Could have been better
Marella Discovery Cruise Review
Contributor Level:
Second Mate
Cruises: 7+ cruises
Reviews: 13
Helpful Votes: 431
Tropical Shore
Sail date: November 14, 2021
Ship: Marella Discovery
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 2 years ago
Review summary
Given this was Discovery’s 1st full Caribbean cruise post COVID things could have been much worse. We cruised COVID free and made all but one of our scheduled islands. COVID protocols were in place and obviously working well at the time. Wearing masks inside was a minor inconvenience and we were more than happy to do so just to get back on board and cruise the beautiful Caribbean again😁. Hopefully the embarkation, slow service, and variety of food will improve as time goes by. Overall we were very happy with Discovery and the price we had paid and look forward to returning if we can find a bargain for March😆Embarkation
It took a total of 3 hours from plane to ship and we were took straight from plane to ship!😡 Waited for 45 minutes for airport to get us some steps just to get off. Another wait on tarmac for bus. Sat on bus for over an hour at port waiting previous buses to unload. Given a cup of water to drink then screamed at to get our masks back on! Another wait to have paper work checked, at this point all the Barbados Port staff left for the day, leaving only 3 cruise staff to check the remaining passengers🤬. After this yet another queue for cruise check in! 3 hours 20 mins we got on board. This was Discovery’s 1st time out of Barbados since cruising returned so lessons may be learned. That said however, they knew exactly how many people were arriving at exactly what time, we only sailed with 1100 aboard, and they were no where near prepared. The 1st plane of passengers that arrived breezed on board in an hour🙄
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
The overall quality of food on board was very good. The main buffet had the smallest selection of foods I’ve ever seen on any ship. Only half the buffet was being used. Variety very obviously lacking here, I guess a cost cutting exercise with a half full ship. Also closes at 8.30pm😯
Enjoyed lunch and late night snacks at Glass House. Great fish n chips at Snack Shack
Surf and Turf food was superb and worth every penny
Good variety of cocktails. Took the upgrade but had I known how slow the bar service was I wouldn’t have bothered. Nuisance getting the bar menus up on app.
Onboard Activities
Activities throughout the day were basic and sparse compared to other cruise experiences. Mostly on the pool deck
Entertainment
House bands were very average. Couple of male singers who played guitar and piano were very good and took requests. Comedian did 2 nights, one family one adult show very good.
Game show in Squid & Anchor could have been more adult given we were sailing child free.
Service and Staff
The rooms stewards were without doubt worth 5 stars! Cabins spotless and extraCOVID measures obviously in place here.
The waiters in restaurants were friendly and efficient.
Bar staff were tediously slow. One bar tender on pool deck bar & sun deck bar each is not sufficient, especially on sea days! The sun deck was supposed to have a mobile bar service with bottle beers and soft drinks, he appeared once at 4pm. Given we were sailing just over half full ship but full crew, this needs addressing.
Ship Quality
Given this is a pretty old ship she is very well maintained. Always staff around ship cleaning, toilets around pool areas given special attention which was very good to see.
Cabin / Stateroom
Outside cabin 2092, aft on Deck 2. Quiet position and convenient for getting on and off ship, just one deck up from gangplank, no waiting on lifts😁Pretty good size cabin. A few sticking drawers and chipped edges but given the age of ship, nothing to moan about. Plenty of drawer and wardrobe space.
Cleanliness of cabin excellent on arrival and maintained throughout cruise.
Ports of call
Very nice shops close to port. Took ship excursion to Klein Bonaire for some beach time and snorkelling. Full instructions on how to keep safe given on way over. Snorkelling was very good, could have done with some water shoes. Take some snacks and drinks nothing available on island apart from welcome drink.
Thumbs Up
0
Disembarkation
Husband spent most of last day, at sea trying to do the UK locator form, as did most of returning passengers. Ships WiFi was useless all day. Ship app to do this just couldn’t handle amount of users. Had to leave boarding passes for flight and UK Locator till we docked and went to terminal to get decent WiFi, which was a stress.
If you don’t have smart phone to jump through all these hoops don’t see how you can cruise at the moment