tbillcruising

We are on the Oasis on Oct 16th in a grand suite. Will the internet package be included to do we need to purchase a package?

Is there a Coastal Kitchen on Oasis of the Seas?

February 3 – 15, 2019 – 12 Night Cruise to the Caribbean - Anthem of the Seas

The following is my review of our most recent experience on the Anthem.  Please do not leave rude comments.  Thank you.

We are Diamond on RCCL and Prime in the Casino.  This was our 4^th voyage on the Anthem.  We were a group of 3 couples that travel very well together.

After reading on these boards and Facebook that there was an outbreak of the flu on the Anthem the week prior to our cruise and that they were going to delay embarkation for up to 3 hours to clean the ship we decided to push back our time to arrive at the pier by an hour and a half.  This was a huge mistake.  First of all the traffic from when you turned onto the road that leads to the pier was horrendous.  It took more than an hour to get to the drop off point.  Cars were cutting in line.  People were getting out of cars and walking with tons of luggage due to the wait being so long.  They really need to find a way to control and expedite this process.  It is not a fun way to start a vacation.  We dropped our luggage, waited for our friend to get back from the parking garage and walked into the terminal.

By now it was about 12:30.  We were in suites so we went to the suite lane and literally walked right up to the check-in counter.  It took all of 2 minutes to check in and we walked directly onto the gangway to the ship.  Once inside we went right to our cabins.  We waited in the stair area for 5 minutes and the doors were opened and we proceeded to our cabin.  Easy-peasy.  Our suites were on Deck 6.  We dropped our bags, grabbed our drink cups included in our pre-paid soda package and walked one deck down to the 270 Café for our Roast Beef Sandwich embarkation lunch.  Here is where I am going to insert that as I stated we have sailed on this ship several times and have been very happy with everything.  This cruise, although we had a great time, things were “off”.  There will be several examples of this ahead in the review.

So we got our food in 270, found a place to sit and then took our drink cups up to the bar to be filled with soft drinks.  Alvin, the bartender started walking toward us and saw the cups, turned around and walked over to other guests who came up to the bar after us and waited on them instead.  Crazy!  He waited on several others as we stood there watching and getting madder by the minute.  This is not the first time we have been ignored with our cups on RCCL cruises.  You spend all of this money on beverage packages and this is how you are treated when you try to get a drink.  I will also mention that there is not a self-serve beverage station in or near 270 or we would have just served ourselves.  The food was good and we finally enjoyed our first lunch on board.

The muster drill was routine.  It does bother me that you cannot see the tv’s or the crew demonstrating from every seat in the room but we have been on many cruises and know what we are supposed to do.

After the muster drill we proceeded to the dining room because even though all 3 couples shared booking numbers with our travel agent so that we would be connected for dining and such we were all assigned to different tables.  It was not an easy task, it took 3 crew members and us refusing to leave the area until the issue was resolved until they finally found us a spot for the time we wanted to dine, together.

When we got back to our cabin our luggage still wasn’t there.  My husband and our friend went looking for it.  They found our bags on different floors all over the ship.  Now all of our bags were clearly tagged with the color coded deck tags provided by RCCL.  We were on Deck 6.  They found some of our luggage on Deck 8, 9, 3 & 4.  WTH???   Like I said, there were many things that were “off” on this cruise.

Our cabin steward never came to introduce himself until the middle of the second day.  There were 2 days when our room never got made up.  We are early risers and go to breakfast around 8ish every morning.  On other cruises our steward knew when we usually went out and our cabin was always made up by the time we would come back.  Not this cruise, our cabin was never made up until after we returned from LUNCH!  It was so weird…. and we were in a Jr Suite.

More about dining… dinner and service in the main dining room was way off.  The first 2 nights the food came out cold, not even luke warm, down right cold.  On the third night we said something about it to the waiter and head waiter and we finally got some pretty hot food.  The next night we went to a specialty restaurant (we ate at 3 thoughout the cruise, Wonderland, Jaimie's 2x, Chef’s Table and Chops.  Food and service were wonderful each time).  The next night we go back to our table in the main dining room and our server is mad at us. Yes, you read that right.  He was not speaking to us.  We asked what is wrong?  You are upset because we went to Jaimie's last night?  Yup! He was mad that we went to another restaurant.  Can you imagine?  He was cold to us for 2 nights.  My husband talked to the head waiter about this, the cold food and the fact that we were almost run down by food carts 2x in the last couple of nights.  We were taken care of very well as the head waiter was not happy with the way the server acted towards us and the fact that we had cold food served to us for several nights. He met my husband for coffee the next morning and said he was going to make it up to our group.  We were treated like royalty for lunch (on him at Jaimie’s) and dinner (special appetizers, filet mignon, wine, champagne for everyone).  The food and service were amazing.

We ate breakfast and lunch in the Windjammer almost every day and the food was excellent.  So many choices.  We were never disappointed up there.

We hang out in the casino every night and the crew in there were great!  We had a great time every night!  Stephan, Lutzie, Alexandra, Joel, Charlie and everyone else working in there were so much fun.  We do not buy an alcohol package as we get free drinks in the casino.  The drinks were awesome as were the people serving them!!

The ports were nice.  We had some cloudy days and a little rain but it was still better than being back home in winter weather.

San Juan - took a cab to the Marriot.  Did a little gambling and had some drinks.

St. Maarten - Did the Beach Rendezvous excursion through RCCL.  It was ok.  The extremely pushy people walking the beach selling things and trying to give massages were very annoying and really took away from the enjoyment.  At one point a toothless extremely dirty guy carrying a bag came up to us and said to my husband “I want to show your wife what I do”!  WTH???

Antigua - Did the Beach Catamaran with Lobster Lunch tour.  It was not at all what we expected.  It turned out to be a booze cruise with people pulling down their pants and mooning each other, falling down drunks.  The lobster was not good.  It was pre cooked, thrown in a cooler and then they throw them on the grill until they are the consistency of rubber.  They had no taste and you couldn’t chew them.  Gross!  This excursion was not cheap and it was horrible.  We canceled the excursions we had for the next 3 islands after these two.

St Lucia - We got off the ship and walked around the shops at the pier, had a couple of local beers and went back and enjoyed the empty ship.

Barbados - We only got off because my friend need to pick up a couple of gifts.  We went right back to the ship and enjoyed the day.

St Kitts - We took a cab to the Marriot.  We were going to go to the beach there but it was very windy so we just walked around, checked out the casino and then went back to the pier and shopped a little.

We had a great time on the cruise.  I love that we were on the ship for 12 nights and we really enjoy the Anthem.  I don’t know what the problem was this time around but a lot of things were different.  I think we are going to take a break from the Anthem for a while. We earned a free balcony cruise in the casino and we will be picking a different ship for that cruise.  

Thanks for reading.  

On 11/5/2018 at 2:39 PM, starrcards said:

 

I agree.  The Chops lunch is worth $24.95 if it's for the entire cruise.

It is per day.  

21 hours ago, Merion_Mom said:

I would like to know which ship this was, since every ship that I have  been on recently has this we-don't-give-out-change attitude.

The latest was Harmony. We use the casino for all $ transactions (i.e. breaking large bills, getting cash to take on shore, etc) and have never encountered an attitude or grumpiness at any time.  We are regulars in the casino and we TIP very well there (in cash, never auto) and have been treated well by ALL employees there.  This would be on Anthem (Hannes is running a great show in that casino), Allure, Harmony, Oasis, Symphony, Independence.

12 hours ago, Merion_Mom said:

 

The good news is that as grumpy as the casino cashiers are about this, the people  at Guest Services are delighted to help you.  🙂

In the 2 weeks we were just on b2b not one time was a casino cashier grumpy to us when we broke down large bills into 5's and 1's.  They were happy to do it.  You certainly cannot speak for all casino cashiers or for all guest service employees either for that matter.  

4 minutes ago, springfire said:

And no tips are required to pay any of those employees!

Correct!!!

7 minutes ago, Merion_Mom said:

 

Do you buy goods in a store on land such as Macy's?  Kohl's?  Publix?  Piggly Wiggly?  Tiffany's?  CVS?

 

Do you know that when you spend money there, some of that money goes to pay the people  who work there?  That $10 shirt does not cost the store $9.00 with $1 profit.

 

EVERY business pays its workers from the money that it takes from its customers.

Correct. The are paid from the cruise fare that we pay for the vacation.  The tip is something extra for extra special service rendered not contribution to salaries.

4 hours ago, not-enough-cruising said:

Similar to why I don’t do “auto” tip. I tip cash, and ONLY of if it is EARNED. 

I do the same. For some reason according to many posters on this thread this practice = being cheap, not tipping at all and doing it wrong! LOL

20 hours ago, Merion_Mom said:

Yes, you would be upsetting the apple  cart.  Your daily gratuities go to the housekeeping staff, mainly your cabin steward, plus the restaurant staff, for all of the venues on the ship, mostly to your assigned wait team in the main dining room.

 

Just leave the auto-gratuities on and tip anyone else what you wish.  That is the fairest way.

 

IMO.  Of course.  😄

What apple cart?  Why would I want to tip people in venues that I don't even go to?  No auto-gratuities for me. 

12 hours ago, BNBR said:

 

You are so generous.  I'm sure the 98% of tipped crew who you stiffed appreciate your generosity very much.  Maybe on your next cruise they will all throw a gala in your honor.

What does this even mean? This doesn't even make sense.

Shorts are totally acceptable in the dining rooms at dinner.  Many men were in shorts and polos most nights and it was fine.  Who cares what other people wear anyway?  There is not a true dress code only suggested dress.  Dress however you would like.  You are on vacation.  We go to 4 & 5 star restaurants in Florida all the time and people are in shorts, why not in cruise ship dining rooms?   

My goodness. What a hot topic!  I agree that gratuities are discretional. It is up to each individual to tip as they see fit.  I do not allow tips to be added to my sea pass account.  I tip in cash.  I don't care to be blasted for that either.  It is a personal issue and everyone has a right to spend their hard earned money as they see fit.  

Thank you!

I'm noticing when trying to book a car reservation for Port Canaveral that most of the rental agencies close before we would be returning the car. Some close at noon. How do you return the car if the agency is closed?

Thank You!!

She's only 14 years old...Freedom of the Seas is 12 years old for perspective... Voyager is 19 years old this year!

 

 

Yes

 

 

Larger ships are usually the focus of the vacation when the ports are unimportant. The larger ships are mostly inward focus.... very few views looking out at the scenery.

 

In Europe, the focus of the vacation are the ports, noi the ship. The smaller the ship the better. The views from everywhere around the ship is exponentially better than any of the larger ships would be.

 

 

No... maybe you'll wonder why you never sailed this small old ship before :D

Luckily there is no need for you to understand it.

I´ve never seen the bionic bar empty on the ships I´ve been on that had it.

 

Do you really think folks give up drinking because there is a service charge added to drinks from the bionic bar? So what would they gain by not going back there because of the added service charge. They have to pay it at every other bar anyway. So your thoughts make no sense at all.

 

Oh yeah and I´m fine with the 18% added just like at any other bar. Not the least bit annoyed or perplexed. I would be perplexed if there wasn´t a service charge.

 

It seems you are quite unhappy with a lot of things, maybe it´s time for you to branch out to other lines or even other forms of vacation.

The obvious difference is that at another bar an actual person is making and or serving you the drink. If you are fine with tipping a machine and it makes sense to you go ahead and do it.

I have been on several cruises with a bionic bar and that bar is empty most of the time, in my experience. If your experience has been different then good for the robot. Geez.

I'll pick and choose my vacation types and companies thank you very much. I don't need you to tell me what to do. I have been cruising since the days of the Oceanic when you got white glove service (literally) and when they said everything except alcohol is included in the fare that is exactly what they meant. No nickel and diming, no paying extra for "better" food, all food was amazing and included, no tipping robots or anyone else that you didn't want to tip either, you tipped for the excellent service provided, however much you wanted to and to actual human beings who performed the service. You were not expected to pay salaries.

We do tip the Freestyle machines, tip is added when you buy the drink package.

Yes.. you are right! I forgot about that. Another rip-off. Oh well I love cruising and will never stop but this really annoys me.

Definition of gratuity

plural gratuities: something given voluntarily or beyond obligation usually for some service; especially : tip

• added a gratuity for the server
  

When the Bionic Bar debuted on the Quantum, I asked the Hotel Director that question.

 

He said that the 18% goes into the Crew Welfare Fund. This directly benefits the entire crew.

Ok... but still, why do they EXPECT or REQUIRE a tip? Should we be required to tip the Coke machines too? That is the same concept as the bionic bar. It makes no sense. Since when are passengers responsible fo the Crew's Welfare?

It's their company, they can do what they want. As you say, your choice is to patronize them or not.

As I said, yes they can but that doesn't make it right. Everyone is capable of doing things that they shouldn't do, it doesn't mean that they should.

When you compare the amount that they take in with the amount paid out it's a joke.

I suppose people have nothing better to do on a sea day.

It is a huge rip-off. Some folks just like to play bingo and don't care I guess.

Because they can.

Yes they can, but that doesn't mean they should. Nobody uses it. Cut off their nose to spite their face. .... and what a crappy way to treat your customer.

Your probably paying for the person who stocks the machine and whatever else is needed. I haven't seen this Robot except for photos.

But shouldn't RCCL pay that person? Gratuities are supposed to be a reward for good service not payment of someone's salary. The person stocking the machine is not serving anyone anything.

How is the Jewel of the Seas? I know she is an older ship but has it been updated? We like the larger ships but are interested in Italy and Greece. We are Diamond and usually sail in a suite. Will we be disappointed with the JOS?