A Detailed Review of Our Cruise To The ABC Islands
Explorer of the Seas Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern
Contributor Level:
Second Mate
Cruises: 7+ cruises
Reviews: 12
Helpful Votes: 510
8 Night Southern Caribbean (Miami Roundtrip)
Sail date: October 29, 2022
Ship: Explorer of the Seas
Cabin type: Balcony
Cabin number: 8246
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 2 years ago
Review summary
To set the background for my review, this was our 7th cruise on Royal Caribbean and our 22nd cruise overall. We previously cruised on the Explorer of the Seas 10 years ago back in 2012. We booked this cruise because Card Player Cruises was holding a special poker event curing the journey. They set up their own poker room in the Conference Center and offered tournaments and cash games every day. My wife played every day, but I am not a poker player so I did not participate in the poker event. We ate with fellow participants and I did take advantage of the special food offered in the Card Player Poker Room. We did not have any issues with COVID, and we felt that this was our first cruise that felt similar to pre-pandemic days.Embarkation
Embarkation was as smooth as could be as soon as we found the embarkation location. The Explorer of the Seas left from Terminal G, not Royal Caribbean’s new Terminal A. Since we drove to Miami from our home in Florida, we searched online and the information we found pointed us to Terminal A. When we got there, we had to detour back to Terminal G. Once we got to Terminal G, it was easy to park right there ($22/day) and walk to the check-in counter. Since we had filled all those documents online, it took less than 3-minutes to check us in. After that, we walked onto the ship. The process was amazingly easy and quick.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
The last time we traveled on Royal Caribbean was three years ago. The quality of food choices was noticeably lower in the Main Dining Room and the Windjammer Marketplace. Much of the food seemed like the cafeteria food I had back in college. It was really substandard and not that tasty. We ate all our dinners in the Main Dining Room and our breakfasts and lunches were in the Windjammer. We did not try any of the specialty restaurants. In the main dining room, my wife enjoyed the appetizers more than the main courses and often ordered multiple choices. The main dishes were satisfactory, but no one raved about their choices. We did notice that it seemed to improve during the last three days of the cruise. Royal Caribbean still featured a lobster tail night. The service was very good, except for a few minor incidences when we felt that our servers were less attentive than they were with larger tables. We contacted the Maitre’D, but were told to “not worry about it”. We enjoyed eating at a set dining time with a table of 8 fellow poker players from the Card Player group. This has disappeared on other cruise ships, so we were glad to experience it again on the Explorer. The choices in the Windjammer Marketplace were consistent and did not change much from day to day. My wife especially enjoyed the Indian food section, but there were not many other international choices. Salad choices in the Windjammer were minimal. I was surprised at the number of stews featured as main dishes in the Windjammer.
Onboard Activities
This is one area that we definitely found below par. Most of the activities were the normal selection of poolside events, game shows, and trivia activities. There was a fair selection, but some nights it seemed rather boring on the cruise ship. The other passengers on board seemed to enjoy the activities and they were very well attended, but that may have been because there did not seem to be an exceptional number of choices. There were normal cruise ship things to do, but we did not find them as interesting as past cruise experiences. We enjoyed the dance classes but thought there were too many game show-type activities replacing shows by professional entertainers. I used the Exercise Room every day of our cruise. It had a good selection of equipment all in good working order. It was never overly crowded. In the past, we have purchased the Vroom Internet access on Royal Caribbean and it was very good. We were greatly disappointed with the speed and quality of Internet connections on the Explorer. Charging $18/day for the poor quality of the access was not fair. The speed was painfully slow and various areas of the ship did not have access. I could barely check my email. Opening a simple Internet page took minutes. The ship’s onboard access seemed like Internet access found in old hotels ten years ago. I went to the Internet manager to see what could be done about the quality and speed. He reset some of the settings on my phone and changed our access point. It helped a tiny bit but did not improve anything dramatically. We ended up using our T-Mobile and Verizon foreign data benefits to check emails and make simple phone downloads when we were on the islands. We were not able to do this through Royal Caribbean’s Internet access.
Entertainment
I always look forward to the entertainment portion of our cruises and try to do one or two things each evening. On most nights, I usually saw only one show. By far, in my opinion, the must-see show was the Ice Spectacular: Spirits of the Seasons in Studio B. The best acts in the theater were the singer Zoe Tyler and the group IMPACT from Argentina. The productions by the Royal Caribbean singers and dancers were good: Invitation to Dance and Wild, Cool, and Swinging’. The comedian, Cary Long, performed on the first night and the last night. His show was mildly funny but overall but I did not connect with his style of comedy. His last set at the Farewell show was his best. The singers in the lounges were good and we enjoyed some great music. They performed a lot. One standout was Ventzi Nelson in the Schooner Bar. His piano sets were packed every night. Overall, we felt that the entertainment options were not up to par with what we encountered on previous Royal Caribbean cruises. On one night, the headline show featured two of the lead singers from the Royal Caribbean performance group. The opening night and farewell shows were made up of the comedian, Royal Caribbean dances, and the group Impact. Everything was only 45 minutes long. We missed performances such as longer Broadway shows. We suspect that the entertainment options have still not fully recovered from the ongoing COVID situation.
Children's Programs
We did not travel with children
Service and Staff
Our room steward, Terrence, was exceptional. He continually greeted us each day and made us feel valued. We used the Do Not Disturb and Make Up My Room magnet when we went in and out of our to communicate with her when it was okay to clean our rooms. Everything went smoothly. The service and towel animals were simply outstanding. The wait staff in the Windjammer Cafe was attentive, polite, and helpful. We were continually greeted and made to feel welcome. When we asked for help, we were given it immediately. They were definitely the friendliest and most helpful wait service staff on the ship. Our two dining room servers Alex and Yoga did a good job. Our table of 8 was moved on the first day since we were part of a group. We were supposed to get expedited service so that the poker players could be finished before 7 PM to start games in the Card Player Poker Room. Our table was often the last to finish because we received food after other patrons who were not under time constraints. No matter how often we brought this up to the maître d', the problem was never resolved. Some at our table had to skip dessert because our service ran too late. I’m not sure the problem was the fault of the servers. I think they were doing what they were asked to do by the management. I think that the problem was that the maître d' didn’t really treat our problem as serious.
Ship Quality
The Explorer of the Seas was state of the art when it was originally launched, but much has changed over 20 years. It doesn’t seem old, but it does not have the Wow factor of the newer ships. Since the Explorer was recently refurbished, the carpets and interior all seem fresh. There was always plenty of room in the main theater, but many of the smaller venues needed more room to accommodate all the people who wanted to see the singers and bands. The entire ship was always clean and we could see the staff maintaining it every day.
Cabin / Stateroom
As part of our Card Player Cruises package, we were given a balcony room on the 8th floor near the front staircases. It was a great location. It was only 3 floors down to the 5th floor Promenade, restaurant, and activities areas and 3 floors up to the pool deck and Windjammer Marketplace. The stateroom was the standard size balcony room. In our opinion most rooms on cruise ships are of similar size unless you opt for a suite. Since the Explorer of the Seas was built over 20 years, it had some features that did not support the way we live today. The bathroom did not have much storage space and it was a challenge to fit most of our clothes in the closet and drawer space. If most of your clothes use hangers, you may want to bring some of your own. The biggest challenge was charging our electronics. There were only two 15-amp US standard wall sockets in the room. I anticipated this and brought a USB hub so that we enough ports to charge our phones, ear buds, Kindles, laptops, etc.
Ship tip
Remember to fill out your cruise docs ahead of time. Also, book your island excursions online well ahead of time. We waited until two weeks ahead of our cruise and found that many of our first choices were already fully booked. You will have a much better experience on the ship if you plan and prebook.
Thumbs up
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Ports of call
Miami, Florida Did not visit port
We booked the Bonaire Highlights North and South tour. It departed at 8 AM. I enjoyed this tour. It was obvious that there are not a lot of exceptional things to see in Bonaire, but the tour guide did a good job of showing us the scenery and sites that were unique to Bonaire. I always try to avoid trips that make a major stop at alcohol factories or gift shops. This trip stopped at a Cultural Museum and the Slave Huts/Sea Salt Mining Operation. I enjoyed seeing the homes and lifestyles of the people of Bonaire. This was very interesting to me and I felt the trip was worthwhile. A good number on our trip thought it was a little boring. Read the trip descriptions carefully and choose something that is of interest to you. The trip was 3 hours long.
We booked the Panoramic Curacao Island Tour at 1:45 PM. The trip was supposed to take 3 hours, but we were back in 2.5 hours. We toured the city of Willemstad and took a trip to a scenic outlook (at a gift shop) over Caracas Bay. Our last stop was a distillery (not my favorite type of stop, but we couldn’t get our first choice). The island was interesting, but we would have preferred to see more of the city and the natural areas of Curacao. The next time we visit, we will book our tour earlier. We did not have time to walk to the nearby city. We felt there was much more we wanted to see in Willemstad.
We booked the Aruba’s Hidden Gems tour. It departed at 8:15 AM and was supposed to be 4.5 hours long, but actually took a little over 5 hours. The tour made stops at a beach, a grotto, caves, a seashore cove, and a rock outcropping that overlooked the island. We also drove through the resort area to see the hotels and tourist areas. We really enjoyed the guide and sites of this tour. The only downside was that it was long. The natural sites were great to experience and we learned a lot about Aruba. We really toured all parts of the island. We would definitely recommend this tour. The one downside was that since we got back late, we did not have time to walk to the nearby city of Oranjestad.
Disembarkation
Since we live in Florida and have about a 3 - 4 hour ride home, we opted to walk off with our luggage. We usually use this option. The boat docked before 7 AM. We got up around 6 AM, ate breakfast, grabbed our luggage, and were at our car by 8 AM. The process was not as quick and easy as we anticipated. The facial recognition technology worked well and made our exit quick. Unfortunately, there was a bottleneck getting from the third to the first floor of the terminal. The attendants insisted that everyone with a large wheeled suitcase had to use the one elevator (that was slow and held only 6 people). The lines were unnecessarily long. They would only let passengers use the escalator if they hand-carried their suitcase down the escalator. This bottleneck made our exit take about 30 minutes longer than it should have.To set the background for my review, this was our 7th cruise on Royal Caribbean and our 22nd cruise overall. We previously cruised on the Explorer of the Seas 10 years ago back in 2012. We booked this cruise because Card Player Cruises was holding a special poker event curing the journey. They set up their own poker room in the Conference Center and offered tournaments and cash games every day. My wife played every day, but I am not a poker player so I did not participate in the poker event. We ate with fellow participants and I did take advantage of the special food offered in the Card Player Poker Room. We did not have any issues with COVID, and we felt that this was our first cruise that felt similar to pre-pandemic days.
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