Good Experience

This was my first time taking a cruise.  So, I was really surprised the first day at how the other guests treated each other and grabbed all of the food from the Garden Cafeteria like they had never eaten before and would never eat again.  Later, I realized that the guests at the Garden Cafeteria were like that all day and many of them were like that in any setting.  The tour operators were good but could have been better at redirecting these inappropriate behaviors. 

For example sitting in the Atrium lounge area, some of these very rude guests would walk right in front of you and stand blocking your view or even put their chair right in front of other guests.  Even though there was a rule regarding saving chairs, apparently this did not count in the Atrium or lounge areas.  Many of the guests would leave a hat or scarf on a chair and then leave to eat, come back an hour later to block the people who were patiently waiting.   The tour operators could have arranged the chairs initially and then observed to ensure people were not leaving to eat or do other errands for an hour or two to return later.

The cleaning crew, particularly Sedrick, was really good and even made towel displays for the room!  That was nice and he even showed us how to turn on the light if we needed additional service.

The last two days of the cruise did get long and boring.  It was tedious to attempt to go to the Garden Cafeteria where one could get run over by other guests pushing and taking all the food.  It was even worse to go to most of the complementary food areas as the service was generally very slow -- except for one waitress Connie in the Manhattan.  The tour could have provided additional activities that had not already been done previously for those last two days for entertainment.

Also, some of the tour activities were scheduled to overlap and guests had to make a choice on whether to go to the International Talent Show or another event.  Additionally, a lot of the Park West Art events were long and drawn out ruining the possibility of attending other events scheduled on the cruise.  The comedy show could have had an afternoon venue for family, as could have the other Theater events.  I overheard one of the guests complaining that the theater shows were not family friendly -- perhaps the tour should not allow anyone under 18 to attend comedy events or theater events after 9 pm as many bars do.