A couple steps back
Navigator of the Seas Cruise Review to Caribbean - Southern
Contributor Level:
Purser
Cruises: 4-6 cruises
Review: 1
Helpful Votes: 36
9 Night Southern Caribbean (Miami Roundtrip)
Sail date: April 12, 2019
Ship: Navigator of the Seas
Cabin type: Balcony
Cabin number: 7520
Traveled as: Couple
Reviewed: 5 years ago
Review summary
Overall I question whether we will take this cruise line again given our experience. We had been on this ship before out of Galveston, TX and it was a much more pleasant experience which is why we had booked on this ship a second time. I had written a very long follow-up to Royal Carribean corporate and they didn't seem to care given their response which is unfortunate if they want to keep our business. Rather than try to re-explain I've included it below: I am writing to you today in order to bring to your attention a multitude of problems we experienced on our recent cruise April 12 - April 21 that has me questioning whether my wife and I will continue to utilize your cruise line for our vacations. I will point out this is not our first cruise with Royal Caribbean. We had taken a 7-night cruise on board the Navigator of the Seas 4 years ago out of Galveston, TX. Before that we had sailed with another cruise line for 2 cruises. That first Royal Caribbean cruise was very enjoyable, and we did not have any problems at all which is why we decided to go again on the same ship. Our latest cruise was nearly the opposite by comparison. Allow me to explain why this is the case. First of all, your website is extremely unstable. During our whole planning process the website would crash, links would not work and it was difficult locating basic information. I also had to resort to contacting you thru Twitter in order to find this email address to send this to you. Anything longer than a few sentences using your email form gives me an Access Denied message. We sailed out of the Port of Miami and this had to be the most disorganized boarding process I have ever seen. The part with driving up to the terminal is probably out of your control (that was a scary and high stress situation in itself) but once inside the terminal there was no signage directing us where to go and staff did not seem to know themselves where we had to go and ushered everyone to one line to stand in. We had used AAA to book this cruise and had been given a priority boarding pass in order to check-in faster (one of the many reasons we have used AAA) but when we presented this to staff, they ignored us and told us to stand with everyone else. After check-in we then had to stand in a disorganized collection of people all waiting to board and there was only one staff member yelling at the top of his lungs (which was not very effective given the amount of people there at the time) to let people know when it was their turn to go up the one and only escalator to get to the ship. By comparison, at Galveston's port staff were very friendly and everything was clearly marked including a line for Priority Boarding. Check-in and boarding was a breeze. We knew where we had to be and when and boarded in an orderly fashion. Depending on what level you were (Diamond Plus, Emerald, Gold etc) there was a line for you, and it was arranged neatly. None of that was evident in Miami and considering this is Royal Caribbean's home port this was very disturbing. Unfortunately, our troubles did not end there. Once we were allowed to go to our staterooms, we got our sea passes and noticed our Dining Room reservation said My Dining. We had chosen 5:30 for our dining time and all our paperwork had confirmed this leading up to departure. Thus, we had to go to Guest Services and wait for approx 40 minutes. In line we had heard we were not the only ones with this issue. During this time there were other staff members with tablets asking people in line if they could help. We clearly explained our problem and were told we had to wait here. By the time we got to the front of the line the staff member at the desk told us we had to go to the dining room to fix this. We explained we had already waited for approx 40 minutes and another staff member told us we had to go here. When this staff member was called over, he denied having told us to wait in this line as we were standing right there. In the end we were told for that evening we had a table at 5:30 but going forward there was nothing she could do. Luckily, we were still in port so we called our travel agent and she confirmed with Royal Caribbean corporate that we were supposed to have the 5:30 reservation in the dining room. Eventually they spoke with the dining room staff and got us a table that we could have each night at 5:30. We confirmed this with the Dining Room manager that evening and that the table we were sitting at the time would be ours the whole cruise. However, the next night we were moved to a different table that we then questioned. Because there was 2 of us, they changed our seating to a table for 2 that might as well been joined to another table of 2. If we were separated so we could be by ourselves I would not have questioned it even though the table of 4 we sat at the night before was promised to us but due to the close proximity to another table we did question it and after a clear look of annoyance by the section head waiter he said it "was fine" for us to have the original table we had. I will say though the rest of the cruise the section head waiter greeted us warmly and made sure we were taken care of. Also, our head waiter and assistant waiter were fantastic every night. Going back to our first night, it got to be around 10PM and one of our bags had yet to be delivered to the room. We again went to Guest Services and the line was only a 30 minute wait this time. Thankfully our bag was behind the counter, apparently the tag had been torn off. What was disturbing was the fact when we pointed out our bag, they just gave it to us no questions asked. We did have a name tag that could have been checked with our sea pass or ID but was not. That is a pretty big problem and could have made this situation worse if someone else happened to point to our bag and walk off with it without some confirmation they owned it. On top of that there not even an offer to have someone bring the bag to our room. It was a big bag and it was on wheels so we were able to move it ourselves, but it would have been nice to at least offer to have the bag brought up to the room. We had to maneuver through the Royal Promenade at a busy time I might add. In general, there always seemed to be a noticeably long line at Guest Services throughout the cruise. Our previous cruise we had observed there being a long line the first night but after that we'd see maybe 2-3 people at a time anytime we passed by. Starting the second night we noticed there was a loud whistling coming from the balcony of our stateroom. We reported it the following morning and a technician did stop by later in the afternoon. He checked our door to the balcony thoroughly even after we said it was not that door causing the issue. He glanced at the partition door and said there was too much pressure from the wind and there was nothing he could do, without even looking at it, then left. On our previous cruise we also had a balcony room and had noticeably windy days as well. Never did we experience the whistling sound we had to deal with on this cruise. Neither of us slept well as a result most of this cruise. We got a reprieve when we started sailing in a westerly direction, so we moved with the wind instead of against it but that all went away the final night and it was noticeably louder. After the second or third night of this I told my wife that I couldn't wait until this cruise was over. That is not something one should say when on one of the most popular cruise lines out there. It was around this time that we remembered that we were supposed to have $50 of on-board credit for booking through AAA. Again, we waited in line at Guest Services and they said there was nothing they could do. Because we were at sea and did not sign up for the Wi-fi package we were not able to contact anyone off the ship to determine what happened, at least not without a sizable charge. When we returned to port, we contacted out travel agent and she informed me that Royal Caribbean corporate confirmed we should have gotten the credit on our account, but it was never there. Royal Caribbean did refund us the $50 in the end, but it was another example of something we were supposed to get and for whatever reason when the information got passed to the ship it was lost. On the last night, we had ordered one digital print to be emailed to us. It was noted that it would take 4-6 days to receive. So far as of today, Day 12 (or 9 business days) I have yet to receive it. That is $19.99 we paid and did not receive what we paid for. If we are not going to get it at this point, I'd like that refunded to my credit card ASAP. From what I understand people that have ordered digital prints are either getting other people's prints or nothing at all, so I know this is not an isolated incident. This ship was recently in dry-dock and had some improvements made such as new restaurants and water slides. One would think that extensive testing would have been done on the water slides to make sure they were good to use. For example, the raft ride (I forget what it is called) had an issue with people getting stuck, myself being one of those that had to be rescued. I will say the lifeguards took great care of me and made sure I was alright, but I had second thoughts about going back on. It’s a shame that more attention was not given to the common areas during it’s dry-dock stay. There are portions of the ship that really could use some attention, the Solarium being one of those. There are portions of the "ceiling" surrounding it that are falling apart. Speaking of the Solarium there were some mornings when there was no music playing on the pool deck until 11AM. The above-mentioned whistling is another example. These are minor problems but when very visible problems are observed it doesn't inspire confidence in the care given to the ship overall. Overall my wife and I along with many others we spoke to on the cruise thought the entertainment was lacking or scheduled poorly. For instance, there were sporting events that I wanted to attend but they were scheduled at 5, right at the time to get ready for dinner. The popular game show Love and Marriage was scheduled for 2:30 in the afternoon on a sea day. Few people would be able to attend since most people would be at the pool. The shows to me felt shorter compared to our last cruise. It’s like our cruise director (whom was rarely seen) was more concerned about quantity rather than quality. To summarize, this cruise was a major departure from what we experienced previously on the same ship and we are hesitant to book another cruise with Royal Caribbean because of the issues outlined above.Embarkation
We cruised out of Miami and there is no organization to this terminal. Traffic getting in was a scary experience with everyone trying to cut everyone else off in order to have a prime spot in front of the terminal. Because our ship was the last one in the line we had to fight through the other ships that were either embarking or disembarking at the same time. One would think they could have separate areas for this to cut down on the traffic or at least separate it somehow. One inside the terminal it only got worse. There was no signage indicating where to go to check in then once that was done everyone is thrown together regardless of Royal status to go up one escalator. One person had to scream unassisted to say whose turn it was to board and those people had to push and shove their way through to get on-board. We had priority boarding but one knew what that meant and we ended up boarding last as a result. I will never take a cruise out of this terminal again. It is not worth the hassle.
Ship experiences
Food and Dining
We had booked ahead of time that we have reserved dining at the dining room at 5:30 and prior to boarding we had confirmed this was still the case. We get to our room and we suddenly changed to "my time" which basically means you check in at whatever time and are seated as tables become available. We were able to get this corrected but the first couple of nights we got passive aggressive treatment from the section waiter because they tried to move our table around (which would have put us on top of another couple giving us little privacy. The food through was excellent. We had dined in 2 specialty restaurants as well: Chops for dinner and Hooked for lunch. I was very impressed with Chops but Hooked service was slow for this being a small place (I think there are 2 dozen tables in there). We also frequented the Windjammer buffet for breakfast/lunch. The food quality was ok, in some cases I could tell the food had been out for awhile and would be soggy or rubbery and in rare occasions luke-warm. The various bars we went to had great service and good drinks.
Onboard Activities
I had utilized the new water slides installed recently and have mixed reactions. I can't remember the specific names but the one that goes head first was my favorite. There was little wait time and it was enjoyable. The other raft one always had a long wait and at times people got stuck part of the way down, myself included. There was also not enough padding underneath because at the end of some drops I was hitting the bottom hard. This I did a couple times and was not impressed.
I also visited the Spa the first full day for a massage. This was mostly enjoyable other than the hard sales pitch at the end to purchase their oils, etc. Staff were friendly and courteous however and I'd do that again.
There were a couple days I participated in basketballshooting tournaments and that was fun to do. Most of the other activities were usually scheduled close to dinner time so I could not participate which was unfortunate.
We utilized the solarium many times and it was pleasant although I wish there were more shady areas for those that don't or can't be in the sun for long periods. The pool was usually crowded most of the day.
Entertainment
We had gone to a few of the shows offered and they were not that impressive. One show the comedy show kept checking his watch multiple times throughout the show. The play was ok but it was not a well known one. I felt it was rushed as well and there was not a lot of variety. The timing of some shows left much to be desired.
Service and Staff
This was another mixed bag. Our room steward, room service staff, dining room waiters and bartenders were excellent. The front desk staff were never helpful (we had to frequent this desk multiple times due to our various problems) and I felt like I was treated as if I didn't matter and was wasting their time which I did not appreciate. There was one instance where one of our bags did not make it to the room and was behind the front desk. All we did was point it out and they handed it to us without checking if it was really ours. We could have taken any of the bags that were available and that to me is a huge security concern. Again though I felt that staff didn't care.
Ship Quality
For the most part the ship was clean and orderly. In some spots, particularly in the Solarium the architecture was falling apart and was very visible.
Cabin / Stateroom
The room for 2 people is spacious. There was a loud whisling sound coming from the balcony when traveling into the wind which was most of the cruise that maintenance said couldn't be fixed so we did not sleep well at all. The bed was pretty stiff and uncomfortable.
Ports of call
As mentioned previously, the terminal is impossible to get into and highly disorganized.
Thumbs Up
2
Labadee (Cruise Line Private Island)
I did the zip-line and that was fun. I felt it was over-priced for the amount of time spent but I'm glad I got to experience it. There is a water slide as well but felt it was worth the price.
There was not a lot to do but we did rent a golf cart to drive around the island and see some various sites and that was fun.
We got a resort day pass at Santa Barbara. I was not impressed with this location as it was dirty and there was not a lot of swimming room as it was in the same area as the paddling.
We got a day pass at one of the resorts and it was ok. The resort understandably provides a very small area for this but we made the best of it. The island has plenty to do and has many shops.
Disembarkation
Almost the same as embarkation but it was more streamlined. There was only one elevator available so it was time consuming if carrying out your own luggage.
2 Comments
CruzeFan 5 years ago
Interesting that there are multiple other reviews of this same sailing that rate it 4 - 5 Stars with nothing said about the issues you mentioned. Several said embarkation was extremely quick. Obviously everyone perceives things differently and the time you arrive at the port can affect the embarkation experience.