Explorer of the Seas Cruise Reviews - Reviews

My daughter and son-in-law gave this cruise to their mothers for birthdays , Christmases, Mother's Day and any other gift giving days.  We mothers roomed together while our children were on a different deck.  I chose this particular trip, my daughter chose the cruise line.  We were both so right. If you are only going to take one cruise this is the one - ship, line, trip.  Here are some reasons:

The Crew:  Every crew member is polite and professional yet personable.  I remarked to my daughter that each of them seemed to genuinely  love the job to which he or she was assigned.  I saw many of them doing several different jobs.  This was particularly true with Graham the cruise director.  He has the ability to make each person feel special and my family now talk of him using his first name.

The Food;  We had the greatest dining experience. Our waiter and assistant waiter were exceptional.  Jerry is a born comedian and we came to love him. And the food?  Well you try to find something wrong with it.  I could not.  It was delicious and artistically presented.

The guests:  I met so many wonderful people.

The shows and entertainment:  I love shows!  Your dancers and singers are fabulous.  I love Hayden, came to adore Tillman, waited anxiously for the parades, and partied with the best of them.  Oh, and that band!  If I left anything out I apologize because it was all wonderful.

The Ports of call, the scenery, the ocean:  I was often breathless.  It was all so beautiful.

Our ship:  I loved everything about it.

Ok so it was my first cruise and I am a novice at sixty-nine.

I have no idea how this could be accomplished; but boarding and dis- embarking are tedious.  However, I don't see any better way to do it and I love to tell people how they can do things better.

Additionally,  please show the cleaners that sanitizing a bathroom includes cleaning the side panels of the showers.  I found blood on the outer panel of my shower when I first entered my cabin.  Gust services immediately called housekeeping to sanitize my bathroom.  However, they still did not catch that blood.  I cleaned it myself and the problem was over. It in no way lessened my love of the cruise.

WONDERFUL!

Nice cruise, but things have changed. Room service $7.95 per call. Windjammer Food has gone down hill. We had (8) in our family in the Main dining room. They didn't cook a steak right in 7 days. We ordered at least 5 steaks per night and not one time were any of the steaks cooked right. Either to raw or overcooked each time. Pubic hair on the carrot cake one night, and plastic grilled into the steak on one side. Complained to the head waiter, and that was as far as it went. Our staterooms were well taken care of. Prices have all went up. Time to move on to another cruise line.

Friendly staff overall.  A lot of activities for both kids and adults.

The only big issues are taste of food at Windjammer, and the stop at Victoria, BC, Canada.

Some items/drinks tasted weird.  The stop at Victoria was a total waste of time!

The food and the scenery!

Every one was helpful and willing to meet our needs!!!  The dining room staff, our stateroom assistant, and guest services deserve all 10s!!!!!

The 3 hrs. of getting on the ship needs to be changed!  Possibly, giving  time for certain groups to arrive would be helpful!!!  

Getting off the ship went extremely smooth!!!!

The ship was very beautiful, clean, extremely well taken care of.  The staff were very pleasant and accommodating. 

I have been on other cruises in the past, and I remember being able to eat at so many places without having to pay extra just to eat.  The only "Complimentary" places I could find this time were at the Windjammer, and the Sapphire Dining Room.  I did find soft-serve ice cream on one of the outside areas, and it was also complimentary.  Everyone was very kind, considerate and pleasant except for the attendant in the Sapphire Room when I was trying to get to my dining table at 5:30 pm on May 17, 2017.  All he had to do was look at my card and he could have seen when I should eat and at what table, but all he could do was yell at me that my time to eat was 8:00 PM and I was not allowed to be there then at 5:30 pm.  Otherwise, everything was great. 

The accommodations were excellent.  The crew went way beyond making sure everything was OK or better.  The food was excellent!!!  We are definitely going to take another Cruise.  Thank You

This short cruise was a wonderful breakaway for my family.  Two had never cruised before so each day held something exciting for them.We spent time together exploring the beauty of the ship and all the activities on board were great.  Each port help interesting things to do.  Our family are ready to go again.

Horrible service from maintenance, room service, cabin steward, and the dining room.  This was our honeymoon.  I was so disappointed.  I will never go on a Royal Caribbean cruise ever again!  The only thing we received from Royal Caribbean for our honeymoon was a luncheon with 2 mimosas.  Thanks......

I would never have taken this type of 'vacation' had it not been for a fundraiser/auction in which I was the highest bidder for a women's center my midwife daughter volunteers for in south Seattle.  Coming from a poor middle class family - I considered a Cruise only for those who were financially well off.  What I totally enjoyed is: I did not have to worry or look after anyone or Do Anything...no cooking, cleaning or taking care of anyone!  I could sleep in, eat well anytime, lay in the sun, hot-tub, swim or attend any of the various entertainment events on board.  Dinners were fabulous and our waiters were professional & so very kind!  Our room was miraculously sparkling clean when we returned, how did they know when we were out!?  I would do it again if possible and would recommend it to anyone who has not had this experience!

Loved the small South Pacific islands, the Captain gave good information at noon each day.  Ship, staff and atmosphere were all up to expectations of the cruise-line. 

The Diamond/Concierge clubs were pleasant, friendly and well-maintained.

One quite major complaint was the lack of availability for current world news.

The only North American channel available on the tv was the degrading and opinionated CNN - Why could RCCL not supply a channel which gives unbiassed world news coverage?  Also most of the other channels repeatedly showed outdated and boring entertainment shows.

Thank you to all the hard-working staff on the Explorer.

Nothing special. The promenade was the only place to be a night. The bars all had something, but high prices for the booze. Shows were mediocre. Food was good, especially a gluten free section. They were charging almost 10% for currency exchange, so if you didn't pay in USD, AUD and CDN money holders were getting ripped off. Cheaper to pay with credit cards, even though they charged a 2% premium. Didn't know what to expect on excursions. They even charged $8 for shuttles from the dock in one port. 

Overall, I was very pleased with this cruise.  We are veteran cruisers (20+), so my comments come with that background.  We were in a Grand Suite on Deck 10 and had access to concierge services and concierge Denzil was absolutely fantastic.  Our room was also nice and spacious, and stateroom attendant Nicholas kept the room nice and tidy and was super friendly.  The food in the main dining room and at Chops Grille was also pretty good, though this was first cruise kitchen that couldn't get a soufflé right (texture was like angel food cake).  On the minus side, this boat had some new and inexperienced staff and it showed.  The casino dealers were mostly new and several couldn't deal the poker based games (i.e., Texas Hold 'Em and 3 Card Poker).  I'm guessing they over- or under-paid several patrons.  The waitstaff in casino also took until day 7 or 8 out of 12 to remember your name and drink when when you had a beverage package, and so it was a pain to provide your seapass card every time you ordered, and the staff was slim, so getting drinks took a long time many nights.  This was also an uncommon experience as typically by day 2 or 3, I would never have to provide my seapass card to a casino waitstaff as they knew my name, order, and would have a record of my account reflecting that I had a beverage package.  I also found several public bathrooms to be rank--just lack of cleaning or regular cleaning needed to keep them fresh.  Casino bathrooms and bathrooms near the pool and Windjammer were the worse.   I learned from a spa staff that some of the inexperienced and new staff were due to where this cruise ported (Sydney, AU), and that it was far away from many places where the cruise companies recruited workers or too costly for workers to leave that part of world to visit home; hence some areas of ship had lots of brand new staff.  This was also the only ship I have been on with a single nail technician, which made getting nail appts more challenging. Lastly, we mostly had great experiences with shore excursions but, in Vanuatu, we were delayed into port due to another cargo boat.  That delay caused our excursion to be cancelled.  However, we received untimely notice of that cancellation and no alternative excursion was arranged or suggested despite being in port for another 7+ hours.  Again, while we experienced some issues, I still loved my time on the cruise, and enjoyed the beautiful ports we visited with some of the prettiest beaches with clear water (Mare, Lautoka, Isle of Pines) that I've ever seen. My son (age 10) also won an iPad Mini in the kids arcade playing a Stacker game, so he couldn't have been happier either.  He also generally enjoyed the Kids club and activities onboard (pool, rock climbing, bingo--free for kids, etc).

Took this cruise to see if we would like this many days at sea. Yes we liked it very much. Captain Rick had a great crew on his ship. Capt Rick was a people person and you could tell because his whole staff followed his lead.

Booked 3 back to back cruises while on ship.

Being ripped off as Royal Caribbean sold 1500 tickets at less than 60% of what we paid ruined what was otherwise a wonderful cruise. I was lied to by RC and told prices would be frozen after the final payment date. Once on board, all of us who booked early through an agent, spoke to the many who got the "deal". Take my advice if you can and do not book early through an agent as that is the excuse RC uses to do nothing to correct you being ripped off. It is a circular scam. The dining staff were also rude when we tried to change our dining reservations from 6 PM fixed to "My Time" so we could make the 7 PM show. I had to involve the Captain.

This was my 4th time on Explorer. The other 3 times have been out of Bayonne NJ either to Bermuda or Canada. These trips were enjoyable with good food, entertainment and service.

Not quite the same on this coastal trip.  Firstly, although it is called coastal, you only get to see the coast on your way in or out of port.

Also the trip was in Oct, so no surprise, it was cold and rainy, yet most of the tail activities were scheduled for outdoors (most were cancelled or unattended).  The big option for indoor entertainment was Trivia.  Unfortunately, everyone on the ship was there so unless you got there an hour ahead there was no seating (or pencils for that matter).

Food was just ok with little variety. 

We did not see our cabin attendant for the first few days.  but the one bright note is that he was very attentive.  He saw we had a bottle of wine in our cabin and brought us wine glasses I hate the sheets being tucked and without being asked, he left them untucked after the first night. Nice!

Loved stops in Santa Barbara, San Francisco, and Victoria. Could have skipped Astoria (San Diego, Monterey or even an extra day in San Francisco would have been nicer).

We enjoyed the time together in the ship's friendly atmosphere.  Service was excellent, the food was good an plentiful and the facilities  on board provided some exciting activities, such as the ice skating rink for our 8-year-old grandson.

The Explorer of the Sea is a beautiful ship.  I loved the common area (The Promanade) where everyone gathered.  It reminded me of a little village.  I was impressed with the fact that some of the inside staterooms actually had windows overlooking this area. There was a few shops and a 24 hour cafe where you could get coffee, sandwiches and pastries included in your package.  It also included Starbucks and Ben and Jerry's ice cream that was extra cost.  The cruise staff hosted many celebrations in this area as well.  We had a really fun 70's disco party.  

I could not rate this a 5 because I was not impressed with the shows that were offered on the ship and normally I love going to the shows.  Additionally, the times offered were a bit inconvenient.  Also about scheduling, we had a situation where we wanted to go to Karaoke one night and when we showed up at a place called the Tavern there was a group of people watching a game on the big screen.  At first the cruise director wanted to cancel the show but then he waited and we got a late start.  It seems to me that if this was a scheduled activity in that venue it should have been coordinated better with the Tavern.  

I have done this cruise before and did not participate in any shore excursions but I love all the ports the ship stopped at.  

Everything else was o.k. but they did seem to be short staffed and I felt better services had been offered on other cruise lines.  

MORE TIME IN SF. WHEN I BOOKED IT  THE  SCHEDULE YOU GAVE ME WAS CHANGED COMPLETELY. YOU HAD 1ST STOP IN ASTORIA AND 2 DAYS IN SF. THEY CHANGED IT COMPLETELY

It started like most cruises but even a little bit better on the boarding process.  That was where the good mostly ended. We (wifey & I) were travelling with eleven other friends and our expectations were high because four of our party had cruised RC b-4 and really talked them up. They ended up apologizing saying that this was an anomaly and not the real RC. It took me three days to finally make the room stewards understand I wanted four extra pillows not the four that I had. No stationary or pen in the cabin. The server team in the dining room was slower than mud going uphill and when we got the nearly stone cold food because of their lack of speed it wouldn't have been much better if it were hot.  The food for the most part was bad in the dining room and totally terrible at the 11th deck buffet. We complained to the team supervisor to no avail and finally got tired of going over their heads and went directly to the food and beverage director after two days of piss poor service. The service got better but the food was still second grade at best ediblwe but not of the quality we have come to expect on our 12 previous cruises on Norwegian, Carnival and Holland America. It kind of makes me feel a little apprehensive about using RC again

4 days to straighten out the pillow situation in the room,   2 more days and 4 phone calls to get the television to work,   food was low quality and the service even lower.  Activities on board were sorely lacking during the day.   dining room not open for lunch,  buffet only upstairs.   descriptions of excursions sounded great but 2 different ones we booked n board were deceptive as we found out while touring.  disappointed was not the word.