dave2step

Nellies Beach in my opinion. Very busy, but has a nice sandy bottom. The other one on the other side (forget the name, sorry) is horrible, with nothing but a rocky/weedy bottom. That was the first one I went into, and couldn't help but wonder why Royal Caribbean would subject our feet to such a horrible beach! Thankfully the others are nicer. Now if only they'd replace all the broken lounge chairs, increase the number of lounge chairs, and add a few more opportunities for people to find chairs under some shade. But I digress... I enjoy Labadee :)

Labadee is a very secluded area, where you're not really going to see any "locals" except for the few that are working there. It's a nice thought, but I'm not sure anything you bring (if it's even permitted) will reach the people you have in mind. No harm in trying though, just don't be disappointed if it doesn't quite work out. Good luck! :)

I'm not overly surprised by the skeptics. Whether or not you choose to believe me makes no difference to me. I saw it. It happened. I shared my experience. Others witnessed the same thing, so I know I'm not alone. I have nothing to gain by lying about this, so go ahead, think what you want to think if that makes you feel better. It doesn't change the truth.

I think most of these problems could be sorted quite easily. The windjammer buffet is nicely set out for absolute chaos and confusion. There should be one way in and one way out of every station. If you forget something, you join the back of the queue.

Food should be handled by the crew only, using tongs

Cameras should be recording at all times and anyone touching food with bare hands should have the footage shown on TV before being dropped at the next port.

Chair hoggers....doesn't bother me. If your chairs' been vacant for more than 30 minutes, your towels off and mine's on. End of!

Mandatory hand sanitizers should be placed outside every rest room and none compliers flogged.

 

Cruising's fun :D

 

Cheers

 

Davy !!!

Haha, cruising IS fun! And let's be honest, a party isn't really a party until the flogging begins... :)

I noticed the pigs eating straight from the trough too, and was happy when RC ended the self-serve and took control of dishing out the food in the Windjammer. What is it with people? Why would anyone think it's okay to dig right in with your hands to shared food trays, especially when they made no secret of the GI illness slowly spreading? I was generally pleased with RC's response to this. I think they handled it well. Just wish people would use their heads and not have it come to this in the first place.

All of this reminds me of why I've been liking the smaller ships more. :D

I've come to the same conclusion. Bigger isn't always better :)

Oh come on.....People digging into the buffet trays with bare hands....I'm sorry and I don't care cause I don't believe this. If it would have been one person that you saw..ok, but you saw a lot of people doing it......I don't buy it and adults at that! I have seen kids do it a couple of times and I told the Windjammer staff and they removed the trays immediately. And if you did see it did you bring it to anybodies attention or did you just look disgusted and let other people get food from there???? You make it seem like you were on a cruise with a ship full of cavmen! So what else happened good on the cruise??

I don't blame you for being skeptical. Like I said earlier, I wouldn't have believed it either had I not seen it with my own 2 eyes, on a daily basis for the first half of the cruise. It wasn't until RC stepped in, ended the self-serve, and took control of dishing out the food in the Windjammer that things started to improve. By and far most of the people on the cruise were fine and knew how to behave, but yes, there were those few "cavemen" that appear to have been raised as farm animals. Those are the people I take issue with, and by the luck of the draw, there seemed to be more than usual on this cruise.

I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the cruise, and had a great time. I've been loyal to RC for a long time, and will continue to be, which is why I raise these negative comments (and yes I have commented directly to RC), as I hope they can try to do something about them, if possible, as surely I'm not the first to raise these concerns.

I was on this cruise but didnt notice anything like what you witnessed. Though I will say the lines in the windjammer were a bit confusing. At the taco station, they had the shells at one end, the meet at the other end and the toppings in the middle. You kind of had to jump back and forth to make your taco. Overall, I thought it was a terrific time!

I agree, there is definitely room for improvement in the flow of the Windjammer, but then again, with that many people, all the planning in the world could be thrown out the window once just a few people start treating it like a free-for-all. Very hard to control.

We had a terrific time also, and certainly weren't going to let a few slobs ruin our vacation :)

Chair hogging happens everywhere there is a pool...not just on ships! Every resort I've been to, loungers are towel covered by 9am....with no one at the pool!

 

Now, the taking food with bare hands....unbelievable! Do you mean they reached into a pan of hot food with their hand and scooped it up and plopped it on their plate? Lordy!

Not so much with the hot/wet food, but literally a guy a few people in front of us dug his hand into the pineapple tray, scooped out what he wanted (no plate), then wandered off with his handful. Those of us in line looked at each other in disbelief. Also saw people grabbing handfuls of dry lettuce from the salad area, and plopping that onto their plates. Saw people pushing hashbrowns aside until they got the one (or five) that they wanted. Bacon, same thing. Biscuits, same thing. Pastries, same thing. Pancakes, same thing. Pizza, same thing. The list goes on. I know I'm not the only one who noticed, as I overhead another couple as well as a family talking about it in disgust also, suggested that they "only take food from the back" of the trays.

I realize this happens to some degree on all cruises, and there are just those who we all know shouldn't be allowed in public, but this cruise in particular I noticed it far too often.

I really have trouble believing people used their hands to grab salad, that sounds to unbelievable to me, an exaggeration maybe.

I don't blame you for thinking that, I wouldn't have believed it either had I not seen it with my own 2 eyes. Seriously, who does that??!!

There were plenty of children on board as usual, but primarily I'm talking about the adults. It was the adults digging into the food trays with their bare hands, and I'm not just talking about 1 or 2 instances. Even when the RC staff started acting as servers, adults were still trying to grab their own food with their hands, despite all the GI illness warnings. Unbelievable.

We just returned from the 8 night Independence of the Seas cruise, and while the cruise itself was fantastic, the ship was in great shape, and we had an amazing time, we couldn't help but notice a few things that were concerning. Over the 15+ cruises we've done with Royal Caribbean, these issues were the worst we've ever experienced on a cruise.

1) Windjammer Café: By far, the area where we experienced the greatest examples of complete lack of manners. People pushing, butting in front of lines, and generally doing whatever they could to ensure they were first at the trough. People grabbing food with their bare hands was a common event, and I don't know about you, but I lose my appetite in a hurry when I watch people scooping out handfuls of pineapple, salad, hashbrowns, etc... rather than using the available tongs, or waiting a few seconds until the tongs were available. Nope, they'd just reach around the person in front of them, dig their hand in, and scoop out what they wanted. It was disgusting! It's no wonder there were cases of GI illness with behaviour like this. By the second half of the cruise, RC finally stepped in and the Windjammer was no longer a self-serve buffet. RC staff were given the responsibility of dishing out the food. This was good in one aspect, but created a whole other level of chaos as it slowed service down, a mass of people would form waiting for food, resulting in people pushing their way in front of others to make sure they got their food first. It was survival of the fittest, and not at all a relaxing experience having to deal with that. Thank goodness there are other options for food on the ship.

2) Deck chair hogs: Common problem, I know, but I can't stand watching the prime deck chairs sitting vacant for the entire day with nothing but a towel placed on them, where someone had claimed the chair early in the morning, then never bothered to return. The "half-hour rule" is non-existent. Not once did I ever see RC staff remove towels to free up these chairs. Perhaps I'm just too polite, and I should have just done it myself, and grabbed whatever seat I felt like, whenever I felt like it. That's just not my style. Similar to my experience in the Windjammer, I believe manners and proper etiquette are important. Sadly, I seem to be in the minority nowadays.

3) Smokers: This one isn't entirely their fault, as RC only has certain designated smoking areas. Just once though, it would be nice to walk through the high-traffic areas on the pool deck and not be subjected to walking through a cloud of cigarette and cigar smoke. Great example they're setting for the children swimming nearby. RC really needs to find them a better location to smoke.

As I said, we thoroughly enjoyed the actual cruise, it's just a shame that when some people go on vacation, they leave their manners at home. Sadly, this is a reality with cruising, but it seems this cruise was worse for this than we'd previously experienced. Hopefully the next one will be better.

For quite a while now we've chosen to stay exclusively in Junior Suites, and wouldn't even consider going on a cruise if we didn't at least have a balcony room. It's funny, because some will strongly agree with us, some will strongly disagree with us. As one of the earlier posts said, it all comes down to personal preference. We're only in our early 40's, but the older we get, and the more cruises we go on, the more we like our space :)

There's just something about waking up in the morning before beginning the days activities, grabbing a coffee, and sitting out on the balcony with nothing but sunshine, the sound of the waves, and the view of the open water to keep you company. No noise, no crowds, no kids... just peaceful relaxation. Same goes for at night, when you can enjoy looking out at the stars. You just don't get that same experience anywhere else on the ship. There may be over 3000 guests on the ship, but at that moment, you'd never know it.

We also enjoy the extra space that the Junior Suites allow, which is VERY noticeable even with just the two of us. Nice big walk-in closet, an actual seating area, and a decent sized washroom. That little bit of extra space goes a long way to increase the comfort level of the cabin.

When we first started cruising I thought the cheaper the room, the better, figuring I'm hardly going to be in there with my eyes open anyway, but then we tried the balcony room. I was hooked. From that moment on I always had to have a balcony. And then one year we tried the Junior Suite. Once again... hooked! Never again would I cruise in any other cabin type. Once you know how good it is to have the larger room and balcony, it's hard to take a step backward.

As you may suspect, nowadays we're more about enjoying the rest and relaxation than partying until the wee hours. That's not to suggest you can't do the same in the other cabin types... this is just what works well for us.