My Majesty of the Seas review 10/12-10/15

[sunlovingirl]

I am sorry if this is winded, but I wanted to make sure I explained why it was good/bad. I also apologize, I can't figure out how to put my pictures into this!

Background:

I’m 29, and my fiancée is 25. We’re both in the medical field. We are getting married Nov 10, 2012 onboard the Carnival Liberty. We took this weekend to get away from the wedding planning craziness, our general family madness, as well as our every day stressors of work life. We both worked the day before we left, and had to take our hamster (Gizmo) to our friends late that night to be hamster-sat while we were gone.

Day 1:

Our day started at 2 AM after a brief nap (not getting to bed before 10 PM due to work/last minute trip to drop off Gizmo). We rolled out of our hometown around 3 AM and drove 2 hours to Buffalo to catch our JetBlue flight. It was really cold (in the 40s) and rainy. We dropped our car off in long term parking, grabbed the shuttle to the airport, got through the remarkably long but efficient security line, and were on the plane with about 15 minutes to spare. We don’t normally run so late, but I think we were just not running at full speed because we were so tired!

About 3 hours later, we were in Fort Lauderdale airport collecting our bags. We used SAS Transport to get us to the Port of Miami. They were very professional. We called them, they called us right back explaining that they would be about 15 minutes and just wait inside. We shared a ride with two other couples, who apparently didn’t speak much English, or at least didn’t want to talk to us. No big deal, we’re on vacation.

There were 5 ships in port that day, 3 NCL (Gem, Pearl, Sky) , the Carnival Imagination, and the Majesty of the Seas. When we pulled up, I was such a little kid. I was so excited about the boats, and I was taking lots of those “far off” shots of the port.

[sunlovingirl]

The porters were awesome with our luggage, the security gaurds were very friendly, and we got through the first leg of our boarding process with ease. We got our SeaPass cards (after the lady took my fiancée’s passport, set it to her left, then insisted he never gave it to her ….*facepalm*… ) and we rode the escalator up to the walkway onto the ship. This whole process took less than I would say 30 minutes. We started security right at 11 and were eating by 11:30. We got on board, went straight to sign up for a cabana, and then went up to get some food. You can’t go to your room early to drop things off, so don’t try. They close all the doors around the elevators so you can’t access it at all.



We got our food (the deli wasn’t open yet, so we just did the Windjammer) and then just sat there. We went all the way to the front and sat with the windows. It was really pretty. The food was very good, and a waiter got us drinks. We took a few random pictures, and finished talking with our families so we could shut off our phones. We then walked around the ship a little, found the schooner bar (one of our soon to be favorite spots), and got another drink!


We immediately noticed the announcements… All of them. In ALL of the different languages. When an announcement came on, we would roll our eyes because you would hear it in English, in Spanish, In German, in Italian, in Portuguese, In French. (I did find it odd that there was a large population of some sort of Asian group, yet they never did an announcement for them in their native tongue). It would take up seriously 5-10 minutes each time. Which was fine unless it interrupted the guy singing for tips (Bingo bingo bingo) in the bar or us napping.



Our rooms opened up around 1 PM so we went and dropped off our stuff. My fiancée (DF) realized at that point he forgot his sunglasses. So, we made a note to go to the gift shop when it opened later. (We got a great deal, only 14 bucks for a pair of Harley Davidson ones). We went up on deck and that’s when I noticed the first of the fruit pieces on the decks. There really weren’t that many people on board yet, so I couldn’t imagine we did this. I probably wouldn’t have noticed, but I had seen a man walking around barefoot , and I remember thinking how gross it would be for him to step on an orange slice.

[sunlovingirl]

The muster drill was interesting. You just sign in with people who have a clipboard in hand. We waited in Boleros. People continued to talk, be on their cellphones and drink during the drill. This was very surprising to me. I thought that was supposed to be the time you actually just listened and did what you were told. But I guess to some, the rules do not apply.



We stayed on deck until sailaway, which was about 30-40 minutes later at least than we were scheduled to leave, and then went downstairs to get my DF’s glasses, then went to go eat. We were told we would have to wait 2 hours to get a table for two (my time dining) or eat in a group. We always hesitate to eat with others, because we’ve had bad experiences, but we were starving. As a rule, I don’t like buffets so we always do MDR when we can. We got placed with two obnoxiously drunk women on a “mommy’s weekend.” Our table conversation (and I say that loosely because my DF and I were not talking) involved poop, nasty vaginas (the one lady worked in a hospital) and how we should raise our children. I promise you, we tried to change the conversation, we asked them to stop talking about those things at the table (now I’m a doctor, I can eat and talk about anything, but not everyone on this trip was a doctor or wanted to hear all this at dinner) and the other couple of ladies who eventually joined us really didn’t appreciate it at all. The waiter, Aries was even slightly embarrassed I believe)


After dinner, we walked around, hung out in the schooner bar listening to some piano music, checked to make sure we got a cabana *we did!* and then we went to the casino for a little while. It’s so smokey in there, though, that we could never stay for very long. I do think this helped our wallets!

Day 2:
We got up around 6 am. We enjoyed the orange juice, coffee and toast in the room. We noticed when we got up that it was really windy and that the waves seemed really high. I was surprised that the captain was even going to attempt to go to CocoCay but hey, I’m not captain. He even came on the PA and announced that he didn’t think it was gonna happen, but he was going to go there anyway. mmmK!


We grabbed some real breakfast upstairs in the windjammer, and they made the announcement that we were not going to be able to do CocoCay because of the weather. Okay, no big deal, but I wondered why the captain didn’t just go ahead and call Nassau the night before to secure us a dock then. The weather had been really windy/gusty all along. He stated he got us a dock in Nassau that morning He stated we would be in Nassau by 1 pm, (which was really 2, but who cares) and to just enjoy the morning. So we went back to the room, repacked our beach bag to accommodate staying on board that morning (no photo IDs etc) and went up to the deck. It was probably 7:30 or 8 am at this point. The deck was clean and empty at that time. We got in the hottub and then laid out. We moved up to deck 12 after more people started arriving so that parents could have chairs close to the pool to watch their kids more easily. It was around 9:30, and we had to walk to the bar every time we wanted a drink. No servers would come up to deck 12 at all. Finally an hour or so later, one guy came up, saw our empty cups, asked us if we’d like another drink and went to the bar. He never picked up the cups. I’m sorry, but I feel like that is part of his job. I didn’t purposely sling food, I always put my orange rind and cherry stem in my cup, but he should have taken it with him.

[sunlovingirl]

I also noted several times throughout the trip that if I wanted ice and water for my bottle that I carried with (I’m on medication that makes me very dehydrated and I have to drink a lot of water) sometimes they wouldn’t let me in the Windjammer, and sometimes they wouldn’t let me in on 12 either. There was a couple of times that neither was open, and I was told I had to wait. Who has to wait for drinks on a cruise in the Caribbean??


We decided around 1pm we were hungry, so we went in to go freshen up in our room (deck 9) then grab some food. It was 1 pm when we entered our room, and it still hadn’t been cleaned. Considering our steward TOLD us all the rooms were cleaned between 8 and 1 and that we were expected to stay out of the rooms during that period, I felt a little annoyed. So we went to get food and came back at 1:30. I laid down to take a quick nap (I didn’t want to be the first one off the boat to Nassau anyway), and at 2 PM he showed up and kicked us out of the room! He told us to go to Nassau so he could clean our room. I wasn’t really prepared to go to Nassau right then, and he didn’t even give me time to use the bathroom before he made us leave. We just went back up to deck 12 and sat out watching all the people get off the boat.



There was so much lunch trash and empties sitting around at that time, I didn’t want to stay up there either. So we waited 20 minutes and went back down. We made reservations for dinner this time, since we wanted to make sure to avoid the drunks again (table for two anyone?). The steward was done with the room at that time, and he was nowhere to be found. But, he did leave his cleaning supplies/dirty rags in our bathroom, very close to our toothbrushes.



We finally got off the boat after 3 pm to go into Nassau. I don’t like this port, there are too many people trying to sell illegal drugs and scam you, and we couldn’t get away from these people at all. I will probably not get off the boat again at this site. We didn’t leave the boat for the rest of the trip.


Back on the boat, we got ready for dinner, and formal night was amazing. The food was excellent, the waiter we had, Aries, was awesome. He kept making jokes about us having bad tablemates the night before. This seriously was some of the best beef I’ve ever had on a cruise ship. So Kudos to RCI for that. We got out of there and went to the Captain’s hour.
I really enjoyed meeting the Captain. I thought it was so elegant how they introduced us by name and location to the Captain. I felt like we were on a really fancy ship at that point! And I really appreciated the free drinks. I thought his stories were good, and I thought it was awesome they way he introduced all the heads of staff. But darned if those same drunk women didn’t come in to that too, still drunk, talking OVER the captain the whole time. They sat in front of us (although they didn’t remember us!) and I couldn’t believe they were still being served alcohol. They could barely stand up! But I guess they didn’t have to drive anywhere, so no harm done.*rolls eyes*


That night we went to see the juggler’s act, which was very good. I only had issue with how raunchy it turned as the night went on. There were lots more than “just” innuendos by the crowd and the performer, and I felt really uncomfortable because of the children who were attending the show. I suppose that’s just me. We went back to change clothes for the deck party, and we ended up falling asleep and not making it! (oops!)

[sunlovingirl]

Day 3: We slept in. It was nice. We got up around 8:30, and we went up to the MDR for breakfast. We ordered a couple of plates of food to share and the waiter seemed really put out by that. We just like to try a lot of different things. I didn’t think it was a big deal.



Afterwards, we went back up and sat out in the sun. I did spend a lot of time on deck 11/12 so I guess that’s why I noticed it so much, but there again, early in the AM were tons of fruit peels and cherry stems and various other plates/ beer cans etc. laying all over the deck. At one point, someone’s boarding pass from their flight to Miami literally smacked my DF in the face as it was blowing around. We threw it away. I had enough, so we went and got lunch.



This time we sat up near Sorrentos and came down to get our food. I preferred this to eating downstairs, there were less people.
My only complaint about the windjammer was it seemed like there was never any ice or juices available for long. There were also lots of times there were no cups. I just felt like they should have been more prepared at lunch time.


That afternoon I went to the spa, and my DF got a beer and took a nap. I can’t complain, it was nice to pamper myself, and I really enjoyed relaxing a little.



That night we went to dinner in the MDR again, with Aries the waiter, again. He was wonderful. He always told us what not to miss, things to avoid etc. I really thought he was a great person. I didn’t end up liking my food much that night, but its always subjective. I can honestly say I did lose weight on this cruise tho, and I think that’s a first.
Afterwards we went to Karaoke (again people got a little too rowdy for the kids that were present IMHO). Then we started to stay for the 80s music, but they kept playing the same song over and over so we left. I wanted to stay up for Quest, but we knew we had to get up early, as we were doing self assist debarkation, and we had a long travel day the next day, so we went to back to the room. We found envelopes for tipping (we had done the prepaid gratuities and I thought this was a bit irritating that he wrote his name on the front of one of them and underlined “tip”) and also all the debarkation info.



(On a side note, I don’t think many people realize the crown Viking lounge isn’t just a place for elite cruisers, and it’s beautiful day and night up there, we would escape up there a lot throughout the cruise)
Day 4: Debarkation day



We got up around 6:30, took showers and started to arrange the last things into our suitcases. At 7 AM we left our room to go get breakfast. We saw our room steward, and since he always asked where we were going, I said, to breakfast, we’ll be back in 20 minutes to get our stuff and finish up in the bathroom. He said “okay, 20 minutes!” We went to get food in the Windjammer since we wanted to get everything quickly, and get back to brush our teeth etc. We got back to the room in just under 20 minutes, to find that he’d gone in stripped the bathroom, put in new cups, new towels, and had already cleaned the toilet and shower. (this freaked me out… what if someone before us used the cup and then put the lid back on it… he had already changed them out! Ick!!) All our bathroom stuff (which I was letting dry before I packed it up) had been placed into the trash can in the room. I just felt like this was very rude, especially since it was 7:30 and our bags hadn’t even been completely packed yet.


We got our stuff, went downstairs and went through a long line through the MDR and exited the boat. The line at customs was kind of long, but really, we didn’t care. We purposely picked a later flight so we didn’t have to wait forever. Also, we used SAS on the way back to FLL and it went fine. We’re using them again next month for our wedding party.



Overall, I think Royal Caribbean needs to rethink their plan of attack on getting returning customers. I would imagine that first time cruisers would want to take a shorter cruise, to see if they like it, before taking the plunge on a 7 day cruise. (IMO). Also, I would think they would try harder to keep things clean in general. I thought it was ironic that they wouldn’t let me fill up my water bottle without using Purell (and yes I used a cup to pour it into my bottle like a good like cruiser), but they didn’t think leaving people’s empties around was a problem.



The Good: our room (9542) was huge. It was a Superior Ocean View, and it was a great size. Coming from a Grand Suite on the Carnival Legend, I really thought we’d miss the space. I don’t think it was ever a problem. I did miss the private balcony though. The cruise director was really funny, and I thought the shows we went to were good. The drinks were good, and the price was similar to Carnival. The sunshine and pretty seas couldn’t be beat. The pizza at Sorrentos was the best cruise ship pizza I’ve ever had. The schooner bar had by far my favorite set of bar tenders, and I really liked heading up to deck 14. I just loved looking at the ocean from up there.



The Bad: our steward ruined this trip for us I believe. He just couldn’t get his act together. Also the lack of cleanliness on decks 11/12 just appalled me. I just couldn’t stop being annoyed that they would look at cups/plates etc and just walk by them. Have some pride in your job and your company! Also I really didn’t like having to search so hard for water. Sometimes I would get a drink just because I couldn’t handle it anymore. (I know that logically that doesn’t make sense because the alcohol dries you out, but I needed something!)


The reason I kept drinking: The people on the boat were a bunch of partiers who apparently didn’t speak English. The overnight in Nassau wasn’t what we were planning on, but it made it much more enjoyable because the boat was consistently emptier and we could get seats anywhere we wanted during that time, inside or out. I doubt I would ever do a 3-4 night cruise again, especially with RCI.

[UNV-IT!!!]

Interesting views you have on your trip. I'm glad you tried rccl. Although you would think otherwise majority of new customers don't sail the smallest ship I.e. majesty as you did and monarch. Due to the fact since 2000 on rccl has been creating (mega cruise ships) a step before everyone else and now with oasis and allure most first time cruisers actually end up on the newer bigger ships. Not smallest, oldest (majesty ,monarch). As you can see in my sig I've traveled her a few times on majesty along with a lot of other rccl ships. New and old. I personally started on voyager a larger class ship then majesty. I've never had a bad room attendant on any of my voyages. I've been on a lot maybe I'm just lucky. What do you mean when you say they couldn't get their act together? I'm also curious a little more on what you mean by cleanliness overall? I just got off majesty a few weeks ago and I personally for how old the ship is find her to be kept up really well. I also like you was on the 9th floor. I had 9004. My room attendant Bruto was fantastic.

[UNV-IT!!!]

Btw. You never need to search for water. Any bar or food place can give you a cup of ice water. Or just water if you would like. Even at pool side the servers will bring you water. No charge.

[Darkwolfe]

A good review. You covered the really good, the good, the bad, the really bad, and the "Holy (insert fav 4 letters here), are you kidding me?"

From what I've heard before, and your review supports it, the shorty cruises are typically the party boat trips and what you saw wasn't unusual. The longer cruises (7+ days) attract a completely different type of cruise customer.

Sure there's still some partying going on, but it's not usually as rowdy. The ship staff seems more relaxed and not stressed out by folks leaving stuff everywhere all at once. Thus, they do a better job.

I'd suggest you take a shot at at least a 5-day cruise (that the shortest I've ever gone on) and see if the environment isn't noticeably different from what you encountered on this trip.

Good luck on the wedding and may things be ever happy.