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All Things Explorer of the Seas! -- Part 2

LauraS
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mets550

mets550

Posted
Posted
You might of just had a bad experience in Portofino's because we've always had a great meal in there on the Explorer as well as on their other ships. We eat at Portofino's at least once or twice every time we're on the Explorer so I wouldn't tell someone to skip it. Like I said, you might of had a bad meal there but it's not normally bad.

 

We do loved Portofino on Explorer. We had our best experience there yet on Explorer and are going back twice on our Jewel sailing this December.

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luvscruising2007

luvscruising2007

Posted
Posted

I was on Explorer 4 years ago so I don't remember the answer.

Is there one formal night that seems dressier than the other.

I have 2 different dresses that I plan to wear. One is long and

one is short. The long one will be a little more fitted so I was

planning to wear on the 1st formal night. Any info or comments

are appreciated.

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buffi001

buffi001

Posted
Posted
Still looking for a hotel that provides parking and shuttle to Cape Liberty. Any suggestions and or where have you stayed.

 

 

We stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites on Staten Island when we left

from Port Liberty. The room rate was very reasonable (somewhere around

($115), and with one night's stay you can park the car for the length of the

cruise. In our case , it was 12 days. They had a very nice buffet , hot breakfast, and a free shuttle to and from the port. Just be sure to make

a reservation for the shuttle as soon as you arrive at the hotel. The

shuttle is shared with the Hilton Garden Inn (same owners). The Hampton

was less expensive and had a better breakfast.

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wants2cruise2

wants2cruise2

Posted
Posted
Besides the coffee maker, the suites also have a tea pot in the room. When we were on a couple of weeks ago, the single cup coffee maker came with a 4 cup coffee pod which obviously didn't seem to fit into the machine. When I asked the room steward(ess) about this, she said "oh just squish it in". Well, let me tell you, it makes for one VERY strong cup of morning java! So, to rectify the situation, I just warmed up about a 1/2 pot of water in the tea pot and added the very strong coffee to it. Voila, the perfect cup of morning joe.

 

Another tip, bring along a small covered container, or just get a paper coffee cup/ lid in the cafe promenade and fill it with 1/2 and 1/2. Put it in your fridge then you will always have it available for your coffee in the morning. The little drink spout on the disposable lib makes it perfect for pouring too:)

 

Enjoy the Explorer. It is one of our favorite ships...love the dining room. The food is terrific there. Although, in my opinion, skip Portofino. It was not worth the extra cost on this ship. I have had a superb experience with it on other ships but it was poor here:/

:eek::eek::eek::eek:

Yuck. Please don't make your coffee in the tea pot. I love tea, hate the taste of coffee, and usually can't use hotel coffee pots cause i can never get the taste of coffee out. Unless something is only for water then the coffee taste and smell lasts forever. IMHO

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luckyprincess

luckyprincess

Posted
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Hi everyone!! So we will be sailing as a family vacation this February on the 9 night itinerary! We are super excited! I have just a few questions please, and I thought if anyone could answer the good people on the Explorer thread could!

 

1. Is Adventure Beach just for kids? it looks like super fun stuff to do and I will have a 2 year old with me so I can use him for a beard :D

 

2. The Over the Water cabanas on Labadee - we're looking at Nellie beach and I really want to rent one - do you think being 4 months out is too late? I can't seem to get info right now because rccl.com isn't recognizing our deposit since we just made it a few hours ago.

 

3. Does anyone have a recent-ish compass for the 9 night itinerary?

 

4. Does anyone have any menus? From room service as well? I just read on here that they may update the menus? That would be awesome - any word on that?

 

thanks!

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Ocean Dancer

Ocean Dancer

Posted
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A few questions.........we have sailed the Voyager out of Bayonne, so will be slightly familiar with the Explorer. What type's of live music for dancing still exists? Will there be a Raggae band by the pool?

 

How many formals for a 10 nighter?

 

Any problems filling a sturdy handled duffle with two six packs of bottled Pepsi/ and two six packs of bottled water...all in original packaging being delivered to our cabin? It was no problem on the Enchantment in Baltimore.

 

Is there still free Seattles Best coffee and free pastries/mini sandwiches on the Prominade 24 hours?

 

How late is the free pizza open, as we have late dinner?

 

My single BIL will be traveling with us, solo across the hall, will there be get togethers for singles?

 

Is the Windjammer the only place to get free iced tea/jucies? On the Voyager, it would close and we'd be out of luck, so we soon learned to carry out an extra drink for our fridge.

 

Besides Quest, what is not to be missed?

 

Thanks, everyone in advance, really looking forward to our pre Holiday cruise when the ship will be all decorated!!:D

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mets550

mets550

Posted
Posted
A few questions.........we have sailed the Voyager out of Bayonne, so will be slightly familiar with the Explorer. What type's of live music for dancing still exists? Will there be a Raggae band by the pool?

 

How many formals for a 10 nighter?

 

Any problems filling a sturdy handled duffle with two six packs of bottled Pepsi/ and two six packs of bottled water...all in original packaging being delivered to our cabin? It was no problem on the Enchantment in Baltimore.

 

Is there still free Seattles Best coffee and free pastries/mini sandwiches on the Prominade 24 hours?

 

How late is the free pizza open, as we have late dinner?

 

My single BIL will be traveling with us, solo across the hall, will there be get togethers for singles?

 

Is the Windjammer the only place to get free iced tea/jucies? On the Voyager, it would close and we'd be out of luck, so we soon learned to carry out an extra drink for our fridge.

 

Besides Quest, what is not to be missed?

 

Thanks, everyone in advance, really looking forward to our pre Holiday cruise when the ship will be all decorated!!:D

 

There is a raggae band by the pool. There are also usually several venues with live music around the ship, ranging from a pianist to the DJ in the club.

 

Not sure about formal nights..I think there are usually two or three on a ten-nighter.

 

Pepsi and water should be fine. Most people report no problems.

 

The Cafe Promenade is open 24 hours. There should be sandwiches all night long, and I think the same is true of coffee.

 

There are several singles "mixers" throughout the cruise, especially on the first night or two. They usually take place in the nightclub.

 

There is water at the Cafe Promenade, but I'm not sure about iced tea and juice.

 

Quest is a lot of fun. We also really like the Love and Marriage game show and Portofino.

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sharonlacey

sharonlacey

Posted
Posted

They have 2 formal nights and ice tea and fruit juice is available in the 24 hour cafe, also coffee and tea. Don't miss the ice skating show, they will tell you when tickets are being given out. Also, if you have a suite they have a private room to have breakfast. You order off a menu and it is really nice. It is served at Portafino's.;)

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stevea36

stevea36

Posted
Posted
A few questions.........we have sailed the Voyager out of Bayonne, so will be slightly familiar with the Explorer. What type's of live music for dancing still exists? Will there be a Raggae band by the pool?

 

How many formals for a 10 nighter?

 

Any problems filling a sturdy handled duffle with two six packs of bottled Pepsi/ and two six packs of bottled water...all in original packaging being delivered to our cabin? It was no problem on the Enchantment in Baltimore.

 

Is there still free Seattles Best coffee and free pastries/mini sandwiches on the Prominade 24 hours?

 

How late is the free pizza open, as we have late dinner?

 

My single BIL will be traveling with us, solo across the hall, will there be get togethers for singles?

 

Is the Windjammer the only place to get free iced tea/jucies? On the Voyager, it would close and we'd be out of luck, so we soon learned to carry out an extra drink for our fridge.

 

Besides Quest, what is not to be missed?

 

Thanks, everyone in advance, really looking forward to our pre Holiday cruise when the ship will be all decorated!!:D

 

Along with the reggae band, we found everything from ballroom dancing thru a"silent" disco (not to be missed) on our may cruise.

 

We had 3 formal nights on our 9 nighter, I understand thru these boards that they have gone back to having just 2.

 

 

The soda and water should not be a problem.

 

The promenade cafe had iced tea, water, seattle's best, sandwiches, cookies, pizza. 24 hours.

 

Quest, love and marriage, any "adult" entertainment. (Hopefully parents with young kids will heed the warnings :)

 

Enjoy!

 

Steve

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Clarea

Clarea

Posted
Posted
Is there a small menu in the Viking Lounge on this ship. I have read other post where they have it on other ships but was wondering if it was on the EOS?:)

At the ships get upgraded, there is a food menu they add to Viking Crown, however this is not scheduled to occur on Explorer unti Dec 2014.

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mets550

mets550

Posted
Posted
I'm just off today' date=' they were printing the new dinner menus all week, the culinary training team from Miami joins Explorer today and the new dinner menus will be out on the sailing in one week.

 

What a great ship ![/quote']

 

Do they have new lunch menus too?

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torromierda

torromierda

Posted
Posted
On sea days....I would advise going to the MDR for lunch. They have what they call the Tutti Salad Bar, where you pick different ingredients and they chop it up for you and place it in a bowl and then you go to the end of the bar and choose whatever proteins you would like, such as grilled chicken, large size shrimp or prosciutto. There's also about a dozen different entree choices as well.

 

Seconded.

 

Unless pushed for time due to an excursion we go to the MDR for every meal for the following reasons:

 

1) It's more relaxed you are served at your table, no food station waiting and no pushing in.

2) you get a proper plate and a laid out table. Not adverse to 'mess hall eating' but given the choice on holiday I would rather 'Dine out'

3) I love my food a bit too much and there is too much choice at the Windjammer leading me to be a bit of a glutton and not actually appreciating any of it.

4) The way they fill the tables means you get to meet new interesting people each day.

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rncruiser

rncruiser

Posted
Posted

I third the choice of the MDR for lunch. Not only do I agree with everything the above posters stated, but I think the desserts at lunch in the MDR are even better than the dinner desserts. There are so many good options for lunch on the menu that it doesn't bother me that the menus are usually repeated during the cruise. In fact, I look forward to it so that I can order things I didn't get to try the first time around.

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mets550

mets550

Posted
Posted
I third the choice of the MDR for lunch. Not only do I agree with everything the above posters stated, but I think the desserts at lunch in the MDR are even better than the dinner desserts. There are so many good options for lunch on the menu that it doesn't bother me that the menus are usually repeated during the cruise. In fact, I look forward to it so that I can order things I didn't get to try the first time around.

 

We just tried the MDR for lunch on Explorer this past winter and loved it. We plan to do the same on our next cruise. We usually opted for the WJ, just because it was quicker and you could wear bathing suits (and get back out to the pool faster). But the MDR was so nice that it is worth changing into shorts and taking an extra 15 minutes to eat.

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Stratus22

Stratus22

Posted
Posted
We stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites on Staten Island when we left

from Port Liberty. The room rate was very reasonable (somewhere around

($115), and with one night's stay you can park the car for the length of the

cruise. In our case , it was 12 days. They had a very nice buffet , hot breakfast, and a free shuttle to and from the port. Just be sure to make

a reservation for the shuttle as soon as you arrive at the hotel. The

shuttle is shared with the Hilton Garden Inn (same owners). The Hampton

was less expensive and had a better breakfast.

 

Thanks for the Info. We are looking at hotels right now and think this might be the one!!!

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mmcruise

mmcruise

Posted
Posted
Besides the coffee maker, the suites also have a tea pot in the room. When we were on a couple of weeks ago, the single cup coffee maker came with a 4 cup coffee pod which obviously didn't seem to fit into the machine. When I asked the room steward(ess) about this, she said "oh just squish it in". Well, let me tell you, it makes for one VERY strong cup of morning java! So, to rectify the situation, I just warmed up about a 1/2 pot of water in the tea pot and added the very strong coffee to it. Voila, the perfect cup of morning joe.

 

Another tip, bring along a small covered container, or just get a paper coffee cup/ lid in the cafe promenade and fill it with 1/2 and 1/2. Put it in your fridge then you will always have it available for your coffee in the morning. The little drink spout on the disposable lib makes it perfect for pouring too:)

 

Enjoy the Explorer. It is one of our favorite ships...love the dining room. The food is terrific there. Although, in my opinion, skip Portofino. It was not worth the extra cost on this ship. I have had a superb experience with it on other ships but it was poor here:/

 

Thank you so much for the ideas. We hear mixed things about Portofino - will probably stick with the dining room anyway.

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