The LAFFNVEGAS "Live" From the Mariner of the Seas

Well not quite yet LIVE ;) We are awaiting our flight to LAX. We live in Las Vegas and are waiting to board our Southwest flight at MC Carren Airport.

I will start off with......Greetings and Good Morning Fellow CCers, many of you here on the RCI Board do not know me but let me introduce myself. If you ever go to the HAL board you may know me. I have done numerous LIVE from threads. I get very detailed and often quite humorous :D I basically tell it like it is and do a lot of laughing at myself. Just hint, I really am blonde.

This past year and a half my DH Tom and I have taken quite a few cruises the last was on the Celebrity Solstice in September to the Westerdam Caribbean where we occupied an Aqua Class cabin and the cruise prior we were on a 7 Night Pacific Coastal on the NCL Pearl in a Full Suite in April, then in January we were on the Crown Princess and while it was a fun cruise with friends we found a few areas to be lacking. Then we have done a B2B E. Caribbean, numerous Mexican Riviera, and a Full Transit Panama Canal and 8 Alaska cruises. Most of these have been on Holland America. We have 161 days with Holland America of which most of these have been Suites. This cruise we are sailing on the Royal Caribbean Mariner of the Seas and feel as if this is going back to where our cruising addiction started. We will be in a D1 category with an aft facing cabin #1390 on deck 10.

A little about us, Tom and I (Lisa) we are both in our mid 50's. We started cruising in 2002 our first cruise was Royal Caribbean Monarch, it was on that very first cruise in March 2002 that we saw infomercials on the TV in our cabin telling about the amazing new HUGE ship that would be coming out November of 2003 called the Mariner of the Seas. This new cruise ship would be the largest cruise ship in the industry. Tom and I both agreed then that some day we would sail on that amazing ship. Well, let's just say it took us a few too many years. Our 2nd cruise was on the HAL Zuiderdam, then we had a chance that same in year in 2003 to sail on the Monarch one more time when she came to the West Coast. After that we stayed with HAL and have sailed on all of the HAL ships but three. In 2008 I lost my long time job as a Finance Director at a car dealership and was unemployed for 8 months in that time we took advantage of my time off and did several longer cruises. Upon returning home from our last HAL 7 day cruise to Alaska in June 2009 I decided I better find a job and was very fortunate to go to work in the Travel Industry which has been my passion for years.

So going to cruise on the Mariner is a cruise that has been a long wait but it is finally here.:) It is really rather funny looking back that we really credit Royal Caribbean and our great cruise on the Monarch that we are so addicted to cruising. I actually won that first cruise in 2001 from a credit union that my car dealership over a threemonth period had sent in the most loans. Oddly, I found out I won the cruise of all days September 11th 2001:o We chose to go March of 2002 to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. Up till that point our vacations consisted of flying to Hawaii at least 2 times a year. We were pretty regular vacationers to the Big Island.

I thought I would start this thread while waiting for our 8:10 Southwest flight to LAX, we are sitting at terminal B at McCarren Airport (old section) sipping on Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte. This old section is not nearly as nice as gates C and D and has no nice tables to sit at. So I am sitting at gate B15 with my carry on bag on my lap and my net book on top of it attempting to type this. The ride to the airport was uneventful and our son who lives at home and takes care of the Zoo of animals while we are traveling took us to the airport. There was a time when the rides were "Mr Toad's Wild Ride", I guess now that he is over 30 he has calmed that down a lot. Not surprising the roads to the airport were busy at 5:45 in the morning and the airport was crazy. Fortunately the check in to SW was not at all busy, we checked in and went to TSA. OK I admit I was fearing this big time, I got to go thru that new scanner. As Tom said......Pictures to follow, check the internet :D Then they just waved him thru the normal metal detector. He joked I must be on the list. It was really no big deal and there was no line at all.

This LIVE from thread will be a bit different than my past LIVE froms, in that I will write every night but unfortunately you will have to wait a few days for me to post. I had originally stated that I would only post while in Cabo, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta but who knows I might purchase a small internet package and post a bit more often. I will not be able to answer any questions during the week but there are so many experienced Mariner Cruisers here that I am sure they will get answered. In my daily writing I will be comparing this cruise obviously to our first RCI and to HAL, NCL and maybe even Celebrity.

I guess I wil get this posted and also post a link to this in Facebook.

Signing off from MC Carren Intl Airport. :)

Lisa and Tom

Have a super time. I always enjoy reading your post. From HAL, NCL, and all your other cruises.

Your reports are fair and balance.

Looking forward to this weeks post.

I'm here, Lisa - and looking forward to your review. I love that you are "too too" honest. Gives us some real insight!

Have a great cruise. The Mariner is a wonderful ship.

What a terrific public service! I will be following your review particularly closely as I will be on the Mariner in one week!!!

Lisa..I hope you and Tom have a great cruise...looking forward to a "live" report...Enjoy:):):)

Lisa, have a wonderful time!

Have a wonderful time!!

Greetings from the Mariner, excuse any typos doing this from my phone. Wow chech in was do fast and easy, we were on board right at 11:30, we just finished lunch in the Windjammer which was where Tom wanted to go. Well it is not inthe league of Celebrity and HAL is also a lot better I would say it is eqal to NCL and better than Princess. Have not seen much of the ship yet but now heading oit to explore. Yes ihad a glass of wine for lunch so the cruise is off to a great start!:)

Have a fabulous cruise. Can't wait to hear about it.

Looking forward to this thread. I'm on the last run in January.

donnaman43- Don't look now.. Neighbor. :D

ButHi still posting from my phone. We really love our cabin. So much bigger than our aqua class cabin on the Solstice, I would almost say it is almost as big as a mini suite on Princess. Defintely love the aft!

We met Philip our cabin steward, he came by to introduce himself. So far I impressed with several things.

OK I have to say that I can see a lot of similarity with the Solstice so obvious Celebrity copied RCI ;) but Mariner is a lot warmer feeling.

I'm here, Lisa - and looking forward to your review. I love that you are "too too" honest. Gives us some real insight!

I'm here too Lisa. Catch you here or on FB.

Pat

Really looking forward to your comparisons between Solstice (my new favorite ship) and Mariner because I've never tried RCL. Knowing how forthright you are in your observations and comparisons, your opinion is very important to me and could go a long way to deciding if we want to try Royal.

Have a wonderful cruise!:)

The Mariner is a wonderful ship with a fantastic captain and crew! Looking forward to your live posts. Enjoyed your cruise!

Hi, Lisa and Tom:

Looking forward to your reports. Hope it is nice and warm where you are. It is windy and cool here still, as you know as you passed through L.A. Have fun.

Bon Voyage! Have a fabulous time on your cruise Lisa and Pedro (I mean Tom)!!! :cool: :D

Lisa:

I will be checking up on you each day. Then I shall return to the HAL board.

I will be on the Voyager of the Seas in March

great start, enjoy the mariner. my favorite spot was deck four aft.

Hola!!!! From Cabo San Lucas, Mexico

It is an absolutely picture perfect day here, not a all humid, very warm but not that feeling that it is too hot and not a cloud in the sky.

I am going to go ahead and post two reports for you while I am sitting in an internet cafe coffee bar in Cabo. The place I use to go is now Senior Frogs and they do not have internet but I am enjoying a Carmelo Frappuccino that is might tasty :D

Monday November 29th, 2010 from a chilly day in the Pacific on the Royal Caribbean Mariner of the Seas.

Greetings CCers,

This is my first actual report having now been on board for over 24 hours and unfortunately you will not get to read till we are in Cabo tomorrow.

After landing at LAX right on time yesterday and our luggage also arriving quickly we headed out to grab the Super Shuttle I pre signed up for. I have taken Super Shuttle several times on the shared van program but this is the first that we actually made two stops for indiviuals to take home. So the ride to Pier 91 took quite a while. We arrived at the pier a few minutes before 11, found a Stevedore to take our luggage, tipped him and walked into the building. There we found no crowds they were checking people in, we entered to the right hand side since we were on deck 10, walked up to a window and within minutes were checked in and had a Sea Pass cards. Within 5 minutes they started announcing boarding number one, we had 6, the next thing I knew we were crossing over the gangway to board the Mariner of the Seas. We were up in the Windjammer and seated at a table before 11:30.

My first impression was not the WOW I remember feeling when we first boarded our first cruise on the Monarch of the Seas with her beautiful open atrium but rather to my surprise there was definitely a similiarity to the Celebrity Solstice with the way the elevator banks are and the atrium area.

As mentioned we went straight up to the Windjammer. I have to admit sadly I was not impressed, the selection is as I remember it being when we were last on the Monarch in 2002 and 2003 which was one of the reasons we actually did not return to RCI. I often hear many people complain about food on NCL but I honestly think their buffet area is better than the WIndjammer. The very best is definitely the Ocean View Cafe on the Celebrity Solstice and right behind the Celebrity ships for embarkation buffet is Holland America Lido buffet. As much as I did not care for Princess food quality I think their embarkation lunch buffet is even slightly better the the Windjammer. To all of the RCI fans I am sorry this may sound like I am complaining but I try to give an honest and fair comparison to all the other cruise lines we have been on. I will basically be doing that through out the week.

After lunch we decided to check on the Royal Promenade area. OK I now think it is a mistake to look at lots of photos of a ship before boarding. The pictures I saw made the Promenade area look huge with lots and lots of shops and restaurants. I was very surprised that it felt small or at least not nearly as big as I felt it would be. Actually over all the ship does not feel big. The Mariner is 138,000 tons where the Solstice is 122,000 tons and it actually does not feel any larger than the Solstice and the Crown Princess which is slightly less than the Solstice felt like the largest ship. The one thing that is very noticiable compared to the Solstice is that it feels very very crowded, not just the Windjammer but going to the Dining Rooms, walkng the Promenade, and many of the lounges. There is a wait for everything, this is not always the case on, HAL, Celebrity or even NCL.

It was about 1:15 and even though we never heard an announcement that the cabins were ready we assumed they were and headed up to find our cabin. We have cabin 1390 D1 on the stern with an aft facing balcony. I actually was impressed with the size. Our last cabin on the Monarch was an OV at the curve of the bow and to get into bed Tom had to crawl over me :D But we had a lot of laughs and giggles on that little three day cruise in December 2003. Our cabin this time is actually larger and far more roomy than the Aqua class cabin we had on the Solstice with a lot more counter space, far more closet space and more drawers. Not sure who designed the cabins on the Solstice class ships but it could not have been a women or at least a women who travels. Our balcony is also huge and while it has lots of bars as a slight obstruction it does not bother me because I had seen plenty of pictures prior and was aware that it would not be as nice of an aft facing balcony as we have had numerous times on HAL ships or the wonderful Romanace Suite we had on the NCL Pearl. I will say that the bathroom is also bigger than I remember having on our last RCI cruise and really is not that bad. Overall the cabin is a great size and we believe it is actually as large as a Mini Suite on Princess. The bed and linens are not nearly as nice as HAL, HAL definitely has the best in this area but Celebrity was not bad. I would say that the bed here is about equal to NCL and definitely better than Princess. Princess not only has hard uncomfortable beds but they do not even have a top sheet, so at least we have a top sheet on the Mariner :)

Life Boat drill was held outside at your muster station without wearing your life jacket. I believe that pretty much all the cruise lines have gotten away from making everyone bring or wear their life jackets which in my opinion was a good move. While it is good to know how to wear your life jacket, I am sure that lots of germs were spread with people wearing them and kids or adult kids blowing on the whistle. It did seem like the Life Boat drill took a very long time and sadly was rather disorganised with no one listening to instructions. But it was not nearly as long as it was on the Solstice where we were crammed into a small lounge like sardines and could not hear or see the instructional information.

We were in San Pedro with the Crystal Symphony and we left way before her, as a matter of fact we starting pushing away from the pier at about 4:45pm and were headed out to the pacific. We have early 6 pm dining in level 4 which is called Top Hat and Tails. We had requested a table for two but were assigned a table for 6. We are seated with two ladies from So. California area and the other two seats were empty for the first night so we shall see if anyone joins us for our first formal night tonight. Dinner was actually fairly good, Tom had the Prime Rib and said it was much better in quality to Princess which was the bench mark for this cruise ;) I had the Sea Bass which was not the best I have ever had but was definitely enjoyable. Service was actually quite good in the beginning, even the Manager of our area of the Dining Room came over and introduced himself. To me I think this is rather important, it at least gives you the feeling that they care and is something that should be done in any fine dining venue. This never happened on any night on the Crown Princess in the main dining room and is sometimes hit or miss with HAL. But I attibute that to hotel management on any particular HAL cruise. Of course we had exceptional above and beyond on the Solstice but then we dined in Blu so that really is not a fair comparison. NCL is a whole different ball game because of their Free Style Dining but I will say that we have had numerous dining room mangers check to see how were were doing on NCL too.

I actually think the dining room on the Mariner is very pretty and wish we were on the lower level. There is just an elegant feel to this dining room. OK I mentioned the service was great in the beginning. Despite the fact I am sounding picky and petty and really am pretty much easy going and those that have cruised with me know that or if you have read my previous LIVE from posts. But one thing I enjoy on a cruise is coffee with cream or half and half with dessert. That is the one treat I enjoy after dinner that I do not have when I am home. What I hate is trying to pass off milk, especially 2% as cream for my coffee. First off you know when you pour milk into the coffee the weird color it turns. Well it was milk on our table and Splenda (yellow packet sweetner) is by request only??? Well it took over 30 minutes for them to track down any cream, they finally brought me the little packets of creamer. Our waiter who really is very nice said he checked in all of them and they were all milk. Well at least he was honest, I had a server once on HAL try to tell me it was cream (come to find out it was at the end of a 14 day cruise and they were low on cream) lol. Fortunately this morning at breakfast it really was cream and I think real cream not just half and half so the coffee at breakfast was very enjoyable ;)

After dinner we decided we did not care about going to the show which was a comedian and only one show time, so we thought we would just go thru the shops. Those who have read my reviews before know I get detailed in this area too. The shops on the Mariner are owned and operated by a company called Starboard, they are the same company the operate and run on many cruise lines such as Holland America, and Carnival. There is another company called Harding Brothers that runs the shops on the Solstice class ships, a couple of RCI newer ships like Liberty but not Oasis and Allure and they are also on the Cunard ships. NCL is ran by Columbian Emeralds and Princess runs and operates their own with all buying done out of Santa Clarita, CA. This is where Princess does shine, they have by far the best I have ever seen for shopping at sea . The selection here on the Mariner is fair at best but then it is a lot like HAL where it is hit or miss but mostly miss. The one thing I did notice is the prices here on the Mariner are not good for items such as cosmetics and frangrances. I am one that waits to purchase items like Estee Lauder cosemetics on board the duty free shops on the ship so I know prices. I found the prices here on the Mariner to be higher than on the past ships I have been on and pretty close to what they are at say Macy's but with a very bad selection. I would love to talk to the head buyer for Starboard, they need to get a better idea of what US passengers are wanting to purchase for especially logo wear on the ship. I honestly think they could be making a lot more money if they had the right merchandise. Tom always likes to purchase nice quality golf shirts with the ship name on it. There is not one to be had here, nor are there any nice logo shirts for women. Basically what is there is junk they cannot get rid of but place out there for a side walk saying saying it is 50% off when they have cut off the price portion of the tags and retagged it with a ridiculous high price ;)

We were back up in our cabin by 9 pm last night, mostly because we were exhausted it had been a long first day with having gotten up at 4 am and not really getting much sleep that night. I have not really read much on the RCI main board but to my surpise there was no pillow chocolates. This has to be the first cruise I can remember ever being on that we did not get this. Also no towel animals but who knows maybe on Formal night lol The one thing I must note that Tom just commented to me about is that Mariner has a much better ice and ice bucket here than they have on the Solstice or even HAL. The ice stays cold and frozen which is a good thing.

This morning I woke about 8 am to see that it was a beautiful day outside, I showered and we decided to go down to deck 3 Main Dining Room for breakfast. We got down there about 8:50 to find a huge crowd and long line waiting to get into have breakfast. This made Tom a bit upset and he stated we have never had to wait this long on any ship to dine in the main dining room for breakfast. The breakfast menu is very basic but it does appear they have a daily special, this mornings was an onion quiche that was actually very good. After breakfast we needed to go to guest relations because none of the ship board credit I was to have appeared on our account and I had purchased Tom a Soda package and he was to get the large thermal mug with it but everyone kept passing the buck stating that it was to be in our cabin on embarkation and our cabin steward states no you are to get it from one of the bar staff. Finally they arranged for us to pick one up at the Promenade Cafe and the front desk also assured us that the ship board credit would be posted they were running behind in posting this information.

At 11:30 was our Meet and Greet, I was extremely curious as to how they did this since they are the claimed "owners" of the Cruise Critic Chat Board "Meet and Greet" It actually was nicely organized with gifts and raffle drawings. Although there was not much there for refreshments. HAL in most cases does a much better job in the refreshment area. I was thrilled to be able to meet up with many of the new CC friends that I had met on the Roll Call, and even took pictures of a few of us together. The Meet and Greet ended at about 12:30 and Tom was ready for lunch so we headed up to the Windjammer UGHHHH!!!!! This place is truly a zoo for mediocore food at best. People act as if it is their last meal or who knows maybe they fear a problem like the Splendor had. Fortunately we have lunch plans the next three days in port then the last two sea days we may go to Johnny Rockets if that is not too crowded. I am not meaning to be complaining but unfortunately there are so many other cruise lines with much better quality and selection for their buffet area. RCI pricing for cruises is not bottom of the barrel by any means so it is surprising that their sister cruise line serves a far more impressive and much higher quality and selection.

After lunch we headed back to our cabin to enjoy our aft facing alcony, we sat outside reading for a while with jackets on but the temps are still quite cool so I came back in to write this. Tom is back out there now because the sun is shining on the balcony so I think I am going to join him.

I will most likely write more this evening to fill you in on Formal night.

Signing off from the Mariner of the Seas as she heads to our first port of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

Good Evening from the Mariner of the Seas, Monday night Formal night......

Or should I say Formal or NOT night :D

As I have stated almost all of our cruises have been on HAL but this past year we have been sampling other cruise lines. Princess passengers were pretty much like HAL with 70% of men in dark suits 20% in a Tux and 5% not really too dressed. Celebrity was a whole lot more men in a tux, I would venture to say 40% to 45%. NCL does not count since they have Formal or Not night but even on that night we saw people dressed very nice and nothing that looked out of place. I had a good idea before we started to pack for this cruise that it would be a bit more casual and my guess was that there would be far less men in tuxes so for the first time in many years Tom left his Tux at home and just brought a black suit. Well let's put it this way Tom is very glad he left the Tux at home, although we finally saw a lot more men in a tux at the Captain's Welcome there were only two that we saw in our Dining Room.

Dinner tonight was very good and Tom and I both had the Filet of Beef and it actually was very tender and good. Service is also very good and they do get you out of the dining room fairly quick so you can go to shows and things like the Captain's Welcome. Our two additional table mates came this evening, they are a Mother and daughter that is in Junior High from L.A. area. They had both not been feeling that well last evening because of being a bit motion sick. Yes, there was cream for the coffee tonight but I did have to ask for the secret stash of Splenda ;)

After dinner we went to the Captain's Welcome in the Royal Promenade so I could compare to the other cruise lines we have been on. It is interesting and definitely a fun place to people watch. I do not think I have seen such a wide varity of attire on any other cruise like I have seen hereon the Mariner. I saw women's gowns that were facier than I have ever seen and I saw people dressed like they just got out of bed. But in the Daily Program it does say "Tonight's Dinner Dress Suggestion" The word suggestion being the key word.

Our Captain is Captain Flemming Nielson, he is cute and rather young and actually a very good speaker. Just this year he was promoted to Master on the Mariner of the Seas. While it was interesting having the Welcome Reception in the promenade it was rather uncomfortable because you have to stand the whole time on the concrete pebble flooring and with wearing dress shoes my feet were killing me.

Tomorrow we are in Cabo and we are to arrive around 10 am, I plan to sit out on the balcony and watch us come in and get some good pictures. Speaking of pictures, we saw an amazing sunset this evening from our balcony. It rivals some of the amazing ones we would see in Hawaii, it was picture perfect with not a cloud in the sky. We also saw whales spouting but they were heading in the other direction so hopefully we may see more tomorrow near Cabo. Tomorrow we have no big plans except I plan to go to the restaurant that has the internet and free wi-fi for lunch. Then tomorrow before dinner is the Crown and Anchor Welcome back Party. We will attend the 5:15 party. This will be our first time to attend since there was not one on our second RCI cruise so this will be good to compare to HAL, NCL and Princess.

Well, I think I will sign off for the night so I may do a bit more reading before going to bed.

Signing off from the Mariner of the Seas, some where in the Pacific nearing Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

Just out of curiosity, Lisa, have you ever been to Kings Court on QM2. If so, how do you compare it with the Windjammer?

Roy

I will add just a bit more info while I am live here in Cabo.

I know the key phrase for Royal Caribbean is the "Nation of Why Not?" So I have some Why Not? Questions....

Why Not have Johnny Rockets open at say 11:00 am for lunch instead of not till 3:00pm till I think it was 1am?

Why Not offer more eating venues during the sea days so that there are not so many lines all over.

Why Not change the clocks on the ship to be the same as port time like all the other cruise lines?

Why Not have tender tickets instead of Long Lines to get on the tendors?

I am sure as the week progresses I will come up with more:)

I am really sorry if I am coming off negative, we really are having a great time but I am just comparing to the numerous other cruise lines we have been on over the past year, especially from the Celebrity Solstice that really is the same company.

Each day we walk around the ship to see more and more Christmas decorations, I am sure by the end of the cruise she will be completely decorated. Except someone needs to relook at the Christmas decorations on the large tree in the Royal Promenade and move around the ornemants, they did a really bad job at where they placed them :D

This morning after we arrived in Cabo we did a lot more exploring of the ship, we went to the Helipad, found the Peek windows to the Bridge, what a totally different lay out for a Bridge, we have been to the Bridge of the Crown Princess, the NCL Pearl and a couple of different HAL ships. Each one of them were almost identical, this Bridge is totally different and almost reminded me of the Star Ship Enterprise :cool:

We did grab a lite breakfast at the Windjammer, I am sorry but that place just is not growing on me. This is the first cruise and cruise line that we have been on that the buffet area did not offer a better variety of juices, no grapefruit juice, no cranberry juice and no tomato juice :( Even NCL and Princess offers those. Of course Celebrity and HAL have always offered plenty of juice selections.

Tonight is the first Cast Production Show so we definitely plan to go to that. Plus we keep wanting to try the drink of the day so maybe this evening :D

Signing off from a beautiful day in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico

Just out of curiosity, Lisa, have you ever been to Kings Court on QM2. If so, how do you compare it with the Windjammer?

 

Roy

QM2 is on my List of ships that I plan to sail on but unfortunately have never sails Cunard:o