Anthem live review 12/12-12/19/2015

[Overtyme]

My upload issues have been frustrating me so I haven't been able to post much. I feel behind. But I have pics of all we have done.

 

My body is sore and aches. Yesterday I did ifly and lots of flow rider. Then we were up late for the quest. Today almost all of my body hurts so lounging around at coco cay was perfect.

 

We will eat at American icon tonight and see spectra's cabaret.

 

Bc of the Upload issues I may have to resort to daily postings and then add pics when I get home.

 

Fingers crossed I can get the issue resolved.

 

 

Live in the moment and enjoy your cruise.

I may get lynched here, but you can always do your postings when you get back home.

[klass2]

Before dinner we stopped at vintages bar for a glass of wine and we purchased the $3 bread variety basket with olive oil and balsamic. It was a good snack before dinner. We didn't take our beverages to dinner and weren't offered any beverages at dinner this time.

 

 

Tonight we had dinner reservations at Chic. The menu on our tv and the menu on the Royal IQ app was the correct menu at the restaurant.

 

We were seated at a more private 2 top table and enjoyed our meal.

 

We thought the service was great despite not being offered any drinks besides water.

 

A cool light fixture near the stairs that take you from deck 3 to 4 right by the dining rooms. It's sparkly and better in person.

 

 

 

Menu:

[klass2]

Real quick here is the other menu from the Royal IQ app.

 

 

I had the chicken noodle soup, Caesar salad and onion crusted chicken. DH had a salad and the grilled chicken.

[klass2]

I think I figured out my photobucket issue. My app needed updating. I think it updated and now it's working better and looks different.

 

So after dinner at chic we went to the bionic bar. We proceed to crash 3 of the tablets they had there for ordering. Apparently the tablets are finicky as to where and how you place your WOW band.

 

This is what the screen looked like when it was ready to order:

 

 

This is what it looks like when it crashed. The admin/bartender had to come and do some sort of restart option.

 

 

But yeah, we crashed 3 different ones. She said it happens often.

 

The drink menu was user friendly. You can create your own drinks and save them for future visits. Or order off the menu. You can click on each drink and get a visual of what the drink is made up of. A good thing too bc some drinks that looked pretty and had cool names had tequila in them and ever since a bad night in Mexico in the 90s I don't drink tequila unless I choke down the occasional margarita. Just the smell of it makes me wince-20 years later.

 

After the bionic bar we hit the solarium for a night time hot tub session. On our way there we passed the NFL football game on the pool screen. DH was upset bc he lost his playoff for work fantasy football this week by 3 points.

 

And the construction at port canaveral continued even at night.

 

After we relaxed a bit we headed to bed. We aren't usually night owls not even on cruise ships.

 

This concludes day 3. Tomorrow we visit Nassau.

[klass2]

Day 4:

Cruise compass:

 

 

 

 

 

**some of the pages got cut off when I took the pic. Sorry about that but I think you can get the idea of what was there.

 

Daily planner:

[klass2]

Kiddie info day 4:

(I forgot to swing by guest services day 3 to pick one up and once it's day 4 they are gone)

 

I woke up this morning and took my time to get to cafe 270 for breakfast.

 

This is the day when I was outside on the deck and noticed the helicopter. So yes, pretty sure it was a helicopter filming the ship bc it hovered around from 0715 when I first saw it until about noon.

 

Pretty cool though. Can't say I've ever seen that before.

 

On my way to cafe 270 I took this pic of the weird sculpture. I haven't spent much time here looking at it to see if it had a name but it reminds me of the bean/cloudgate at millennium park in downtown Chicago.

 

The walkway to 270 has all those awesome seats and nooks to sit and relax. The area and decor is bright and welcoming but I have yet to hang out there

 

 

I had a few pieces of bacon and the ham and egg on English muffin for breakfast. DH and I both agree that they don't cook and warm up the sandwiches long enough on the panini grill. I'm sure they are in a hurry to pump as many out as they can.

I had the burrito once it was supposed to have eggs in it but it seemed like some chili con carne in a pastry like thing rather than a tortilla. And they put it in the panini press so it was flat. In this pic the burritos are the small tubes towards the front.

 

 

The Royal IQ app is good overall but sometimes if freezes up like this:

 

After breakfast I hurried to my room to put on sneakers and get ready for ifly ripcord appt at 0900

[klass2]

It's ripcord iFly time. Wooohooo!

I was in the first group of the day. They weighed us, we watched a quick video, we got suited up and we headed up to the wind tunnel (you meet at the ifly desk deck 15 starboard aft and the tunnel is deck 16).

 

I was third to go and a bit nervous. But, it was exhilarating and I wouldn't hesitate to do it again. In fact I'm thinking of taking my kids to the one in Chicagoland for a Christmas gift experience rather than spending money on crappy toys.

 

 

 

All that fun AND you get to take home your own personal set of ear plugs. ;)

 

My group was done and we were finished by 0950. DH and I headed to the solarium to relax before we eat and he did his ifly at 1220.

 

We decided to try out Johnny Rockets for lunch. We have enjoyed it on every cruise and feel it's worth the up charge. Although it would be nice if it was free like the Guy's burgers on the carnival cruises.

 

JR was scheduled to open at 1130. We went there at 1132 and waited and waited and waited. Nobody even acknowledged our presence or said, we will be with you in a minute. Several other people waited in line with us, then gave up. JR is now an a la carte place on the anthem.

By 1150 we had enough so we went to grab a quick bite in the windjammer.

 

While DH was doing his ifly orientation I did some more flow riding. I was slowly getting better at it. And I had the best ride EVER and DH wasn't there to watch. I asked an on looker to record me so I could prove to DH and my kids that i indeed got up ok my knees. I was quite proud of myself. But of course when I wiped out, I wiped out hard. I usually go flying to the back and slam against the wall.

So yeah this day was my proof being a fun person and not a haggard mom of 6.

 

Pulling into Nassau. Dang that water is pretty.

[klass2]

Looks like a few of my links above are broken. I will have to fix that sole time when I'm not on my phone.

[njmomof2]

You totally rocked the boogie board!!! Good for you. And you did great in the iFly!

 

I'm really enjoying your report. Weirdly, thanks for the photo of the English muffin sandwiches. My younger one loves them (I spend way too much at Dunkin' Donuts every other weekend) so I think he'll be really happy that they have them. He likes the muffins a bit underdone so I think this would be great for him.

 

If you can and you're out and about, do you think you can tell me if the rock climbing wall is using auto belaying equipment? On Freedom, the staff hand belay you, giving encouragement along the way (not that my younger one needs it...he does every wall and even helped out the staff by going up and tightening the handholds with their tools). He really enjoys the interaction and when we were on Oasis, he was disappointed with the auto belaying equipment. The staff never even talked to him while he was climbing and he kind of missed that.

 

Only 2 more days for us.

 

ETA: One more thing. You might have mentioned this or not, but there are a lot of reports about the beds being particularly "firm" and that they are rolling out these harder beds fleetwide. How have you found your bed this trip? I'm concerned as I've been having back issues for the last 6 months and I simply cannot sleep on a firm/hard mattress. I also heard that they have done away with the egg crate toppers so I'm trying to plan in advance for any issues.

Edited December 17, 2015 by njmomof2

[klass2]

While in Nassau we decided to do pretty much nothing but walk around and scope out a beach within walking distance.

 

I would have loved to do Atlantis but it closes at 5pm and we would only get about 2.5 hrs there and it's pricey for that short amount of time.

 

Nothing else really interested us. We will be back in Nassau on the harmony in Jan 2017 with our kids so we wanted to see if a the free beach within walking distance.

 

But first we had to stop at diamonds international to get our free charm bracelet and charms. We made our way down Bay Street and were surprised at how much traffic and congestion there was compared to other ports we have been to.

 

All the typical touristy stores are there.

We continued our walk down past the Hilton and around the corner to junkanoo beach.

 

I wanted to see if this would be a good option low cost option to take our kids to in the future.

 

Sadly it is not. There was enough little bits of broken glass all over the beach that I would not feel safe bringing my kids to it. My feet were achy (wore the wrong shoes) so I took off my shoes and had to walk very carefully on the beach.

 

We found a beach shack with some $6 Bahama mamas and sat and relaxed. The weather was perfect. Mild temps with a gentle breeze.

 

 

We also saw this place which I had seen on a Google search during pre-cruise research. $10 for 4 beers and 2 shots. Sign me up! Kidding. I can't do shots without some serious regret later.

 

 

We stayed awhile taking in the sights and then decided since the beach wasn't for us that we would head back to the ship. We took a cab. $8 fare plus a tip and we were back to the ship area.

 

We spent a little time in the solarium drinking more Bahama mamas before heading back to our cabin and to get dressed for our 545pm dinner at American icon.

 

Some more reflection on the virtual balcony. So basically they have a camera on the back of the ship feeding the wake view to your tv 24/7. The balcony is super imposed via software and looks good from afar but up close it looks kind of fake.

 

We do like that with the balcony on you can see if it's night or day and it does help to wake you up in the morning. And if you don't like it, you can turn it off.

[klass2]

For dinner we went to American icon.

Menus:

 

I had the chicken noodle soup and we both had Caesar salads which wasn't on the menu but our server brought to us.

 

Each cruise we always seem to have one server that is friendly, likeable and just goes out of his way for us. Tonight we met him. His name is Lucian and he is awesome. Courteous and witty at the same time. We were seated at a 2 top next to a window and it was spacious and great.

 

Lucian also took our drink order and brought us our wine. He recommended the Nebraska short ribs so we both ordered it.

 

Best meal so far for us. The meat was tender and the gravy was flavorful and the mashed potatoes and veggies were great too. Good comfort food.

 

I'm not a dessert person but DH is. He wanted the skillet cookie (he still talks about the melting chocolate cake thing from our carnival cruise). Lucian said that there had been some complaints about it being too hot. What the what? Isn't that the point? A hot cookie with ice cream on top...

 

Lucian recommended the icon candy bar so he brought out one of those too. DH said it was very peanut buttery.

 

After dinner we walked around and then decided to take a strategic nap before the quest. We knew we would be up late for the quest and up early the next day for coco cay.

 

After waking up from our power nap, we headed to North Star bar to get a drink before the quest and we ran into some cruise critic friends and chatted a bit.

[klass2]

The quest. What can I say? In a nutshell it was fun as usual but definitely more tame (IMO) than other cruises I have been to. And it lasted about an hour. I feel as if it was over too quickly/sooner than other quests.

 

The venue for the quest was the sea plex which is not ideal. But there really isn't a good place to have it.

Seats were limited and most people had to stand and even then you can't see all the action. We were there early enough to get some chairs on the second level of the sea plex so we could see down and see all the action.

 

There were kids lingering around for the beginning but most of them cleared out. But I did see a few kids under 10 there. I just don't get that. I would never ever take my kids to something that is deemed an adult activity.

 

And abe (cruise director) even flat out said he still noticed kids in the area so he gave a special shout out to their parents for being "parents of the year" or something like that. I saw one lady look kind of embarrassed but her kid still stayed.

 

Maybe that was why the quest was more tame? Maybe it's this cruise director's style? Maybe corporate is cracking down on anything that could be perceived as over the top? I dunno.

 

 

But it was still fun.

 

We wanted to get off the ship early at coco cay so we headed to our room to sleep.

 

This concludes day 4. Next up--Coco Cay.

[flowerlady]

Where did they do Quest....love your review!

[klass2]

Day 5 compass:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 5 daily planner:

 

[klass2]

Day 5 kids adventure ocean:

 

 

 

I don't have many photos of coco cay to share bc I mostly used my waterproof camera and not my phone.

 

But I have a few and can share a bit.

 

We headed off the ship by 0830. We had to wait a bit for the tender boat to fill up but once we were full it was a quick ride.

 

On our way I looked back and saw this Norwegian ship by our ship. It went to the island next to coco cay, I think theirs is called great stirrup cay? Not sure I get the private islands mixed up from the various cruise lines.

 

 

Once we got off the tender we decided to head to barefoot beach and need to go to the right. We crossed a little bridge to take a "short cut" through a nature trail area. It was a nice quiet place to walk through but I think it might have been the scenic long route bc on our way back we went the other way and it seemed quicker.

 

We were at the beach and grabbed a few loungers by 0915. I decided that I wanted a bar within my sight bc that's how I do beach days. Lol

 

We would have headed down by the clamshell cabanettes but I wasn't sure if there was a bar that way. Later on we found out there was and if you want total peace and quiet that is the area to be.

 

Still the area we decided on (between the kayak rentals/floating mat station and the cabanettes was quiet enough for us.

 

When we got there we were alone. Towards the end of the day there were still loungers available though.

 

By 0940 I was all sunblocked up and ready to take a nap.

[klass2]

One of the links above got messed up. Here is the anthem with the Norwegian ship going by:

 

 

The water was a little cool at first but as you got used to it, it was not a problem. And as the day went on, the sun warmed everything up. Or maybe it was the amount of coco locos I consumed. ;)

Look at this beautiful water. It was pretty shallow far out off the beach too.

 

We spent the day strolling up and down the beach watching people and looking at the area. I've been to labadee 3 times but I think I prefer coco cay. I'm relieved we got to go and didn't miss it due to weather.

 

While walking along the beach I looked down and saw a pretty big starfish. I took pics and even picked it up before putting it back. Pics are on the other camera, not my phone so they will have to wait.

 

We ate lunch and it was the typical BBQ lunch they serve at the islands. I had some bbq chicken and jerk chicken. It was ok. Not great but it filled my tummy.

 

We consumed quite a few coco locos (same thing as a labadoozie) and made friends with a bartender who normally works at the sky bar. We will have to find him later on the ship.

 

You need to bring your sea pass cards to the bar to charge. The wow band is not sufficient. Kind of a bummer bc I left my band on my arm but wanted to leave my sea pass in my bag so it wouldn't get all wet and funky.

 

On our way back we walked through the straw market area and onto a tender. Before getting on the ship they have feet washing stations if you need it.

 

Bye bye coco cay. We will definitely be back.

 

Once onboard we went to our cabin and took a little nap and cleaned up for dinner. We were headed to the American icon again.

[klass2]

You totally rocked the boogie board!!! Good for you. And you did great in the iFly!

 

 

 

I'm really enjoying your report. Weirdly, thanks for the photo of the English muffin sandwiches. My younger one loves them (I spend way too much at Dunkin' Donuts every other weekend) so I think he'll be really happy that they have them. He likes the muffins a bit underdone so I think this would be great for him.

 

 

 

If you can and you're out and about, do you think you can tell me if the rock climbing wall is using auto belaying equipment? On Freedom, the staff hand belay you, giving encouragement along the way (not that my younger one needs it...he does every wall and even helped out the staff by going up and tightening the handholds with their tools). He really enjoys the interaction and when we were on Oasis, he was disappointed with the auto belaying equipment. The staff never even talked to him while he was climbing and he kind of missed that.

 

 

 

Only 2 more days for us.

 

 

 

ETA: One more thing. You might have mentioned this or not, but there are a lot of reports about the beds being particularly "firm" and that they are rolling out these harder beds fleetwide. How have you found your bed this trip? I'm concerned as I've been having back issues for the last 6 months and I simply cannot sleep on a firm/hard mattress. I also heard that they have done away with the egg crate toppers so I'm trying to plan in advance for any issues.

 

2 days?! Exciting times. Anticipating is half of the fun.

 

I will check on the rock climbing. I haven't been out that way when it has been in session.

 

The bed has been ok for us. Now that you mention it, maybe a bit on the firm side. We have a tempur bed at home so I'm used to a firm bed initially and then it softens as you sleep.

 

I have only seen our room steward twice. She's like a ninja. I can ask if they have egg crates available if I see her.

 

 

 

Where did they do Quest....love your review!

 

 

Thanks. The quest is in the sea plex (sports area). The location isn't ideal and they even mentioned that before the quest started. From what I've heard there have been lots of complaints about it.

[klass2]

I forgot to mention that I haven't seen any drink specials like the cards for $100/10 drinks that have been on select cruises but on the way to coco cay they were handing these out

 

$40 all you can drink but only on coco cay. Didn't sound like a great deal to me but I took a flier to post here.

 

For dinner we went back to American icon and requested our favorite waiter. A table in his zone was not available but they sat us close and he was able to be our server.

 

Dinner menus for the night (the 2nd set of menus not found in the Royal IQ app).

 

[Nessa1dc]

KClass,

 

All I can say is WOW and thank you so much. I will be on the Anthem on January 3, 2016. We are so very excited and so far, it seems like you and your husband are having a great time. Continue to enjoy your vacation (certainly well deserved with all those little ones at home).

[robtulipe]

Katie,

Does Anthem offer 24 hour internet periods or sessions like is offered on non-Voom internet ships and I believe also on Oasis Class or was only a multi-days package to the end of the cruise being offered when you set up your internet account?

 

We want to use one of our C&A D+ internet credits for two 24 hour period early in our upcoming Anthem cruise and the other to partially cover the cost for a internet package to the end of our cruise after doing the above.

 

Someone currently on your cruise, screen name jljlinda, posted on a RC forum internet thread that there were no two day package offered. This was their exact wording so it was unclear if this meant there were no 24 hour consecutive sessions available to those who want to use their C&A credit for these mid-cruise or no two day packages unless one gets that for the last two days onboard. They seem to indicate that the package cost on Anthem was prorated as to the time remaining on the cruise. :confused:

 

Below is what was on our D+ Exclusive Onboard Saving letter we got on Freedom in October, Thanks

 

Note the credit amount is different as on non-Voom internet ships internet is $20/day with a package and $40/day for a 24 hour session. :)

 

Edited December 17, 2015 by robtulipe

[klass2]

I tried the pastrami pastry thing for my app along with some more soup. The pastry was dry and had minimal amounts of pastrami.

 

A chicken Caesar was also an app. Quite a large portion for DH's app.

 

 

Our waiter recommended that we try the lamb for dinner but DH was still thinking about his dinner last night and was eager to repeat the short rib. Lol we have promised our waiter to try to come back on the last night and try it. I'm finding no reservations before 945pm that night so it might not happen. :(

 

 

I have been have withdrawl from pasta syndrome (haven't had any on this cruise so it's been too long) so I chose the spaghetti and meatballs. It would have been perfect with a little more sauce but it still was pretty good.

 

We decided against drinks (time to hydrate with water from too many coco locos earlier) and against dessert. No dessert menu. Sorry. But if we go back tomorrow I will snap a pic of the dessert menu.

 

After dinner went to walk around a bit. Guest services was quiet.

[klass2]

I wanted to walk through the casino at least once so we did and walked forward to the music hall area and there is a cool hallway with funky decor and seating. We also ran into another CC friend there and chatted a bit.

 

 

We had a good amount of time to kill before our 1045 reservation to see spectra's cabaret.

 

We watched a singer in the music hall for a bit. Entertaining and she had great stage presence but she was not a great singer IMO. People were having fun dancing and listening to her though and that's what counts.

 

I caught up on some posting for this thread and DH sipped a drink and entertained himself with his phone too.

 

So as we headed to the show I told DH that we might not like it and we could always leave early.

 

So many mixed reviews about it.

 

Before the show we ordered the cotton candy martini and the crescendo citrus one.

 

 

 

I am not a martini person at all. 2 tiny sips of those and my throat burned. Ugh. Even though they were fruity and sweet martinis still too much for me.

 

Again this is where I like having a drink package so I don't feel guilty about wasting a drink.

 

The show was great. I loved it. The music was more to my liking. Upbeat contemporary music with lots of bass. Kind of like being in a night club. The technology was pretty cool too.

 

It was kind of psychedelic and trippy at times but overall I loved it. DH liked it too.

 

I would see that over we will rock you any day. But we all have different taste so it's nice to have a variety. Sometimes I feel that event for the cruise are either geared towards and older generation (I'm genX, 39 yo) or to a much younger one and then I feel old or to kids.

 

When will Royal get rid of the 1970s party and go with an 80s party? I think it's high time for that... But they didn't ask me. Lol

 

After the show we went to music hall to dance but ended up sitting and watching and listening to music. I was still kind of sore and achy so not up to it.

 

On our way back to our cabin we ran into a friend at the bionic bar.

 

I fell asleep pretty quick. This concludes day 5.

 

Sea day tomorrow.

[Alter Ego]

Like everyone else, I'm enjoying your review. I'm sailing in May and am beginning to look more seriously at posts on the ship.

 

Would you please confirm that they take photos at iFly? I'm traveling alone and assume there will be a ship photo that I can later buy. There is unfortunately no proof that I did the zipline on Oasis and I would not like the same here! Thank you.

[RealDeal]

Great review.

 

So, how are you finding the food and service overall? Sounds like you're having a much more positive experience than a lot of others are reporting.

[klass2]

Day 6 cruise compass:

 

 

 

Day 6 daily planner: