Great Getaway cruise

Cruises: 7+ cruises

Reviews: 8

Helpful Votes: 116

Review summary

This was my 7th Royal Caribbean cruise and my 12th cruise overall. For this cruise I went with my wife and daughter for a quick getaway. This was my second Freedom Class ship experience. Embarkation overall went extremely smoothly. Since this was a cruise out of Bayonne, NJ we drove. I dropped my wife and daughter at the entrance and parked. The only delay we had was the wait for me to park and walk over from the secondary parking lot since there was no room in the parking deck. We had a standard interior cabin that could sleep up to 4 people on Deck 8. The beds for the 3rd and 4th passengers are bunk beds with railings that pull down from the ceiling (which my daughter loved). It was a little tricky for our four year old to climb the ladder up to the bed, but she got used to it pretty quickly. If your child is a young 4 yr old or younger, the bunk bed might not be ideal. In that scenario I would recommend when booking a room verify the room has a sofa bed instead of the pull down bunk beds. The room also had the standard two twins, or when combined, one king size bed and the room had what I would describe as a 1/2 couch, bigger than a regular seat but smaller than a standard couch. Surprisingly, the room didn’t feel cramped probably due to the fact we didn’t have a sofa bed taking up so much space. The rooms were big enough for three of us on this four night cruise and there was plenty of storage space with multiple well designed shelves. Also included are the safe, phone and tv which were all functionally easy to navigate. The bathroom was a standard small bathroom with the normal circular shower had the plastic/glass closing enclosure. There was enough storage space in the bathroom for three of us, however, our 3rd person is only 4 years old so with a 3rd adult it might be cramped. In the shower there was a combination soap/shampoo dispenser and they provided a small bar of soap at the sink. I would advise bringing your own soaps and shampoo products. We brought with us onto the ship two bottles of wine. We didn’t have a drink package but we did purchase the unlimited dining plan. They do have multiple specialty dining venues including, Chops, Giovanni’s, Sabor, Johnny Rockets, Ben and Jerry’s, and the Cupcake Cupboard. Complimentary venues include the Windjammer, MDR, Sorrento’s Pizza and Café Promenade. Since we had the unlimited dining package we ate at most of the restaurants with the exception of Johnny Rockets. Complimentary venues we tried were the Buffet for breakfast and lunch, MDR for breakfast, and Sorrento’s pizza lunch. My reviews of those are as follows: Windjammer Buffet - Windjammer was so-so on this trip. There was adequate selections and in general good (not great) food quality. The fried egg station was extremely poor as every single egg appeared to be over hard/overcooked. They did not do a good job like past ships in putting out a good variety of cooked fried eggs. The service, however, was top notch as always. Main Dining Room - We only ate breakfast here on the disembarkation day but the food quality and service at the MDR breakfast out shown the Windjammer in my opinion. If you are not in a rush to grab food and go, I recommend instead of going to the Windjammer to go to the MDR for breakfast. Sorrento’s Pizza - Classic Royal Caribbean pizza. Good quality and fast service. I actually ordered a pie for my family to bring back to my room during peak lunch time and I only had to wait about 10 minutes. As for specialty dining my reviews are as follows: Chops Grille - We tried Chops for both lunch on embarkation day and dinner twice. I actually enjoyed the change of menu offerings on the lunch menu. As always, Chops is not my favorite steakhouse at sea but it is a solid experience with phenomenal servers and service. Giovanni’s Table - We ate at Giovanni’s twice for dinner. Great service and good food. Like Chops, it is not my favorite Italian Restaurant at sea nor is it even my favorite Royal Caribbean Italian restaurant. I much prefer Jamie’s Italian and I haven’t had the opportunity to try Giovanni’s Italian Kitchen. This isn’t to say Giovanni’s Table or Chops are bad as we otherwise wouldn’t regularly purchase the Unlimited Dining Package. It’s just, in my opinion, the quality is a noticeable step down from other competitor cruise lines specialty dining compared to these two options. Sabor - We ate here for dinner one night. I was pleasantly surprised with how good Sabor was considering they are phasing it off of the fleet. The guacamole and pico were both fresh and the Mexican food was very good. Again, similar to the other specialties on Royal, very good but not quite up to some of their competitors offerings. We also tried Ben and Jerry’s as well as the Cupcake Cupboard. Ben and Jerry’s is always good and you know what you are getting. Cupcake Cupboard my advice is to stay away. You get better complimentary desserts in Café Promenade across the “street”. Entertainment and Activities: Production Shows – As always, this is one of the areas the Royal Caribbean shines. Saturday Night Fever is the Broadway style show in the theater and the quality is top notch. I’ll be honest, in the fact the type of music is not my particular taste, however, I cannot detract from the talent and quality of the show. The ice rink production show was by far my personal favorite on the ship. No other cruise line has anything like the Royal Caribbean ice rink and the shows it can offer. Don’t miss out on the show if your schedule permits. Other Entertainment - Pool Deck is one of the best on Royal. Solarium is standard with its pool for those 16 and up for people who want to avoid children. The main pool is amply large with plenty of hot tubs. Finally, they have another section with a spash away bay (Kids splash park), with a kids pool, two water slides and two hot tubs. This did great at spreading the children out and gave plenty of fun for the kids to enjoy besides just the main pool. Every ship needs this set up. In addition, in the back of the ship had the flow rider surf simulator, rock climbing wall and water slides for teenagers and adults. The Promenade also had it’s normal Royal Caribbean slew of entertainment including musicians at Boleros and the English Pub. This is in addition to other normal cruise activities like Karaoke, trivia, bingo, etc. The schooner bar also had a good piano player/singer like normal. Adventure Ocean is a complimentary venue for children and for my 4 year old it was fantastic. They divide the children by age group. Just sign your child up on the first day when you first get on the ship. Afterwards you can drop your child off whenever they are open. My advice is to make sure you drop your child off the first day after dinner (opens at 7 PM) so they can make friends when everyone is new to the area. They do some sort of craft every day. I can’t say enough good things about Adventure Ocean. One night I went to pick my daughter up and she told me to come back later because she wasn’t finished with her craft. Ports: As this was a one port stop quick getaway the only port we stopped at was Halifax, Nova Scotia. We opted to do a private tour on our own. We used Halifax Tour Guys. Our driver picked the three of us up holding a pink sign at the entrance to the port. They were really easy to spot and a quicker walk than the buses being used by Royal and other tour operators. The company had a child seat in the car already installed for our little one. Our first stop was Peggy’s Cove. On the way to Peggy’s Cove we were able to learn a lot more about Peggy’s Cove, Halifax and the area in general thanks to the personalized service of our Tour Guide. Since we had our own guide, he dropped us off approximately in the same location the tour buses drop people off for us to do our thing. Peggy’s Cover was worth the trip. Remember to get your passports stamped upstairs in the main store if you want to have a stamp in your passport. After we were done with the lighthouse, the store and the views, we walked along the village. We then called our tour guide and he met us in a nearby parking lot so we didn’t have to walk back to him. He then took us around different neighborhoods showing us beautiful views, houses, etc so we could get a good taste of the area. We then asked for him to take us to a restaurant the locals eat at. He took us to Vernon’s Thunderbird Diner which served the best seafood chowder I’ve had in my life. It had a lot of seafood including a good amount of lobster. We were then going to go to a city gardens but due to my daughter reaching her limit we elected to skip the garden and head back to the ship. The private tour cost about twice as much as the royal Caribbean Peggy’s Cove tour and highlights excursion, but we got so much more out of it including going to a restaurant, seeing different neighborhoods and ending the tour early in order to get my daughter a nap. If you can afford it, I think it is worth it. Overall, a great getaway cruise on my favorite class of Royal Caribbean ship. I would highly recommend this ship to anyone as well as highly recommend using Halifax Tour Guys for anyone visiting Halifax that wants a more personalized experience.

Embarkation

Ship experiences

Food and Dining

Onboard Activities

Entertainment

Children's Programs

Service and Staff

Ship Quality

Cabin / Stateroom

Ports of call

Halifax, Nova Scotia

Cape Liberty (Bayonne), New Jersey

Disembarkation

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