Serenade of the Seas New Years Cruise Review out of New Orleans for the OCD Planner!!

[5 in OK]

What a wonderful, wonderful cruise - near perfect weather and calm seas! I hope you enjoy the review! I'll add pix along the way - just so much fun!

 

 

My husband and I took our 25th anniversary cruise aboard the Serenade on the New Years Cruise - December 27, 2014 - January 3, 2015, from New Orleans.

 

We flew out of Tulsa, OK on American (the night before American’s automated service called at 11:00 p.m. to let me know our 9:00 a.m. flight was cancelled – we had scheduled it 10 months ago – they rescheduled us on a later flight but that bumped us getting in to New Orleans until after 3:00 p.m.).

 

We arrived in New Orleans the day before and spent the day sight seeing as we had never been there before. Our first stop was Cafe du Monde and had the beignets - wow!! Probably one of the most amazing fried desserts I have ever had - and so reasonable - both of us had an order each plus coffee and the bill was $8.00. Definitely the best deal in New Orleans! We did wait about 40 minutes in line to enjoy but totally worth the wait! We also popped down to Bourbon Street -mostly so we could at least say we'd been there. It was dusk and getting a bit rowdy already so we took a couple of pics and headed back to the hotel. (We signed up for the post-cruise excursion tour for the city. More on that later!)

 

We stayed at the Hampton Inn and Suites Convention Center - super nice bedding, plenty of space, pretty decent complimentary breakfast and a free shuttle to the terminal (sign up for the shuttle upon check-in and take the 10:00 shuttle as they were running about 40 minutes behind trying to get the cruisers coming off the ship back to the hotel).

 

Saturday, December 27th, we headed down to the lobby with luggage in tow ready to start our amazing cruise vacation! It was raining pretty steadily but our shuttle was there (unloading previous cruisers) - we boarded and were at the terminal by 10:30 a.m. We handed over our luggage and walked in to check in. We had read several reviews and made the decision to go with cash only instead of a credit card. No problem - we were not asked for any money upfront and were shown the waiting area for Gold status (lowest on the totem pole but still priority boarding). Check in was really a breeze!! At 11:00 straight up they began calling Crown and Anchor Diamond, Platinum ect.. and by 11:15 they called gold - we excitedly walked up the gangway to our beautiful ship!!

 

The Serenade was still decked out in Christmas - very festive and nicely done. The centrum is as beautiful as the photos - actually a bit more majestic than the photos show. It is totally the hub of everything on this particular ship - we kind of liked that! (New Year's Eve was a PARTY in the Centrum - more on that later!)

 

We made our way to the Windjammer - it opened at 11:30 and enjoyed our first lunch. We quickly found that AWESOME outdoor seating located aft - just keep walking through the Windjammer and you will find it (Deck 11 Aft). Not too many people found this fun eating area so there were plenty of seats every time we went. Good food - we were impressed at how good everything actually was. Some of the items were fried chicken, sliced ham, a type of Chinese dish (sweet and sour chicken maybe?), hamburgers, sandwich stuff, fries, soups, salads, tons and tons of delicious fresh fruit (we LOVED the fresh fruit!!). We leisurely ate our lunch, grabbed our first (of about 20) ice cream cones and set out to explore. People were painting, cleaning and doing general maintenance everywhere - the ship showed a bit of wear and tear but it was clean and ready for us!

 

At 1:00 we made our way to our room (8066) - we splurged for a balcony - the room was small (as we expected) but well appointed with tons of storage in the closet, drawers and bathroom. The shower in the bathroom has sliding round doors instead of a curtain - that was nice not to fight the curtain for showers. It was tiny but we managed very nicely once we got used to it. The portion of the 8th level balcony rooms located in the middle of the ship are actually on top of the life boats. So you are not looking directly down into the water but rather onto about 10 feet of white metal sticking out and then you can see the water beyond that. Not a deal breaker for fun but if I had known I would have selected a cabin at the front or back of level 8 or moved up to 9 or down to 7. I don't want to paint a picture that we were unhappy - we had an amazing view and loved our balcony. The first thing we did when we arrived was Lysol everything (we brought the 2 ounce Lysol to Go spray with us) and opened the balcony while it dried out. We also noticed something kind of gross - the button behind the toilet used to flush was really dirty. I took out my Clorox wipes to go (I know OCD preparing) and cleaned it up. Other than that our room was in great shape. Our cabin steward popped in to introduce herself - Helen. Not the most personable cabin steward we've had - not sure she really likes her job - but our room was clean and made up all week long. Overall, we would give our room an 8 (mostly from the obstructed view of the ocean straight down - our view straight out was excellent).

 

We then set out to continue exploring since our luggage would be a while. It had stopped raining for a bit!! We got our bearings pretty quickly as the Centrum in the center of everything and most everything is accessed right off of it. We wondered around the ship for a bit and then grabbed a dessert from the Windjammer and headed back to our room to figure out where we needed to go for the Muster Drill. The drill was at 3:30 sharp and was quick and painless. You do not bring your life jackets to the Muster Drill.

 

By the time we returned to our room 2 of our 3 pieces of luggage had been delivered. So we began unpacking and organizing. I brought magnets (looked like the pieces to the game Sorry) to use keep us organized. The walls of the cabin are all magnetized so I hung the Compass, excursion tickets, My Time Dining schedule (more on that later) ect….on one of the walls. We actually used the magnets for so many more things throughout the week – we hung everything from visors to damp bathing suits there to dry. Here is the link to the ones we purchased from Amazon – they were super strong and extremely light- weight to pack!! We did take a battery powered alarm clock (just for the time – not the alarm!!) and a small night light. There are no plug ins in the bathroom though so we had to cover the night light at night so it would not be quite so light but still cast enough shadow to make it to the bathroom. Our final suitcase arrived shortly after that and we were able to completely unpack by dinner – always a goal but you never know when your luggage is going to arrive.

 

I'll post more soon. :)

Edited January 6, 2015 by Host Jacquelyn

[L454S]

Glad you are sharing your experience. Did not know how long the Christmas decorations would be up. We got to enjoy them on the Dec. 6 sailing.

 

Someone posted last week about how disorganized the boarding was at the Julia St. terminal. Your review sounds like what we experienced at the pier, very smooth.

[stones902]

Thanks for posting. I look forward to reading more of your review!

[5 in OK]

I almost didn’t include this in my review but in the end decided to share. My most important item packed: Okay – I will probably get flamed or roasted or whatever we call it on Cruise Critic but I researched and researched and decided to try to take a hammock to hang on my small balcony on the side of the ship. I bought a super cool hammock made from parachute material and folds into a bag about the size of a soft ball from Amazon.com. It came with it’s own straps and hooks. My husband checked the design of our balcony upon arrival and deemed it would work perfectly!! And it did. We connected it across the balcony and still had room for both chairs and the table. (Remember – we were in a single balcony – I believe we were in the smallest balcony size they have.) I will honestly say having the hammock (laying in a hammock is one of my all-time most favorite ways to relax) enhanced my vacation so much. I would wake up and lay in the hammock and watch the sunrise or set or just the beautiful sea. We would pop back in after breakfast while we planned our day and I would hang for a while. My most favorite time to hang in the hammock was watching the sunset and just swaying in the quiet – just the waves! So much fun! I would almost always find an hour or so during the day to take a nice, quiet nap in the hammock! My husband set it up so that we could simply clip and unclip the hammock on to the straps and unhook it when we weren’t using it. Super easy – took about 30 seconds to put it back up. I’ll include a pic to show you the hammock – it was just so much fun to have it!

 

My Time Dining: We chose My Time Dining for this cruise and we absolutely loved it. I spent some time before hand studying all of our excursions, port times, shows and football bowls (yes, my spouse is a football nut!) and made our dining each evening accordingly. We ate between 6:00 and 7:30 each evening and found My Time Dining was exactly what we were looking for! Instead of the normal 2-hour dining experience in the early or late seating we were served all of our courses and finished in about an hour. My children would have done SO much better when they were young had we had My Time Dining!!! We had the same wait staff and table each evening (Cleve and Joy - Joy was absolutely our favorite crew member on the ship - he totally made our cruise a more memorable experience and loves his job. We just fell in love with this young man!). I give My Time Dining and the overall dining experience of Reflections Dining Room a 9 - superior service and good food choices nightly! We did not eat in any specialty restaurants as we felt our choices each evening were abundant. We did miss the dining room one evening as they were showing the Sugar Bowl on the Giant Screen by the pool at dinner time and my husband really wanted to watch the game there with other fans. We ate in the Windjammer that evening during half-time. Please do not miss out on the dining room because it is easier to just go to the Windjammer - the service and food are just so superior in the beautiful dining room. We met some of the nicest people during our dinners (we had a table for two but it was located so close to the next table conversing was super easy!) and were so glad we chose My Time Dining!!

 

As soon as I can figure out how to post pix I’ll put some up. :D:confused:

[gckcswmo]

Enjoying your review. We were on the cruise before yours and we too enjoyed Serenade and watched you all sail away from our hotel room. We thought embarking went smoothly too and was on the ship by noon and had all our luggage quickly. Can't wait to read more.

 

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[Raxter54]

Looking forward to the review. We will be sailing on the Serenade at the end of February. Glad to hear that embarkation went smoothly, and no reports of over crowding in WJ on embarkation day.

 

A quick question - on embarkation, what deck did you enter the ship on? I've heard near the Centrum on either deck 4 and deck 5.

 

And I've heard on several reviews that the crew was using some of the Centrum elevators to take luggage up to the rooms. Did you encounter this?

[5 in OK]

Looking forward to the review. We will be sailing on the Serenade at the end of February. Glad to hear that embarkation went smoothly, and no reports of over crowding in WJ on embarkation day.

 

A quick question - on embarkation, what deck did you enter the ship on? I've heard near the Centrum on either deck 4 and deck 5.

 

And I've heard on several reviews that the crew was using some of the Centrum elevators to take luggage up to the rooms. Did you encounter this?

 

Hello! You are going to have so much fun!! In New Orleans we entered the boat on the right side if you are standing at the back of the boat facing forward. I'm not sure if the right term for that.

 

Yes - there are 6 elevators at the Centrum - the crew used three of them for luggage and then only two toward the end.

 

Happy cruising!!!

[5 in OK]

Our first night in the dining room was casual (as some still had not received their luggage) so we dressed in comfortable, casual clothes and headed to the 5th floor aft for the My Time Dining Room check – in. There are two lines for check-in; reservations and non-reservations (walk-up). There were never people lined up more than one or two families deep to be seated in the walk-up line. There was never a line in the reservation line. I recommend going online before the cruise, take some time to check your excursions, departures, ports and shows and make your reservations online before you go – makes things go a bit smoother! We walked in and were seated immediately and within moments our wait staff began superb service that lasted all week long. The choices were plentiful and delicious (I had prime rib – cooked to perfection). We finished appetizers, main course and dessert in about an hour and were off to grab a seat for the Welcome Aboard Show in the Tropical Theater – Forward Deck 5 & 6.

 

Cruise Director: John, our Cruise Director did a nice job of entertaining all week. He can actually sing quite nicely (sounds like Neil Diamond) – his wife travels with him – they are a nice couple – always smiling and greeting people. They seemed to genuinely enjoy their job. A little corny at times but he won us over by mid-week!!! He seemed sincerely interested in making sure we enjoyed the week – made connections and had a great time.

 

The Welcome Aboard Show was nice – the theater was beautiful and there wasn’t a bad seat in the house! We went to a few shows – I recommend going to the ones that you are interested in. We skipped a couple that didn’t interest us and went to the rest. There was a new group to the ship called “The Alley Cats” – they were an acepalla group and did a really nice job on their one-hour show. They even got a standing ovation and a curtain all and came back to do one more song. They sing all of the oldies and were quite entertaining. Very family friendly! We watched a comedian one evening (family showing – we didn’t attend any of the adult shows – a bit too much for us and we would probably be one of the poor souls that they seem to always make fun of).

 

We were exhausted after the show and some dessert (notice that we keep coming back to the dessert) and headed for the room to watch the end of some football game and hang in the hammock – what a wonderful first day!

 

Every single morning we got up early (about 7:15) and headed to the Windjammer for the buffet breakfast – made our plates and sat in the open air seating (covered but open on the sides) on the back of the ship behind the Windjammer. There were several mornings that we were either the only ones out there or there were just a few other quiet couples joining us. Such a fun way to start each day. Breakfast was good – about the same offerings each day; biscuits and gravy, bacon, sausage, tons of fresh fruit, baked beans (we were confused about this one every day but it just kept showing up!!), sliced breakfast meat (turkey, ham and pork), bagels, cheeses and meats, pastries and muffins, scrambled eggs, omelets made to order, waffles, pancakes, chocolate chip pancakes, and a ton of juices, coffee and hot chocolate. The menu didn’t vary much but there was so much to choose from we enjoyed our breakfast buffet so much! We did not order room service or eat breakfast in the main dining room as we loved our little spot on the back of the ship so much we couldn’t miss it.

 

Key West, Florida. Well – we just fell in love with this little town. We hope to go back some day for a weeklong visit to give us time to explore. We didn’t get clearance to disembark until 11:30 and we had to be back onboard at 4:45. We just didn’t feel it was enough time to see everything we wanted to. We shopped for the first hour or so then we had to be back to the pier for our Snuba Diving Tour. We definitely want to return. Okay Snuba Diving – WOW!! We loved it so much. It was drizzling when we met up with our tour guide and boarded the Snuba of Key West boat but by the time we were out in the harbor it quit raining and the sun popped out! We road out about 40 minutes away all the while learning how to Snuba Dive. We actually were in the water about 45 minutes and then headed back to the pier so that we would have time to board before 4:45. I highly recommend the tour – it was a lot of fun learning how to breathe underwater – but we wished we had had more time at this port!! It was about 80 and partly cloudy in Key West. Side note: The line to board was about 45 minutes long when we arrived – not sure what the delay was but we stood in the line quite a while.

 

CoCo Cay, Bahamas. We were very aware that the chances of stopping were against us as only one other ship has been able to stop there since the beginning of November. We were so pleasantly surprised to find that the waters were glass calm with clear skies and 80 degree temps and we go to drop anchor and tender in to this beautiful island. Majesty was there the same day we were! Only two ships – we felt lucky! This turned out to be our favorite stop of the cruise! We brought our own snorkel and fins and found a good seat at Snorkel Beach and set out into the water. We saw three stingrays – they were burrowed under the sand and then just swam away – so much fun! The fish just swarm around you – they are not afraid at all of humans and there’s a sunken ship out about 30 yards that you can swim to and around. We came back in for a delicious BBQ lunch (BBQ ribs, chicken, mac and cheese – very cheesy – delicious!, all of the fresh fruit you can imagine (they were literally there cutting it as fast as we were taking it), drinks and a dessert bar. Following lunch we snagged a couple of hammocks to let our food digest and then headed back out to snorkel. We snorkeled, laid in our beach chairs and snorkeled some more until about 4:00 then we headed up to get into the tender line to get back onboard. We were back in our room by 5:00 and showering for dinner. Fantastic day of fun!! Remember – CoCo Cay is a cash only port – they take no credit cards and your sea pass will not allow you to charge to your room. Take cash if you want to rent umbrellas, float/mats or alcohol.

 

Nassau, Bahamas. We chose to do the $160.00 Atlantis access. We were called to the Tropical Theater (I thought – wow! What a large area to meet in and then realized why – there were about a thousand people going to Atlantis just from our ship!! There were FIVE ships at port – there were a lot of people heading to Atlantis). We were literally herded like cattle to the taxi bus things awaiting (they held 20 each so you can do the math on how many of those taxis were waiting for all of us). The ride to Atlantis took about 20 minutes. The ride over reminded us how poverty stricken Nassau is – then you get to Paradise Island and everything sparkles! We unloaded and a group of about 200 of us were led through the Casino and around the back of the building to the side of the water park and then to get a towel – we were completely lost but found some water in a pool and jumped in to cool off. We tried to get in line for the iconic slide but the line was about an hour long so we skipped it. We found the one-mile lazy river – that was pretty cool. Then we found a quiet and large pool with a DJ (Maybe an adult only area?) and stopped there to swim and eat at the poolside restaurant. We had a hamburger, grilled chicken sandwich with chips and drinks for about $30.00 – not bad – we were expecting worse from what we had read. Remember – it is a credit card only park – they accept no cash! Be sure to only take your credit card with you off the ship.

 

I’ll add more tomorrow – our New Year’s Eve was AMAZING!!!:)

[stones902]

If I recall last year we entered on deck 5. The elevators were being utilized for luggage so we simply took the stairs. No big deal.

 

 

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[okgladmom]

Awesome review! Going on SOS in March

[Raxter54]

If I recall last year we entered on deck 5. The elevators were being utilized for luggage so we simply took the stairs. No big deal.

 

 

Sent using the Cruise Critic forums app

 

DW's knees would probably keep us from walking up to deck 11. Heard there are some elevators near the theater, might try those if the Centrum ones are busy...

[5 in OK]

DW's knees would probably keep us from walking up to deck 11. Heard there are some elevators near the theater, might try those if the Centrum ones are busy...

 

It was on deck 5 - sorry I didn't answer that fully. When we arrived and boarded at 11:15 there was not wait to get on the remaining Centrum elevators not in use. Even when we returned after lunch we only waited a few moments to go back down the Centrum elevators - even with only 3 open to the public (due to the luggage coming up on the others).

[Rogocop]

Thanks....Great review....we are leaving on the Serenade on January 31st and will be there on Super Bowl Sunday. We are looking forward to the trip and will spend two days prior in New Orleans.

 

P.S. I think the baked beans at breakfast were served because that was served in every full Irish breakfast when we went to Ireland in March last year, so I am guessing they are there for the Irish passengers. Just no blood pudding....

Edited January 6, 2015 by Rogocop

[packercruising]

Thanks for the review! We sail the same itinerary Feb 21. Looking forward to pics.

[5 in OK]

Thanks....Great review....we are leaving on the Serenade on January 31st and will be there on Super Bowl Sunday. We are looking forward to the trip and will spend two days prior in New Orleans.

 

P.S. I think the baked beans at breakfast were served because that was served in every full Irish breakfast when we went to Ireland in March last year, so I am guessing they are there for the Irish passengers. Just no blood pudding....

 

 

You are going to LOVE watching the Super Bowl game on the Giant Screen at the pool. They even turn the sound on (instead of island music) to the game for you to enjoy. Just a caution though, we had to grab seats by 8:00 a.m. with a view to the screen for a 4:00 p.m. game so throw out some towels, a book and your flip flops to save your seat. There are signs everywhere that seat saving is not allowed. Unfortunately, they do not enforce this rule - if you wait like you are supposed to you will not find a seat. We found this out the hard way. Just a thought. :D You are going to have so much fun - the ship and crew were amazing!

[HRBR]

Thanks so much for posting this review! We are going on SOS and to these same ports in a couple of weeks. Can't wait to see pics!

[5 in OK]

[5 in OK]

[5 in OK]

[5 in OK]

I forgot to review our first sea day (on Sunday – the day after departure). We woke up early and had our breakfast on the back of the ship at our favorite spot and then headed back to the room. My husband hung the hammock and I got some awesome hammock time until about 9:30 (the best hammock time was when the boat was moving – the gentle sway of the hammock put me right to sleep!!!). It was about 70 degrees with sun and some clouds. Perfect weather for a sea day for sure! Around 10:00 a.m. We decided to participate in the BINGO fun and headed to the Safari Club to find out more. There were several ways to play ranging from $22 - $55 (for the machine) – we opted for the machine so that we could play 30 cards each game. We didn’t win but had a bunch of fun! We headed up to the Windjammer to eat some lunch (some of the same offerings as the day before – some new) and grabbed a plate then headed out to our favorite outdoor seating (aft behind the Windjammer for open seating). We decided we wanted to grab a couple of chairs near the big screen to watch one of the bowls that would start that afternoon. We got to the main pool and there were zero seats available. Tons and tons of towels on empty chairs (that remained empty) so we asked one of the crew standing by the bar if we could move chairs from deck 11 to deck 12. He said, “Absolutely no problem!”. So we grabbed a couple of short chairs (high backs but no foot rest area) and hauled them up to 12 in an empty spot and viola he was watching the big screen and I was sunbathing – everyone was Happy, Happy, Happy!!! (We ended up moving chairs each day as I really liked how comfortable the short chairs were for reading and just kicking back!). We hung by the pool and watching football until around 5:00 and then headed in to shower and change for dinner. Dinner was awesome – same table and wait staff – delicious selections and then we headed to the show – a comedian – really funny! After the show we were worn out and called it a day. We went to our cabins (I caught some more hammock time) and then started getting stuff ready for our first stop – Key West!! We felt it was just about a perfect first day!

[Memom04263]

What about a picture of hammock. We are goin 17th might need to order 1! :)

 

sent from app

[PaulInPGH]

DW's knees would probably keep us from walking up to deck 11. Heard there are some elevators near the theater, might try those if the Centrum ones are busy...

 

There are elevators near the theater. My in-laws stayed in a cabin that was more toward the forward part of the ship and they called those elevators their private elevators since no one else was ever using them.

[kags711]

I'd love a picture of the hammock too! We are going on the serenade at the end of March and might purchase one!

 

 

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[5 in OK]

New Year’s Eve: After spending a long day at Atlantis, Bahamas and shopping in Nassau at the straw market we board the ship – not a bad line at all – we were on the ship in about 20 minutes – we decided to rest (hammock time!!!) a bit before dinner to see if we could build up enough stamina to stay up until midnight (I’m totally giving away our age here – but announcing we were celebrating our 25th anniversary you may have already guessed!). We dressed and headed for dinner – we each had a steak – delicious! This was the night the Alley Cats acapella group performed. About a one hour show – very nice! By 9:00 we were just exhausted but wanted to be sure to see the balloon drop in the Centrum so we popped up to our room to take a quick nap. Around 11:30 we made our way to a very, very crowded Centrum (we watched from the 8th floor) and enjoyed the music and excitement- they were rocking the house and people were dancing, drinking and just having fun! The captain and his crew from the bridge even joined in on the fun for the countdown and toasts to the new year. At exactly 11:59 they released confetti – a TON of confetti!! It was so festive! Then they did the countdown and dropped thousands of black and white balloons from the top of the Centrum. It was quite fun to watch – not sure I would have wanted to be in the throng of people jammed packed into the Centrum floor but they were having a blast and to each his own! We stayed for just a few more minutes and then headed to back to our room to crash for the night. After three days of water fun it was beginning to catch up to us!

 

On our 2nd sea day (Thursday, January 1st) we woke up around 8:00 a.m., grabbed our towels (we got 2 the night before – there’s no check out for towels on the Serenade), flip flops and books and headed up to deck 11 where we snagged a short chair to carry up to the deck 12 to find our favorite spot. We pulled a long chair over to the spot by the railing (there’s just enough room between the rail and the track) and loaded up our stuff on the chairs and headed to breakfast. I will admit the buffet choices were getting a bit tiresome – all were delicious – just the same choices. We were always content though. Then we headed to the Centrum – we were curious if crew members had to stay up all night cleaning – and they did! It was spotless – we were a bit in awe!! Then we headed back up to our chairs around 9:00 and enjoyed reading, people-watching, napping and watching bow games through lunch. We grabbed lunch and ate it while watching one of the bowls (Rose Bowl I think) and then I took a break while my husband stayed to watch the end of the game – it was getting really really warm – it got up to about 85 that day (I kept telling my husband to remind me how warm it was when we returned to frigid Oklahoma!). I enjoyed some quiet hammock time on the balcony and then we spent the rest of the day on the deck – I believe the Sugar Bowl started around 4:00 p.m. My husband talked me in to staying on deck and watching the game (there were so many cheering and having fun) – we decided to skip the dining room and eat at the Windjammer instead (we ate there during half-time). He so enjoyed getting to watch the entire game but we totally sacrificed delicious food and wonderful service for the game. The Windjammer was a bit crowded and loud for dinner – a LOT of children (some with parents – some not) and we decided we prefer the dining room for dinner for sure! (On a side note – I called down to My Time Dining to let them know we wouldn’t make our reservation – they seemed to appreciate the effort but I don’t think it is required to cancel.) We went back to our rooms after the game (it was actually getting cold on deck after dark) and headed to bed. It was a nice, relaxing day – we both got some sun – it was a great sea day!

[toosaxykk]

Thank you SO much for posting this review. My husband and I will be celebrating our 9th anniversary on the SERENADE in March! I am enjoying reading your review. Cannot wait to see more pics!

 

OH and BOOMER SOONER! (I'm an OU grad and lived in Norman for 12 years before moving to Houston)