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LIVE from the Freedom of the Seas * Feb 15, 2015 * Western Caribbean!

ckrobyn

By ckrobyn,
in Royal Caribbean International

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counsdr

counsdr

Posted
Posted
Cheryl - why was the rest of the cruise disappointing???

 

Robyn, first of all my DD hadn't been on a cruise since her honeymoon in 2008 on AOS. So much has changed since then so she was very disappointed in a lot. She had expected the kids club to be open all the time so you could drop the kids and pick them up as you wanted. The times were 9-12, 2-5 and 6:45 -10. For her that meant they had to be on a schedule all the time. They had to wake them up to eat breakfast in order to take the to kids club by 9 AM, pick them up in enough time to get them showered and dressed for dinner, etc. That didn't bother me, but it did them. Their room steward was awful and only left the 4 of them 2 towels each day. My DD would call and ask for more and was told to get them from her room steward at dinner time. One day, I asked for robes for my DD and DSIL at guest services as they hadn't gotten them, he met DSIL and me in the hallway screaming that we had no business going to guest services for robes! Even though my DD asked and left a note asking for 6 towels, he continued to only leave 2 every day! He didn't make towel animals for the children and they were very upset that Nana had them and they didn't!

Our dining room wait staff was horrible. We found the quality of the food was down a lot. I was on FOS last year and it was much better! My DD asked for shrimp cocktail and was told they didn't offer them any more. We asked for wines on the menu and were told they didn't have them any more. Other bars did have the wine though we found out! I have to stay on a low sodium diet and my food was not low sodium, my fingers are just starting to get a bit smaller and my kidneys are starting to function again. If we didn't care for an item on the menu, our waiter would not offer us anything else. If we said we didn't like the dish he'd say oh, OK and take our plate away. He never told us each night what the chef's suggestions were or anything. He didn't put a napkin in our laps, push in our chairs or greet the children. His assistant wasn't much better.

We found the drinks very expensive and wound up buying the drink package.

I took a brand new suitcase and they ripped the entire bottom of it. I had bought an entire matching set and now they've discontinued that style!

The liquor issue isn't RCCL's fault.

The only bad cruises i've been on have been Freedom, so i've decided I need to stay off of her! The first one in 2009 when I met you, I was with my friend who had cancer. I never saw her again and it was a sad cruise for me, but not RCCL's fault. Last year was with that horrible group of over 1000 that RCCL just turned the ship upside down to please and inconvenienced everyone else and now this.

My favorite ship remains the Explorer! Drydock Dave is on her now if anyone wants to follow along on her refurbishment.

Sorry to be such a downer on my Freedom experiences.

Cheryl

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reallyitsmema

reallyitsmema

Posted
Posted
Robyn, first of all my DD hadn't been on a cruise since her honeymoon in 2008 on AOS. So much has changed since then so she was very disappointed in a lot. She had expected the kids club to be open all the time so you could drop the kids and pick them up as you wanted. The times were 9-12, 2-5 and 6:45 -10. For her that meant they had to be on a schedule all the time. They had to wake them up to eat breakfast in order to take the to kids club by 9 AM, pick them up in enough time to get them showered and dressed for dinner, etc. That didn't bother me, but it did them. Their room steward was awful and only left the 4 of them 2 towels each day. My DD would call and ask for more and was told to get them from her room steward at dinner time. One day, I asked for robes for my DD and DSIL at guest services as they hadn't gotten them, he met DSIL and me in the hallway screaming that we had no business going to guest services for robes! Even though my DD asked and left a note asking for 6 towels, he continued to only leave 2 every day! He didn't make towel animals for the children and they were very upset that Nana had them and they didn't!

Our dining room wait staff was horrible. We found the quality of the food was down a lot. I was on FOS last year and it was much better! My DD asked for shrimp cocktail and was told they didn't offer them any more. We asked for wines on the menu and were told they didn't have them any more. Other bars did have the wine though we found out! I have to stay on a low sodium diet and my food was not low sodium, my fingers are just starting to get a bit smaller and my kidneys are starting to function again. If we didn't care for an item on the menu, our waiter would not offer us anything else. If we said we didn't like the dish he'd say oh, OK and take our plate away. He never told us each night what the chef's suggestions were or anything. He didn't put a napkin in our laps, push in our chairs or greet the children. His assistant wasn't much better.

We found the drinks very expensive and wound up buying the drink package.

I took a brand new suitcase and they ripped the entire bottom of it. I had bought an entire matching set and now they've discontinued that style!

The liquor issue isn't RCCL's fault.

The only bad cruises i've been on have been Freedom, so i've decided I need to stay off of her! The first one in 2009 when I met you, I was with my friend who had cancer. I never saw her again and it was a sad cruise for me, but not RCCL's fault. Last year was with that horrible group of over 1000 that RCCL just turned the ship upside down to please and inconvenienced everyone else and now this.

My favorite ship remains the Explorer! Drydock Dave is on her now if anyone wants to follow along on her refurbishment.

Sorry to be such a downer on my Freedom experiences.

Cheryl

 

How many were actually booked to your daughter's cabin? Was it all 4 of them or were some of them booked in your cabin to avoid the single supplement? The steward could have been leaving towels based on that number. He should have changed to the requested number once he was asked, but that could have been why he left so few at first.

 

As far as Adventure Ocean, the kids can be dropped off at anytime while it is open. There is no need to wake them up to get there for the 9am opening, you can use it based on your own schedule. It is just not an all day daycare and is not marketed that way. The kids compasses are posted on cruise critic, it is too bad your daughter didn't find them prior to your cruise.

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SeaNC

SeaNC

Posted
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Cheryl, Am so sorry for the service issues you encountered. As someone has said, that is just unacceptable. Our experience two weeks ago was mixed re. service: a wonderful cabin steward--Ewi--up on the new 12th; some very good bartenders and some very rude ones; and what became a hilarious dinner service.

 

Our table of 7 noticed that we were the last to be served in the whole dining room on the first three nights. We even missed shows because the service was so slow (8-10!). So we asked that it be faster and at that point the manager(? red coat) comes to inquire how it's going. He got an earfull. Next two nights were faster with waiters giving us the 1-10 survey pitch. Now we're down to an hour and a half and the manager is becoming a frequent visitor. Unfortunately, he asks about the food. We gave him a so/so response and asked why the tiramisu had no lady fingers, expresso or cocoa in it and, not by the longest stretch, did it resemble tiramisu. Akin to the 'chicken marsala' which turned out to be edible but fried chicken with mushroom gravy. To his credit, he had the chef make a real tiramisu for the entire table the next evening. And, for being such stellar (wink) passengers, we did get shrimp cocktail, meals not good were replaced, special requests were honored. Obviously, no one should have to be friends of the manager (another wink) to get good service!

 

And btw, does anyone know how to find out if a certain cruise is a charter? We tried calling RC but that didn't work.

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Dave85

Dave85

Posted
Posted

 

And btw, does anyone know how to find out if a certain cruise is a charter? We tried calling RC but that didn't work.

 

 

Not a sure fire solution by any means, but I spend some time googling my cruise date and ship along with words like charger, group, special events, etc. I think it would work most of the time, but it fortunately has not been an issue for us yet. *fingers crossed*

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Ocean Boy

Ocean Boy

Posted
Posted
We have had a cabin steward go off on us before when I walked out of the room drinking OJ from one of the drinking glasses from the cabin. And now that I think back to it, that was on Freedom, too. That was unacceptable.

 

What did you do about it?

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FamilyCruiser1234

FamilyCruiser1234

Posted
Posted (edited)
As far as Adventure Ocean, the kids can be dropped off at anytime while it is open. There is no need to wake them up to get there for the 9am opening, you can use it based on your own schedule. It is just not an all day daycare and is not marketed that way. The kids compasses are posted on cruise critic, it is too bad your daughter didn't find them prior to your cruise.

 

I'm traveling on Freedom next week with two kids (ages 10 and 13). Do you know where I can find a link to the kids compasses that are posted on the site? Thanks!

Edited by FamilyCruiser1234
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ckrobyn

ckrobyn

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Cruising experiences on the whole are mostly subjective......but there is no excuse for any crew member to raise their voice or "go off" on a passenger. That behavior is just wrong and completely unacceptable. They key take away here is if you are ever in a similar situation, you must report it immediately to Guest Relations and ensure you follow up to see what was done about it.

 

Referencing Cheryl's poor dining room experience - sadly, this has happened to me before too. When you have had amazing waiters and assistant waiters, and you know what excellent service looks like, it's hard to settle for anything less. Those little touches like placing your napkin on your lap are what I have come to expect on RCI. There is no question that levels of service in the MDR vary across the fleet. Consistency is definitely something RC needs to get a handle on. I am a Corporate Training Manager, and I don't envy those in the same role at RCI - they have a tough job.....but....that is what department managers are for.

 

Insofar as hotel operations on the ship are concerned (in particular the Freedom), I found our suite attendant to be very good. For us, the less we see of the attendant the better (we like our privacy). On a cruise in our early years, I struck up a lengthy conversation with the attendant and from that moment onwards, every time he saw me he wanted to engage in a life history story! While I like chatting, it was a little much!

 

I don't have any immediate plans for another cruise on the Freedom, but if a great deal presented itself I wouldn't say no! :)

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counsdr

counsdr

Posted
Posted
How many were actually booked to your daughter's cabin? Was it all 4 of them or were some of them booked in your cabin to avoid the single supplement? The steward could have been leaving towels based on that number. He should have changed to the requested number once he was asked, but that could have been why he left so few at first.

 

As far as Adventure Ocean, the kids can be dropped off at anytime while it is open. There is no need to wake them up to get there for the 9am opening, you can use it based on your own schedule. It is just not an all day daycare and is not marketed that way. The kids compasses are posted on cruise critic, it is too bad your daughter didn't find them prior to your cruise.

 

There were 4 actually booked in my DD's cabin 2 Adults, 2 children. As we were able to get a great deal for that cabin with children sail free, and the BOGOHO on my single, it worked out as the best price. My DD requested the 6 towels daily and called housekeeping. She even left a note for the cabin steward and it was a daily battle to get more than two towels.

 

We hadn't used Adventure Ocean since my daughter was very young and she is 33 now, so at that time, they were open longer. I didn't have a problem with their hours, she felt stressed over it.

 

On my daily menu that I got the night before so I could pre order my food, I wrote a note to the Chef about how the food had gone so far downhill and how dis-satisfied we were. Our head waiter Randy who was an angel came over and spoke to us about it and obviously took it to the chef as the next day I had a dish of sweets brought to my cabin with an apology from the chef! That chef left on vacation on Sunday with us as did Gustavo, the Diamond Lounge host.

Cheryl

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  • 4 weeks later...
pjamms

pjamms

Posted
Posted
b1c248fd6017f3f7c8f754fa9ff2140b.jpg

New bathroom

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Sorry if this is a really dumb question but as I have never cruised before what is in 1 & 1/2 bathrooms. Is it an extra toilet or is there extra shower too also do you think this room would be suitable for a family of 5 adults.

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SherriZ366

SherriZ366

Posted
Posted
Maybe I missed the post. We are sailing next month and are curious if the cushions for the outdoor furniture on the suites (loungers) returned to Freedom?
This was for suites that have wicker furniture. Will try to find out from friend who is sailing on FR this week.
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