Spring break on the Allure...a photo review

My husband and I are doing this itinerary in July. I was wondering if the 2nd night was still formal night even though you were in port?

Yes- in fact, you made me realize I skipped a part of my review! The 2nd night was formal night- and we saw Mamma Mia. Whoops!

So let me backtrack because I forgot that we had seen Mamma Mia on day two. It was at 5pm in the Amber Theatre, which is a really nice venue.

If you've pre-booked your entertainment (and promise me you will because otherwise...lines lines lines) they just scan your seapass and in you go. I think we arrived about 7-10 minutes before the show started, no problem finding 4 decent seats together. Take note that some seats have very obstructed views (like behind a pole) so you want to take note of that. The night we saw Blue Planet the theatre was packed 10 minutes before- we wound up in the balcony (which was fine).

So...back to Mamma Mia. Let it be known that I lived a good deal of time in NYC and have seen lots of Broadway. I have never (ever) seen a halfway decent show on prior cruises. As my teenagers would say, cruise ship entertainment is by and large "cringe-y".

But the reviews of the entertainment on Oasis class were good, and Oceanaria was good, so we took a stab at Mamma Mia. 3/4 of us lasted the entire show. Son left at intermission. I will say that RCCL is definitely hiring a higher caliber of singers and dancers. They were good. The production value was good- and Mamma Mia was fairly decent- it was watchable! That's a win in my book. One big complaint was the "canned" music- far prefer a live orchestra, and the music definitely drowned out the singers at some points. Later we would find out that there were some live instrumentals behind the scenes- never would have known that.

So, music/sound aside, the show was pretty decent. I'd compare it to a very good high school production. (And although I grew up in the 70's and had my share of ABBA albums, I just am not a huge fan of this particular show and would MUCH rather have seen Chicago).

While we are on entertainment and music, I will say this: the piped in music on this ship was LOUD. Old lady rant alert: at the pool deck, in the theatre, etc- just too loud!

Okay...back to our review in progress. Where was I? We finished up our day in St. Thomas...ooh, then we went to 150 Central Park!

150 Central Park was really, really good you guys! We had all sorts of food...but the highlight was the salt. YES I SAID SALT.

They give you a bread basket (yum, in fact, whomever is in charge of all the bread/pastries on this ship is awesome) and plain unsalted butter. Then they give you a ceramic little dish, and you take the top off, and it looks like a flower, and in each petal-shaped section is a different kind of salt. And a coke spoon. (Yes, the little salt scoopers look exactly like coke spoons. I do not know this from personal experience - how DARE you! - but I watch Narcos on Netflix and so I know.) I strongly suggest once you finish this review, you log onto Netflix and watch Narcos if you haven't already. It's soooo good.

So you take your coke spoon and scoop some salt on it. Then you butter your break and sprinkle the salt on it and...yum. I bet you never knew that you needed 6 different kinds of salt- but you do. (They should sell one of those pretty salt holders with the different salts onboard. I would've been a sucker and bought it.)

I *think* this was the night that we hit up the English pub for some beers and listened to the pub guitar guy. I'm sorry I don't know his name, because he was pretty decent! He did some Neil Diamond, Billy Joel, all good stuff to get the crowd singing along. It was a lot of fun to sit there and suck down a few beers, listening to the music and people-watching.

Back to the cabin where we had this little guy waiting...

(I will say that the next morning, I was tearing the cabin up looking everywhere for my sunglasses, until I realized where they were. DUH.)

DAY FOUR???...St. Martin/St. Maarten

Well, we thought about doing one of those Soualiga tours that takes you on a boat to all the hot spots...but as we were planning the trip I figured maybe we wouldn't want to spend two days in a row on a boat. So instead, I followed Mitsugirly's advice and booked kayaks through Caribbean Paddling to paddle over to Pinel Island.

I figured a little exercise would be good, this was a cheap excursion ($60 for two tandem kayaks), and it would be a nice beach day. Off the port at St. Martin we found a more reasonable taxi line than in St. Thomas, and hopped in a cab to head to over to the French side of the island. The ride was maybe 25 minutes or so- and cost $50 one way for the four of us.

Once you get to the paddling area, they give you dry bags to put your stuff in, jump in your kayak, and GO. If you've ever kayaked before, it is a very easy paddle out to Pinel Island.

I made the mistake of sharing a kayak with the girl teenager, so I was doing the heavy lifting when it came to the paddling. On the way to Pinel there is another small island (totally undeveloped) with a teeny tiny beach you could stop at. Seriously, if you want fantastic photos of this excursion, you're going to have to leave this review and go read Mitsugirly's. Sorry.

So we made a quick stop on the small island and then moved on to Pinel. The water and scenery there was beautiful!

I should have planned this day a little better...once you arrive you drag your kayak up on to the beach, and there are two different "beach clubs" there. Yellow beach, and the beach on the left. We plopped our stuff down in lounge chairs, and were promptly informed by a snotty French guy (we'll call him Francois) that our chairs were going to be $25 each. Ugh. I didn't plan on spending $100 to sit on the beach for a couple hours.

So we got up and went over to Yellow Beach, and found another snotty French guy (we'll call him Francois II) who told us that 2 chairs with an umbrella was $50. So that seemed more reasonable, and I really didn't want to lay on the sand (no shade). So I handed over the plastic and we plunked down.

We arrived fairly early, and it was still pretty empty there. There were lots of locals...all your heard around you was French, and all you saw around you was...well...ladies who were au naturel. So be prepared if you go to Pinel, you will likely land up on what I like to think of as Boobie Beach. (For some reason my son decided to take a nap - a really long nap - and missed what I assume is considered good scenery for most 16-year old boys!)

Now Yellow Beach had food and drink service but it was expensive. Really, really expensive. Not New York City expensive - I've had plenty of $12 hot dogs at Madison Square Garden (go Rangers!) and that doesn't phase me, but this was like $29 French fries expensive. They do take your credit card though, so bring your plastic! The restaurant area was rustic and cute - think wooden booths and thatched roofs. Thankfully, no LOUD MUSIC piped in there.

Before too long it got really crowded, and lots of cruise ship passengers got off their boats and found no more $25 lounge chairs available.

Not bad, right?

There was also a little market area (absolutely no pressure in there) back off the beach set up under some trees, and they had some cute little trinkets. Very charming and not at all expensive (compared to the $29 French fries, anyway)

This is the Yellow Beach side where we hung out:

After a couple hours, we paddled back, taking our time and looking at the Oceanside houses as we got close. The folks at Caribbean Paddling will be happy to call you a cab. We had asked our driver from the morning to come back and get us, but she was nowhere to be seen. No worries though- there are several taxis there (although you may have to get your driver out of the shady gazebo area!) and the ride back to the port was an easy one.

Overall a good day- but we spent a lot more than we though we would. $60 kayaks, $100 in taxi, another $50 for chairs...not too bad, just not what I expected.

EWWW these disgusting lizards are all over Pinel Island.

At first you don't notice them, far up on the beach on the rocks- then you see one, then another, then you realize the rock face has dozens of them <shudder> but they blend in really well. Then you look up and $%^@^& crap - they're in the trees above you! It's horrible and disgusting.

Even worse, there are tourists luring them over with lettuce and grapes and food scraps - eww, you guys! - and it just grossed me out. I mean, those things are reptiles and the probably have salmonella and I kept thinking of what would happen if one of those lizards bit somebody...people were letting their kids (little kids) get really close to feed them. Nasty!!!!

So my apologies if you are a lizard lover, but they give me the chizzles. When we were getting ready to leave I went to use the bathroom (think normal toilet but in an outhouse type building, no showers there), one of the lizards walked sort of near me and I didn't see him at first then noticed and jumped OUT OF MY SKIN and yelped. People nearby saw me flip out and thought it was funny, but seriously, I almost had a heart attack.

I will never live in St. Martin. They can keep their reptile-ridden beaches!!!

Okay I've been off the cruise ship for a week now and honestly, I should have taken notes. I can't remember what we did on what night- where we ate or anything!

So I'm gonna spitball here instead and tell you what we discovered about My Time Dining on Allure. Each night we had reservations for either 6:45, 7:00, or 7:30. And there was NEVER a wait for a table. The weird thing is, when we finished and were walking out, there was always a HUGE line. Like at 8:45 or 9pm! I could NOT figure it out, until the waiter told us that they had a huge amount of Spanish folks onboard, and Europeans like to eat late.

We had noticed a lot of Spanish people onboard (man, those ladies kill it in the nicest dresses and heels - have I said that already???) but never would have known had our waiter not told us that the longest wait times for dinner the week we were on were for those who arrived at 8:30pm or later. That worked out really well for us - because our last My Time Dining experience (on Celebrity Silhouette) was REALLY crappy. They did not have their act together. So kudos to RCCL for doing this well.

So on our St. Martin night we went to the ice show. It was "Ice Games" themed, which is WAY cheesy. Even cheesier than Oceanaria- with the whole Monopoly thing going on. But I will say...once again, we were impressed with the talents of the skaters! They were MUCH better than the ones a few years ago on Independence of the Seas. So if you can get past the corny, cheesy "ice games" theme, you'll seem some cool trick skating. (My lord can anyone explain to me why there was a woman in a sea horse costume in the beginning??? It was so WEIRD...like maybe the creator of that show used the salt spoons from 150 Central Park to snort something else....)

So if you're keeping track at home, so far our family is 3 for 3 on shows. Which is a huge improvement over the last cruise where we walked out on every single show!

Love the review! Thanks!

Sent from my iPad using Forums

We were on the same sailing with our 9 and 11 year old boys. They had their own room next to ours. My parents came with us too. We're planning on the Harmony now for next year's spring break. We had attached ocean view rooms (hubby doesn't want to spend $ on a balcony since we're never in the room, sigh). We were on Navigator last year. Allure was much better - shows and food.

We felt that there were a lot of gaps in live music timing (we like to see bands/musicians) for example, someone would play until 8 and then next show would be at 9:15. Gaps are tough because we'd get tired and lose momentum. Thursday night was the best with lots of reggae and the 70's party. The kids went back to their room and went to sleep and we stayed out til 11:30. (Late for us!)

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

We were on the same sailing with our 9 and 11 year old boys. They had their own room next to ours. My parents came with us too. We're planning on the Harmony now for next year's spring break. We had attached ocean view rooms (hubby doesn't want to spend $ on a balcony since we're never in the room, sigh). We were on Navigator last year. Allure was much better - shows and food.

 

We felt that there were a lot of gaps in live music timing (we like to see bands/musicians) for example, someone would play until 8 and then next show would be at 9:15. Gaps are tough because we'd get tired and lose momentum. Thursday night was the best with lots of reggae and the 70's party. The kids went back to their room and went to sleep and we stayed out til 11:30. (Late for us!)

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Forums mobile app

That's us exactly. I need to keep going otherwise I'm all...ehh, let's go back to the cabin.

There were a couple nights with gaps in live entertainment - but it was a lot better than our last Indycruise, where you couldn't seem to find ANY live music until 9:30 or later. We did spend a lot of time in Jazz on 4 - don't know if that was a house band, or what, but they were GOOD.

And because I'm 40ish and going on 80, I prefer pre-dinner music and entertainment. Let's have that all wrapped up by 9:30 so I can be in bed with my book and a hot tea.

Celebrity does a GREAT job with this- not as much nightlife, but usually good live music from like 6-9pm or so.

Rob Ondras was the guitar player and singer that was on our March 12th Allure sailing. We first saw him perform in Central Park while we had dinner sitting outside at Giovanni's. We then saw him later that night in the pub. It was a lot of fun singing along to songs largely from the 70's (yes, we are boomers!).

We also loved 150 Central Park. Great food and service, and loved the variety of gourmet salts!!

Did you go to Vintages? We often stopped there afternoons and got to know the bartender, Daniel D. He was great!

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Rob Ondras was the guitar player and singer that was on our March 12th Allure sailing. We first saw him perform in Central Park while we had dinner sitting outside at Giovanni's. We then saw him later that night in the pub. It was a lot of fun singing along to songs largely from the 70's (yes, we are boomers!).

 

We also loved 150 Central Park. Great food and service, and loved the variety of gourmet salts!!

 

Did you go to Vintages? We often stopped there afternoons and got to know the bartender, Daniel D. He was great!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

YES! This guy is right- Rob Ondras rings a bell.

We did stop at Vintages one evening for a glass of wine before dinner...waiter was slightly annoying because he really wanted to sell us a bottle. I told him "I'm limited to one drink a day, thanks." (Not true but figured this would scare him off) and he kept pressing me. Annoying. Wine was good and so was outdoor ambiance.

OH NO NO NO

They have their eye out for "cutters" and they won't be having that. No sir-eee. Let me tell you, the people that work at Port Everglades are efficient, and serious, and when it comes to your line shenanigans, THEY AREN'T HAVING IT. So you sit where they tell you to sit and you move where they tell you to move. Yes ma'am!

Your mileage may vary by who is working. I've done this 4 times now at this terminal and one time the agent wasn't paying attention. I was at the back or row 1 and row 1 and 2 all got up and walked to the boarding area. About 60 people jumped ahead of me!:')

S.if you're in Giovanni's and you have to pee, you have to leave the restaurant and go through Central Park near the elevator bank to find the bathroom. Now, is that a very big deal? Well, okay, no, it's not/quote]

 

It can be. If you sat in the terminal waiting, say 30 minutes to board, got on board, went to either GIovanni or the Park Cafe for lunch and relaxed awhile when Nature called, the closest 2 restrooms are behind closed doors on that deck because the rooms at the end aren't open yet.

YES! This guy is right- Rob Ondras rings a bell.

 

We did stop at Vintages one evening for a glass of wine before dinner...waiter was slightly annoying because he really wanted to sell us a bottle. I told him "I'm limited to one drink a day, thanks." (Not true but figured this would scare him off) and he kept pressing me. Annoying. Wine was good and so was outdoor ambiance.

I'm guessing there was a different bartender in the evenings. Daniel D. was the one there to open Vintages every day - and he was very friendly. He didn't once push us to buy anything. We had the drink package, and he even suggested wines to try that were within our package limit. He also made suggestions for our 2-for-1 drinks (C&A). We ordered tapas on some of our visits (as light lunches). On the last day - when we walked in - he had set spots for us and had ordered a selection of tapas for us on the house.

Am loving your review but I feel impelled to correct a false statement made by you while discussing stinky feet. You stated that you were from NYC, the pizza capital of the world. Anyone who has ever visited Chicago and has the minimum amount of tastebuds will agree we are the pizza capital. We recently had friends who reside on the Island of Long,NY visit us and agree fully. We have also visited them and sampled "NY pizza" in the past and all I can say is some of those pizzeria owners should be arrested for impersonating Italians!!!!LOL Keep up the great review.

Omg I 100% agree with this! NYC is definitely NOT the pizza capital of anything. Lol

Sent from my Galaxy S7 Edge using Forums App

Omg I 100% agree with this! NYC is definitely NOT the pizza capital of anything. Lol

I beg to differ! mmmmmm.

(PS ... I"m about 20 minutes south of you. Hi!)

I beg to differ! mmmmmm.

 

(PS ... I"m about 20 minutes south of you. Hi!)

Hi neighbor! Haha

Don't get me wrong, I will eat Any pizza (I even like sorrento's, I know, the horror lol)... But I've had pizza in NYC, Rome, Venice, and everywhere in between... And I prefer Chicago pizza to them all! 😛

Sent from my Galaxy S7 Edge using Forums App

Hi neighbor! Haha

 

Don't get me wrong, I will eat Any pizza (I even like sorrento's, I know, the horror lol)... But I've had pizza in NYC, Rome, Venice, and everywhere in between... And I prefer Chicago pizza to them all! 😛

 

Sent from my Galaxy S7 Edge using Forums App

I have no dog in this fight lol, but if you're talking about that deep dish/cake type pizza...I don't think so! :eek:

I prefer Chicago pizza to them all! 😛

Greetings from GroveTucky. :)

Now the real question: Lou Malnati's, or Giordano's?

I'll be in Chicago in June ... I can't wait to get my hands on some Garrett's.

I beg to differ! mmmmmm.

 

(PS ... I"m about 20 minutes south of you. Hi!)

I work near you two, but live in Northland, buying a NY style pizza tonight from Borgata :) By the way people, the made fresh personal pizza at Sorento's on the Oasis class isn't too bad.

Greetings from GroveTucky. :)

 

Now the real question: Lou Malnati's, or Giordano's?

 

I'll be in Chicago in June ... I can't wait to get my hands on some Garrett's.

Listen, guys, this is Cruise Critic, not Pizza Critic, so ZIP IT or else I'll report you all to the moderators! :'):'):')

We were on the same cruise. Always nice to read a different perspective, we stayed at Hyatt 17th street pre cruise.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Greetings from GroveTucky. :)

 

 

 

Now the real question: Lou Malnati's, or Giordano's?

 

 

 

I'll be in Chicago in June ... I can't wait to get my hands on some Garrett's.

Malnati's. Not Giordano's! And yes, Garrett's is great!

We did a gift exchange on our Allure cruise last month - with gifts themed from our hometowns. We included a gift certificate for mail order Malnati's in our gift!

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

So at the end of St. Martin day, we had two lovely sea days to look forward to. We didn't have a bunch planned other than continuing to see just how far we can stretch our stomachs by consuming 4,000 calories a day (not including the alcohol).

Sea days we usually got up early and hit the track for a brisk walk. We also hit the gym, but the gym on Allure STINKS compared to the freedom class gyms. On Freedom class, there are panoramic Windows and great views off the front of the ship. On our last cruise I was slogging away on the treadmill and even saw dolphins swimming and jumping alongside! It was fantastic. The only anomaly on freedom class in the gym was the boxing ring. What the h-e-double hockey sticks (it's Stanley Cup playoffs, y'all!) do they have a boxing ring for? Stupid, stupid, stupid. Other than that, the gyms on freedom...niiiice.

But on Allure it was small (for the size), dark, and - strangely enough -smoky! What's the story with that? I'm guessing it is adjacent to the casino smoke-ventilation system or the Marlboro-themed nicotine lovers crew club or something. Nothing like taking a big deep cleansing breath during your cardio routine and inhaling...nasty cigarette smell. EWWW!

So it didn't bother my husband as much, but I took this as a sign that I was not destined to have a rigorous workout on this cruise. And that's okay. As long as when I got home, I hit the ground running -no, literally- it would be fine. (Sadly I've now been home a week and maybe jogged 10 half-hearted slow miles in the last seven days...sigh...)

After the morning "workout" we would swing back to the cabins and pick up the teens for breakfast. Oddly the kids really liked breakfast in the MDR, so we did that on each sea day. One morning, my husband was changing and said, "you guys go get a table- I'll meet you there..." So we headed to the MDR, waited for a table, sat down, ordered coffee...5, 10, and even 15 minutes later...no hubby. (My husband is a military guy- he is PROMPT - so I knew something was amiss!)

So I sent my son up to check the Windjammer. Let's be clear: I never mis-communicate, but sometimes my husband mis-hears me. ;). Sure enough, my son found my husband in the crowded Windjammer, eating breakfast at a table with strangers. My son came back down to the MDR laughing - turns out, my husband thought we got there, ate, and left for the solarium so he just figured he'd grab breakfast on his own.

He came down to the MDR to sit with us and had Breakfast, Take Two. Smart man.

I will give you this tip about breakfast in the MDR: they have these horrible, awful, terrible "Dreamworks character breakfasts" in there. Okay, you're probably thinking, that sounds like fun! I'm going to bring my kids! Ugh. You are a better parent than me, because it looked like the seventh circle of H-E-double hockey sticks (Go Rangers!) in there.

The waiter sat us adjacent to this character breakfast. They set up speakers which were blaring awful music (I LIKE TO MOVE IT, MOVE IT, YOU LIKE TO MOVE IT, MOVE IT...) at top volume. There was a giant panda bear stuffed guy waddling around, and I looked at the waiter like, hell no! He told us the breakfast was almost over...so we sat down.

Sure enough before too long they shut it down and we had a peaceful breakfast...until...the vomit incident! I didn't see the vomit incident, but suddenly I did notice a few dining room employees escorting a mom and her kids (and pushing a stroller) out of the room.

THEN CAME THE HAZMAT TEAM....

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

So clearly one of her kids tossed their cookies all over the table/booth/carpet/chair.

You may be wondering: what caused the kid to barf? Was it the food? The movement of the ship? The overstimulation? Well, my theory is that it was the "Move it move it" song. Seriously. That song was horrible ten years ago when it came out, and it's only worse now. The kid just couldn't take it and said, "Mom, this is awful, can we go?" And she said, "No way, kid- I paid $39 a head for this character breakfast, and you're gonna sit here until that terrifyingly giant stuffed panda comes round for a photo!" Well, the kid found a genius exit strategy. Well played, vomit kid, well played.

You have never seen anyone move faster on a ship than the RCCL hazmat crew. They had red bags and EVERYTHING from the table went into those bags. Is that just to get them out of the room? Or do they incinerate stuff? Why is there no behind the scenes tour of the hazmat stuff?

You will also notice he had some sort of vomit-sucking vacuum with him.

After everything was vacuumed and stuffed in the red bag, he sprayed everything with this wet stuff and they let it sit there for about ten minutes. Once it was dry, the table was set, and the next round of breakfast guests had no idea they were sitting on someone else's tossed up eggs Benedict!