Mediocre cruise due to ship but great destinations.

Item: Freedom of the Seas
Rating: 3.2
Author: jeffifer

Freedom of the Seas Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern

jeffifer

Contributor Level: Purser

Cruises: 4-6 cruises

Review: 1

Helpful Votes: 36

Overall rating:

3.2 out of 5

7 Night Southern Caribbean (San Juan Roundtrip)

Sail date: May 12, 2019

Ship: Freedom of the Seas

Cabin type: Balcony

Traveled as: Family (older children)

Reviewed: 5 years ago

Review summary

Would never go on this ship again and will probably never go on Royal Caribbean again. Overall, the staff on Norwegian and Carnival much more pleasant. Lines for everything and no cold beer anywhere. Big letdown. Ports however were overall great except Antigua ( don't leave the ship if you go).

Embarkation

4 out of 5

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

3 out of 5

Food was very good in main dining room with great service. Buffet was below average. Carnival and Norwegian much better. Plus RCI would have buffet closed most of time when people coming back from excursions. Very little draft beer and mostly warm. Virtually impossible to find a cold beer anywhere on ship unless you could find a iced beer cart every few days or so.

Onboard Activities

4 out of 5

Rock climbing, flow rider and miniature golf fun for our adult kids. Pools were great especially adult one.

Entertainment

1 out of 5

Did not go to a stage show but other entertainment was poor and some embarrassing.

Service and Staff

3 out of 5

Room Stewards were great as was the main dining room staff. The vast majority of bar staff were poor and rude.

Ship Quality

2 out of 5

Cabin / Stateroom

3 out of 5

Overall good but not on par with Norwegian or Carnival.

Ship tip

If you like friendly bar staff or cold beer, don't ever sail this ship.

Thumbs up

Ports of call

San Juan, Puerto Rico

5 out of 5

Old San Juan was awesome. Did Old San Juan "on your own" tour. Very punctual and pleasant staff.

Thumbs Up 10

Philipsburg, St. Maarten

5 out of 5

Go to Maho Bay to see the planes!

Thumbs Up 5

Basseterre, St. Kitts

1 out of 5

Adult kids did zip line and loved it. Best "cruise port town" ( shopping and food near the ship) of the five stops.

Thumbs Up 1

St. John's, Antigua

1 out of 5

Hated it. Will never visit again.

Thumbs Up 0

Castries, St. Lucia

5 out of 5

Very friendly island. Got private taxi cheap and saw the island, beach and historic site.

Thumbs Up 3

Bridgetown, Barbados

5 out of 5

Did private excursion and saw a cave and wild monkey feeding. Would do both again.

Thumbs Up 3

Disembarkation

4 out of 5

8 Comments

Cruisers4Lyfe 3 months ago

Thanks for sharing

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bigcruisers2 5 years ago

Don't understand this one, Royal Caribbean is the best cruise out there. Sounds like you are a carnival employee

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shipmate13 5 years ago

Meant Carnival. Sorry for misspelling the word.

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shipmate13 5 years ago

Anyone who puts Carnival over any cruise line is just weird to me. He must of been a real joy to be around pouting over beer. I will give him credit for saying some things good about the ship. If your beer was warm, what did you do about it? I am sure RC would have resolved your complaint. Go to Csrnival, sounds like it's a perfect fit.

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SREstrada216 5 years ago

St Kitts best port but one star 🤔🤷🏾‍♂️

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Ship4brains 5 years ago

Thank goodness I don't drink beer, I prefer to get superior service from bartenders who make the best drinks.

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nekocrouton 5 years ago

I was on this ship last month and had a completely different experience. This leads me to believe that the OP is making things up. The crew were always friendly and smiling, I maybe ran into one bartender who wasn’t, and I was surprised to see how long the Windjammer actually was open on most days. Can’t say anything to beer since I don’t drink it. Anyway, bye OP. Enjoy your time on ‘nickel and diming’ NCL and mediocre Carnival. 👋🏻

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GigiPartyof4 5 years ago

Everyone has different wants and takeaways from cruising for which I have gathered from reviews/ comments. Why bash individuals for their reviews? He wanted a cold beer and prefers Norwegian or Carnival. My question to Jeffifer is...Did you at least write this review with a cold beer in hand? I had a very good experience on RCCL and hope the poor rating was not primarily due to warm beer consumption.

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Other reviews of this sailing

Awesome ship.. just alot of nickel and diming

Amazing Family Cruise!

Barbados