Very late review of 2012 med cruise on adventure of the seas

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Hi there,

well, actually I wasn't planning on writing ANY review beyond a quick text in the ship review section... but now I've read and thoroughly enjoyed the reviews of KansCocoa here on cruise critic so much and I thought...what the heck, you still have 1 month, 20 days, 19hours, 29min and 55 seconds to go till the next cruise so I might as well try to recap our time on the Adventure.

 

I will kinda use this as a practice round, since I plan on writing a REAL review of our Serenade cruise coming up July18th.

So bear with me.

 

First of all I guess I should start with telling you who we are. Me -- I'm the Blonde in the pictures am called Steffi or Steph if that's easier for all you english speaking folk:rolleyes:. I've travelled with my better half Tanja (the Brunette in the pictures).

 

We're a couple since 1999 and married since 2005 --- well sort of married. Since we are two women living in Germany we more or less have something that's called a registrated partnership for Life <-- well doesn't that sound romantic:(. But still for us it feels like marriage so we'll just call it that from here on.

 

This was our first cruise ever and it sort of started on the wrong foot...

 

First of all Tanja tore her crucial ligament 2 weeks prior to this cruise while chasing some of our sheep over a wet pasture...bad idea. Her leg was swollen like a treetrunk and she missed a whole lot stability while limping--- aeh, I mean walking on this cruise. Of course she was too proud to take crutches. Gah.

 

Second of all we were supposed to go on this cruise with our 12 year old foster daughter at the time. She was with us since 8 months and was immensely looking forward to this trip. Well, then the summer holidays were getting closer and her biological parents started to want her back...they have three more kids and our Fosterdaughter was usually in charge of babysitting during holidays. Life isn't good there for her....it was'nt in the past -- why she came to us -- and it won't be in the near future. We knew, the kid knew, the agency knew even the parents knew....but they just didn't care. She had to go back against her will. The situation wasn't bad enough to go to court over it and win so us and the agency were left speechless as to how parents can be ruining a childs life on purpose... but I don't want to get into this too much....Just let me add, that of course Life didn't work out back home for her and now she's in a supervised youth group at the sea, happy and finally starting to breathe freely and get on with her life. Sigh. The cruise for three was now down to a cruise for two.

 

We flew out of Hannover, over Brussels to Malaga.

100_3203.jpg

 

yeah I know it's a dorky picture, but heck, we were about to go on a cruise.... and although things started off a bit awkward we were really excited!

 

More to come!

[Keith1010]

Thanks for posting this review and look forward to the rest.

 

Keith

[Newtoncruise]

What date were you on the cruise.......we sailed 3 August so look forward to hearing of your experiences.

 

Photos too ?

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Well, we just left the beautiful (not) waiting zone at Hannover Airport to be bussed out to the plane....mmh, usually they have one of those tunnel thingies were you can board the plane immidiately -- why are we being brought onto the field?

 

see thumbnail1

 

 

okay guys -- I'm a computer idiot... I don't know how to put a picture from my computer into the middle of this text... so until I figure it out you'll just have to live with the thumbnails -- sorry!

 

aahhh -- we're suppossed to fly with THIS? It has propellers. No turbines...aaahhhh --- did I mention I'm really afraid of flying anyway? Of course Tanja was all stoked...she even took a picture of the propellers during the flight...sigh.

 

see thumbnail 2 and 3

 

well- we landed safely in Brussels anyway.

 

what to do in Begium for the first time ever? We didn't have enough time to leave the airport, but more than would be fun to just sit and wait for the next check in. Oh what the hell, it ain't 11:00 am yet, but let's have a beer!

 

see thumbnail 4

 

that is one great beer! and we Germans know good beer! Needless to say, I wasn't quite as chicken on the second flight anymore ( hick:D).

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Thanks for posting this review and look forward to the rest.

 

Keith

 

 

Thanks Keith!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

What date were you on the cruise.......we sailed 3 August so look forward to hearing of your experiences.

 

Photos too ?

 

Hi Newtoncruise,

 

we were on the cruise leaving Malaga on August 25th. I'll try to remember it all...I'm quite late writing this and since I never planned on writing a photo review.... the pictures are ...well, more suitable for the album at home I guess:). But hope you enjoy it anyway!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

In Malaga we dragged our luggage --- no wait --- Tanja couldn't drag anything because of her knee -- I dragged the luggage to the near by subway station. This really is a quite easy and convenient way to travel into Malaga. We got off and walked over to our hotel. Embarkation wasn't until the next day. On that walk we discovered this:

 

see thumbnail 2

 

I know -- we're in beautiful andalucia and I almost faint because we find a Taco Bell. You have to know that I went to Highschool and college in California a loooong time ago and I basically LIVED on Taco Bell that time. In Germany there is no Taco Bell -- or any other mexican junkfood. this brought back memories and of course it would be our first stop once the luggage was dropped of. Poor Tanja.

 

see thumbnail 1

 

I'm extatic, can you tell?

 

Once stuffed and happy we took the Hop on Hop off busses to get an overview of Malaga. The bus was nearly empty which was cool, just the earplugs were a nuisance because the connections were all screwed up and loose. The information content wasn't that great either. But to get an overview of the city it was okay. The busses drive up to Gibralfaro which sits way up on a hill. We didn't get off there, but you get a great look over the city and sea from there.

 

I loved the shopping lane with the drapes way above the street to keep out the heat. --> see thumbnail 3

 

also we were suprised by the real nice impressive city beach they have.-->

see thumbnail 4

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

after a little stroll (remember the bad knee) around the old town alleys we called it a day and were looking forward to the next day --> Emarkation day whohoo.

 

The next morning we tried to attach the ship luggage tags to the trolleys. mmhhh, we forgot to bring scotch tape or a stapler. The guy at the hotel reception only spoke Spanish ( which is fine, since we're in Spain, but we've gotten so spoiled by almost everybody being able to at least speak a little English). Sigh...what the hell is "stapler" or " scotch tape" in Spanish??? We managed a theater worthy impression of us stapling the tags to the trolleys with an invisible stapler...I think they thought we're kind of strange...but eventually they understood and handed up the desired stapler. YES! Off to the port...with the luggage ... on foot ... with a limping Tanja. Oh joy. --> see thumbnail1

 

and there's when we first saw the ship. --> but wait...I'll have to pause here since this thumbnail thing is really starting to annoy me:mad:. Can anybody please help stupid old me on how to add pictures in the text which are on my computer:confused:?

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

test...

 

Hoorrayyyy---it worked! now I can go on!

[Newtoncruise]

Which hotel did you stay in Malaga? Walking distance from the port?

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Well, we left off at the entrance of the port, where we saw the ship for the first time.

 

Wow -- it's huge! ....and still so far to walk with dragging two suitcases behind me. (I zoomed this pic to the max) Sigh. But the adrenaline of actually embarking on that giant cruise ship gave me immense strength I guess... so we hauled on.

 

When we got to the ship, getting the suitcases taken care of was no problem at all. There were several -- very nice -- people from RCI there to put them on some portable carrier thingies. We were there at 10:30 and got in line to embark. Embarkation started I believe at 10 :45 and we were at the counter in less than a minute from there. It was a little awkward telling the lady, that we'd only be two and she could cancel the set sail pass for our foster daughter:(. But then after a deep breath we decided to enjoy our very first cruise anyway. We passed all the little stands, where you can buy soda packages and so on, took the cheesy picture (but didn't buy it) and went onboard....oh boy -- what a feeling. First thing we did was to explore the ship. We took the elevators up to the pool deck and wanted to walk around -- that's when I noticed something --- oops, the ground moves. Not really suprising is it? but we were on a cruiseship for the first time and to us the feeling was new. I have a history of getting seasick on tiny boats...even on rivers... just passing rivers on ferries actually. Why did you book a cruise then you ask? Well naive old me just thought the ships are so big that you don't feel the motion --- wrong ---.

So first thing I said to Tanja on the pool deck was -- wait -- I need to sit down. Tanja of course knows what a whimp I am... and surely her face said... oh no ...ALREADY? but we came prepared hehe. I bought those nifty little wristbands with the pressure point on them. Put them on right there and then and about 5 minutes later I was feeling perfectly fine! Usually I'm real sceptical about those things --- but heck -- if it works for ME, it 'll work for anybody. So happily we could go on exploring ( Tanja now with a HUGE relieve on her face).

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Which hotel did you stay in Malaga? Walking distance from the port?

Hi Newtoncruise,

we stayed at "Don Curro". walking distance to the port only 5 minutes...but to the ship...a whole other story. The hotel was okay for us. Not too expensive, clean but nothing fancy. Breakfast was nice. We picked it because of the proximity to the subway and the port. We'd choose them again for those reasons.

 

Stef

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

okayyyy -- now this is the part where I have to confess that I don't really have a lot of pictures from the Adventure. Like I said, this will only be a practice review. On my next cruise on the Serenade of the Seas -- yippiieee only 50 more days --- I promise to take a ton of pictures! But I have some at least... so here it goes.

this was one of the most important stops for everybody that likes soft serve ice cream. We do. So we visited this place often --- not as often as these chubby spanish kids though hehe.

 

This was the pool deck on our sea day going back to Malaga... it was overcast and suddenly there were a few drops of rain hehe...look how panicky the sunbathers get, pulling the towels over their heads...I thought that's kind of funny.

 

this was in our opinion the best place to bask in the sun.if there were an sun ....it's high up above the main pool -- but beware -- it's the topless area, so if that bothers you ... better search for another spot. The Solarium was nice too. See the clouds? we had some pretty strong winds that day... the captain called it "motion in the ocean".On a scale it was a 6. We had to hold on in the stateroom as to not fall. And it was funny to see people torkeling through the royal promenade ... but thanks to my sea bands ... I was FINE!!! Amazing. By the way -- never slept as well as on the cruise ship that night. Our cabin was way in the front and the motion was really strong...I felt like a baby rocked into sleep. I love it!

 

More to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

well speakin of cabins. We had an inside stateroom on deck 8 starboard WAY up in the front.

 

aint that a cheesy photo?

 

the cabin was okay for the two of us...but with a kid...mmhhh I'm not so sure. Our cabin attendant was a doll ---well sort of a big bulky doll, but very charming.His name was Simeon. We loved him. When we first met him he told us that he'd prepare the Pullman bed for our kid later on that day --- ouch --- here we go again... but once we told him she wasn't able to join us he never mentioned anything about it again.

 

The downsides of the room:The room still had a bulky old fashioned tv, which was sort of in the way sometimes. There's only one plug for European voltage and don't even attempt to pull out the string way up in the shower to dry clothes on....unless you're not easily tempted to vomit.

The carpet was a little worn and the sofa was in desperate need of upholstering. But other than that --- just a great little spot to crash at night in complete darkness and silence:).

Here's Tanja at the entrance to our realm for a week. See the monkey in the mirror?

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

okay, this is getting addictive--- but it'll be my last post for today...or at least until the evening:).

 

Let's talk a bit about the people onboard.

 

I was worried ... I mean really woriied about this because of some bad critics on the ship reviews here on cruise critic. We were especially warned that almost the entire passenges were spaniards who got their tickets last minute for a miniscule price. There were supposed to travel in hords, smoke basically everywhere and all the time and were rude beyond belief. Well, there were a LOT of spaniards...I'd say about 85 % of the passengers...and they did seem to travel in large groups. Not all of them , but certainly most. As to the smoking we didn't think it was too bad. We're more outside people, so we didn't use the promenade that much. but you could sniff a constant faint smell of tobacco there. The spanish culture onboard seemed to be a lot louder, more active in gestures amd mimikry as well as movement...wants to say that it was quite something to get used to. For us it would be common courtesy to let people leave the elevators before going in....not so with most of the spaniards aboard...they'd shove in right away and if you wouldn't shove back, you wouldn't have had a chance to exit. But the curious thing is---they were'nt rude while shoving...I know it sounds weird...but to them this was perfectly normal behaviour. The didn't at all mind to be shoved back..they expected it...but seemed rather confused when people spoke to them about their "rudeness" in a rather pissed off voice after beeing shoved. It was a lesson in cultural differences... and we tried to jump over our shadow and adapt to the situation. We never felt quite good with the shoving though.

 

Since we don't speak Spanish -- okay we can order a beer and such elementary stuff -- but that's about it -- we never had any closer contact (despite shoving:)) with the Spaniards. We couldn't seem to get together a meet and mingle...there were only 2 other people on the roll call who didn't really post ....bummer. So all the other people we met was at dinner.

 

a quick overview of the dining ventures and our experience:

 

When we were first getting on the ship we were scheduled for late seating. We were very unhappy with that since we planned on doing a lot of excursions and knew we'd come back famished. So we asked the person at the desk in front of the main dining room if we could change to early seating. He said it's too early for that today, we should come back tomorrow:(. Bummer. Well, it was the first evening and we went to late seating to the MDR. We were seated with a German couple with a teenage son WAY in the back on the ground floor right next to the entrance of the waiters where they bring all their stuff after cleaning the tables. It was a nasty spot to sit. the family was nice but --excuse me -- a bit dull. We told them right away, that we probably wouldn't be there for more than tonight, since we plan on switching times. The waiter there was a desaster. He was outright mean. He glared at us... I don't know, maybe we offended him by just beeing there:eek:. We swore to ourselves to never come back here. The food was great though. The next evening we could change. They put us on a large table with i think it were 4 elderly Swedish couples. They were really nice, they spoke some english. Life was better than before. The waiters were wonderful as was the food....but still 99% of the table conversation was in Swedish and we felt left out:(. Too bad. We didn't really know how much we missed out on until we were seated for breakfast one morning with 3 english speaking folks. A couple from Ireland, a couple from Yorkshire and a couple from somewere in England but I forgot, sorry. We had a blast. We laughed, enjoyed the food and took forever until leaving the MDR. It was one of the eating highlights of the cruise...and we started thinking -- how nice it would be to enjoy the same conversation at dinner time. Sigh. Next cruise. We did stick to the MDR for dinners though since we really didn't enjoy the Windjammer. Maybe it was because of the Spanish children hordes who ran between the filled to max capacity tables...maybe it was the fact that plates were not cleaned off in a decent time and maybe it was the average food...lots of choices no doubt--but average.Nah, Windjammer and us didn't match on this cruise. We never tried out the Specialty dining. We could have gone to Portofino or a Burger place....nahh, food was too good at MDR:).

 

more to come!

[solaris88]

Keep it coming! Loving your adventure and looking forward to meeting you both in Barcelona! :D

[Jeff&Mel]

WOW !! This is great! I am loving it:D We are sailing on the Aventures of the Sea next month out of Southampton for a Baltic cruise! First time Royal.

 

Thanks so much for posting this review. I am looking forward to reading more :)

[star cruiser 1]

Loving the review, i was on the same cruise as you and had a great time so it will be good to hear your take on it. :)

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

well -- it's not evening yet...4:00pm....but anyway what the heck, lets move on.

 

The Adventure. I'll just keep on talking about stuff on the ship, since when I start with our daily port visits it'll basically be down to: getting up, heading to MDR, eating, getting off the ship for the day, getting back on the ship in the evening, eating dinner at the MDR and crashing. It'll be all about the ports...so not much more ship stuff -- sorry, I think I mentioned I wasn't planning on writing this.

 

Anyway. The ship. As first timers we were completely confused with the royal promenade and that you just cannot just pass from one side of the ship to the other on certain decks. We were way in the front of the ship, but the Dining room was way in the back. Boy that was one loooong journey, and if you would have to use elevators first up or down, then pass -- just to take another elevator again in the opposite direction -- that could be a little frustrating at times. But this way we at least walked off some of that soft serve ice cream, hehe. With time we figured well if we have to pass anyway, lets do it with a view

 

I believe this was deck 4-- our favourite to pass to the back of the ship. It was almost deserted most of the times and Tanja could rest her knee half way to the dining room. It was also a nice retreat spot on sea days, when the pool deck was completely overpopulated, not a chair in sight. Here there was always a nice place available and according to the time of day you could choose sun or shade...just pick the right or the left side of the ship:). aehm, I mean starboard and what was left again??? I guess we'll be cruise newbys for quite a while still:o.

 

So what else was there, ah talking about calories. The gym. Loved it for various reasons. First of all I was the only one to work out ... duhh, Tanja couldn't . The work out area was light, spacy, had an incredible view from huge windows. You felt like you were about to run into the ocean while actually running on a treadmill. There were fresh towels ready to use everywhere. I LOVED it! We both loved it -- Tanja was visiting me quite often, since they have 3 wonderful things here. First the hot tub. It's an in door hot tub, which hardly anybody uses. Well it was ours for this cruise, hooray it felt almost as if they reserved it just for us. Then there are the showers. They have quite spacious showers free to use at the gym. Compared to the tubes in the cabins this was pure luxury. We used those a lot too. and then they had the sauna and the steam room also free to use right next to the showers -- at least for adults -- and men and women separately -- but no one seemed to know about these little gems so we basically had those two all to ourselves as well. YES! Life is good.

So what else? There's the rock climbing wall. I did it, there are no pictures to prove it, but I have my clipped sea pass to prove it! You have to sign a waiver and once you did it, they clip your card for future climbs. I never climbed before. It wasn't easy but I made it up to the bell. Then strength failed me--- I hung on for dear life --- the RCI guy who secured me kept shouting "RING THE BELL". I shouted back " I can't"...he seemed to be suddenly deaf because he just ignored me and kept shouting "RING THE BELL!!!!!!". With the last inkling of muscle I lifted my arm and miraculously rang the bell!!! Oh my god I'm so proud of myself:D! All thanks to the RCI guy who suddenly could use his ears quite normally again.

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

The entertainment on board:

 

Yes there was a bellyflop contest--- we didn't attend. As you can possibly guess -- quite large male beer bellies don't really appeal to us:D. but even being quite far away from the spectacle, you couldn't miss it. It was loud. I can't decide which was louder, the guy with the microphone in fluent Spanish or the cheering Spanish bystanders:confused:. We escaped -- very untypical for us to the royal promenade to have a glass of wine. But I have to admit-- we were hooked earlier on, since we attended the wine tasting in the main dining room (watch out - this is not free) and fell in love with the ship's Merlot at the time. The tasting was wonderful, the sommelier explained everything in english, so even non wine people would understand. There were different cheeses that went with each wine....oh my god -- my mouth starts to water as I write.... 50 more days till the next cruise! well anyway, I'm driftin off a bit...

 

so we escaped the bellyflop contest and had a WONDERFUL time at the pub of the royal promenade. I forgot the name-- it has real dark wooden chairs out front and right next to it is a little stage. Speaking of stage -- the wonderful time we had is not only due to the ever growing amount of red wine that day, but because of Pedro. He's a crew member I heard, and he plays the guitar. Just him and a regular guitar. no singing no nothing, but we were in awe. It was magical. He played variations of known songs in a way where you thought in the middle of a song --- wait I know this -- isn't this this or that song? At the beginning of the songs they all sounded like his own beautiful creations. Once we heard him we tried to listen to him whenever possible. We checked the compasses to be there when he was suppossed to be playing and sometimes we would halt walking to whereever we planned to go, because we heard his guitar from somewhere. Sigh, a bummer he won't be on the Serenade this summer. I would be in heaven.

 

As to the other entertainment we did see 1 and a half shows at the Lyrik theater. The "half" was the newly wed game. Oh my god, how cheesy can one get. Nope -- we couldn't stay. The full show was the beatles maniacs. It was okay, we stayed till the end but I can't say that it was enlightening. Would I go again? no.

 

The ice show however was fun. I would definitely go see that again. But watch out, the tickets went fast! The ice ring is itsy bitsy tiny. I don't want to say anything negative by saying that -- quite the opposite. The way those skaters moved on this miniscule space was breathtaking. We're not into skating, so we never used the ice ring ourselves. But you can rent skates there at certain times.

 

The minigolf was fun but frustrating since the fake grass and the ground beneith it was so worn at places, that you would have all kinds of bumps and dips in there to make it virtually impossible to get that darn ball in the holes(;)lol -- of course it couln't be due to our lack of experience and expertise)

we're total champs --NOT-- see how Tanja is constantly lifting her right leg? Poor baby. oh and we're grinning like idiots since taking that photo was so much fun. I put the camera on some thingy and ran. I think this was the third attempt...on the others you see me running back...and NO I won't post them:D.

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

:eek: I just noticed I haven't even written down the itinerary of our cruise -- so WOW if you were reading along until now without even knowing where we would be heading --thank you:cool:!

 

So this was the itinerary of our cruise:

 

Saturday August 25th Malaga Ship leaves port at 17:00

Sunday August 26th Valencia 13:00 - 21:00

Monday August 27th Seaday

Tuesday August 28th Civitavecchia (Rome) 07:00 - 19:00

Wednesday August 29th Livorno (Pisa/Florence) 07:00 - 19:00

Thursday August 30th Ajaccio, Corsica 07:00 - 16:00

Friday August 31st Seaday

Saturday September 1st Malaga Ship arrives port at 06:00

 

more to come!

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

just one more for today.

 

let's get started on our daily stuff that happened.

The only thing on day 1 that is still to mention is the muster drill. Boy that siren is loud. Our spot to be was the imperial lounge. We've never been to such a drill (duuhhh --first cruise) so we didn't know what to expect. It was packed! Seating? Yeah right! not if you hadn't been there for at least half an hour in advance. Even standing was hard, since everybody was so tightly packed. Remember Tanja's knee? After exploring the ship and the cabin that knee was basically screaming for a break. She couldn't put any more weight on it. She was standing there on one foot. The entire drill. Silently cussing. That was fun:( I tell you! Told her she should have brought crutches ! (Don't you hate people who say "told you so"?:rolleyes:).

Plus the fact that we weren't allowed to use elevators....that's when I went bellistic. There was no way in freaking hell that they would make my honey walk stairs with that knee from the 8th to the 4th (I believe it was) floor! Over my dead body:mad:!!! I won. We were allowed to use the elevators. By the way, I totally understand the need to use the stairs in an emergency situation. This just wasn't!

 

So that's pretty much all I have remembered about the ship and our activities on the ship. The next day it was strange to get up...it was dark in the cabin...daytime, nighttime? who knew? This is the only thing that bothers me in an inside cabin....you loose track of the day and nighttime change. We didn't get used to that for all the cruise days. Oh well. We skipped Valencia. We only docked there half a day---way out in an industrial port where we would have to take an expensive RCI Shuttle to get off the ship at all and it was sunday, so pretty much everything would be closed. The ship was more fun for us, so we stayed. The next day was a seaday -- again no more news to tell here... but if you can think of any questions go ahead...it's been almost a year, so I might have forgotten a thing or two.

Anyway we'll start off tomorrow with the description of our Rome adventure on our own.

 

more to come!

[Newtoncruise]

Enjoying the review steffi. 85% Spanish for us a few weeks earlier too. I think because Malaga was a new embarkation port and the euro recession was really biting last summer.

 

Keep those memories coming.........

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

WOW !! This is great! I am loving it:D We are sailing on the Aventures of the Sea next month out of Southampton for a Baltic cruise! First time Royal.

 

Thanks so much for posting this review. I am looking forward to reading more :)

 

Thank You!

 

You'll have fun for sure. Rumors on the ship last summer were saying that they wouldn't do the Malaga tours anymore because they had too many complaints...I guess they switched to Southhampton instead. It'll be a whole other feeling I'm sure. The Adventure is an old ship, but still VERY great to be cruising on! I'd go again.

 

Stef

[Kreuzfahrtneuling]

Keep it coming! Loving your adventure and looking forward to meeting you both in Barcelona! :D

 

Thank You Tatiana!

 

we're very excited to meet you too! 49 more days whoohoo!!!

 

Stef