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My trip report: Liberty of the Seas 5-night (Belize, Cozumel leaving 12/10/11)


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I have some time to kill in the Fort Lauderdale airport with free wifi, so I thought I'd work on my report.

 

Where I’m coming from

 

One of the reasons that I love cruising is that it can suit so many vacation appetites. For those who are sun-worshippers, you can spend your days basking in the heat. For those who enjoy sports, you can invest your time shooting hoops, zip-lining, and otherwise getting your exercise on. Others, like me, just enjoy having a well-kept room, a place to read, some opportunities to meet new people, and not having to worry about meals or the nightly entertainment. The only reason I’m sharing my point of view is that it is impossible for it not to color my experience. I can’t tell you the best place to sun-bathe, nor can I give tips as to when the Flo-Rider is least busy. I can, however, let you know about my trip, what worked and what didn’t, and otherwise offer my insights about my 5 days spent aboard the Liberty of the Seas.

 

Pre-cruise

 

This cruise was booked fairly late (mid-October) to take advantage of post-final payment pricing. It was intended as a quick get-away for me and my dad (as well as providing him with enough days to bump to Diamond Plus for his long cruise in April). We were trying to travel as cheaply as possible which meant an inside guarantee and no big plans for excursions or other charges.

 

Whether or not I’ve flown in day-of my cruise or not has recently depended on my schedule. I have found that day-of arrival gets my nerves on end, however, so even though we were trying to travel cheaply, we ended up coming in the night before on an afternoon direct flight from Indianapolis to Fort Lauderdale on AirTran. We traveled only with carry-ons (one roll-aboard and one shoulder bag for under the seat) which seemed to work fine even though with the number of people carrying on, it is always an adventure.

 

I had used Priceline for our stay, and a 4-star $75 bid in the FLL Beach zone landed me the Hyatt Pier 66. This is definitely not a beach property (which was fine), thought it was a very large resort on the marina. Our flight landed at about 4:30, which meant that once we grabbed a cab at the taxi stand, we hit Friday afternoon rush-hour traffic. It wasn’t too horrible, but it lengthened our ride a little bit with the final fare being about $18 to the hotel. When we arrived we were quickly checked in. I started talking football with the counter clerk and, commiserating over the fate of the Indianapolis Colts this season, he upgraded us from a garden room (which evidently is standard Priceline accommodations … they are low buildings around the pool with large see-through windows) to a tower room. The room itself was quite nice with large, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Port Everglades inlet (I ended up watching the Oasis come into port about 5 AM) and a huge bathroom. The room also featured free wifi from AT&T, which was definitely unexpected from a Hyatt property. There were several restaurants on premises, but they were hotel-expensive places to eat. We ended up eating dinner at the Pelican Landing which offered happy hour pricing until 7 PM which meant half-priced drinks and appetizers. This brought things down to about what the food was “worth” in terms of quality … it wasn’t great, but it was fine and it was on the water. The next morning we woke up and grabbed breakfast (in the form of Dunkin Donuts) from the convenience station across the street. A little before 11 AM, we grabbed a cab over to the Liberty of the Seas (Terminal 25, I believe) for about $14 plus tip.

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Boarding

 

We arrived at the Liberty about a 11:15 and things seemed to be moving fairly smoothly outside in terms of baggage handling and heading through security. Security itself was fairly quick for those with the proper documents in hand (passport/citizenship and SetSail Pass) though the lines sometimes got clogged up as people has trouble navigating their carry-ons through cattle-chutes and/or had to stop in the middle of the line to dig up documents.

 

Terminal 25 is in nowhere near the same class as the terminal the Oasis and Allure use. Once through security, the check-in lines were in one large area split up by deck. After checking the status of our “deck” line (we’ve too many times gotten into longer “priority” lines), we headed to the end of the room, nearest the exit to the ship, where the C&A priority lines where. Unlike Port Canaveral, this terminal at least seemed to have a sufficient number of agents working the priority line and a greeter who quickly and efficient shuttled people to their correct agent. We were quickly checked in (passports and credit card for file) and we saved time by pre-filling in health forms found online and simply handing them over. Photos were taken at the desk, which saved waiting in line later. We received our cards and then were directed to the ship at which point the organization was lost a bit. It was about 11:30 and the ship was already boarding. With my Diamond Plus card, I was waved to “the other side of the metal partition” and then there were not other cruiseline agents to direct me where to go. I’m assuming they had already boarded the priority group as one of the customs officials told us to merge into the line that was already moving towards the escalator. They were taking safety very seriously and were not allowing anyone elderly or with beyond airline sized carry-ons to use the escalator. There were some hold-ups and an extremely steep boarding ramp, but by about 11:45, we were on the Liberty of the Seas.

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My dad found some health forms on this site ... not sure about the specific thread. They were not Royal Caribbean specific, but asked the same questions and were taken without question (and we even asked if they were ok. We printed them out, then filled them in day-of while at our hotel.

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Ports of call

 

Belize

 

This was my fourth visit to Belize. Having twice before gone on cave tubing trips, and twice before experienced broken down busses in the middle of nowhere, I opted this trip to stay on the ship. Here is some information about the stop, however. The first rule of visiting Belize, according to anyone I’ve talked to (local or otherwise) is to stay inside the tourism village in Belize City unless you are leaving on an organized tour. Obviously there are those who do not and who are just fine, but based on my past experiences, this is one tip I heed. Perhaps the city has changed since my last visit, but I doubt it. The second thing to know about a visit to Belize is that it is a tender port … and it is a long tender ride. I believe it can be from 20-30 minutes from ship to shore, and that does not include the time waiting in line and sitting on the tender waiting to fill.

 

The Liberty had a simple, if somewhat less convenient tendering process. Ship’s tours left from the front of the ship. Everyone else left from the back of the ship. There were no tender tickets, nor did I ever see anything about “priority” debarkation. We were advised by the Diamond Concierge that if we did not need to get ashore right away, to wait until at least 11 for the crowd to die down (I believe we arrived at about 9). From what I saw, there still a pretty decent-sized line up until noon. It came up the stairs and actually looped around the area outside of Studio B and On-Air.

 

Cozumel

 

As usual for Royal Caribbean, the Liberty docked at the International Pier in Cozumel. We were sharing the pier with the Mariner. There were at least three other ships in port with the Carnival Glory and Carnival Triumph at the Puerta Maya pier and a Holland America ship docked downtown.

 

With no special plans, we ended up debarking, leaving the tourism village, turning right, walking about 5 minutes on the sidewalk to visit the Carnival pier (Puerta Maya). I’ll just say this … that pier area is much, much, much nicer than the one at the International Pier. It feels more open, offers plenty of shade, loungers, and a variety of shops and restaurants. We visited Los Cincos Soles at that pier because it included a version of their restaurant, Pancho’s Backyard. This restaurant is also at the downtown version of Los Cincos Soles, though not at the International Pier version. I thought that the food and drinks were quite good if a tad pricey ($5.95 for a small margarita, $8 for nachos). The quality definitely beat anything offered at ½ Senor Frogs at the International Pier.

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Dining

 

Food quality is very subjective, but my impressions for the Liberty were that the food was generally decent with a few misses. Breakfasts in the Windjammer seemed to be very popular, especially the made-to-order omelet and egg station (which is closed on debarkation day). Breakfast in the main dining room was a little more relaxed, though sometimes there seemed to be a wait as the servers figured out who was seated in their section ... I'll admit it is sometimes aggravating to be seated and then wait to be noticed (server may be retrieving something for another table, etc) while those seated 5-10 minutes after you already have water, coffee, and pastries. We actually ended up just heading up to the Diamond Lounge for continental fare and specialty coffees most mornings.

 

Lunch onboard was limited to the Windjammer or promenade locations on port days and embarkation. I always enjoy the idea of grabbing a small snack or meal at Sorrento's or Cafe Promenade. The Windjammer offered the standard assortment of food (salads, sandwiches, carved meat of the day, hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza, pasta, asian, other), though I thought that most of it tended toward the bland and tasteless side. Lunch is offered in the main dining room on sea days and you can order off of a set menu and/or visit a very large and well-stocked salad bar and have a custom-made salad put together. I was surprised about the crowed for the MDR on the last sea day ... there was a small line when we went at 12:15 and a longer line when we left about 1:15.

 

We ate dinner in the MDR each night except for the first night when we went to Chops. I truly enjoyed our servers in the MDR (Kerisha and Justin). I thought that the food was just OK. I'm jaded, yes, as I've ordered off of these menus many times before, but sometimes I found myself wanting to order something "different" and not finding anything else other than the "usual" that sounded good. Beef dishes can sometimes be a bit sketchy ... the filet on formal night was actually pretty good (though consisted of only two tiny pieces) but the NY Strip on the last night was a piece of shoe leather with bernaise sauce on it. Desserts are about the only thing that seems to have improved a little over the past few years. I noticed that there was a new addition to the pay meny ... now in addition to the $14.95 Chops steak, you could order a $24.95 Portofino Surf and Turf platter with lobster.

 

**Side Rant**

 

There have been many discussions on this board about the self-entitled attitudes of cruisers who believe that rules do not apply to them. Many have a laissez-faire attitude, believing it does not affect anyone else. Well ... when it comes to showing up to the dining room on time, it DOES affect other people. One table in our section decided they wanted to show up 45 - 75 minutes late each night. Since this was allowed by the MDR management, our server then had to accomodate them ... meaning our dinners were extended by at least 20 minutes each night while we had to wait for our server to return from extra trips to the galley.

 

**End side rant**

 

As for Chops, it was a very nice experience, though for me, I think it is a bit overpriced at $30/pp (the only reason we went was with my B1G1 coupon in my D+ book). The service was very attentive and the atmosphere was decent. The food was fairly standard high-end steakhouse fare with appetizers like shrimp cocktail (the only shrimp cocktail onboard not made with tiny bait shrimp) and onion soup. My dad ordered the 10 oz filet and I ordered the 18 oz porterhouse. Both were cooked quite nicely and were good cuts of meat. For dessert I had the mud pie (after which I'm surprised I didn't slip into a sugar-induced coma) while my dad had the creme brûlée which was brought to the table on fire.

 

Extra note: On the last night, we arrived in the MDR without our paid tip "slips" because we had not yet received them from our room steward. We asked our waiter if she actually needed the slip and she said yes ... typically the slip was not needed, but evidently sometimes there are pay discrepancies and the slips help her prove what she was supposed to earn. This was a new one for me (who always assumed the slips were pretty much a placeholder) so I thought I would share.

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I just came off the Liberty also... great cruise.. entertainment was awesome... second only to Allure , in my opinion.. I even thought the ice show was better than the one I saw on Allure

 

embarkation was a breeze... debarkation not such a breeze.

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Hi Chris....Well done review, as always. I was particularly interested on your take on this ship, since we sailed on her recently, 14 nights, Barcelona to FLL. Our experience on board the Liberty actually ran the gamut, and IMO, for that sailing, it was the worst managed ship we have ever experienced. But, it sounds like you and Jim had a good cruise, and an enjoyable experience.

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Do you happen to remember which menu was served on which night? Trying to plan for Chops/Portofino night. Thanks

 

1 - Onion Tart/Prime rib night

2 - Formal night (escargot, filet)

3 - Italian (risotto, tiger shrimp)

4 - Fisherman's Platter/Lobster night

5 - Turkey/NY Strip

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Cabin

 

We booked an inside guarantee and got what we paid for ... cabin 6399 is an inside connecting cabin almost all of the way aft. Since it is connecting, it has a chair instead of a small couch. The connecting door was not much of a problem, though some sound from the TV next door could sometimes be heard.

 

Service

 

While many of the crew seemed friendly, nothing really stood out in terms of service. My dinner waitstaff were all excellent, but beyond that, everyone seemed fairly average. In all of my visits to the Windjammer, not once was I asked if I would like a beverage which is definitely counter to most of my experiences on RCI. My room steward was also very unexceptional, seeming to forget requests (such as for a laundry bag). That's not to say he was bad, but after so many room stewards who have gone out of their way to be exceptional, the bare minimums come across as indifference.

 

Diamonds in December

 

I thought that the Liberty was very well organized for this event. The Diamond Lounge was extended to include all of the Viking Crown from 5-8:30 each night, and this seemed just fine for the over 400 diamond members and above for this cruise. There seemed to be fewer gifts this year (pin, luggage strap, large magnets), but that's not really an issue. The Diamond concierge (Ooana?) was very friendly and approachable. The waiters in the evening in the Lounge itself were Reynaldo and Kyle, both of whom were excellent. I did not attend the Top Tier event, so I don't know if they did anything special there.

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I was on this sailing also.Our tablemates had prepaid tips they lost coupons on way to dinner.We asked if necessary our waiter took a paper out of his pocket checked it and said the tips where already in his account.The food was fair the service was excelent and we really enjoyed it.

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I was on this cruise, we had a great time. Very relaxing time with good weather.

 

This was my 4th time on Liberty of Seas....I thought the service was better than the last time in May.

 

Was a bit disappointed they didn't do more for the December Celebration.

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Hi Chris,

 

We are going in Feb with another couple (first time cruisers) on the Liberty. How is your dad? Have done about three cruises since the Australia - New Zealand deal. We did B2B2B last Dec on the Navigator and a Transalantic to Bracelona on the Voyager. Still at Purdue? E mail me Privately if you still have my address.

 

Bob

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Hi Chris,

 

We are going in Feb with another couple (first time cruisers) on the Liberty. How is your dad? Have done about three cruises since the Australia - New Zealand deal. We did B2B2B last Dec on the Navigator and a Transalantic to Bracelona on the Voyager. Still at Purdue? E mail me Privately if you still have my address.

 

Bob

Hi Bob and Chris,

 

I'm always glad when I get to read about your travels. Nice review!

 

I had a great trip to the Med on the Independence last winter. I'm taking this winter off before I head to Africa next December and the Galapagos Islands in 2013.

 

Chris-say hi to your dad.

Bob-say hi to Sharon.

 

Laurel

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