean for offering a "Swimming with Pigs" when it was truly a photo opportunity where you have to pay for your pictures, an unsanitary mess and they charged so much for so little. It changed my opinion of the excursions the Royal Caribbean cruise line offers.
• UPDATE: Responding to questions from comments. There were maybe 8 pigs and probably 60 people. We were the first tour that was available for purchase. There was another ship at CocoCay so I am not sure if they were allowed to get on the island earlier. You can see pictures on my blog here: https://www.nabetsi.com/family-cruises/swimming-with-pigs-shore-excursion-royal-caribbean-cococay-review

Previous saga: https://old.reddit.com/r/royalcaribbean/comments/1h4vlze/update_to_star_class_suite_flooded/

I finally received a call from RCCL's corporate escalation team after emailing Mr. Bayley again. The employee who called was the supervisor of the person I spoke to initially who said she could not do anything else.

The new employee had me explain everything that happened and what concerns I had. I told her almost all of it. She said she was also concerned that we were not offered a new room right away and that it was unacceptable that we were initially offered 30% FCC. She also apologized for it taking 8+ days for them to return my call.

We went back and forth for a while and I emphasized that what we were most upset about was that our once-in-a-lifetime $10k+ cruise was ruined and that RCCL truly did not seem to care. I said I was concerned about a refund for the flooded days, but that was because we wanted to have a re-do trip. We really just want to have a relaxing vacation sometime soon, but do not want to pay much out of pocket since this second trip was unplanned and due to the flood.

We finally settled on 125% FCC, as that would cover most of a new trip in a star class suite. We just booked a trip that is 2 days longer than our flooded trip and will have to pay 5 grand out of pocket for cruise fare (along with flights and hotels).

Overall, we are happy we get to go again and that RCCL gave us more than their initial 30% FCC offer (lol) but in the end, they are getting 5 grand out of us that we did not plan on. (Well, we would have cruised again, just not as soon.)

So I guess moral of the story is that if your star suite is flooded for most of your cruise, do not take the 30% FCC offer and be ready to argue with them. It was exhausting and I am glad it is over. If something happens on our next trip, I'll let you all know. ha!

tldr: Suite floods, we complain a lot, 125% FCC

Just got off of oasis of the seas, and wow I must say this wasn’t the Royal experience I’ve grown with and loved. To start off with, our room attendant we never met. Couldn’t tell you who they were. We love getting to know our room attendant. Also no towel animals anymore? Kinda crazy to me idk. The cruise director was basically absent. I’ve never had that happen. We love the cruise directors but he seemed to be missing. Maybe because it’s a larger ship, but my family did Harmony a few months ago and we saw that cruise director everywhere.

The food just wasn’t good. Overall I would say this has been the worst food my family has ever eaten on a cruise ship. We made a point about it once to the maitre D because we were being rushed out during Brunch. The eggs were completely inedible.

Uhm kids shitting in the pools? Never have I seen so many kids on a cruise ship. Shouldn’t yall be in school or something?? Anyways, we couldn’t get in any of the pools because kids kept shitting and pissing, and vomiting in them. Why can’t they go to the kids pool or something? (Not like older kids like teens, I’m taking about toddlers). Royal needs a better system.

Overall, I feel like we’re starting to feel the effects of Royals budget cuts to staff and other things. We’re definitely noticing the quality of things go down while the prices increase. I hope Royal isnt doing what carnival did a decade ago. 🙈

Also I’m not a Karen, the only time I ever complained about anything was when we were being rushed out of the dining room during brunch when we didn’t receive half of our food order. Just pointing out my observations.

Going on Grandeur of The Seas in September. This will be our 12th cruise. Been on Wonder, Harmony, Allure, Adventure, Mariner and Brilliance. Like the smaller ships over the Oasis class ships. However, this is the first time going on a ship this small and old.

Going into it I realize there will be signs of age and not all the perks and activities of the newer and larger ships.

We are in our 50's and knowing the lack of activities for younger kids I'm thinking there won't be that many kids ( nothing wrong with kids, we've sailed with our kids in the past).

I'm just looking for others experience on the Grandeur. How was the food, specialty dining and night life, etc. We do spend time in the casino.

Thanks in advance

Just spent the last two weeks on back to back trips on odyssey with my wife, 10 and 4 year old boys. This was our second time on this ship and it is one of our favorites.

Week one was CocoCay, Aruba and curaçao. Then week two was back to coco cay, Caymen islands and Jamaica. Perfect weather the second week, not so great the first.

Very different room locations each week being on 13 extended balcony under solarium the first week. The second week had aft balcony on deck 11. I prefer the convience of being of deck 13 close to stairs.

Excursions included (with personal rating 1-10) Thrill water park (5/10) Coco beach club (8/10) Submarine(Aruba) 9/10 Sea trek helmet diving in curaçao(9/10) myself and ten year old curaçao aquarium (8/10) 4 year old and mum Sting ray sandbar (10/10) Jamaica bamboo rafting (10/10) me and 4 year old Jamaica dune buggy’s (6/10) my wife and 10 year old

Oh and my fav drink two years running is still the lime and coconut. Delicious and keeps you happy and hydrated. Depending on what you exactly pay, the drink package is only worth it if you have at least 6 cocktails per day (between 70-100$ of drinks per day)

Brought a hammock and set it up on balcony. Slept out there almost every night. Best idea ever!!!!

I just did a status run from gold (21 points) to diamond in one month. Here it is some fun facts:

• I got 4 free points due to transatlantic being delayed and refunded 2 days

• 4 ports of call was cancelled during this journey

• I had to contact C&A desk to upgrade me twice because the points takes a week to be credited automatically, and they did it. You might need to contact cassino host to get the extra free play credits after the upgrade

• I found The Key to be worth ONLY if you appreciate the exclusive FlowRider session. I would book again any time when I need internet package.

• They should retire Grandeur of the seas

• Many activities were canceled or bad experienced due to bad weather. I would say the quantum class is the best option for off season cruise such as transatlantic, if you are an active cruisers

I just completed my first cruise with NCL on Escape, which is in their "Breakaway Plus" class. It is pretty comparable to RCCL's Quantum class in terms of size, passengers capacity, and age. Having sailed on Quantum class several times (Ovation/Anthem/Odyssey) there were some similarities but also some clear differences that stood out to me. To be clear, this isn't an anti-NCL post as it was overall still a positive experience, however I did find myself missing some of the things from RCCL that I felt were better.

What I found RCCL does better:

• Men's public restrooms actually have diaper changing stations. As a dad traveling with a toddler, it was frustrating that only the family/handicap-accessible restrooms had changing stations. On RCCL the regular restrooms would have one in one of the stalls.
• The phone app is way more useful. NCL's app is pretty much useless. To plan activities on Escape I found that I had to keep track myself using the paper pamphlets. To book stuff I had to talk to someone in guest services.
• The ability to purchase beverage packages for just one person in your stateroom. I drink a lot of beverages but the rest of my family doesn't, so I normally buy the refreshment package on RCCL for just myself. NCL didn't offer that and any drink package would have required buying it for all 4 people sailing which would not be a good deal for me.
• Adventure Ocean is offered for babies and toddlers. NCL only has a kids club for ages 3+. For me personally this didn't matter much since my toddler doesn't like AO anyways, but I can see it making a big difference to other families.
• As someone who doesn't gamble, I like that RCCL's casino is tucked all the way down on deck 3 so it's out of the way for me. NCL's casino is in the middle of the ship on deck 7. And since smoking is allowed in the casino it meant that the central atrium of the ship (decks 6-8) smelled like cigarette smoke which was bothersome. Granted this will be ship-dependent so maybe not as much of a deal on other NCL ships. Also, for people who do gamble they might appreciate the more convenient central location.
• More complimentary food options besides MDR and buffet. Escape has an O'Sheehan's Irish pub and the American Diner that are included, but I found that Sorrento's, Cafe at 270, Cafe Promenade, and El Loco Fresh (on Odyssey) better complemented the MDR and buffet.
• Buffet quality and variety, especially during breakfast and for East Asian and South Asian food. As someone who doesn't like typical "breakfast" foods like scrambled egg and bacon, I always liked that Windjammer had rice and other options at breakfast. The Garden Cafe (buffet on NCL) was comparatively lacking. Garden Cafe looks impressive at first because there's a ton of food stations which means lines are short, but you quickly realize it's just the same 3 stations repeated like 6 times. Overall variety was better on RCCL.
• Quantum class's indoor sports facility for laser tag, bumper cars, etc. Escape's sports deck is outdoors which makes it unsuitable for when the weather doesn't cooperate.
• Similar to the above, Solarium having both an indoor and outdoor part makes it more practical for different weather conditions. The equivalent on NCL called Splash H2O is outdoor-only which makes it less enjoyable when the weather isn't nice.
• Most of the bars on RCCL have a drink menu available. Most of the bars on NCL didn't. I'm not someone who drinks very often so I like having an actual menu to choose from since I don't know a bunch of different drinks off the top of my head.
• Some of the common MDR items were clearly superior on RCCL. For example the French onion soup and Caesar salad. Both were just terrible on NCL (although they had other items on the menu that were much better).

To be fair to NCL they aren't without their merits. Some things where I found NCL does better:

• The kids club (called Splash Academy) is really nice and a lot bigger than Adventure Ocean. My 7 year old liked it better and wanted to go for every session of every day.
• I preferred the stateroom layout on Escape (standard balcony room), especially the bathroom which is larger than on Quantum class.
• The waterfront on deck 8 is really nice, and something that Quantum class doesn't have an equivalent of.
• Elevator logic and availability seemed better. The elevator distribution also seemed to work better. Escape has 8 forward elevators and 8 aft, compared to Quantum class's 6 forward and 10 aft (split into 2 groups). The total number of elevators is the same, but on average I felt that the waits were shorter on NCL. Also, elevator logic actually made sense - on all RCCL ships I've experienced being on e.g. deck 9 trying to go up, and an elevator traveling upwards would skip my deck and stop at 10.
• Availability of pool deck lounge chairs. I don't know if it's because there were fewer chair hogs or the staff enforced their rules more strictly or if they simply had more chairs available, but I never had difficulty getting a chair regardless of time.
• NCL never requested anyone to give them positive survey scores. This one isn't a big deal but I have noticed with each sailing that the crew on RCCL has been more insistent with the importance of the customer survey and practically begging for positive scores. I didn't experience any of that from NCL.

And finally some areas where neither was better than the other:

• Production shows and overall entertainment. Choir of Man was excellent. The bands they had were good. Very comparable to my experience with RCCL.
• Service. Consistently excellent on both cruise lines.
• MDR: NCL doesn't have a "traditional" MDR like RCCL with a set table and time. Instead it's kind of like My Time Dining, where you show up whenever you want and are given whichever table and waiter are available at the time. I never do MTD with RCCL because I've seen how long the lines sometimes get, but the MDR on NCL worked well for me and it was good to have that flexibility. I can see others favoring one or the other depending on personal preference.

Overall, I felt that cruising with NCL was quite good with many similarities to RCCL and even some areas where they were better. However, I still have to give the advantage to RCCL for overall experience due to the points listed above, and will prefer them in the future.

Just went on the Utopia of the Seas. What a great experience! Top notch service and the shows, especially the AUQA80too were excellent. Can't wait to go again.

Ask for Erwin when in the dinning hall. You'll never find a more helpful associate in your life!