Family Trip

It was 20 minutes from drop off to being on the ship.

Overall, with a few exceptions I will note, the food was very good throughout the cruise. Not 5 star, but still very good. The Ship is very accommodating for Gluten Free diets. . Windjammer – I only ate at the Windjammer on boarding day. This is a tradition for us. There is a hand washing station as you enter and a hand sanitizer. There was a line to get into the Windjammer. I actually believe this is more due to the fact that they are tunneling people through an area that has only four hand washing stations. Though it was busy, we did not have a problem finding a table for 5 of us. A waiter came right away and took a drink order. The food was actually pretty good and was warm. Mini-Bites – We ate breakfast here on one day. It was buffet style, though much smaller selection of food and you could get made to order omelets. This was also good and was warm. They were not busy at all. Park Café – A few of the days we had lunch here. I had the wonderful roast beef sandwiches. I love these. Others also had the made to order salad and the paninis were very good. Johnny Rockets – The kids went here for breakfast on a few days which they said was very good. I stopped in one day to grab an order of cheese fries and milkshake for a fee of $7.95. All was served quickly, was hot (fries) and good. Sabor – We had lunch at Sabor one day. There is a $19 charge for this. It was for anything on the menu with no limit. Twelve of us ate there that day. They did not have any trouble accommodating us. The waiter suggested he would bring out a variety of appetizers and serve them family style which worked very well. We all ordered a main item for our meal. Everything again was very good. Our waiter was very pleasant and very prompt. Izumi Hibachi – Ten of us had lunch here one day. The lunch is the same meal as the evening meal. Which also means it is the same price as the evening meal. All the other pay restaurants have a separate lunch price. Beyond that the meal was very good and our chef was very entertaining. Main Dining Room – We had traditional dining at 6:00 pm. We were seated at three tables of eight people and rotated tables throughout the cruise. Though the kids ended up at the same table every night. I have to say the food was very good. I had some apprehension prior to the cruise about the quality of the food after reading some of the reviews. Though only item I really did not care for was the crème brulee which I normally really enjoy. I was disappointed you could no longer get the scallops as an appetizer. Our wait staff, Olenka and Buya were outstanding. They had cheese plates and our drinks waiting when we arrived each evening. Even when we were switching things around. Chops – My husband loves to eat at chops one night during the cruise. While the food has been good, I have found that during our last three cruises the service in chops has been consistently getting worse. I ordered a house glass of Pinot Grigio. It took them almost 20 minutes to serve. The waiter apologized for the delay saying they were out of it and had to go to another bar to get some….. We were in the restaurant for 40 minutes prior to our orders being taken. They were very slow between courses. Our waiter seemed very rushed though the restaurant was not that full. The food though was very good. Wonderland – An amazing culinary dining experience and a fun place to spend a little time. Our waitress suggested she choose our meal. After looking over the magical menu, we agreed. She asked if we had any specific dislikes or allergies. She also said if we did not care for something she bought out, she would gladly bring something different. I am not sure how to explain the food in Wonderland. For example, many of the items you see do not actually taste like how you would normally expect them to taste. So you take a bite into something thinking it will taste like a tomato only to find out it does not taste like that at all, but trust me, everything was exceptional. It took about 2 – 2 ½ hours from start to finish. I will probably book my next cruise based on whether or not they have a Wonderland Restaurant….lol. Again I will reiterate that even the pickiest of eaters, keeping an open mind, will enjoy this restaurant!

The Pools – All of the pools had life guards. RCI did a good job of keeping the adult pool to just adults. Just by walking around, I could see the chair hogs were out in full force if you wanted to be right next to the pool. However, you could find a random chair if you wanted to sit back a few rows. There were always chairs available in other areas. I also noticed that several nights the pools were closed by 8 pm. I also thought the kids’ pool was a very nice area. There were lifeguards and life jackets available as well as signage to keep an eye on your children posted in all of the pool areas. DreamWorks Characters – I noticed several times throughout the day there were random siting’s of the DreamWorks characters as well as official ones posted in the Cruise Compass. Slides – I did not go down the water slides but our kids did. On Sea days the lines to the slides were very, very long. The kids said they were fun, but not thrilling. It seems that they may need to work on the water pressure in the slides a bit. Several adults I spoke with said they had to kind of scoot at the end of them. The Spa –My daughters and I did the spa tour and they were able to get the girls appointments for pedicures on boarding day with a discount. (we ran out of time prior to cruise to get this done). It actually was a very good and I told them up front that they could tell me about the products they use, but not to give me a big spiel as I was probably not going to buy anything. I also half-jokingly mentioned that the more I spent on products the less I would have to spend on a tip. I did end up buying one of the scrubs and still left a very nice tip for the three of us. Stowaway Piano Man – We saw him several times around the ship. We always got a kick out of seeing him. We ran into him in the elevator twice and he was usually outside one of the dining rooms for the early traditional dining. The Casino and smoking – I did spend some time in the casinos and even ended up ahead. I did notice the machines seems to pay out more the first few days. I feel the layout on the casino is better than some of the other ships. There seemed to be more of a division between the smoking and non-smoking sides of the casino. There seemed to be more people playing both the machines and at the tables in the non-smoking side than I have noticed on some of the older ships. It did not seem as smoky in there as I noticed on our last cruise which was the Adventure. Maybe on the newer ships they have a better ventilation system. One thing I did notice was that the smoking section on the pool deck 15 was usually full during the main part of the day. To the point there were not any chairs to sit in. This may be some of the reason that people are going into the casino just to smoke as I saw quite a few people doing that. The Arcade – Our kids spent a little bit of time in there as a group. They had fun, but didn’t elaborate a lot. One thing to mention is prior to the cruise we could purchase an arcade credit through the cruise planner. Once I realized our kids were going to be in the arcade I went to guest services to inquire about purchasing one on the ship and was told you could only do that in advance through the cruise planner. Service Dogs – Let me state up front that I have no problem with legitimate service dogs and welcome them. I love my dogs. There were two dogs I saw on this cruise. One of them was easily a legitimate service dog. It was traveling with a very nice young woman in a wheel chair. I saw them several times around the ship. The dog stayed right beside her. If she was at a table, it was laying at her feet and was very well behaved from what I saw throughout the cruise. I am not going to pass judgement on whether the other one was or not, but it was always in a cart, dressed up and was yippy around people. Artwork – This ship has some beautiful artwork all around the ship and in the neighborhoods. The décor throughout the ship was beautiful and fresh. Captain’s Corner – Captain Gus Richardson was our captain. This event was very well attended and it was interesting. The Head of the Motel Management was also there along with Director Bobby. We had a few Alpha, Alpha, Alpha codes during our sailing. One of the attendees asked what the Alpha, Alpha, Alpha message stood for and Captain Gus replied only that it was a confidential way to relay information to the crew and that if someone really wanted to know, they could join the crew. I found that answer interesting as you can simply google this to find out. Escape the Rubicon – Between my Sister and I we had 8 reservations for Escape the Rubicon. We were not going to do it ourselves, but felt like at least this many in our group might so we put them all under our name. It was not a problem to switch the names to who actually wanted to do it once we were on board. Our group solved the puzzle with 2 minutes to spare. They said they had a great time and would do another one. The price was $8.95 per person. It is for ages 14 and over. Martini Tasting at Wonderland A lot of people do not realize that Wonderland has a bar. You enter through a free standing gold door. It is quite small but has a great atmosphere. It does not open until 5:30 though. This ended up being our “go to” place for our pre dinner drink each night. Victor was the bartender here and was great, awesome and fantastic at his job. They do not have a blender at this bar. They specialize in signature cocktails and martinis. They also carry a selection of beer. Due to the unique décor of this venue, it is also a great place to get some photos. It has a few really eclectic chairs in the bar area. Wonderland has a Martini Tasting each sea day. It consists of five, two oz. glasses of different martinis. This equals two and a half regular martinis. Victor goes through how to make each one and how different types of liquor, purees and fresh ingredients affect the taste of the martini. Victor prepares the ingredients into the glass then each participant does the shaking. This was so much fun we ended doing this every sea day at 2:00 p.m. The class lasts a little over an hour give or take 15 minutes.

Grease - This was done very well and we enjoyed it much better than Cats. It is my understanding that the current performers just started their rotation a few weeks ago. There is some adult content in the production and RCI does note that it is for mature audiences. Nothing over the top, but teens would notice, under 10 probably not. Adult Comedy –We always catch this show on sailings and have not been disappointed. The comedian was Jim David. This is the first time I have seen him and thought he was very funny. Simeon was the Host. I have seen Simeon as the host before and he is hilarious. I would go to a show just to watch him. The Fine Line – This is the aquatic/diving show. We were scheduled to see this show on the third night and it was cancelled due to technical difficulties. This was also the night the boat was noticeably rocking so that may have played a part in it. It was rescheduled to Thursday night at 7:15. I always found 7:15 to be an odd time to have a show. Difficult to see this timeframe if you have traditional dining at either the early (6:00) or late (8:00) seatings. We skipped dessert to make it to the show. While I can appreciate the athletic and artistic elements of the show, it does not really make a whole lot of sense. The Headliner – Comedian Juggler Adam Kario – I was prepared not to like this show was much. My thinking was how entertaining can a juggler be for an hour…. However I was pleasantly surprised that he was funny and very entertaining. Columbus, The Musical – This show made absolutely no sense to me. However I did find it very entertaining. The song, dance and the set was very well done! 1887 – A Journey in Time – This was the ice show. I could follow the storyline and the skating and artistic elements were exceptionally well done. There was a Bubble Artist about half way through the show. He was very good also. I would say the Ice show was my favorite one of the cruise. This will have been the 4th ice show I have seen and feel this was the best one.

Our children did not participate in them.

Restaurants & Wait Staff - With the exception of Chops, we had very good luck with the wait staff that served you table side on the ship. They were all very personable and efficient. I will say that some of the food servers behind the counters in the places like Park Café, Windjammer, etc. looked mildly annoyed most of the time. Our room steward was excellent as were the bartenders and pool side waiters.

Temperature and Cleanliness – I found the temperature and the cleanliness of the ship very good. I saw them cleaning and wiping down common areas often. Several times passed them on the stairs wiping down hand rails. The only time I noticed public bathrooms needing a bit of cleaning was right after shows were finished.

We had Junior Suite 6648 and an Ocean View Balcony Cabin 6650 that were adjoining. They were on the beginning of the aft hump, starboard, Deck 6. I thought our JS was very nice and roomy. The bathroom had a tub/shower combination. Our cabin steward, Ricardo, was excellent. We had the connecting door opened and the divider on the balcony opened as well. I do love the large JS closet. The connecting balcony 6650 was also a nice cabin. There are closets on each side of the bed. The bathroom does not have a tub, only a shower. Both cabins had the couch and the connecting door by the balcony door. As this cabin was right at the start of the hump, the balcony has an angle on it.

We did self disembarkation. From getting in line on the ship to arriving at FLL took 30 minutes.