MattInFLL

Matt, I always enjoy your reviews and find them positive and even-handed. I'm sorry this particular trip did not go well, but I love your "didn't spoil the cruise" attitude. I'm going on Indy for 5 days in a couple of weeks. That trip will bring me to Diamond Plus, which I will enjoy on a Brilliance British Isles cruise in June . You wrote, "Now, with my D+ discount, four days of surf and stream is about $32." What is the Diamond Plus discount? I've seen conflicting posts. There's a 30% discount on Internet Cyber Monday sale now, and I'd like to figure out which is better. Thanks. Carol

Thanks Carol. The D+ benefit is $39.95 off any package. I think there’s also a 2 free days perk. I get packages, so I only ever apply the $39.95.

So our friends are in the Ben & Jerrys sweet. They were nice enough to share their free ice cream coupons. I did not know they got Gold cards and suite privileges. Nice perk.

The lifeguard is lonely in the H2O zone. That’s got to be a hard job (staying alert).

The main pool is a little more active in this cloudy windy day.

A random shot of aft Centrum.

An obligatory Flowrider pic for Andrew. :) the newbies are pretty good.

Can’t beat a beautiful wake.

Fun to watch my Patriots on a ship full of Miami fans :)

Check out the Labyrinth.

Labyrinth has been consistently busy this cruise. And staying open a bit later than usual.

Funnily enough the open deck dance party - which is no longer the Absolut 20/20 party- was not well attended. For those of you familiar with it, they didn’t even have the extra bars set up. There was no need. But after 1 am, Labyrinth was rocking.

Even more funny, made a new friend this cruise. He always sits in the first chair of the downstairs bar. And I always sit at the seat next to him. We were both on last year and in the same seats and talked to the same people and somehow never met. Strange.

I feel like I’m complaining a lot this cruise. I don’t usually. None of what I’ve reported has “ruined” the cruise. It’s still been fun, especially when surrounded by friends.

But this may be my last trip on Indy. Next year we’re thinking about 7 days on Symphony over T day week.

A little nit picking. I always do one stop at Johnny Rockets for the onion rings. I ordered a sprite. Whatever it was, it was not Sprite. The ranch dressing that comes with the rings? Not sure what that was either. It was very watery. My server was more than happy to correct these issues but odd such basics were off to begin with. The dressing that came back was thicker, but still not the usual tasty ranch. Ah well.

We are having windy overcast weather today so people are scrambling to find other things to do. It might be too chilly for the bellyflop. Or it will take some brave souls. :)

This has been my most reliable internet connection - in Johnny Rockets.

Pub drinks menu. Hard to take with one hand :)

What did royal do wrong in that scenario?

 

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The supervisor approved it before hand. And considering all the dining reservation screw ups for us and many others, yes Royal has screwed up. Last night they overbooked Chefs Table and displaced a party. Sorry, but Royal has screwed up. And I tend to be a Royal apologist more than a critic.

Post party promenade - banner still up.

I must be getting old. These long walks from front elevators to back elevators never used to bother me. Now it’s like the Twilight Zone where the hallway keeps getting longer and longer as you walk :)

And tonight’s towel animal mystery :)

And I will post all compasses at some point.

Pyramid Lounge tonight (and every night). Great band called Pulse. But hardly any people.

Lots of people headed to the 11:30 comedy show.

Matt, I just caught up. Hopefully things will head the right direction tomorrow.

 

 

 

Andrew

Andrew! Always good to “see” you. And yes, fingers crossed :)

Should she or he have done it. No. But this is the end of the world ? Geez.

Sheesh. Two of our party just joined us in the Pyramid lounge with our favorite bartender Sharon, and told us the following. They went to the MDR to their assigned table. Where they ate last night all alone (at an 8 top). I would have been next to them had I gone. A family took over both tables and told the waiter our friends could not sit there. So they were tableless. As I would have been. A supervisor finally came over and gave them a two top. But really, Royal. Get your act together ! And we’re all D+

Jackie and Victoria, our Diamond Concierge and Bar Attendant, are the ultimate representatives of Royal Caribbean. We were on the previous cruise that docked on Thanksgiving morning, and they, more than any other crew members, made our cruise special. If you can, we'd be so happy if you told them that Birthday Bob and wife Nancy send xoxo's, and have submitted our survey with glowing remarks to both. Thanks!

Will do. This is my 4th cruise with Victoria. She’s a love. And I’ve only met jacqui this cruise, but she clearly cares. I don’t say that often about DL concierges.

Matt...thanks for the great pics and review. And yes, no going off the ship to a hospital this year, please.

 

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It’s still the fastest I’ve ever cleared customs though. :)

But yes, no repeats, please.

Nachi was great. Something we learned this year - if you want premium alcohol or a stronger drink, just ask. They’re happy to accommodate. Also learned you’re not restricted to one meal. Our server Carlos (had him last year, too) was offering us more food all day. Taxis are $4-5 per person depending on how many you are fitting in. I would imagine a single has to pay at least double.

Tonight was a Windjammer dinner - plenty of selection and fairly tasty. They finally figured out our Giovanni’s snafu and confirmed us for tomorrow at 7. But we have heard of dinner reservation screw ups left and right. Something is amiss. Royal IT at work :)

Tonight is also 70s “dancing in the streets” on the Promenade followed by outdoor dance party in the solarium (yay!). My favorite event on the cruise. The deck party, not 70s. I’ve watched the village people look a likes enough :)

I enjoyed the spa. My therapist did not do the sales push. :) I had reflexology which is my fave. Pedicure tomorrow.

We are doing Nachi Cocum today. Got here early so our large group could get palapas together. We love Nachi. Clean and peaceful, good food and we are fine with their drinks.

I think this is one of my favorite towel animals ever:



Have to say dinner in the MDR was fairly disappointing. And I usually don’t have a problem with dinner in the MDR. The food was OK. The onion soup had good flavor. But one of my table mates had the beef sliders, which is one of their staples, and the bun truly could’ve broken a window if you threw it at it, and the french fries were inedible. I’ve never experienced that.

Another table mate reported that the lobster tail was not well cooked. And of course gone are the days when the head waiter would walk around and separate the lobster meat from the tail for the guest, to earn his tip. Another casualty for profit I suppose. We did not have a drinks waiter. Our assistant waiter had to fill-in and she knew nothing about alcohol. She wasn’t even sure we would want ice in our drinks. And even on two attempts she could not get the drinks correct.

But the worst part is to sit there and watch every table around you getting their food in a timely manner and you’re still sitting there with your one roll. We did not get our first appetizer until about 9:10, or about 40 minutes after sitting. The second appetizer was about 20 minutes later. And the main course did not come until about 10 PM. Our waiter had three tables, one of which was empty. Suffice it to say we were not happy. We were never offered another roll and no one refilled our waters. I know from my many past experiences this is not usually how it goes. But considering how much they screwed up our dinner reservations already, it was just icing on the cake. We skipped dessert and hightailed it out of there.

We won’t be going back to the dining room. Tomorrow night will be in Windjammer, and then hopefully the reservation we were supposed to have at Giovanni’s will come through for Sunday night.

On the plus side, since I’ve now been on the ship four times in three years, it truly is special when crewmembers remember you from past trips and want to give you a hug and say hello. It is one of those special things about Royal and about being a repeat cruiser that makes it worthwhile.

A couple of random shots from the seventh floor balcony from the elevator area overlooking formal night earlier.

I’m on Indy for a 4 day and it wasn’t scheduled, but now it is for tomorrow night. I really believe it’s up to the cruise director. I’m glad to have it. I always love the open deck parties

Well, our group of 14 is in 3 different parts of the dining room. 3 different decks too.

They’re still trying to fix our issue. Oh well.

Tonight is formal night and it’s the Jasmine menu.

Today’s treats. I ate the cheesecake square before I remembered to take the pic.

And what? No napkin and silverware anymore? Odd place to cut back.

I forgot to add - none of us wanted to try the sea food tower.

I had heard complaints about them starting to add a gratuity to specialty restaurant bills. They weren’t doing that here.

This surprised me - lifeguards at Solarium pool. I thought that was only a kids pool thing. But there are 2 life guards at every pool.

One truly annoying thing - now when you check out a towel, they don’t just scan your card, they also ask for your cabin number. One guy for the entire pool area. That’s insane. And my friends on the B2B said it was the same getting off in Cozumel. One guy for all passengers going ashore. How many ratty blue towels were guests actually stealing?

Matt, if you pop in to Dog and Badger would you let me know if any of Victoria, Nick and Adrian are still around?

 

 

 

Enjoy your cruise.

Jarmo, Victoria is now in the Viking Crown. Alternating between Diamond Lounge and Olive or Twist. I’m not sure I’ve seen Nick or Adrian. Yesterday it was all women.

More thoughts:

Because there ended up being 14 of us, we tried to make it easy on our Chops waiter Shaymus from Turkey. He did the starters family style (and the sides) and we each ordered our main meal.

Everything was good. But the bacon appetizer is different. I always remember it having a sweeter glaze. It doesn’t anymore. Still good though, but preferred the old glaze. My 6 oz filet was cooked perfectly, and the truffle fries are tasty.

Today we had a little drama. Giovanni’s lost our reservation for tonight. Jacqui the diamond lounge concierge is great and really tried to fix it. But they have no tables tonight. And for some reason our MDR tables aren’t linked even though we all were linked before hand. Finally 6 of us were put together in MDR and they’re trying to get another table nearby.

We have a letter confirming our Gios rez tonight. So the maitre d’ is trying to do something for us the last night.

I excused myself from the drama and went and got a massage :)

Matt terrific posts and photos.

 

That voice recognition worked very well.

 

May I ask what device you used it on?

 

Keith

I am on an Apple iPhone X.

A couple of more shots of the Royal promenade before I go to bed. They’ve turned on the lights because they want everyone to go home LOL.

Tomorrow is a sea day and they are doing a “Black Friday“ sale on the promenade. It should be interesting to see what that really is.